Ṭabas al-Tamr

Tabas al-Tamr, the “Tabas of Dates”, was an oasis town on the eastern edge of the great salt desert. Medieval geographers described its underground water supply, baths and orchards of citrus and date palms. Al-Baladhuri called it the gate of Khorasan, a fitting name for a town approached across the desert from the west. In the early eighteenth century, Malek Mahmud of Sistan governed Tabas and Tun under the Safavids before expanding his power in Khorasan. Later in the century, Mir Hasan Khan, a governor of the two towns, established the Golshan Garden at Tabas. Its planted grounds and flowing water made a cultivated refuge amid the surrounding desert.