ANDĪMEŠK

 

ANDĪMEŠK (also ANDĀMEŠ, ANDĀLMEŠK), the name of medieval Dezfūl. Modern Andīmešk is the former village of Ṣāleḥābād, 8 km northwest of Dezfūl. Lying at the foot of the Zagros mountains (altitude 160 m) it owes its recent growth (7,324 inhabitants in 1956, 16,195 in 1966) to its location as the site of an important station on the Trans-Iranian Railway in 1929 which served as the starting point for further construction across the mountains. During World War II it became a transfer point for petroleum bound north for Russia; to reduce railroad traffic, a pipeline was built from Ābādān to Andīmešk, where the petroleum was transferred to trucks or trains, an arrangement that continued until the pipeline was extended through the mountains to Tehran in l955. Today the town derives its livelihood from the presence of military bases and a large factory for railroad ties, begun as a Franco-Iranian venture. The recently created township of Andīmešk does not own any real estate; neighboring lands belong primarily to the inhabitants of Dezfūl.

Bibliography:

Estaḵrī, p. l97.

Ebn Ḥawqal, p. 361.

Yāqūt, I, p. 372.

Nozhat al-qolūb, p. 111.

J. G. Lorimer, Gazetteer of the Persian Gulf, ʿOmān and Central Arabia II, repr. of Calcutta, 1908, p. 479.

Kayhān, Joḡrāfīā II, p. 472.

E. Ehlers, “Dezful and Its Hinterland: Observations on the Relationships of Lesser Iranian Cities and Towns to Their Hinterland: Geography,” Journal of the Association of Iranian Geographers 1, 1976, pp. 20-30, with map and table.

Idem, Traditionelle und moderne Formen der Landwirtschaft in Iran: Siedlung, Wirtschaft und Agrarsozialstruktur im nördlichen Khuzistan seit dem Ende des 19. Jahrhunderts, Marburg, 1975.

Great Britain, Naval Intelligence Division, Persia, Geographical Handbook Series, Oxford, l946, pp. 549, 555-58, 560.

Razmārā, Farhang VI, pp. 27-28.

(X. De Planhol)

Originally Published: December 15, 1985

Last Updated: August 3, 2011

This article is available in print.
Vol. II, Fasc. 1, p. 26

Cite this entry:

X. De Planhol, “ANDĪMEŠK,” Encyclopædia Iranica, II/1, p. 26, available online at http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/andimesk (accessed on 30 December 2012).