BAHĀRVAND, a Lur tribe now living mostly in the dehestāns (districts) of Kargāh and Bālā Garīva, south and southwest of Ḵorramābād. It forms a part of the Dīrakvand tribal confederacy. According to oral tradition, the connection between the Bahārvands and the Dīrakvands was established toward the end of the 10th/16th century, when a man named Bahār moved to the village of Dara-ye Naṣab, south of Ḵorramābād, from the village of Robāṭ, north of that town, and married a certain Dīrak, who was the leader of the Dīrakvand tribe (S. Amanollahi-Baharvand, The Baharvand, Former Pastoralists of Iran, Ph.D. thesis, Rice University, May, 1975, p. 43).
Under Bahār’s grandsons, Morād-ʿAlī and Kord-ʿAlī, the Bahārvand tribe was divided into two clans, Morād-ʿAlīvand and Kord-ʿAlīvand. For a long time, the tribe had its summer quarters around Dara-ye Naṣab and its winter quarters further south, toward Dezfūl. But at the end of the 11th/17th century, for reasons that are still unknown, it was forced to dwell the year round in its winter quarters in the Korkī region, where it eked out a living from both agriculture and animal husbandry (ibid.).
Owing to dynamic leadership and a growing population, the tribe, starting in 1830, underwent a period of expansion, as a result of which it became “one of the most powerful tribes of Luristan with substantial holdings of land” (ibid., p. 44). It defeated the Sagvand tribe, which had encroached upon its territory, taking over the Čenāra mountains, as well as the plains of Reżā, Čīn-e Zāl and Bīdrūba. Toward the end of the 13th/19th century, it moved northward, routing the Mīr tribe and occupying the Ṭāʾī valley. Then, in 1321/1903, it defeated the Pāpī tribe, reoccupying the Dara-ye Naṣab valley and annexing the nearby Ṭāf valley (ibid.. pp. 44-49). A. T. Wilson, who visited Luristan in 1329/1911, described the Bahārvand tribe as the strongest of the Dīrakvand tribes. According to him, it contained some 1,000 families (the same figure is given by Kayhān [Joḡrāfīā II, p. 66] for 1311 Š./1932) with a fighting force of 1,000 men, 500 of whom were armed with rifles, and possessed large flocks of sheep and goats, many mares and a number of mules (Luristan, Simla, 1912, p. 19). In 1332/1914, the Bahārvand tribe allied itself with the Mīr tribe and conquered the Kargāh (Ḵorramābād) valley (Amanollahi-Baharvand, op. cit., p. 49).
The Bahārvand tribe, like other tribes of the Pīš(-e) Kūh, suffered greatly from the harsh measures taken by General Aḥmad Amīr Aḥmadī to quell tribal unrest in the region in 1923 and from Reżā Shah’s forced settlement policy. Ḥosayn Khan, the leader of the tribe, and his brother were both arrested in 1929 and kept in confinement for twelve years (ibid., p. 51).
Today, the Bahārvands are completely sedentary. According to a list of the tribes of Iran published in 1963, it then comprised 5,000 families (J. Behruz, Iran Almanach, 3rd ed., Tehran, 1963, p. 424).
Bibliography:
See also Ḥ. Īzadpanāh, Āṯār-e bāstānī o tārīḵī-e Lorestān, Ḵorramābād, 2535 = 1355 Š./1976, table facing p. 4.
(P. Oberling)
Originally Published: December 15, 1988
Last Updated: August 23, 2011
This article is available in print.
Vol. III, Fasc. 5, pp. 484-485
