TEHRAN –A museum house, dedicated to historical postage stamps, will open in Tabriz, the capital of the East Azarbaijan province. 

The museum, which would be the first of its kind in the northeast province, is scheduled to be inaugurated on Thursday at the 200-year-old Mojtahediha Mansion. 

The inauguration ceremony is scheduled to be attended by the CEO of the National Post Company, Ramezan-Ali Sobhanifar who also doubles as the deputy minister of Information and Communications Technology (ICT), and several cultural officials and cultural heritage experts.

A selection of stamps printed since 1962 will be on display at the museum. 

Back in February, Iran’s first Post-Museum School opened in Rasht, northern Gilan province. 

The museum aims at educating children in various fields of communication and media as well as promoting the culture of the post by holding communication courses and classes. 

The second Post-Museum School is also scheduled to be inaugurated in Delgan county, southeastern province of Sistan-Balouchestan in the near future.

It was during the Nasser al-Din Shah Qajar’s rein (1848-1896) that the postal system in Iran has begun developing. He was inspired by the reported successes of a postal system in many regions, so he decided to send a group to France to study the system and launch it in Iran.

Capital of East Azarbaijan province, Tabriz, which is well-soaked in history and culture for millennia, embraces several historical and religious sites, including Jameh Mosque of Tabriz and Arg of Tabriz, and UNESCO-registered Tabriz Historic Bazaar Complex to name a few.

The ancient city was declared a world craft city of carpet weaving by the World Craft in 2016. It also bore the title of 2018 Islamic Tourism Capital.

Tabriz became the capital of the Mongol Il-Khan Mahmud Gazan (1295–1304) and his successor. Timur (Tamerlane), a Turkic conqueror, took it in 1392. Some decades later the Kara Koyunlu Turkmen made it their capital, it was when the famous Blue Mosque was built in Tabriz.

The city retained its administrative status under the Safavid dynasty until 1548 when Shah Tahmasp I relocated his capital westward to Qazvin. During the next two centuries, Tabriz changed hands several times between Persia and Ottoman Empire. During World War I, the city was temporarily occupied by Turkish and then Soviet troops.

ABU/AFM