Khuzestan province (; ) is one of the 31 Provinces of Iran. An extension of the Mesopotamian Plain, it is located in the southwest of the country, bordering Iraq and the Persian Gulf, and covering an area of . Its capital is the city of Ahvaz. The provincial capital was moved from Shushtar to Ahvaz in 1924. Since 2014, the province has been part of Iran's Region 4.

Khuzestan comprises much of what historians refer to as ancient Elam, whose capital was at Susa. It was once one of the most important regions in the Ancient Near East. In modern Iran, there has been episodic conflict between the province's Arab population and the central government. Iraq invaded Khuzestan in 1980, and the invasion was reversed at the Battle of Khorramshahr in 1982. Containing Iran's largest oil field, it is a key strategic province.

Etymology In Greek and Roman sources, from the Achaemenid period until the early centuries AD, the land now called Khuzestan was known as Susiana, a name derived from the city of Susa (modern Shush), which served for a time as a capital of ancient Elam and, under the Achaemenids, as one of the imperial capitals. According to the Achaemenid royal inscriptions, however, the Achaemenids themselves (c. 520–330 BC) called this satrapy Ūja or Uvja, a name that also appears in historical texts as Hūjiya. With the rise of later dynasties such as the Parthians and Sasanians, the name Susiana gradually fell out of use, and in the Middle Persian period it was replaced by names derived from the root hūz. Arab authors of later periods recorded this as Khūzī.

The word Hūjī occurs twenty-four times in the inscriptions of Darius the Great and once in an inscription of Xerxes I. This same word Ūja was rendered by the Greeks as Uza and Uzi, and was later written Uxi and pronounced "Uxi". Strabo and Pliny refer to the inhabitants of the region as the Uxii.

The Hūzī or Hūjī were a non-Semitic people who lived in southwestern Iran from well before the Christian era, with their capital at Susa. The word Khuzestan, which until the Safavid period took the form Hūzestān, consists of the elements hūz and -stān and means "land of the Hūz". The suffix -stān means "land", and older maps and documents indicate that the form Khūzī is an altered form of Hūzī.

According to Richard N. Frye, following the large-scale migration of Arabs into Iran from the west, in particular the migration of the Banu Ka'b and Bani Lam into southwestern Khuzestan, the province's name changed semi-officially from Hūzestān to Arabistan in the Safavid period onwards, that is from the 16th to the 19th century, until under Reza Shah it was officially named Khuzestan.

Uzistan or Huzistan, meaning the land of the Uz or Huz people, appears in Middle Persian (Sasanian Pahlavi) as well as in Parthian as hūjestān or hūžestān. In Syriac the region was called Beth Huzaye. A passage in a Parthian text on the Manichaean manuscript M 5569, which describes the time and place of Mani's death and was written in the third century AD, reads:

English translation:

The Arabic-speaking people who settled in this land after the Muslim conquest of Persia preserved the pronunciation of the people's name as Hūzī, and referred to the Hūzīs using the Arabic broken plural on the pattern afʿāl, that is, Ahvāz. They knew the city of Ahvaz as the "market of the Hūzīs" (Sūq al-Ahvāz).

Medieval Muslim geographers treated the name as covering a wide territory. Ibn Khordadbeh applied the name Ahvāz to the whole of what is now Khuzestan, describing it as an extensive land made up of seven kuras or districts, which he called Akwār al-Ahwāz.Ibn Khordadbeh, al-Masālik wa'l-Mamālik, translated by Saeed Khakrand, Tehran: Institute of Historical Studies and Publications, 1992, p. 36. Richard N. Frye likewise describes the province as a wealthy lowland region divided into at least seven kuras, the largest of them Hormizd-Ardashir, which the Arabs called Sūq al-Ahvāz. Al-Istakhri placed Khuzestan between Fars, Isfahan, the Karkheh and Lorestan, and Khwarizmi mentioned both the province and the Hūzī language in his Mafatih al-Ulum in the second half of the tenth century.

According to Frye, following substantial Arab migration into Iran from the west, in particular the settlement of the Banu Ka'b and Bani Lam in southwestern Khuzestan — the province came to be known semi-officially as Arabistan rather than Hūzestān from the beginning of the Safavid period onward, that is from the 16th to the 19th century. The name Khuzestan was restored in official usage under Reza Shah. The older form of the name also appears in Ferdowsi's Shahnameh, where the inhabitants of the region are called Khuziyān.Shahnameh of Ferdowsi, edited by Djalal Khaleghi-Motlagh, vol. 2, "The War of Hamavaran", line 331; vol. 6, "Shapur Zu'l-Aktaf", line 559; vol. 7, "Hormizd Nushin-Ravan", line 571.

History

Antiquity

The province of Khuzestan is one of the centres of ancient civilization, and one of the most important regions of the Ancient Near East, based around Susa. Human settlement in the region goes back to at least the late fourth millennium BC, and the Elamite civilization took shape here in the third millennium BC.CHRONOLOGY OF IRANIAN HISTORY PART 1 iranicaonline.org

Archaeological remains show the province to have been home to the Elamite civilization, a kingdom speaking a language that was neither Semitic nor Indo-European, and the earliest civilization within the borders of what would later be called Persia.According to: Sir Percy Sykes, A History of Persia, RoutledgeCurzon Publishers. 3rd edition. 16 October 2003. p.38

In antiquity, and particularly under the Achaemenids, the region was divided into two parts: the northern and northeastern districts, known as Anshan, which were mountainous and heavily wooded, and the southern lowlands, with a hot and humid climate and fertile alluvial plains. The southern part, known as Elam, was strongly influenced by the culture of Mesopotamia.

In the words of Elton L. Daniel, the Elamites were "the founders of the first 'Iranian' empire in the geographic sense."Daniel, Elton L. The History of Iran. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood, 2001. . Print. p. 26 Hence the central geopolitical significance of Khuzestan, the seat of Iran's first empire.

In 640 BC, the Elamites were defeated by Ashurbanipal, coming under the rule of the Assyrian Empire who brought destruction upon Susa and Chogha Zanbil. After the death of Ashurbanipal, the Assyrian Empire began to experience internal conflict, which was quietly taken advantage of by the Medes who had hitherto been subjects of Assyria. During the reign of the Median Cyaxares (625–585 BC), Elam was incorporated into the Median Empire, but in 538 BC, the Persian Cyrus the Great who established the Achaemenid Empire, was able to conquer the Elamite lands from the Medes. The Persians regarded Elam highly and the city of Susa was proclaimed as one of the Achaemenid capitals. Darius I then erected a grand palace known as Apadana there in 521 BC.

The geographer Strabo described the plain of Khuzestan as among the most fertile in the world, irrigated by numerous rivers that made agriculture and settlement possible across the region.

In 331 BC, following Achaemenid defeat at the Battle of the Uxian Defile, Susa was conquered by Alexander the Great, and a year later in 330 BC after suffering defeat at the Battle of the Persian Gate, Persia (the Achaemenid Empire) was conquered by the Macedonian Empire. The Susa weddings were arranged by Alexander in 324 BC in Susa, where mass weddings took place between the Persians and the Macedonians. After Alexander, the Seleucid dynasty came to rule the area.

As the Seleucid dynasty weakened, Mehrdad I the Parthian (171–137 BC) gained ascendency over the region.

Over centuries, Elamite culture and peoples were eventually absorbed into these later Indo-European-speaking populations. Speakers of Elamite may have persisted in isolated regions of Khuzestan into the 10th century, on the basis of interpretations of a Xūzī language reported in Arab sources. Elamite is now extinct.

Sassanid period In 224, after the Parthians suffered defeat at the Battle of Hormozdgan, fought in what is now Khuzestan, the Sassanids established control over the area, bringing the 471-year rule of the Arsacids to an end. The Sassanids were responsible for the many constructions that were erected in Ahvaz, Shushtar, and the north of Andimeshk. During the early years of the reign of the Sassanian Shapur II (AD 309 or 310–379), Arabs crossed the Persian Gulf from Bahrain to "Ardashir-Khora" of Fars and raided the city. In retaliation, Shapur II led an expedition through Bahrain, defeated the combined forces of the Arab tribes of Taghleb, Bakr bin Wael, and Abd Al-Qays and advanced temporarily into Yamama in central Najd. The Sassanids nonetheless resettled the aforementioned tribes in Kerman and Ahvaz. Arabs named Shapur II "Shabur Dhul-aktāf" after this battle.

The existence of prominent scientific and cultural centers such as the Academy of Gundishapur, which gathered distinguished medical scientists from Egypt, Greece, India and Rome, shows the importance and prosperity of this region during this era. The medical school at Gundishapur was founded by the order of Shapur I. It was repaired and restored by Shapur II (also known as Zu'l-Aktaf, "the Possessor of Shoulder Blades") and was completed and expanded during the reign of Anushirvan.

Muslim conquest of Khuzestan

Rashidun period

The governor of Basra first sent Mughira ibn Shu'ba to take the towns of Khuzestan, and the Iranian landholders of Ahvaz submitted and accepted the payment of jizya. Mughira was subsequently removed from office and replaced by Abu Musa al-Ash'ari.Abbas Eqbal Ashtiani, History of Iran from the Advent of Islam to the Fall of the Qajars, Elham.

In 639, the Muslim Rashidun Caliphate forces under the command of Abu Musa al-Ash'ari defeated the Sassanids in Ahvaz and drove the Persian satrap Hormuzan out of the city. Susa later fell, so Hormuzan fled to Shushtar. The Muslims led by Abu Musa thereafter imposed a siege on the Sassanid forces in Shushtar that lasted for 18 months. Shushtar finally fell in 642 and the Muslims subsequently established full control over the area. The Khuzistan Chronicle records that an unknown Arab, living in the city, befriended a man in the army, and dug tunnels through the wall in return for a third of the spoil. The Arabs purged the Nestorians—the Exegete of the city and the Bishop of Hormizd, and all their students—but kept Hormuzan alive.Hoyland, Robert G., Seeing Islam as Others Saw It, Darwin Press, 1998, p184 Hormuzan was sent to Medina, where he was later killed after being accused of complicity in the murder of the caliph Umar.

There followed the conquests of Gundeshapur and of many other districts along the Tigris. The Battle of Nahāvand finally secured Khuzestan for the Muslim armies.Encyclopædia Iranica, p. 206

During the Muslim conquest the Sassanids were allied with non-Muslim Arab tribes, which implies that those wars were religious, rather than national. For instance in 633–634, Khaled ibn Walid leader of the Muslim Army, defeated a force of the Sassanids' Arab auxiliaries from the tribes of Bakr, 'Ejl, Taghleb and Namer at 'Ayn Al-Tamr.Encyclopædia Iranica, page 204, under "Arab conquest of Persia"