Īz̄eh

Izeh occupies a small valley in the Zagros east of the Karun River. In medieval accounts it appears as Mal-i Amir or Malamir, a seat of the Hazaraspid atabegs of Greater Luristan. Their dynasty governed the mountain country until 1424. Its rulers improved caravan movement by cutting a paved road through the Zagros, remembered as the Atabeg's Road or King's Road. The town consequently stood within a mountain principality whose routes connected the interior with Khuzestan.

Shah Rukh's destruction of the atabeg dynasty changed the valley's fortunes. Malamir was gradually deserted, and the fortress of Mongasht fell into ruin. Under the Safavids, the plain became part of the territory of the Bakhtiari confederacy. A few permanent settlements remained, while migratory pastoralism came to dominate the region's social life. The early modern landscape was therefore shaped by a substantial break in urban occupation. The valley retained its place among the Zagros routes, but the medieval seat of rulers gave way to a country of pastoral movement and scattered settlement.