In the 17th century, the city's wealth and grandeur inspired the rhyming proverb, Isfahan nesf-e jahan, or "Isfahan is half the world."Īfter a brutal siege shattered that golden age in the early 18th century, new rulers eventually moved the capital to Tehran, leaving Isfahan to languish as a provincial backwater, which not incidentally left many of the old city's monuments intact. Europeans, Turks, Indians and Chinese flocked to the glittering Persian court, the center of a vast empire stretching from the Euphrates River in what is today Iraq to the Oxus River in Afghanistan. Elegant bridges crossed its modest river, lavishly outfitted polo players dashed across the world's largest square and hundreds of domes and minarets punctuated the skyline. When these mosaics were still vibrant, Isfahan was larger than London, more cosmopolitan than Paris, and grander, by some accounts, than even storied Istanbul.
I crowd up to the wall with Hamid Mazaheri and Mehrdad Moslemzadeh, the two Iranian artist-entrepreneurs who are restoring this private residence to its former splendor. Underneath a coarse layer of straw and mud, a faded but distinct array of blue, green and yellow abstract patterns emerges-a hint of the dazzling shapes and colors that once made this courtyard dance in the shimmering sun. Suddenly, a paint-splattered worker picking at a nearby wall shouts, waves his steel trowel and points.
This decrepit house in a decaying maze of narrow alleys in Isfahan, Iran, betrays little of the old capital's glory days in the 17th century. The courtyard is coated in a fine brown dust, the surrounding walls are crumbling and the flaking plaster is the same monotonous khaki color as the ground. The city's most famous bridge, Si-o Seh Pol (Bridge of 33 Arches) is nearly 1,000 feet long and 45 feet wide. Four hundred years ago, Isfahan was larger than London and more cosmopolitan than Paris.
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