Shahr-e No ( fa, شهرنو, "New City") was the

red light district A red-light district or pleasure district is a part of an urban area where a concentration of prostitution and sex-oriented businesses, such as sex shops, strip clubs, and adult theaters, are found. In most cases, red-light districts are partic ...

located in Gomrok, a south-western district of

Tehran Tehran (; fa, تهران ) is the largest city in Tehran Province and the Capital city, capital of Iran. With a population of around 9 million in the city and around 16 million in the larger metropolitan area of Greater Tehran, Tehran is th ...

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkm ...

. It appeared in the 1920s and was destroyed in 1979; it employed about 1,500 women. Its location is now occupied by a park and a hospital.

History

Prostitution in Tehran is known to have existed since the 1870s in various locations of the city (

brothels A brothel, bordello, ranch, or whorehouse is a place where people engage in sexual activity with prostitutes. However, for legal or cultural reasons, establishments often describe themselves as massage parlors, bars, strip clubs, body rub par ...

were indicated by a lantern). During the following forty years, prostitutes gradually became more visible, displaying themselves in the streets. In March 1922, the government's interior ministry, then non-religious, organized a partial

roundup A roundup is a systematic gathering together of people or things. Roundup, Round Up or Round-up may also refer to: Agriculture * A muster (livestock) (AU/NZ) or a roundup (US/CA) is the process of gathering livestock. * Roundup (herbicide), a M ...

of prostitutes and assembled them in Shahr-e No, an area close to the citadel. Tehran's other prostitutes joined them in the next eleven years, then Shahr-e No was circled with a 2.50 m high brick wall, with women being forbidden from leaving this area. After the

Iranian revolution The Iranian Revolution ( fa, انقلاب ایران, Enqelâb-e Irân, ), also known as the Islamic Revolution ( fa, انقلاب اسلامی, Enqelâb-e Eslâmī), was a series of events that culminated in the overthrow of the Pahlavi dyna ...

and the establishment of Islamic regime, in July 1979 a crowd which witnessed the death sentence of three women accused of procuring assaulted the district, burned the

brothel A brothel, bordello, ranch, or whorehouse is a place where people engage in sexual activity with prostitutes. However, for legal or cultural reasons, establishments often describe themselves as massage parlors, bars, strip clubs, body rub p ...

s, persecuted women and spread terror. At this time the area sprawled over 13 ha and hosted 1500 women, 753 street sellers, 178 shops and two theaters. The next year after

Ayatollah Khomeini Ruhollah Khomeini, Ayatollah Khomeini, Imam Khomeini ( , ; ; 17 May 1900 – 3 June 1989) was an Iranian political and religious leader who served as the first supreme leader of Iran from 1979 until his death in 1989. He was the founder of ...

emerged as the

Supreme Leader of Iran The Supreme Leader of Iran ( fa, رهبر ایران, rahbar-e irān) is the head of state of the Islamic Republic of Iran. The Supreme Leader directs the executive system and judicial system of the Islamic theocratic government and is the c ...

, the government demolished the red light district and flattened it with bulldozers, only leaving a barren area.

Hooman Majd Hooman Majd (born 1957) is an Iranian-born American journalist, author, and political commentator who writes on Iranian affairs. He is based in New York City, and regularly travels to Iran. Early life Hooman Majd was born in 1957 in Tehran, Ira ...

, author of ''The Ayatollah Begs to Differ'', said that the Iranian government did this for Islamic reasons and to demonstrate the government's authority. The Islamic Republic then strove to erase all memory of it, destroying books and movies which mentioned its existence. The city's maps are marked with a rectangle captioned: "parc in construction". Only rare witness accounts remain, such as the photographic series ''The Citadel'' by Iranian photojournalist Kaveh Golestan. The area wasn't refurbished until 1998, with a city park and a hospital.Article by Luis Alemany, "La terrible destruction du quartier rouge de Téhéran", Courrier international, no 1680, 12-18 january 2023, p. 47, translation of an article published in El Mundo in january 2023.Content in this edit is translated from the existing French Wikipedia article at :fr:Shahr-e No; see its history for attribution.

History

References

See also