Qazvin Provincee

Qazvin (Persian: قزوین, also spelled as Ghazvin) is the largest city and capital of the Province of Qazvin in Iran with an estimated population of 331,409 in 2005.

Introduction and history

Qazvin (historically also rendered as Kazvin, Kasvin, and Casbin in the West) is a city in Iran, some 150 km northwest of Tehran, in Qazvin Province. It is at an altitude of about 1800 meters above sea level, and is a city with a cool but dry climate being south of the rugged Alborz range.
The city was the location of a former capital of the Persian Empire and contains over 2000 architectural and archeological sites. It is a provincial capital today that has been an important cultural center throughout history.
Archeological findings in the Qazvin plain reveal urban agricultural settlements for at least nine millennia. The name “Qazvin” or “Kasbin” is derived from Cas, an ancient tribe which lived south of the Caspian Sea a thousand years ago. The Caspian Sea itself in fact derives its name from the same origin. Qazvin geographically connects Tehran, Isfahan, and the Persian Gulf to the Caspian seacoast and Asia Minor, hence its strategic location throughout the ages.
The city today known as Qazvin is thought to have been founded by Shapur II, King of Persia in 250 CE, under the name Shad Shahpur, when he built a fortification there to control regional tensions.
Qazvin has sometimes been of central importance at important moments of Iranian history. Captured by invading Arabs (644 AD) and destroyed by Genghis Khan (13th century), the Safavid monarchs made Qazvin the capital of the Safavid empire in 1548 only to have it moved to Isfahan in 1598.
Hasan-i Sabbah established the headquarters of the Hashshashin at the nearby fortress of Alamut about 1090.
Bombed and occupied by Russian forces in both World Wars, Qazvin is also the place from which the famous coup d’état that led to the rise of the first Pahlavi dynasty was launched in 1921.