Pictures from Old Iran
Nomads
BASSERI TRIBE : DOMESTIC UNITS
The Basseri count their numbers and describe their camp groups and sections in terms of tents (sing.: khune = house). Each such tent is occupied by an independent household, typically consisting of an elementary family; and these households are the basic units of Basseri society. They are units of production and consumption; represented by their
Basseri Tribe : History, Ecology and Economy
The Basseri are a tribe of tent-dwelling pastoral nomads who migrate in the arid steppes and mountains south, east and north of Shiraz in Fars province, South Persia. The area which they customarily inhabit is a strip of land, approximately 300 miles long and 20-50 miles wide, running in a fairly straight north-south line from
Mohammad Taqi Khan Chahar Leng in Bakhtiyari Tribe
At the beginning of the second quarter of the nineteenth century most of the Bakhtiyari was under the governorship of the Georgian enunch, Manuchehr Khan Mo’atemed od Dauleh, and the provinces under his authority included Isfahan, Khuzistan, and most of Luristan. A northern corner of the Haft Leng territory was under the governor of Burujerd,
Mohammad Taqi Khan Chahar Leng in Bakhtiyari Tribe Read More »
Economic Resources of the Khans
In practice the Bakhtiyari territory would appear to be considered the property of the khans of each tayefeh; they determined its use. The ilkhan and ilbeg were assigned by the Central Government to collect the annual tax or maliyat, and within the confederation itself they had the final decision in cases involving disputes over the land. Traditionally the tayefeh had rights
Tribal Role of the Khans
Mention has been made of the intermediary role of the khans in collecting taxes and conscripting recruits for the government. It will be seen that a khan requires support from within the tribe in order to fulfill these functions. There are-frequent references in the sources to a change of allegiance within a tribe and/or a part of
Historical References of Bakhtiyari Tribe
Perhaps the earliest written reference to the Bakhtiyari dates from approximately 1330 A.D. in Hamdullah Mostaufi‘s Tarikh-e Gozideh, and possibly the earliest written reference to the divisions of the Haft Leng and Chahar Leng is in Muhammad Kazem’s Nameh-ye ‘Alam Ara-ye Naderi, ca. 1740 A.D. A In the Tarikh-e Gozideh the Bakhtiyari and the Osteraki, which is one of
Bakhtiyari Tribal Organization
The political grouping of the tribes below the Haft Leng and the Chahar Leng have been in a continuous state of change. Briefly, Barth writes, A “tribe” among South Persian nomads is a political concept; its unity is not ethnic, but depends on its allegiance to a chief. The processes whereby ethnic complexity persists in the tribes,
Bakhtiyari Tribe Origins
The origins of the Bakhtiyari and their division int two major groups of Haft Leng and Chahar Leng” have long puzzled historians and observers of Iran. “Who the Lurs are,” says Curzon, writing in 1890, “and whence they came is one of the unsolved and in- soluable riddles of history.” He quotes Rich, who declared the Bakhtiaris to
Symbiotic Land Use in the Zagros
First, the nomads and sedentary population complement each other in their seasonal use of land and pastures. As the Kurds, Lurs, and Bakhtiyari move out of their winter pastures in the uplands of Mesopotamia, the Arabs move in with flocks of camels and goats that can subsist on these pastures which by this time are too dry for the