

w.as

hgat

e.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m

World Heritage in Iran2

restored and touristified’ to communicate national pride (Jarzombek 2011 p. 127) and to endorse dominant political discourses. Chief among these discourses is nationalism (accepting that it comes with various definitions and implications). through heritagisation, a site is instantaneously transformed into a state symbol, an emblem. depending on the context, such value-laden symbolism often results in the entanglement of the site in larger scales of politics and this may overshadow other issues such as archaeological research on the ground, though these too, possess their embedded political values. Such broader, often state-level, politics has been observed and usefully examined on various heritage sites in different countries.2 However, examining the state-level politics in itself, while useful, remains inadequate and reveals little about the experience of place. instead it is likely to reify the site by avoiding its daily life and by applying all too predictable ‘frames’ of analysis.

Pasargadae (est. 550 BCe) represents a case in point. its importance as an archaeological site dates back to the latter part of the nineteenth century. However, as it is pointed out here and frequently throughout this book, the place was established as a political and commemorative gesture by Cyrus the great. even before the twentieth century, as Stronach (2011) points out, the place was involved in politics in various ways and subsequently and most spectacularly in the latter part of the twentieth century, during the 1971 Celebrations for the 2500th Anniversary of Persian Kingship to which we shall return.

in the early islamic era, the original, achaemenid meaning of Pasargadae, which hosts the tomb of Cyrus the great, founder of the achaemenid empire, was committed to oblivion. the place was adapted for islamic practices and the tomb of Cyrus was ascribed to the Mother of Solomon. it was only at the beginning of the twentieth century that archaeologist ernst Herzfeld proved the association between this site and Cyrus. Since then, the site has been the focus of archaeological activities. The historical significance of the site resulted in its appropriation for different reasons into conflicting political discourses, particularly at State level, between nationalism and islamism. Whereas the iranian Monarch appropriated it as a tangible legitimating symbol for authenticating his kingly ambitions, the islamic republic initially ignored it with an air of hostility, only to gradually readmit it – particularly in recent years – into political discourses as a symbol of national identity.

However, Pasargadae is not an isolated World Heritage site, nor purely a symbol of abstract state politics. Pasargadae and its immediate vicinity constitute a living landscape occupied by villagers, nomads and tourists. Whilst there is much scholarship on the archaeological aspects of Pasargadae, there has been little research to date on any other aspects of this place. the major problem is that the

2 For an example of the complex relationship between nationalism, politics, heritage and archaeology see Meskell (2002); for general reading on the politics of heritage see Harrison (2010), timothy and nyaupane (2009) and Smith (2004) and for a comparable and specific reading on the state-level heritage politics in Egypt see: Mitchel (2001).



w.as

hgat

e.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.

Conceptualising a World Heritage Site 3

current understanding of Pasargadae is often limited by disciplinary boundaries, which usually interpret it under the rubric of art history or archaeology, and are likely to perpetuate the site’s reification and to miss the more complex meanings and constitution of the place. While yielding important insights to particular issues, this approach is piecemeal; it cannot offer an integrative account of the problems related to and posed by Pasargadae.

another issue that this living heritage site confronts is the various perceptions espoused and perpetuated by different groups of stakeholders on site. in response, this book explores a holistic approach underpinned by the idea of place.

Pasargadae is imagined differently by various individuals and groups or collectives; it is a multiple place. Who are these groups and how do they mutually inform and transform one another and how does this influence conceptions of this site as place? How stable are these groups and what are their commonalities and differences? in other words, how many renditions of Pasargadae as a place exist? This book identifies some of these groups and some of their concerns. The multiplicity of Pasargadae is rooted in its long history and is compounded by contending political, economic and representational discourses that operate upon the site at a range of scales, from local to national and even global (including as World Heritage). Furthermore, these political contestations of the site can cause immediate existential threats.

a report in 2004 suggested that the site was suffering from a general disintegration caused, amongst other things, by state-level ‘political divisions’, conflicts of interest between locals, non-locals and authorities, physical and natural erosion and shortage of infrastructure and facilities (iranian Cultural Heritage organization (iCHo) 2004, pp. 14–15). disintegration could be partly mitigated if different groups of users felt shared ownership of the site. to this end, various facets of Pasargadae should be allowed to coalesce in an ‘assemblage’ that represents concurrent and equally valid constructions of idea(s) of place. this is not limited to a concern for ‘interpretative flexibility’, (Latour 2005, p. 120) stopping at deconstruction, and is distinct from a single meta-narrative voice that suppresses difference. rather, it is an acknowledgement of the existence of concurrent social realities and the facilitation of their construction into perspectival (meta)narratives.

in this chapter, after introducing the site, i will outline the theoretical approach to place and then provide examples of Pasargadae’s transpositions and a provisional list of the collectives that play a role in interpreting sites such as Pasargadae. this will lead to the positioning of the other chapters in this collection.

Pasargadae, a Brief Introduction

Pasargadae is located approximately 90 kilometres northeast of the City of Shiraz, the Capital of the province of Fars, in southern iran (Figure 1.1). it is within the Morghab Plain, an area of 20 × 15 kilometres with diverse geographical features comprising mountain passes, riverbeds, agricultural and dry land, permanent



w.as

hgat

e.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m


village settlements, archaeological sites and annual nomadic encampment and migration routes (Sami 1971, p. 140). Pasargadae is adjacent to an ancient north-south highway that connected Shiraz and isfahan and was in use until the 1950s (Stronach 1978, p. 11). The site is the location of the first royal residence planned and built by Cyrus the great after he founded the achaemenid empire (Wiesehofer 2004, p. 26; Stronach 1978, p. 97). it contained a sacred district (Wiesehofer 2004, p. 26) and an administrative and ceremonial capital for Cyrus and his successors and retained its relative administrative significance until the fourteenth century (Sami 1971, p.140). While the original function of the place is subject to speculation, as is the exact extent and form of Pasargadae, some historical sources suggest that the achaemenids could have used the site for succession (investiture) ceremonies or as a religious training centre (Plutarch 75 Ce; Sami 1971, p. 102, p. 137).

Cyrus planned the core area of Pasargadae as a geometrical ensemble (Sami 1971, p. 12, pp. 13–14; Stronach 1978, p. 107), of what would become known as ‘paradise garden’. in Xenophon’s words: ‘there are gardens, which are called paradeisoi, full of everything good and beautiful that the earth cares to grow, and in these [the Persian king] passes most of his time when the season does not prevent it’ (Xenophone quoted in lincoln 2001, p. 142).

the gardens would become the prototype for all later achaemenid gardens and the subsequent islamic garden (Figure 1.2). this design was an innovation by Cyrus following a long history (dating back to 900 BCe) of using gardens as royal accomplishments or emblems and as the affirmation of the cosmic position of the monarch or as a symbol of foreign conquest (Stronach 1990, pp. 171–2, 178–9).their innovation was also in the relationship between built form and landscape as structures became pavilions within the gardens. today the most iconic of these structures is his tomb, which would have been located within a walled garden (Sami 1971, p. 12; Stronach 1978, p. 24), although it is now sitting as a singular monument within a dry piece of land (Figure 1.3).3 architecturally, the tomb is a hybrid of Mesopotamian and ‘traditional iranian tomb and house’ typologies. Hybridity is characteristic of all the structures on site and shows the highly innovative nature of the nascent achaemenid architecture (Stronach 1978, p. 51).4 Pasargadae was also a royal political statement expressing the geographical extent and uniqueness of the empire through its use of architecture (Stronach 1978, p. 40, pp. 42–3). While the design innovations informed Persian architecture for the next two and a half millennia, the idea of a paradise garden was teleological in that it represented an originally ideal state of being, followed by the fall and then the hope to restore life back to that ideal within the material world and this could have been the Achaemenid justification for the expansion of their Empire (Lincoln 2001, p. 145).

3 For a detailed description of these monuments refer to Sami (1971) and Stronach (1978).

4 For proof of Hybridity refer to Nylander (1970).



w.as

hgat

e.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m


the tomb was transformed into a mosque in the islamic period (between tenth and eleventh century BC) and this has turned it into a palimpsest featuring the remains of a prayer niche upon which the Victory Surah of the Koran is inscribed (Sami 1971, pp. 29–31, p. 34).

Today, Pasargadae is designated as World Heritage, in accordance with the first four criteria designated by UneSCo, namely (UneSCo World Heritage Centre 2012, p. 20):

1. to represent a masterpiece of human creative genius,2. to exhibit an important interchange of human values, over a span of time

or within a cultural area of the world, on developments in architecture or technology, monumental arts, town-planning or landscape design,

3. to bear a unique or at least exceptional testimony to a cultural tradition or to a civilisation which is living or which has disappeared,

4. to be an outstanding example of a type of building, architectural or technological ensemble or landscape which illustrates (a) significant stage(s) in human history.

Figure 1.2 Remains of water courses (right) and Palace P in the background. Takht-i Solaiman fortress is seen on the far centre

Source: ali Mozaffari © 2011



w.as

hgat

e.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.


in the above discussion, art-historical and archaeological values seem to be of prime concern (iranian Cultural Heritage organization (iCHo) 2004, 1,7). this understanding and interpretation often ignores other important aspects that relate to the site’s life, such as its socio-political milieu. Perhaps it is in reaction to such a focus that its management plan emphasises ‘the cultural value of the site’ by ‘introducing it as cultural landscape’ (and identifying a number of issues, chiefly cultural tourism and social development).5 the terminologies of cultural landscape or cultural value are vague and say little about the current and changing relationships between different groups, such as local residents and tourists, at this site.

Pasargadae is a multiple place. it has become a site of national origin and the tomb of Cyrus is an emblem for national political debates, and an allegory for the construction and contestation of sanctioned versions of collective identity. this can potentially expose the site to neglect through dwindling protection measures or, worse, to political or even physical violence. This was seen for the first time

5 For a UNESCO definition of cultural landscape see UNESCO World Heritage Centre (2012, p. 14).

Figure 1.3 The tomb of Cyrus in 2004

Source: ali Mozaffari © 2004



w.as

hgat

e.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m


in March 2013 during the celebrations for the iranian new Year, the nowrouz.6 Since 2008, a growing number of people have been gathering around the tomb to celebrate nowrouz. the actions on the part of some of the revellers had caused some concerns. For example their chanting of nationalist slogans or reciting poetry which was perceived as politically sensitive or the occasional prostrating at the foot of the tomb that had offended religious sensibilities. this had at times caused strong, even violent, reactions, but not to the monuments. this year, as revellers began chanting ‘Cyrus is our father’, someone from among the people threw a fire cracker at the wall of the tomb and chanted ‘Death to America’. the incident was recorded by smartphones and then shared online and shortly thereafter removed (‘Complete Film of attack with Hand-Made grenade to the tomb of Cyrus [Persian title]’ 2013). this incident was an overt expression of one of many types of conflict in which Pasargadae is implicated.

as this incident demonstrates, the problem is concrete and immediate. if Pasargadae and similar sites are to be preserved, attempts have to be made to engender and negotiate divergent senses of identification and belonging among different groups of users and ‘stakeholders’. Such identifications underpin the multiple perceptions of place.

The question is: what are the different figurations of Pasargadae and how can they coexist and even enter into a dialogue? to understand this, it is necessary firstly to formulate a notion of place and, secondly, to identify those who imagine the site’s various connotations, which is to ask: who are the (particularly) collective actors?

Conceiving Place

Place should be formulated from a collective perspective, as the outcome of a process of associating identities (which are ever-changing) with sites – in this instance the heritage site of Pasargadae.7 I have elsewhere identified this process as inscription, which relies on the imaginations of a given site (Mozaffari 2010, p. 28; 2012, p. 8; 2014, pp. 7–10). The collective here signifies groups of individuals assembled through the common grounds of cultural practices, social and political inclinations or economic status. As such, collectives are fleeting indiscrete formations and are always provisional. From this perspective, individuals are important in so far as they inform and shape collective imagination. Place is conceived once a site or locale is imagined through four components: textual references, performative actions, spatial interventions and political colligations (Mozaffari 2010, p. 28; 2014, p. 9). textual references are citations, pictorial,

6 Iranian New Year at 21st March and celebrated with a 13-day national holiday.7 For an introductory text to summarise various other formulations of the idea of

place see Cresswell (2004), for examples of discussions on place from various other angles consider adams, Hoelscher and till (2001), Castello (2010) and Massey (1999).



w.as

hgat

e.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.


written or aural (and, with the advance of technology, multi-media), through which the locale is described, imagined and remembered. Performative actions designate human presence and movement within a locale, be it a religious or civil ritual, or the annual nomadic transhumance, or else, as in this case, the almost ritualized movements of visitors and tourists upon a site. Spatial interventions designate any addition, transformation or restriction that results in a spatial change or a change in the perception of space. these may include constructing a structure such as a museum, or more subtle acts, such as determining patterns of movements upon a site – designating a visitor path or fencing off the old transhumance route. Finally, political colligation suggests the deliberate appropriation of a site for an ideological narrative, as its symbol or emblem, such that the sanctioned version subsumes all other existing narratives upon the site; it is, therefore, totalising. together, these four elements form a collective imagination that transforms the site into different places. Place is, therefore, relational and is determined by other connections, including those to other sites, outside the locale. Furthermore, place has an inherent aesthetic aspect – it is perceived and experienced through the senses.8 this model of conceiving place can help to identify the multiplicity of Pasargadae and acknowledge the different layers of history and experience that underpin it. an overview of the transpositions of Pasargadae over the past few centuries clarifies the operation of different collective imaginations upon the site and the multiplicity of places arising from that process. in the following chapter, Boucharlat provides a thorough description of the history of archaeological discoveries at Pasargadae. the intention in the following is to discuss some of these transpositions throughout the site’s history in order to highlight their relationship to place.

Transpositions of Pasargadae9

after the fall of the achaemenids at the hands of alexander and his troops, Pasargadae gradually fell into oblivion. it took until the nineteenth century for Western travellers and explorers to make the connection between the tomb – then buried under layers of subsequent appellations and historical functions – and Cyrus. during that period of oblivion, the tomb was designated as the Martyrium of the Mother of Solomon (Stronach 1978, p. 1; Sami 1971, p. 18) and was considered sacred and, among other things, a place of feminine pilgrimage

8 I am deploying this term as distinct from the Kantian notion of ‘disinterested delight’, but closer to a.g. Baumgarten’s notion of the term, as sense perception. For further see Kinnaman (2008, pp. 578–82).

9 The narrative of transpositions is constructed based on the writings of Sami, Stronach and others whose work is cited in this chapter. this includes the document presented to UneSCo for the inscription of Pasargadae as World Heritage.



w.as

hgat

e.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m


(Stronach 1978, pp. 1–2).10 the tomb, and by extension the site, would have been cloaked in a sacred aura and religious stories and citations would have emerged from it (textual references). as such, the place was a pilgrimage site (place for performative actions) and as an administrative centre, it combined political and religious signification. In 1223, the tomb was transformed into a mosque built of materials spoliated from the ruins of the palaces on site (Sami 1971, pp. 128–9). this constituted spatial intervention upon the site, reinforced by the inscription of Koranic verses on the interior wall of the tomb. almost a century later, (between 1358 and 1374) and in close proximity to the tomb, an islamic school (Sami 1971, pp. 131–2) or caravanserai (gharavi 1997) was established for pilgrims and, possibly, religious education purposes. the site was decisively islamised and its memory as a sacred islamic place would linger until the present.

The Achaemenid origin of the site was identified gradually and through speculations about the true identity of its structures, such as the tomb of Cyrus (then a mosque), in particular by the german grotenfend in 1818. it was only in 1908 that the german-american archaeologist, ernst Herzfeld, conclusively ascertained the ascription of the site to Cyrus the great through material archaeological evidence (Stein 1936, p. 217). this revealed the islamic layer as an afterlife of the achaemenid site. in the course of the next few decades, the site would become the focus of archaeological attention and state ideological projections.

in the mid-twentieth century, in a nationalist milieu, the site would be politically colligated. ali Sami, a former director of Pasargadae, described the structures of the islamic period as the ‘ugly and unsightly’ work of ‘graceless and inexpert builders’ (Sami 1971, pp. 128–9). He endeavoured to restore the supposedly pure Persian architectural and artistic qualities of Pasargadae ‘before any admixture and association with other countries’(Sami 1971, p. 146, p. 155), a statement which could be interpreted as ideological since it was not supported by scientific archaeological evidence. In 1955, Sami oversaw the construction of a stone platform around the structure within a 1.8 metre high wall ‘enclosing the area surrounding the tomb in such a way that the view of the tomb is [remained] unobscured’ (Sami 1971, p. 48). although this was a preservation measure, it contributed to definitively historicising an otherwise living religious monument. this was not the only measure of spatial intervention. Sami (1971, p. 63) notes:

in order to protect and preserve with care what remains of this palace [of audience of Cyrus], so recently unearthed, from injury and depredation at the hands of the inhabitants of local villages, and the tribes who pass by every spring and autumn we built a wall of sundried bricks to a height of two meters around the site to prevent foolish and mischievous persons entering the building.

10 Even before 1638, when, during the reign of the Fourteenth Caliph, Albrecht von Mandelso travelled through Fars province, the attribution of the tomb was to the mother of Shah Suleiman (King Solomon), (Stronach 1978, p. 1).



w.as

hgat

e.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.co

m w

ww.a

shga

te.


in describing the local inhabitants and nomads as (potentially containing) ‘foolish and mischievous persons’, Sami is practically eliminating the local stakeholders of Pasargadae and its custodians, denying their care for the site and thus alienating them from the place.11

the appearance of the perimeter wall and other protective measures would have transformed the movement patterns of locals, thus changing their rendition of the site. it would have also assisted in the cessation of traditional ritual and religious practices, which transposed the place by changing its performative aspect from ritual ultimately to heritage tourism. Such transformations were apparently undertaken independently of state political intentions, but existing and future state politics would render them otherwise.12

in the achaemenid period, Pasargadae was the centre of a network of royal achaemenid sites. in the latter part of the twentieth century, it would be included in another network of sites. a monarchic nationalism that appealed to archaic origins significantly informed the cultural policies of the Pahlavi Dynasty (the last monarchy to rule iran before the islamic revolution), particularly in the reign of Mohammad reza Shah Pahlavi (1942–1979). the public manifestation of this policy was the Celebrations for the 2500th Anniversary of Persian Kingship. Without going into details, the Celebrations were intended as a show of magnificence and power to other nation-states, authenticating iran as a modern state with ancient origins. to prepare the site, a further spatial intervention was carried out by the italian institute for the Middle and Far east (isMeo). they dismantled the islamic period structures in order to restore the achaemenid palaces – this would provoke a desire to restore the islamic layer almost 40 years later (see below). on 12 october 1971, the Shah inaugurated the Celebrations in Pasargadae. in a formal procession toward the tomb, which now looked pristine (Figure 1.4), he laid a wreath upon Cyrus’ tomb and addressed him, thus positioning himself as a legitimate heir to the achaemenids. Combined with that speech, which was an instance of a textual reference, the performative actions on Pasargadae and at the other important achaemenid site, Persepolis, transposed Pasargadae and colligated it into the state

11 In an interview with this author in September 2011, Mr. Saidi, the elder of the village, described how Iranian officials gave his father the title of honorary guardian of the site for saving valuable artworks from the hands of an illegal english treasure hunter. this is but one incident that shows that the former perception that cast locals as a destructive force was inaccurate.

12 In addition to the remaking of the tomb, there is an unsubstantiated claim that the adjacent village – the Mother of Solomon – was displaced to make way for the 1971 Celebrations for the 2500th Anniversary of Persian Kingship. However, field interviews suggest that the village was moved mainly after the islamic revolution and as a result of centrally determined housing and development policies by the state, which may have encouraged construction for economic gain. the remnants of the older settlement, a mud brick fortress dating back 170 years or so, were demolished almost two decades ago (in the 1980s) and it is unclear as yet what exactly caused its demolition. the location is now a fenced football pitch.

Conceptualising a World Heritage Site (Pasargadae)

Documents

Transcript of Conceptualising a World Heritage Site (Pasargadae)