From Timur’s tent in Samarqand to Shah ‘Abbas’s palace in Isfahan and Humayun’s tomb in Delhi, the pavilion has been an integral part of Persianate gardens since the Achaemenid garden in Pasargadae in the sixth century BC. Here, Mohammad Gharipour places both the garden and the pavilion within their historical, literary and artistic contexts, emphasizing the importance of the pavilion, so overlooked in the study of Iranian historical architecture. He does so by examining the representations of gardens and pavilions in religious texts (such as the Zoroastrian Aban Yasht or the Qur’an), the poetry of major Persian poets (such as Ferdowsi, Sa’di, Rumi and Hafez), miniature painting, sculpture and carpets, as well as accounts of travelers to Persia. Gharipour thereby highlights the spiritual, symbolic and religious aspects of gardens, as well as their more social and economic functions, reflecting patterns of patronage and ownership. This book reaches back through Persia’s rich history to explore the relationships between human beings and their domestic environments and will be a valuable resource for Art History, Architecture and Iranian Studies.
