Recent archaeological research in Iran - Prehistory to Iron Age

Abstract

In spite of considerable hardships of the late 1970s and several years afterwards, archaeologi-cal research in Iran never completely halted. A few Iranian expeditions were at work, even during the difficult years of the war. Since the 1990s, nevertheless, archaeological research in Iran experienced a considerable reinvigoration. The amount of field expeditions has risen to more than 250 programs in the Iranian year 1384 (March 2005–March 2006), including a dozen for-eign – Iranian joint missions since 2000. The Iranian Cultural Heritage Organization (ICHO; “Sazemān-e Mirās-e Farhangi-e Kešvar”), the suc-cessor of the National Organization for the Pro-tection of the Ancient Monuments of Iran and the (“Sazemān-e melli-ye hefāzat-e āsār-e bāstāni-ye