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Iran's Wolf Wall, Second-Longest in the World, Is Still Shrouded in Mystery
- xeromal 8y agoIran is definitely under-represented in western education. I came across this the other day. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakhch%C4%81l https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakhch%C4%81l Iranians constructed these deep structures that engineered in a such a way to grow ice in the winter and keep the ice for the entirety of summer. They made a kind of sorbet as a dessert. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faloodeh https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faloodeh Thanks for sharing this! Great read!
- msaharia 8y agoThanks for posting this!
- mavelikara 8y agoI had always wondered how they came up with Faloodeh, for a community that had very hot summers. Thanks for posting, this explains it! BTW, love Faloodeh! Also, not to be confused with Falooda (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falooda https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falooda).
- walrus01 8y agoIf you like Faloodeh you might like Firnee: https://www.google.com/search?client=ubuntu&channel=fs&q=firnee&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8 https://www.google.com/search?client=ubuntu&channel=fs&q=fir...
- cheez 8y agoThere will be a comment about how Persians didn't really come up with the concept and the basic idea was created by <some culture that _is_ covered in western education>
- dang 8y agoPlease don't post flamebait. It causes the very problem you're talking about, i.e. taking threads in a bad and needless direction.
- walrus01 8y agoYakhchāl is also used in Dari (Afghan version of Farsi) to refer to ordinary household refrigerators. Or if you were going to be really specific, Yakhchāl barqee which means electrical fridge. There's also these, which are marvels of desert engineering: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qanat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qanat
- MarkPash 8y agoTo avoid confusion, it is also used in the same way in standard Iranian Farsi too. And while Yakhchāl barqee makes sense, I've never heard that before, at least in an informal setting anyway.
- rezashirazian 8y agoI always think the European border would have extended all the way to Iran (and thus more fairly represented in western cultures) if it hadn't fallen to the Arabian conquest.
- endisukaj 8y agoFallen and stayed*. Andalusia too was part of the muslim caliphate and yet....
- rezashirazian 8y agoTrue.
- Mediterraneo10 8y agoBefore the Arab invasions, there was a state of constant hostility and sometimes outright war between Byzantium and Persia. I think that even had the Arab conquests not happened, Christian Europe would still have seen Persia as "other".
- inawarminister 8y agoAnd even the West as it is treated the Greeks (and Russians!) as Oriental others. The former between 800s-1400, the latter between 1700 to now. [] Started with Charlemagne being crowned as Holy Roman Emperor when the Eastern Empress (Mother?) Irene still lives. Even to the point of friendly relationship between the Roman Emperor on Aachen and Arab Caliph on Baghdad, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abbasid–Carolingian_alliance https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abbasid–Carolingian_alliance
- enitihas 8y agoOr the Persian(Iranian) border may have extended all the way to Europe had Persia defeated the greeks. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Salamis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Salamis 2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Thermopylae https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Thermopylae
- zaarn 8y agoTo my knowledge, a countries education tends to focus on the country itself. American education teaches a lot about the US but little about the history of specific European countries and in turn EU countries teach little about American history ( IIRC during my education we covered the entirety of the US history in half a year and then went back to more local history ) It's always quite amazing to realize that other countries mostly have just as much of a rich history as your own.
- mattmanser 8y agoThis wasn't true in the UK when I was at school 20 years ago. Admittedly, the 'general' history we did in the first 3 years of secondary school (11-14) we covered mostly western history, but it covered Romans, Greeks, Egyptians, etc. We did some English history (Boudicca, Alfred, is all I can remember now). In the optional GCSE History I did (14-16) we did little English history as far as I remember and covered inter-war Germany + rise of Hitler, Vietnam war, Chinese Communist Revolution, formation of Israel, Cuban Missile Crisis and probably some more I've now forgotten. EDIT: I actually now remember we did cover Cromwell + English Civil war as well as William the Orange and the Suez crisis, probably at least one of those in GCSE. Slightly modified to reflect this. A lot of those do directly impact the UK, although when we covered China, it was still fairly weak compared to its present position in the world.
- amaccuish 8y agoLeft school 4 years ago now. At primary, it's mostly kings and queen's, magna carta etc. Secondary it's mainly WWI/II (including "roaring 20s US" and Weimar). For sixth form it's the USSR, America, and I think China (I didn't do A-level history). (This was the AQA course anyway) Weirdly we learnt almost nothing about the British Empire, which I think is sad because some people have a rose-tinted view of it. You can't begin to form an actual opinion until you know the history, the good and the bad etc.
- mattmanser 8y agoIf the exam boards still work the same way, different boards have different historical subjects, and I think they might even have a range of historical subjects that the teacher can be pick from, so not every school is the same. I've learnt a lot of my English history from Bernard Cornwell historical fiction books.
- rezeroed 8y agoInteresting. Reminded me of the Kew Gardens Ice House, a far more modest Georgian England version.
- foota 8y agoThe Yakhchal reminds me of this strategy for preserving a water supply through summer in the Himalayas https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/apr/22/the-ice-stupas-of-ladakh-solving-water-crisis-in-the-high-desert-of-himalaya https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/apr/22/the-ice-...
- senorjazz 8y agoAm half way through Dan Carlins King of Kings podcast all about the Persian empire and and hefty chunk on what came before in the region. Thoroughly recommended, as you say I was fairly ignorant to most all the history of this region
- frozenport 8y agoNo its not. Persia has contributed almost nothing to modern discourse and thought. They will be primarily remembered for checking the expansion of the Roman empire and state sponsored terrorism.
- Alex3917 8y ago> Iran is definitely under-represented in western education. The British destroyed a lot of their advanced ancient technology, which is probably why it's not taught as much.
- jaza 8y agoFascinating, I had never heard of this wall before. There are also numerous impressive and under-explored archaeological sites north east of Golestan, in modern day Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, see this overview of them that I wrote a few years ago: https://greenash.net.au/thoughts/2014/10/forgotten-realms-of-the-oxus-region/ https://greenash.net.au/thoughts/2014/10/forgotten-realms-of...
- nafey 8y agoPersonally I have felt that the fascination of Western archaeologists with Roman History is explained by the necessity of the American "aristocracy" to establish a cultural heritage of exceptionalism. This has led to an extremely detailed view of Roman History. The history of other regions and civilisations serve no such similar purpose and have been ignored.
- sumedh 8y ago> The history of other regions and civilisations serve no such similar purpose and have been ignored. Before pointing fingers at the West, does Iran take an extremely detailed view of its Persian History, that would not go well with Islamic Iran.
- nafey 8y agoI fail to see the relevance of Iran's example although drawing moral equivalence with a country which has often been decried to belong to "axis of evil" seems counter productive
- sumedh 8y ago> I fail to see the relevance of Iran's example If a country wont look at its history why do expect others to look at that country's history?
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- casefields 8y agoHere's another thorough article: http://www.shca.ed.ac.uk/staff/supporting_files/esauer/iranian_walls.pdf http://www.shca.ed.ac.uk/staff/supporting_files/esauer/irani...
- melicerte 8y agothanks for sharing. This is more interesting and more detailed than the original post.
- potopoto 8y agoThis structure is impressive but I'm surprised the longest wall in the world is not even mentioned in western education The walls of Benin were 4 times longer than the wall of China: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walls_of_Benin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walls_of_Benin The ignorance of this structure is partially due to the racism of the time and Britain's determination to erase Benin from history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benin_Expedition_of_1897 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benin_Expedition_of_1897
- rezeroed 8y agoBut it doesn't exist anymore - not as useful for show and tell.
- dsfyu404ed 8y ago>I'm surprised the longest wall in the world is not even mentioned in western education It's no surprise it's not mentioned in the US. Thanks to a bunch of college students and religious extremists (granted they look like the Amish compared to more recent extremists but in the day they were certainly extremists) 40yr ago Iran went straight to the bottom of the priority list and there's never enough time to teach everything so only the highest priority items get covered.
- Eupolemos 8y agoGotta love Benin's flag: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Benin https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Benin
- jcranmer 8y agoThe walls of Benin were earthworks; the Great Wall of China is a massive, impressive stone fortification. The latter tends to captivate people's attention much more (most people don't realize that the modern, stone walls of the Great Wall of China are not how it existed for most of history).
- DiabloD3 8y agoAlthough this article is very interesting, the author seems to have very little knowledge of Middle Eastern history.
- raarts 8y agoIf someone made such a statement about an article you wrote, wouldn't you want to see it substantiated?
- Alir3z4 8y agoIf you enjoy that, you may like "a masterpiece of creative genius", the [Shushtar Historical Hydraulic System][0] as well, it's one of its kind and I'm still amazed how and using what technology they were able to make tunnels and canals into the rock under the city, of course how they did stop the stream until they finished the construction. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shushtar_Historical_Hydraulic_System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shushtar_Historical_Hydraulic_...
- haloux 8y agoGorgon, also the species of Medusa. . . https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gorgon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gorgon