The Persian Garden and the Study of Islamic Gardens

Islamic Gardens have been the subject of recurrent and voluminous studies since 1970s. A prevailing assumption in most such studies is that Islamic societies are more or less the same. Differences in climate, geography and cultures are therefore not taken into account.
Furthermore, these studies refer to pre-Islamic Persian gardens as an archetype with which they compare with their findings. Differences between garden design in east and west of the Persian Empire are not considered, either. Persian garden terms such as ‘paradise’ are also evasively used. This paper presents a critical review of current studies and through a review of gardens of east and west of Iran, tries to clarify the place of the Persian Garden in formation of Islamic Gardens. On this basis, the origins of diversity in Islamic garden design are also explained.