Iran - Nishapur

Iranian-French archaeological expedition at Nishapur: the fortified city (Qohandez and Shahrestan)

The Nishapur site is located in a fertile plain along the northern perimeter of the Iranian Central Plateau. The plain is positioned on either side of the intermittent river called ShuradRud (“salt-water river”), which forms a central conduit in an east-west direction, ending further to the south in the desertic endoreic depression of Dasht-e Kevir. It is bordered to the north by the high mountains of the Binalud chain, whose highest peak rises to 3,000 m above sea level or 2,000 m above the level of the plain. This mountain separates Nishapur from the Mashad plain.

Let us move onto the reasons why, in 2005, we decided to start excavations in Qohandez and continue with them in 2006. American excavations between 1937 and 1945 had focused on the tepes (mounds) in the central part of the site (Sabz Pushan and others), while Iranian archaeologists had carried out excavations in the western part - Shadiyakh - between 1995 and 2005. The two teams uncovered remains from the Islamic era, which they dated to between the end of the 8th century and the 12th/13th centuries. Neither team identified levels prior to the 8th century, since the Iranian archaeologists did not finish their excavations - or they may well have gone on to find something - and the American archaeologists apparently searched for earlier levels without success.

In the publication on the American excavations, Wilkinson asserted that it was necessary to look outside Nishapur for the Sassanid city since their excavations did not turn up any artefacts predating the Islamic period, even in five soundings dug in Qohandez and Sharistan (the findings from which remained unpublished). The few Sassanid and Parthian coins uncovered consequently had to be considered a random occurrence. The Iranian archaeologist Moussavi, who also worked at Nishapur, recently confirmed this opinion. It is a fact that no conclusively Sassanid artefact has ever - except in the case of a mistake - appeared in a museum or a collection or been presented for sale as coming from Nishapur. That is why a persistent tradition gave weight to the fact that no Sassanid remains existed in Nishapur.

Contrary to this opinion, Richard Bulliet, a specialist in the history of Nishapur according to written sources, believes that there was indeed a Sassanid settlement on the ancient site of Nishapur, which came under Arab rule in 651. The complete consistency of written sources with the topography of the ancient site of Nishapur, as well as the persistence of the place name from the High Middle Ages invalidates Wilkinson’s hypothesis, according to which Sassanid Nishapur is not the ancient site next to the city currently bearing its name.

We can explain why our predecessors did not discover any Sassanid remains by suggesting that, during the Islamic period, signs of earlier occupation on the site were completely obliterated. When the joint Iranian-French expedition was established, it seemed necessary to clarify this issue and to uncover, if they existed, pre-Islamic levels in Nishapur as well as signs occupation immediately following the Arab conquest in 651.

In spite of the height of its preserved remains, the Qohandez site (fig. 2), which remained unexcavated by archaeologists, was certainly not ignored by thieves. Plunderers seeking archaeological treasures or soil to enrich farm land transformed large tracts of the tepe into a craterous landscape. The walls and especially the corner tower structures stand 6 to 7 metres tall, like ghosts, while the softest layers have been removed or reduced to a maze of ditches and tunnels that were subsequently devastated by erosion (fig. 3). Recent satellite photos (fig. 2) show that, in addition, a strip of land around 20 m wide and 150 m long was worn down to the level of what might have been a farmyard, esplanade or place of arms, following the 1950s when the first aerial photograph of the site was taken.