The Largest Sasanid City Discovered in Fars

LONDON, 11 March 2006 (CAIS) -- A large Sasanid city has been discovered near the town of Kazerun in the southern Iranian province of Fars, the Persian service of CHN reported on Saturday. “The city is located 70 kilometers from Kazerun near the bas-relief of Bahram II (Sasanid king of kings, reigned 276–293 CE) and Sar-Mashhad village, so we tentatively named it Sar-Mashhad,” the director of the archaeological team working at the site said.
Although no one knew its extent, people were aware of the existence of the buried city due to several small mounds at the site, but during the new phase of studies, the team found a large site that covers 600 hectares, Saeid Ebrahimi explained.
Based on the shards gathered at the site and its proximity to the Bahram II bas-relief, the archaeologists believe that the site dates back to the Sasanid dynastic era and was still inhabited in the early Islamic era.
The team is currently searching for references to the city in historical texts, Ebrahimi added. Villagers who use some sections of the area for farming believe that the site was used by Bahram II for lion hunting, but Ebrahimi rejected the idea, arguing, “The site contains many mounds and a large tepes, which all point out to an urban life.”
With Persepolis and the city of Gur, Fars Province is home to major palaces of the great dynasties of the second Iranian dynasty, the Achaemenids (about 550-333 BC) and the forth dynasty, the Sasanids (224-652 CE).