Bāsht

Basht lies in the Zagros Mountains of southwestern Iran, in the Kohgiluyeh country of the Lurs, where long folded ridges and narrow valleys rise above the Fars plains to the south. Oak woodland covers the slopes, and the valleys carry small streams, orchards and fields of wheat and barley. Winters are cold, with snow on the heights, and summers are dry and warm.

The people of this country were Lur tribes, among them the clans of Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad. Many lived as semi-nomadic herders who moved their flocks of sheep and goats between winter quarters in the lower valleys and summer pastures high in the mountains, while others farmed settled villages. Honey and beeswax from the oak and wild-flower slopes were products of the highlands. Tribal khans held local power and usually acknowledged the distant authority of the governors of Fars at Shiraz, whether under Safavid or later Qajar rule, but the rugged terrain left the mountain tribes largely in control of their own affairs.