Janan Lu () is a village in, and the capital of,

Minjavan-e Sharqi Rural District Minjavan-e Sharqi Rural District () is in Minjavan District of Khoda Afarin County, East Azerbaijan province, Iran. Its capital is the village of Janan Lu. Demographics Population At the time of the 2006 National Census, the rural district ...

Minjavan District Minjavan District () is in Khoda Afarin County, East Azerbaijan province, Iran. Its capital is the village of Asheqlu. History The only noteworthy allusion to the district in official records relates to an appeal by the inhabitants of th ...

Khoda Afarin County Khoda Afarin County () is in East Azerbaijan province, East Azerbaijan province, Iran. Its capital is the city of Khomarlu. History Before the Islamic Revolution, the city of Khomarlu was merely a village that was distinguished from other ...

East Azerbaijan East Azerbaijan province () is one of the 31 provinces of Iran. Its capital is the city of Tabriz. The province is located in Iranian Azerbaijan, bordering Armenia, the Republic of Azerbaijan, Ardabil province, West Azerbaijan province ...

province,

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...

History

The online edition of the ''Dehkhoda Dictionary'', quoting Iranian Army files, refers to Jananlu as a

Malaria Malaria is a Mosquito-borne disease, mosquito-borne infectious disease that affects vertebrates and ''Anopheles'' mosquitoes. Human malaria causes Signs and symptoms, symptoms that typically include fever, Fatigue (medical), fatigue, vomitin ...

-infested location with a population of 284. At the time, Jananlu was the largest village of

. Moreover, a clan of the

Mohammad Khanlu Mohammad Khanlu (Moḥammad-Ḵānlū) ( محمد خانلو) is one of the six major Tribes of Arasbaran. It is a Turkified Kurdish tribe dwelling for the most part in the Arasbaran region, in East Azerbaijan province of Iran. Its summer quart ...

tribe, comprising 60 households, used the village as its winter quarters.

Demographics

Population

At the time of the 2006 National Census, the village's population was 604 in 153 households, when it was in the former

Khoda Afarin District Khoda Afarin District () is a former administrative division of Kaleybar County, East Azerbaijan province, Iran. Its capital was the city of Khomarlu. History In 2010, the district was separated from the county in the establishment of Khod ...

Kaleybar County Kaleybar County () is in East Azerbaijan province, Iran. Its capital is the city of Kaleybar. History In 2010, Khoda Afarin District was separated from the county in the establishment of Khoda Afarin County. Demographics Population At ...

. The following census in 2011 counted 1,786 people in 496 households, by which time the district had been separated from the county in the establishment of

. The rural district was transferred to the new

. The 2016 census measured the population of the village as 1,742 people in 555 households. It was the most populous village in its rural district. The rate of population growth is perhaps the highest in the

Arasbaran Arasbaran (), also known as Qaradagh (; , ; ), is a large mountainous area stretching from the Qūshā Dāgh massif, south of Ahar, to the Aras River in East Azerbaijan province of Iran. The region is confined to Aras Riv ...

region, and it is expected that the village will be designated as a city in near future.

Archaeology

Just to the north of Jananlu in the Khoda Afarin Plain, near the

Araxes river The Aras is a transboundary river in the Caucasus. It rises in eastern Turkey and flows along the borders between Turkey and Armenia, between Turkey and the Nakhchivan exclave of Azerbaijan, between Iran and both Azerbaijan and Armenia, and, fin ...

, there are located two important archaeological sites of the

Chalcolithic The Chalcolithic ( ) (also called the Copper Age and Eneolithic) was an archaeological period characterized by the increasing use of smelted copper. It followed the Neolithic and preceded the Bronze Age. It occurred at different periods in di ...

period that are near to each other. They are now located on the shore of the artificial lake that has been created after a new dam was built on the river.

Kohneh Pasgah

Kohne Pasgah Tepesi has a very deep deposit from the

Kura–Araxes culture The Kura–Araxes culture (also named ''Kur–Araz culture, Mtkvari–Araxes culture, Early Transcaucasian culture, Shengavitian culture'') was an archaeological culture that existed from about 4000 BC until about 2000 BC, which has traditionally ...

period. It shows a continuity of occupation from the Late Chalcolithic into Early Bronze Age I. Here, the Kura‑Araxes layers superimpose on the Chalcolithic phase without any visible interruption. Kura‑Araxes pottery sherds dating to the earliest phases of this culture are attested. But after the Kura‑Araxes II period (2800‑2600 BC), the site is abandoned until the Iron Age. Nevertheless, the occupation continues at Kohneh Tepesi, a sister site located nearby.

Kohneh Tepesi

Excavations were conducted at Kohneh Tepesi in 2006 and 2007. In the middle of the third millennium BC, Kohne Tepesi was a densely occupied site of the

, with the cultural deposits of about six meters thick. Around 2650 BC, there was a shift from the Kura-Araxes II phase to Kura-Araxes III phase. Then after a gap of thousands of years, the site was reoccupied during the Parthian period. Outside of the residential area, some unusual funerary structures of Kura-Araxes period were found, which are unknown from elsewhere in Iran. Tools were made of

chert Chert () is a hard, fine-grained sedimentary rock composed of microcrystalline or cryptocrystalline quartz, the mineral form of silicon dioxide (SiO2). Chert is characteristically of biological origin, but may also occur inorganically as a prec ...

(bifacial sickle elements), and

obsidian Obsidian ( ) is a naturally occurring volcanic glass formed when lava extrusive rock, extruded from a volcano cools rapidly with minimal crystal growth. It is an igneous rock. Produced from felsic lava, obsidian is rich in the lighter element ...

. The obsidian assemblage is quite unusual, as it lacks standardization and regular tool types. The faunal remains from the settlement indicate the presence of sheep, goat, and cattle in their economy, with cattle being the main source of food.Ali Zalaghi, Sepideh Maziar, Bayram Aghalari, Marjan Mashkour, Mozhgan Jayez
Kohne Tepesi: A Kura-Araxes and Parthian settlement in the Araxes River Basin, Northwest Iran.
Journal of Iran National Museum, 2021, 2 (2), pp.49-74. 10.22034/JINM.2021.253021 . hal-03872069

Notes

References

{{Khoda Afarin County, state=collapsed Populated places in Khoda Afarin County