Built in Kashan, Iran and completed in 1590, Fin Garden is the oldest garden in Iran. It’s a traditional Persian garden that may or may not have begun under Abbas I’s reign during the Safavid dynasty. May or may not because it could have preceded Abbas I. The timeline is a little sketchy. We do know it was considered complete in the late 1500s and expanded by other rulers most notably, Karim Khan and Fat’h Ali Shah Aajar.
It’s had a long history of political and royal intrigue. In fact, at one point, the site was where Iran’s “great reformer,” Amir Kabir, was exiled and eventually assassinated by King Nasereddin Shah in 1852.
For some time the garden fell into disrepair and was damaged several times, but in 1935 the the Iranian government made the garden national property and set about restoring the garden and its several structures including 4 circular towers. The site has many water features including fountains and pools fed by a stream located at the back of the garden site which has such strong pressure that none of these features has ever needed mechanical pumps.
The garden became a World Heritage site by UNESCO in 2011. While most of us won’t find ourselves sightseeing in Iran, if you do make it there the entrance fee is 200,000 IR which equates to just under $5 US.
Image: Fin , near Kashan by Eugène Flandin.jpg Public Domain
Sources:“Bagh-e Fin”. gardenreview.com. Retrieved 2021-04-05.
Amanat, Abbas (2017). Iran: A Modern History. Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0300112542
Blow, David (2009). Shah Abbas: The Ruthless King Who Became an Iranian Legend. London, UK: I. B. Tauris. ISBN 978-1-84511-989-8. LCCN 2009464064.
Molavi, Afshin, The Soul of Iran, Norton, 2005, p.195,197
Amanat, Abbas (1991). “The Downfall of Mirza Taqi Khan Amir Kabir and the Problem of Ministerial Authority in Qajar Iran”. International Journal of Middle East Studies. Vol. 23. Oxford: Cambridge University Press. pp. 577–599.