ویژگی‌های نخستین "پارک" تهران : پارک امین‌الدوله*

Numerous researches have already revealed that Iranians were the first people who located large green spaces in their cities and used them as parks. Nevertheless, most of these spaces were later used for hunting. Even during the Safavid era, Chaharbagh Street in Esfahan was described by travelogues as one of the greatest public green spaces in the world. A look at the old maps, scripts and records shows that the term park was firstly used during the Qajar dynasty instead of bagh in reference to green spaces. It is notable that Tehran’s development was specifically sped up during the reign of Qajari king Nassereddin Shah. Nassereddin Shah, who was the fourth king in the Qajar dynasty, reigned about 50 years and this long term is one of the most important and effective periods in regenerating Iranian new urban life. The development of modern knowledge in Europe and the emergence of new technologies had a significant impact on the Iranian culture and civilization. This later led to great changes to the intact and traditional essence of the Iranian culture.  Those changes had been addressed from different points of view by researchers. They accordingly illustrated European cultural effects on Iranian (Persian) architecture and urbanism which is one of the most effective changes in Persian culture. Meanwhile, some Iranian (Persian) gardens which were mainly designed based on Eastern ideologies have changed and obtained new forms over time. The researchers for the first time named these gardens as parks. It is notable that these parks that have been shown in Najmolmolk map of Tehran were not used as public spaces.  On the other hand, there were some other green spaces in the city that had the name of Public Gardens and were mostly used as playgrounds.  An example of this included Golshan-e-Arg Garden which was generally categorized as Bagh-e-Ammeh or public garden in Persian.The present article later discusses some considerable questions: What are the differences between the ancient Iranian gardens that were called bagh and the green spaces which were named parks?  Do these new parks have any relevance to the meaning of parks in European culture (although they have been under the influence of European culture)? What are the differences between new modern Persian parks and the earlier ones that had been built in old Tehran around 150 years ago? Persian gardens which are reputable around the world are studied by both Iranian and foreign researchers. Nevertheless, Iranian parks are not sufficiently been studied. Therefore, the present research is focusing on the first park in Iran’s history called Ammin-o-Dolleh park. The park takes its name from Mirza Alikhan Ammin-o-Dolleh who was one of the noble people in Qajar dynasty and was best known for his academic qualifications and intellectuality. In course of time, after he designed the very first park, other honorable people were also inspired to follow suit in designing parks. The present article begins by explaining the type of the cultural diversions that happened during the Qajar dynasty as well as its influences on the common culture and social relations in Iran. Later, the article highlights the history of the park under study. Based on available documents, such spaces had certain elements that they made them to be called parks on the Najmolmolk map of Tehran. Both Qajar gardens and Persian old parks had private owners, high walls and boundaries that separated the indoor and outdoor spaces.  Besides, both of them may have had foreign gardeners.  To some extent, they also may have been built based on European designs. Furthermore, the parks had some features that were imported from Europe. Therefore, the difference between Qajar gardens and the first Persian parks are in their geometry. The present article shows that the first Persian parks used organic geometry which was the main difference to the Persian Qajar gardens which used symmetric geometry. The geometry of the design was organic with no axis as was customary to Persian gardens. Even the palace or the main building in the king’s court which was located next to one of the main roads had a different form and style from the Persian design.  In addition, these differences were also seen in a number of trees and the landscape designs around them.  Accordingly, unlike the modern parks, the first Persian parks were designed with walls that functioned as the boundary for privacy.  Based on researches carried out over this issue, even though the very first parks in Tehran had similar names to the existing ones, they have over time developed changes in terms of character, identity, usage and form. Finally, the analysis of the results show that a part of sudden changes in Persian culture occurred as the result of inspirations from Europe especially in art and architecture. These changes eventually made the Persian culture lose a certain degree of its indigenous elements.