Karyan (Persian: كاريان)[a] is a village in, and the capital of, Karyan Rural District of Harm District, Juyom County, Fars province, Iran.[4]
At the time of the 2006 National Census, the village's population was 2,068 in 404 households, when it was in Harm Rural District of the former Juyom District of Larestan County.[5] The following census in 2011 counted 2,843 people in 730 households.[6] The 2016 census measured the population of the village as 2,919 people in 749 households.[2]
After the census, the district was separated from the county in the establishment of Juyom County. The rural district was transferred to the new Harm District, and Karyan was transferred to Karyan Rural District created in the district.[4]
Karyan is the setting of a Zoroastrian legend during the time of the Muslim conquest of Persia, where a Muslim force of 12,000 men besieged Karyan only to be slain single-handedly and unopposed by a Persian defender named Shah Karan while they were engaged in their prayer.[7] However, a new Muslim army, seeking revenge, was able to conquer Karyan after the betrayal of Shah Karan's wife and the residents were then massacred.[8]
In the Harm district of Fars, not so very far from Yazd, Edward Strack came across a naive legend which is a rough inversion of the Zoroastrian one; see his Six months in Persia, I, London, 1882, 119. According to this, at the time of the Arab invasions, a certain Zoroastrian, Shah Karan, was besieged at Karyun by 12,000 Arabs; and sallying out of the fort while they were at their prayers (which they would not leave), he slew them all. There were 40 virgins in the camp, who prayed to Allah for deliverance from him. The earth duly opened and swallowed 37 of them. The remaining three fled, pursued by him and his men. One turned to the mountains to the north and was nearly captured, when a cave opened in the mountain-side and she ran in and disappeared. 'The cave is called The Ghar Bibi, or Lady's Cave, to this day, and is well known to have no end.' Another of the maidens also disappeared into the mountain-side 'and water has trickled from the cleft ever since'. The third is said to have died of exhaustion on the mountains to the south. ' Her shrine, called that of the Bibi darmanda, or Tired-out Lady, is a famous place of prayer for childless wives.'
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