Shahbaz Nouri Fesharaki; Mohsen Javeri; Mohammad Mortezayi
Abstract
Esfahan is one of the cities that, despite its ups and downs, retains part of its historic texture and is relatively healthy. Two factors have contributed to the maintenance of the ...
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Esfahan is one of the cities that, despite its ups and downs, retains part of its historic texture and is relatively healthy. Two factors have contributed to the maintenance of the relative health of the old city: relatively low rainfall and low relative humidity on the one hand, and the lack of destructive earthquakes on the other. The quarter of Jobareh (or Jubara) has a brilliant history as the oldest quarter in the city of Esfahan. The mosque is the main core of the city of Esfahan, and its oldest residential quarter dates back to the Achaemenid period; it is reknowned for the centrality of the establishment of the Jewish community there. This quarter was famous for its Jewish population from the beginning of Islam until the fifth century AH. During the Seljuk period, this quarter was located adjacent to important monuments, including the mosque and the Seljuk and market complex, and the city square. This paper tries to answer the following questions: what was the impact of the Jobareh quarter on the formation and growth of the city of Esfahan in the early Islamic centuries and what was the role of the Jews as its native and primary inhabitants in the formation of this historic quarter? The research method used in this study is descriptive–analytical, based on archaeological data including archaeological sites, cultural sites and all monuments ranging from pre-Islamic times to the Safavid period. According to the arguments presented in this paper, one can conclude that one of the most important centers of Esfahan for immigrant Arabs was the Jubara quarter, with the Arabs living in this quarter and with its growing prosperity, it became an important quarter; as time went on, it became larger than the Jay quarter, and the throne of Esfahan was thus transferred from Jay to Judea.
