TEHRAN – The ancient fort of Turan Posht, named after Turandokht who was a princess of Persia during the Sassanid era (224 CE–651), has recently been inscribed on the National Heritage List. The monument stands tall on a hillside in Taft county of Yazd province, central Iran.

Narratives say that residents of the historic village of Turan Posht (which shares the name with the fortress) had sought refuge in the past to defend themselves against the threat of predators and aggressors threatening them from the desert between Yazd and Fars provinces.

“The fort is unique in terms of using stones in its construction, and it has a large number of rooms, each offering shelter to a local family when the nearby region was on the verge of a foreign threat or attack,” ISNA reported on Wednesday.

“The fort is considered a biological stronghold as foodstuffs such as beans, nuts, flour, and other ingredients had been classified and stockpiled in special places of the monument.”

The Sassanid era is of very high importance in the history of Iran. Under Sassanids, Persian art and architecture experienced a general renaissance. Architecture often took grandiose proportions such as palaces at Ctesiphon, Firuzabad, and Sarvestan that are amongst highlights of the ensemble.

In 2018, UNESCO added an ensemble of Sasanian historical cities in southern Iran -- titled “Sassanid Archaeological Landscape of Fars Region”-- to its World Heritage list. The ensemble is comprised of eight archaeological sites situated in three geographical parts of Firuzabad, Bishapur, and Sarvestan. It reflects the optimized utilization of natural topography and bears witness to the influence of Achaemenid and Parthian cultural traditions and of Roman art, which later had a significant impact on the architecture and artistic styles of the Islamic era.

The Sassanid archaeological landscape also represents a highly efficient system of land use and strategic utilization of natural topography in the creation of the earliest cultural centers of the Sassanid civilization.

AFM/MG