An aerial view of Meybod in Yazd province

TEHRAN, March 4--Cultural heritage authorities in the central province of Yazd have for the first time undertaken an elaborate program to treat historical sites with pesticides, reported ISNA.
According to deputy head of the Cultural Heritage Base in the historical city, Mojtaba Farahmand, pesticide was sprayed in the Jame’ Mosque of Fahraj, 30 km from Yazd to protect the site which is fast decaying.
He said that Jame’ Mosque in Fahraj belongs to the early Islamic era and is one of the most rare examples of architecture dating back to 45 AH. It is one of the unique examples of Iranian culture and civilization which has survived to the modern era and its preservation is of great significance.
The official said that the most important threat to the ancient mosque was termite and a campaign was conducted to fight the scourge by placing 60 devices to track down the pest in neighboring houses.
Farahmand said that a type of termite called ’microcerotermes sp’ was identified as belonging to termitidae family of the subterranean species.
He said that a research center was established under the supervision of Dr. Rahim Ghaiurfar to counter the termite attack.
In addition to Fahraj Jame’ Mosque, the mausoleum of Seyyed Shamseddin was also treated with pesticides as well as Ziaiyeh School or Eskandar’s prison and Hosseinian’s House dating back to the Ilkhanid era (1256-1343 AD), he concluded.

Minaskanian playing piano at a concert on the 150th birth anniversary of Mozart at Vahdat Hall.

Iranian music scholar and virtuoso pianist, Raphael Minaskanian will perform a selection of his wide repertoire of classical music in two up-coming concerts in Paris and Los Angeles, during this Norouz, Iranian new year which begins on March 21.
Minaskanian will present works by Mozart, Schumann and the late Emanuel Melek Aslanian at the Salle Cortot in Paris on March 13 and an exclusive piano recital of varied compositions by Schubert and Schumann at the Schoenberg Hall of the UCLA in Los Angeles, California on March 26.
Minaskanian has brought style and discipline through long years of pioneering work in the field of concert music, in his native land.
Well-versed in orchestral, symphonic or chamber piano recitals, he ranks among leading Iranian and international pianists, widely acclaimed for the sheer beauty of his melodic performances.
Audiences worldwide have enjoyed his carefully organized yet flexible rhythms whenever his treatment of music come across through his varied repertoire, dealing with the old and more severe contexts or the more modern and ornate compositions.
Born in Tehran in a musically oriented family and encouraged much by his mother, Minaskanian showed extraordinary talent at the age of six and his early performances became regular hits during the first televised concerts in Tehran.
Entering the school of medicine in the United States, he was soon advised to take up music professionally by one of the noted UCLA music scholars. His early studies in the US, Italy and London as well as in the Juilliard School of Music in New York, provided Minaskanian with a wide range of style and approach to classical music.
Despite having the opportunity to live and study abroad, he has always remained faithful to one of his early music teacher and composer the late Emanuel Melek Aslanian, who gave him the authentic style and feeling for classical music.
His performances at the Purcell Room of the Royal Festival Hall, and in the US and European capitals are avidly sought out by music lovers, yet Minaskanian’s
love for his native country has always kept him active in teaching and performing during most parts of the scholastic year.
He is rated among top music teachers and jurors at Tehran University College of Music, and numerous music students have benefited from his expertise before he went abroad for higher studies.
Minaskanian’s devotion to music and academic works at Tehran University keep him quite active between local classical performances and foreign tours.
Among the recent events that marked out Miniaskanian’s tribute to his teacher and early mentor, was a brilliant concert he gave in memory of the late
Iranian pianist Aslanian, playing several of his pieces, along with those by Bach, Beethoven, and Chopin.

TEHRAN, March 4--The second round of lectures sponsored by the London Middle East Institute affiliated to the School of Oriental and African Studies, London University began at the British Museum on Friday.
According to CHN, the lectures are presented under the general theme: Iran’s Map: From Khorasan to Euphrates, focus on the Achaemenid era (about 500 BC).
The first round of the event was held earlier at the British Museum concurrent with an exhibition on the Achaemenid Empire.
The first lecturer of the event was Vesta Sarkhosh, head of the Ancient Iran’s Coins Section, who focused on ’Revival of Iranians in the Parthian Era’. He dealt with the rise of the Parthians, their migration from northeastern Iran and the expansion of their political base from the third millennium BC for nearly 400 years.
Head of London University’s Art and Archeology Section, Professor David Biwar also presented a paper on the first Indo-Parthian king.
The last lecturer of the event will talk about the text in Avesta.

TEHRAN, March 4--Preliminary works for the registration of villages in the vicinity of Burnt City (Shahr-e Sukhtah), setting up databanks on potteries and commissioning a unique trove of ancient fabrics have been completed.
Announcing this, director of Shahr-e Sukhtah Cultural Heritage Base, Ali Reza Khosravi, told ISNA that the initial stage for registering the villages near Burnt City on the national heritage list was completed following the survey and cartography of 47 mounds in at least 700 villages.
Noting that each of the villages has independent identity and will receive special registration number, Khosravi added that with the registration of the villages on the national heritage list, the entire region will be transformed into a cultural site. This will curtail movement in the area which will only be possible with the permission of Iran’s Cultural Heritage and Tourism Organization (ICHTO).
He further announced the completion of the first phase of setting up a databank on potteries and said that 7,000 pieces have been identified and classified in this phase.
The databank, which is considered to be the only computerized bank in southeastern Iran, is ready for use, he noted.
Khosravi said that in compiling the information, all physical and artistic characteristics of the potteries will be recorded to facilitate access to the databank by researchers.
Stating that Burnt City is home to the most precious and unique trove of cloths dating back to the third and fourth millennia BC, Khosravi said that the collection has also been categorized for ready access by researchers.

TEHRAN, March 4--Noted Iranian poetess Soraya Kahrizi has compiled and recomposed the lullabies hummed by Iranian and Iraqi mothers from the Kurdish community called ’Hardship of Life’ in cooperation with Hashem Salimi and published them in a book.
Kahrizi told Fars news agency that credible reference books, documents and Kurdish folklore publications were used in a series of research studies and compilation of the book on lullabies.
She said that Kurdish reference books also came in helpful in conducting research studies.
Asked to elaborate on the features of the book, she said that she translated the lullabies available in the reference books in Kurdish language into Persian and put them in the form of poetry.
“I have done my best to preserve the beauty of the original poetry in Kurdish language. My incentive to do such a job was to present the extent to which lullaby of Kurdish mothers conveys hardship and sufferings of the Kurdish community. I myself wept several times while listening to lullabies hummed by Kurdish mothers,“ she confessed.
Kahrizi said that the book has 260 pages in seven chapters and each chapter represents lullabies of a specific region of Iranian province of Kurdestan and Iraqi Kurdistan.
She said that the book contains complete classic poetry on lullaby.

TEHRAN, March 4--Thousands of books, valued at more than 120 billion rials, are lying unused in the depot of the Printing and Publications Organization of the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance.
Reporting this, Fars news agency quoted an informed source as saying that unfortunately the books have been stored for long and not distributed because officials claim that the people are not interested in buying books.
Of course, there are a number of reasons for the failure to distribute the books, the most important of which is that they are not so useful.
Referring to the measures taken by the staffers of the organization to reduce the number of the books in the depot, the report said that they have written a letter to the minister proposing that book vouchers be issued for 20,000 staffers of the ministry, which will reduce the value of the books held in the depot by some 4,000-5,000 million rials each year. However, this proposal has not yet been approved, it said.
Some of the books in the depot are those which have been confiscated because they contain inappropriate material, the source said.