Talking gazelles at Ahuan

I’m fascinated by the area around Ahuan. Isidore of Charax’s Parthian Stations run through it. It’s near where Darius was killed by his men as he tried to escape from Alexander. And the Seleucid King Antiochus chased Arsaces across here too, with both forces trying to take control over the water supplies.

Now, there’s a pre-Islamic ribat (fort); and also a very splendid Safavid caravanserai, erected – not for Shah Abbas, as is often said – but in 1685 (so in the reign of Shah Soleiman).

When I visited, apart from these buildings I saw only a petrol station with queues of cars. Nineteenth century travelers, however, told much prettier stories about the local wildlife – the name ‘Ahuan’ apparently comes from ‘Ahu’ (for gazelle) in the plural.

The diplomat Eastwick (in the 1840s) saw four foxes, and was told that no one shoots wild animals at ‘Ahowan’ since they are sacred. This was apparently, he said, “in consequence of an absurd legend, that Ali met here a deer that complained to him of a huntsman who had carried off her fawn. Ali, says the story, restored the fawn to its dam”.

Even cuter than that was the fawn brought to Jackson in 1911. Jackson was told that the saintly Imam Riza, passing through one day, met a huntsman who had just caught a deer. At sight of the saint the animal “became gifted with speech, and besought him to allow her to return to her young ones, at home, who would perish for want of nourishment if she were kept a prisoner. Thereupon the saint ordered the huntsman to let her go, promising to go bail for her reappearance. The huntsman obeyed, but as the deer never returned, he complained to the saint, who then, by force of prayer, summoned back the animal to its captor, and it was kept sacred by him ever after.”