Āvishan

Āvishan, a genus from the family of Labiatae, has been identified in Iranian traditional medicine (ITM) with different names such as “Sa‘tar”, “Ābshan”, and “Kahlik oti”. Three kinds of this plant, “Barri”, “Bostāni” and “Jabali”, have been considered in the ITM. In this paper, we tried to determine the scientific names of these three kinds, according to their characteristics mentioned in the ITM resources and also propose appropriate Persian names for these scientific names. It was concluded that the characteristics of “Barri” in ITM are matched with the two species of Thymus including T. daenensis and T. pubescens, those for “Bostāni” seems to be corresponding to T. kotschyanus and “Jabali” is matched to Zataria multiflora. The suggested Persian names for these species are “Āvishan Denāī” for T. daenensis, “Āvishan korkdār” for T. pubescens, “Āzorbeh” for T. kotschyanus, and “Āvishan Shirāzi” for Zataria multiflora.