TEHRAN (CHN) -- The Iranian province of Hamedan has earned a tourism revenue of 300,000 dollars within a period of six months which is considered a very good record for this province.

Announcing this news, deputy director of the Cultural Heritage and Tourism Department of Hamedan said that the amount has been calculated by assigning 160 to 170 dollars on average to every foreign tourist and an equivalent of 5 dollars for every domestic visitor. He also said that the tourism industry created many job opportunities, both directly and indirectly, for the residents of Hamedan.

According to an earlier statement by Ranjbaran, about 3 million people visited Hamedan province on a daily basis from March to September 2006.

Historic monuments of Hamedan are considered its major tourism attractions. Particularly important are the Achaemenid inscriptions of Ganjnameh (literary meaning “treasure book”) carved artistically on the rocks in one of the foothills of Alvand Mountain in three ancient languages of Old Persian, Neo-Babylonian and Neo-Elamite.

The mountain is located 5 kilometers southwest of the provincial capital of Hamedan, the city which was once the capital of the Median Empire (728 BC-550 BC). The name of this city appears in historic texts as Ecbatana.

It was the royal residence of the Median kings and is described by Polybius of Megalopolis, the Greek historian of the 2nd century BC, as the richest and most beautiful city compared with all other cities in the ancient world.