Bishapur

Shapur I founded Bishapur in the third century AD after his campaigns against Rome, and the city was laid out on a grid at the mouth of a gorge where the Shapur river comes out of the mountains, with a palace, a temple building sunk below ground level and fed by a water channel, and streets that Roman prisoners are said to have helped build. Floor mosaics from the palace show clear Roman influence in technique and subject, and some remain on site while others are in museums. In the gorge above the city are six large Sassanid rock reliefs carved into the cliffs on both sides of the river, showing investitures and victories, and further up a cave holds a colossal statue of Shapur himself, over six metres tall, fallen and re-erected.

History

According to an inscription, Shapur I founded the city in 266 after his victories over Rome, in which Gordian III was killed, Valerian captured and Philip the Arab forced to surrender; it was not wholly new, as remains of the Parthian and Elamite eras have been found, and tradition places an older town, Din-Della, on the spot. Laid out on a grid like a Roman town, a plan never repeated in Iran, by an architect from Harran and built by Roman prisoners, it was one of the Sasanian capitals and the birthplace of the kings Hormizd I and Bahram I. Arab armies took it in the 630s and 640s after repeated revolts, and in the Islamic period it slowly declined as its people moved to Kazerun. Georges Salles and Roman Ghirshman of the Louvre first excavated it from 1935 to 1940, an Iranian team under Ali Akbar Sarfaraz later uncovered the Temple of Anahita, the Valerian Palace and other buildings, and only about three per cent of the city has been excavated so far (Wikipedia, Bishapur).

The main sights

• The sunken water temple - a chamber below ground fed by a channel.
• Roman-influenced floor mosaics - technique and subjects from the west.
• Six rock reliefs in the gorge - carved into cliffs on both riverbanks.
• The colossal statue of Shapur - over six metres, in a cave above the valley.

When to go

March to May and October to November. Two to three hours for the city and the nearest reliefs. The cave with the statue is a steep climb and takes a further two hours. Spring brings water down the gorge.

Practical notes

The city is at foundation level and needs imagination. Reaching the statue cave is a hard scramble up the mountain and not suitable for everyone. There is little shade and no facilities. Some mosaics have been removed to museums.

Nearby

Kazerun is east; Firuzabad lies south-east across the mountains.

Key facts