TEHRAN - On Thursday, the touristic village of Masuleh in northern Iran held a day-long workshop on indigenous dolls in a bid to commemorate International Museum Day.

The workshop was aimed to empower breadwinner women who are engaged in weaving traditional dolls and puppets, CHTN quoted a local official as saying on Thursday.

Handmade dolls have long been famed as one of the souvenirs of Masouleh estimated to date for a millennium. Experts believe that the existence of numerous graveyards inner and outside of the village proves its old age.

With 14 entries, Iran ranks first globally for the number of cities and villages registered by the World Crafts Council, as China with seven entries, Chile with four, and India with three ones come next.

Last month, a selection of 46 Iranian puppets was added to the national heritage list. Being kept at the Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults (IIDCYA), National Museum of Children’s Art and Literature in Tehran, the puppets date back to the late Qajar (1789-1925) and early Pahlavi (1925-1979) eras.

Home to stunning landscapes, Masouleh is one of the many stepped villages that are quite common to find around the country, especially in Iranian Kurdistan and around Mashhad.

Masuleh is famed for its Lego-shaped earthen houses built on another’s rooftop. He added the discovery of archaeological remains at such high altitudes would help archaeologists to shed new light on the human adaptation to the high Alborz mountains from prehistoric times up to recent centuries.

AFM