The Shahnameh atlas · The historical age
Gur (Firuzabad)
گور (فیروزآباد)Ardashir's round city, the Glory of Ardashir
- A real place the poem names · Fars in the Atlas
- Ardashir, Ardavan
In the Shahnameh, Ardashir celebrates his victory by building. Among his foundations is a city in Pars that he names Khurra-ye Ardashir, the Glory of Ardashir, with springs, gardens and a fire temple. The poem lists his cities with evident pleasure, part of its portrait of the first Sasanian king as the founder of an ordered realm.
The city is real, and remarkable. Ardashir, historically the founder of the Sasanian empire in the 220s CE, laid it out as a perfect circle about two kilometres across, divided by radial roads into sectors, with a tall tower at its centre. In the gorge to the north stand two of his buildings: the fortress known as Qal'eh Dokhtar, built on a crag while he was still a rebel against the Parthians, and the domed palace in the plain below. On the cliffs nearby, rock reliefs show his investiture and his victory over Ardavan.
The city is real, and remarkable.
The city today
The city was known for centuries as Gur. A well-known story says the Buyid ruler 'Adud al-Dawla renamed it Firuzabad in the tenth century because "going to Gur" sounded like "going to the grave", gur, in Persian. The ruins and the nearby monuments are part of the UNESCO World Heritage site of the Sasanian archaeological landscape of Fars, inscribed in 2018, along with Bishapur and Sarvestan. The modern town of Firuzabad stands a short way to the east. Of all the cities the Shahnameh credits to its kings, this is one of the few whose founder, plan and date can all be confirmed on the ground.
More from the historical ageشاهنامه
Babylonبابل
In the Shahnameh, Eskandar (Alexander) returns from his travels to Babylon, where omens foretell his death. He dies there, and his body is carried to Alexandria.
Estakhrاستخر
In the Shahnameh, Babak, the ruler of Estakhr, takes the shepherd Sasan into his service, dreams of his royal destiny and gives him his daughter. Their son is Ardashir, founder of the Sasanian dynasty.
Kajaran, Haftvad's fortressکجاران
In one of the Shahnameh's strangest episodes, Ardashir fights Haftvad, a lord of the coast whose fortune comes from a magical worm found in an apple. Ardashir kills the worm with molten metal.
Shushtarشوشتر
In the Shahnameh, Shapur, son of Ardashir, captures a Roman commander and sets him to build a bridge at Shushtar. History agrees in outline: Roman prisoners taken by Shapur I worked on the great weir and bridge there.