The nucleus of Civilisation;

https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20210818-epic-iran-ancient-objects-that-reveal-writings-roots

By Kelly Grovier19th August 2021

An exhibition about Iran traces how some of the world's earliest scripts developed. They were as much about images as text, writes Kelly Grovier.
"What more do you want from your time here?" The existential question, posed by the 14th-Century Persian poet Hafiz, is woven into a dazzling 16th-Century carpet that is among the treasures showcased in the Victoria & Albert Museum's vast exhibition Epic Iran, 5000 Years of Culture, and in the lavishly produced catalogue that accompanies the show. Thornily thought-provoking in itself, the probing fragment of verse belongs to a sequence of five couplets from a ghazal (a medieval Arabic verse-form typically devoted to the subject of love) that is stitched into the border of the silk, wool, and metallic-thread carpet, providing a calligraphic frame for the pattern of intricately interlocking flowers and birds that sprawls across the textile. ....................
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Inevitable politics comment creeps in:
Must keep Taliban at bay at all cost!
The following link to a present day flowering of Iranian Intellect; first 3 entries are Women.
I have indelible impressions from travels through Iran, as have millions.
Alas, travelling now via BBC reports such as this; bless them!

https://theculturetrip.com/middle-e...n-s-10-most-inspiring-poets-and-their-verses/

Cheers,