Indigenous Knowledge
Hosein Raie
Abstract
Throughout history, Iranians' livelihoods were contingent on agriculture and farming, and affluent landowners and lords were regarded as noble and high social strata. Existing historical and archaeological records and documents demonstrate agricultural heritage sites in Iran's cultural area. Some are ...
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Throughout history, Iranians' livelihoods were contingent on agriculture and farming, and affluent landowners and lords were regarded as noble and high social strata. Existing historical and archaeological records and documents demonstrate agricultural heritage sites in Iran's cultural area. Some are related to farmsteads, which developed from the early Islamic ages to the twentieth century and were utilized for centuries as a means of subsistence and commerce. They had four ownership system types: endowment, lordship, court and regality, and in the Qajar and Pahlavi periods, part of them came under lordship ownership. This ownership type has resulted in physical and functional changes in historical farmsteads due to political, social, and economic changes in Iran during the 19th and 20th centuries, challenging their identity and authenticity.The moot point of the research is the need for a deeper understanding of the relationship between lordly ownership and the life of Iranian farmsteads during the Qajar and Pahlavi periods, and this article aims to introduce the influential elements using the interpretive approach and historical interpretive strategy. To this end, the Qazibala farmstead in Qom will be used as a healthy and comprehensive case study of an Iranian farmstead.