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"Palace, Paradise, Landscape and the Spatial Cosmologies of the Iranian Expanse" with Matthew Canepa

This lecture explores a central problem that runs throughout my forthcoming book, "The Iranian Expanse" (UC Press, 2018), that is, the intersections between architectonic and environmental spaces and the conceptual spaces of Iranian political cosmologies. I argue that royal engagement with natural, urban and architectonic space was not merely an ornament to, or natural outgrowth of Iranian kingship, but a fundamental tool by which sovereigns established their dominance, manipulated cultural memory and appropriated, subsumed or destroyed the traditions of their imperial underlings. This ‘hylonoetic’ continuum between the conceptual, spatial, material and practical bases of Iranian kingship forming played a central role in supporting and changing Iranian royal identity. While we look to earlier dynasties as well, this lecture pays particular attention to the Sasanian Empire and the role of palaces and royal estates in establishing and inculcating an experience of the Sasanian imperial worldview.

Matthew Canepa of the University of Minnesota – Twin Cities