Nahavand

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Nahavand (Kurdish: Nehawend); also transliterated Nahavend, Nahawand, Nehavand, Nihavand or Nehavend; formerly called Laodicea (Greek: Λαοδικεια; Arabic Ladhiqiyya), also transliterated Laodiceia and Laodikeia, Laodicea in Media, Laodicea in Persis, Antiochia in Persis, Antiochia of Chosroes (Greek: Αντιόχεια του Χοσρόη), Antiochia in Media (Greek: Αντιόχεια της Μηδίας), Nemavand and Niphaunda – is a town in Hamadan Province in Iran.

It had an estimated population of 77,206 in 2005.[1]

The city was founded by Seleucus I Nicator, in Media along with the two other Hellenistic cities of Apamea and Heraclea. (Strabo xi. p. 524 ; Stephanus of Byzantium "Laodikeia") Pliny (vi. 29) describes it as being in the extreme limits of Media, and (re-)founded by Antiochus I.

The city was a center of Chosroes I's empire. After military reverses (ca. 540) following his sack of Syrian Antiochia in 538, he was forced to rename his capital "Antiochia".

It is the site of the Battle of Nihawānd in 642 that completed the Islamic conquest of Iran.

Natives of Nahavand include Benjamin Nahawandi, who was a key figure in the development of Karaite Judaism in the Early Middle Ages, and 8th-century astronomer Ahmad Nahavandi, who worked at the Academy of Gundishapur.

[edit] References

• Richard Talbert, Barrington Atlas of the Greek and Roman World, (ISBN 0-691-03169-X), p. 92.

[edit] External links

• Hamedan Province Cultural Heritage Website
• Persian History Website
• Smith, William (editor); Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography, "Laodiceia", London, (1854)

This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography by William Smith (1857).