TEHRAN – “The Comprehensive History of Iran” was introduced during a ceremony at the Center for the Great Islamic Encyclopedia on Tuesday.

The unveiling ceremony was attended by the chairman of the Expediency Council, Ayatollah Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance Ali Jannati, center director Kazem Musavi Bojnurdi and a large number of academics and cultural figures, Persian media reported on Tuesday.

The 20-volume book explores the political, historical and social aspects of Iran since the pre-Islamic era to the reign of the Qajar dynasty.

The first five volumes cover the history of Iran before Islam, and the other fifteen contains the history of Iran within the Islamic era.

In his opening speech, Jannati called the compilation of a book on history an extremely difficult task and said, “Many have spent their lives conducting research for this book and some passed away before the book was published such as the scholars Iraj Afhsar (1925-2011) and Enayatolah Reza (1920-2010)”.

“Although they are not alive to see the fruits of their labor, their spirits will make the best use of it,” Jannati said.

He added that historiography needs a complete knowledge on history and unlimited love toward the history and culture of the country.

Jannati also mentioned that the center has made great efforts in publishing the book.

“History is a combination of culture and politics of a society, and this book surely aims to make Iranians and non-Iranians more familiar with the history and culture of Iran,” he added.

“The book contains the political, social and cultural history of all Iranians in the past and depicts all the behavior, thoughts and lives of Iranians over the past 3000 years,” Musavi Bojnurdi said.

“This book is the most significant document on national identity of Iranians and we aim to keep it alive and remove its shortcomings over the course of time,” he added.

Hashemi Rafsanjani also expressed his happiness over the publication of the book.

“I am delighted to see the appearance of this invaluable work for the history of our country. Of course the great historians had previously written the history of Iran in pieces, but a complete collection was required for readers and researchers containing the history from the beginning until today,” he said.

One of the chief editors of the book, Sadeq Sajjadi, in his brief speech paid tribute to Iraj Afshar as one of the first researchers in historiography.

A council composed of 48 professional experts supervised all research conducted for writing the book, which is priced at 17 million rials (over $500).



Photo: National Library and Archives of Iran Director Reza Salehi-Amiri (L) gives a volume of “The Comprehensive History of Iran” to Expediency Council Chairman Ayatollah Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani during the unveiling ceremony of the book at the Center for the Great Islamic Encyclopedia in Tehran on June 16, 2015. (ISNA/Ruhollah Vahdati)

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