Descendants of Cyrus

by Thornton, Christopher;

  “Tell your president I will paint the White House, and for free! It will be my gift to the American people!”

  Back at Naqsh-e Jahan Square, I wandered through one of the exits and back onto the street. Most of the busses had left, but a few remained, waiting for the stragglers from the rent-a-crowd to climb aboard. I walked down the street to the National Museum of Contemporary Art, where a sign outside the gate caught my eye: “Remembrance of a Friend: Artworks on the Occasion of Iman Khomeini’s Heavenly Departure.” It was advertising a special exhibit, and the title was enticing enough to warrant a look. I paid the entrance fee at a booth inside the gate and entered. The grounds were as attractive as any of the artwork could have been: A cluster of sand-colored buildings was surrounded by a rectangular pool that reflected a stand of cypress trees. Like the Qajar houses of Kashan, it was intended to create a garden setting, a haven of peace set apart from the traffic and bustle of the street.

  In the hall to the right of the entrance was an exhibit of Persian calligraphy, relatively small works no more than a foot square but exhibiting an astonishing array of color combinations—pink, yellow, and orange; green and blue set on a gold background; browns and reds with flashes of yellow woven into the border designs. The only unifying element among all the works was the delicate, swirling Persian script that swept from right to left, at times in a single line, at others in neatly stacked verses of poetry.

  The main event was to be found in the building at the back of the complex. On the ground floor, six rooms were hung with portraits of Ayatollah Khomeini portrayed in ways that interpreted his “heavenly departure,” as the sign outside the gate suggested they would. There was the ayatollah surrounded by angels, Ayatollah Khomeini staring into an unknown distance with the visionary gaze of Che Guevara, Ayatollah Khomeini standing on a cloud. The message was as clear as the day’s political propaganda: Khomeini was Iran’s messiah, the savior who had delivered it from the morbid abyss toward which it was heading under the rule of the shah. But judging the paintings according to strict Islamic doctrine, all of them could be condemned as pure blasphemy. One of Islam’s fundamental precepts is “There is no God but Allah,” which means there is no divine intermediary between human beings and the Creator himself. Even the Prophet Mohammad is not regarded as a divine being but one divinely inspired, and on these canvases Ayatollah Khomeini was being portrayed with near-godlike status. But when religious principles collide with political propaganda, the latter is usually the winner.

  Watching over the exhibit was a team of art students from the nearby academy—young women donning manteaux that hung just far enough down their thighs, and veils that concealed just enough hair to deflect the eyes of the morals police. One sidled over, a little shyly at first, and asked where I was from. One question led to another, and that followed with another, and it soon emerged that I had been a university instructor in the U.S. The rest crowded around. It then emerged that the dream of all was to attend art school in the U.S., but with visas for Iranians almost impossible to obtain they were looking elsewhere—Australia, England, Canada—anywhere but Iran. Since an arts degree offered no possible way out of Iran, like many young, educated Iranians they were all studying English translation as a way of improving their chances of emigrating. Despite the slimness of their chances, the U.S. was still their destination of choice, and for a moment my appearance had revived it, and they were going to make the most of the opportunity. They peppered me with questions: What were the best art schools in the U.S.? Was it better to go to a large university or a smaller one? Did the part of the country matter? How did the U.S. higher education system work? How was it different from Europe? I gave a mini-lecture on American higher education, and American arts education, and the whole time felt twinges of guilt because, sadly, I knew that their chances of ever studying in the U.S. were minimal. If they had degrees in engineering, IT, or business and finance, their chances would be much better, but with arts degrees their overseas choices were probably limited to Canada, Australia, or New Zealand. The sad point was that, across the academic spectrum, many of Iran’s “best and brightest” saw no future in Iran. Obtaining a student visa was only the first step. A university degree, better yet a graduate degree, meant a chance of employment, which meant establishing a new life in the land where they had received their education, which meant never returning to Iran.

  “Funny, isn’t it,” Golnaz, one of the students, said as I left, “you’ve been wanting to come to Iran for such a long time, and we only want to go to America.”

  Esfahan is one of those cities, like Paris or Madrid, Prague or Saint Petersburg, that is made for exploration by foot. Almost all of the sights are close to the center—the center meaning Naqsh-e Jahan Square—and connected by tree-lined boulevards that bear the pedestrian traffic from early morning until late in the evening. Like Tehran, Esfahan now has a metro, which opened in 2015, but like metros in most cities, it is mainly a commuters’ necessity. The best way to experience any city is on foot.

  I had a full day ahead of me. I chose to start at the bird market, a mile or two north of the square, head over to the historic bathhouse, now a museum, and then turn south toward Naqsh-e Jahan Square, and from there cross the historic stone bridges that cross the Zayandeh-rud, or Zayandeh River, and end in the Julfa district, home of the largest Armenian community outside of Armenia.

  The hotel where I was staying was another sonnati, or Qajar-era house converted into a hotel. In several old quarters of Iranian cities, enterprising Iranians saw great promise in these dusty, crumbling relics from the nineteenth century, spruced them up, installed air conditioning, refurbished the rooms with antique furnishings, refitted the courtyard pools, and opened them up for business. In any other part of the world they would have been a developer’s dream, with rooms going for $200 to $300 a night. But here in Iran, rooms were almost free for the taking, at around $40, but they were still a flight of fancy for those who believed, “Build it and they will come.”

  I had breakfast in the open-air courtyard and then made my way up to the bird market, tucked inside a neighborhood bazaar at a busy intersection. Middle Eastern countries may be known for camel markets and the trading of goats, sheep, and donkeys, but, geographically, Iran lies on the eastern fringe of the Middle East. It may border Iraq and the Arab states on the other side of the Persian Gulf, but its eastern border faces Afghanistan, and beyond that Pakistan and central Asia, where the delight in avian wildlife has been celebrated for centuries, in painting and poetry.

  Many centuries ago, the Sufi poet Rumi found expression through the image of the bird:

  I want to sing like the birds sing,

  Not worrying about who hears,

  Or what they think.

  And the thirteenth-century master Saadi observed:

  A student who learns without desire

  Is a bird without wings.

  In Persian literature the bird has also represented freedom and the flight of the soul. In The Conference of the Birds, a twelfth-century literary masterpiece of allegory by the poet Farid ud-Din Attar, all of the birds in the world congregate to choose a ruler. Yet each candidate possesses a human shortcoming that has hindered its spiritual progress. To become ruler, each must reach the dwelling of Simorgh, which in Farsi means thirty (si) birds (morgh). During their journey, many die, and only thirty of the birds eventually reach Simorgh, where they learn a simple but illuminating lesson—that enlightenment resides only in themselves.

  Like so much Persian poetry, natural imagery quickly attains spiritual meaning, as though the purpose of the natural world were little more than to serve as a window into the ethereal. In The Conference of the Birds, Attar wrote:

  If Simorgh unveils its force to you

  You will find that all the birds,

  Be they thirty or forty or more,

  Are but shadows cast by that unveiling.

  What shadow is ever separated from its maker?

  Do you see?<
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  The shadow and its maker are one and the same,

  So get over surfaces and delve into mysteries.

  The master of verse Hafez connected birds to his favorite subject—love—but a kind of love that embraces both the earthly and the spiritual:

  I saw two birds on a limb this morning

  Laughing with the sun.

  They reminded me of how

  We will one day exist.

  My dear,

  Keep thinking about God,

  Keep thinking about the Beloved

  And soon our nest will be the

  Whole firmament.

  Forget about all your desires for truth,

  We have gone far beyond that.

  For now it is just—

  Pure need.

  Both our hearts are meant to sing.

  Both our souls are destined to touch

  And kiss

  Upon this holy flute

  God carries.

  Anywhere in the world such a potent image would rise to the level of myth, and the bird and Iran are no different. In Persian mythology the bird of legend is Simorgh. Simorgh resembles a giant eagle or hawk, but she—and Simorgh is unequivocally female—is anything but a vicious bird of prey. She embodies the values of kindness, empathy, nurturance, and generosity. Simorgh also possesses great wisdom. She has lived so long that she has survived three cycles of the destruction of the world, and in that time absorbed all the knowledge of humanity. Simorgh is also responsible for the fertility of the Earth. She made her nest in the Tree of Life, which rose from the center of the Vourukasha (World Sea). Whenever Simorgh flew from the tree, its leaves shook so violently that it scattered the seeds of every plant on Earth, and this abundant greenery possesses the power to cure the maladies of all humankind.

  The powers of Simorgh are most vividly revealed in a tale from Ferdowsi’s Shahnameh. The grandfather of Rostam was Saam, and, according to the epic poem, Saam was horrified when his wife gave birth to an albino son, whom he named Zal. But Saam believed Zal to be the offspring of demons, so to be rid of him, Saam left him to die on the slopes of the Alborz Mountains. Little did Saam know that the mountaintop was also home to Simorgh. The bird heard Zal’s weeping and saved him from certain death, and then raised him as she would one of her own offspring. As time passed, Zal longed to return to the world from which he had come. Parting was difficult, but when the time came Simorgh gave Zal three golden feathers to burn should he ever need her to come to his aid.

  Zal returned home and eventually found a wife in Rudaba, one of the kingdom’s beauties. Soon they were expecting a child, and when the time came Rudaba’s labor was long and painful. Rudaba was about to die when Zal called upon Simorgh by burning the three feathers. True to her word, the bird appeared and taught Zal how to deliver the child by caesarean section. Rudaba survived and gave birth to the legendary hero Rustam.

  I found the bazaar and the bird market with relative ease, but neither the spirit of Attar nor of Hafez. But there were birds, by the dozens and hundreds, silent and squawking, flittering and fluttering in metal cages, some still too young for flight. A group of children were gathered around a cardboard box where a collection of young chicks, newly hatched and brightly colored in yellow, pink, blue, and green, flapped their wings and tried to squint through eyes that had yet to see. All were destined to live the rest of their lives in cages in middle-class homes, where they would be watered and fed and occasionally spoken to and played with, but the emotional lift of the spirit inspired by the words of Hafez, Attar, and other poets would be confined to their verses, caged like the birds in the bird market.

  I left the market quite downcast. The noise and flutter of feathers, mixed with the stench of the droppings, made it hard to connect this world of birds to Hafez:

  Both our hearts are meant to sing,

  Both our souls are meant to touch.

  I left the market behind and headed off to the Ali Gholi Agha Hammam, or traditional bathhouse. It had been built by Ali Gholi Agha, a member of the royal court in the early eighteenth century. Most traditional bathhouses in Iran have been converted either into museums or restaurants, and the Ali Gholi went the historic route.

  In the nineteenth century Esfahan was sprinkled with dozens of bathhouses, fed by wells rather than hot springs. They held an important place in both social and religious life. If one wanted to catch up on local gossip, informed citizens went to the bathhouse. If a devout Muslim wanted to maintain bodily purity, he or she went to the bathhouse. If one wanted to kill two birds with one stone, the bathhouse was the place to do it. The bathhouse also functioned as a one-stop medical clinic. If one were suffering from muscle tension, insomnia, bronchitis, anxiety, or any of a list of ailments, a physician might prescribe a trip to the bathhouse.

  On the way to the Ali Gholi I imagined a loincloth hanging outside, which in the nineteenth century signaled it was open to men. No loincloth in the morning meant women’s hours. In the nineteenth century there also would have been no ticket seller, for the visit would have been provided as a community service. The greeter would have been the hammami, who supervised an army of staff whose skills could satisfy every human need. The dallak would scrub the client’s body with a sponge mitten. A haircut would be given by the salmani, a shave by the challakian. My clothes would be looked after by a jamehdar. An asignan would massage my muscles. If I wanted my head shaved, a sartoashan would do it. A sonybandan would dye my beard, and the fassandan would drain any bad blood lurking in my veins.

  Let us imagine this is the nineteenth century. I am only here for a simple bath, to wash away the stench of the bird market. I move on to the vaulted hall lined with stone slabs. The light from the ceiling dome passes through imbedded triangles of glass and fills the room with a soft blue-and-white glow. I strip down, wrap myself in a loincloth, and sip sweet tea while the attendant soaps me down. From there I move on to the garm-khane, or steam room. After a dip in the pool I stretch out on another slab of stone, and the dallak pours water on the tiles, heated through an underground piping system. Quickly, the air is puffed with clouds of steam. My muscles become limp ribbons. The dallak takes a pumice stone and rubs off the rough, dead skin on my heels and palms. Fully poached and scraped, I am ready to leave.

  In the heyday of the hammam there would have been stands nearby where clients could refresh themselves with a glass of cherry or pomegranate juice. Nothing like that was waiting when I left, but further up the street I found a juice bar and took some of the edge off with a watermelon-mint combo. With or without the bath it went down cool and smooth, whipped up sparklingly fresh in the blender behind the counter, a recharge just as the afternoon was warming up.

  A few minutes later I was back at Naqsh-e Jahan Square. There was no sign of Ahmadinejad’s visit of the day before. Not even a torn poster of the hardline duo of Khomeini-Khamenei remained. Like the traveling circus that it was, it had been packed up and carted away. For Esfahanis like Mehrad it was welcome relief. The cleanup crew was sweeping up not discarded trash but the specter of the regime itself.

  Naqsh-e Jahan Square was the creation of Shah Abbas after he moved his capital to Esfahan from the northern city of Qazvin, fearing the expansion of the Ottoman Empire. Esfahan was further south but at the time better strategically located, close to the Persian Gulf and the increasingly profitable trade routes for Portuguese and other European merchants. The city also developed a reputation for tolerance and inclusion, which in historical terms dated back to the reign of Cyrus I. Many ethnic and religious groups had made the city their home. Some of the Jews freed from Babylonian captivity settled in Esfahan rather than return to Jerusalem. An account by Ibn Al-Fajah Al-Hamedani, a tenth-century historian, reads:

  When the Jews emigrated from Babylon, fleeing Nebuchadnezzar, they carried with them a sample of the water and soil of Jerusalem. They did not settle down anywhere or in any city without examining the water and soil. They did this everywhere until they reached Es
fahan. There they rested, examined the water and soil, and found that both resembled Jerusalem. Then they settled there, and today the name of this settlement is Yahudia.

  Many centuries later, Esfahan would receive an inflow of Christians. Throughout the sixteenth century the northern reaches of the empire were populated with Christian Armenian communities under threat from the Turkish Ottomans. In 1606 Shah Abbas ordered a forced resettlement of the Armenians to Esfahan and set aside a section of the city to be their new home. Three hundred thousand Armenians were sent south to populate New Julfa, named after the thriving Armenian city of Julfa, north of Tabriz. The shah’s motives are still a little on the sketchy side. Aside from any threat the Turks posed to the Christian minority, he recognized the Armenians’ talents in business and commerce, and believed they would provide the economy of his empire with a shot in the arm, and there would be no better place to do this than in the new capital. After much hardship on the part of the Armenians—namely, hunger and disease—those who survived the trek flowed into the Julfa district. For the survivors, it may have been worth it. Quickly, the Armenian merchants became major players in a trading network that stretched from Europe to eastern Asia, laying the foundations of a modern Iranian economy.