Istakhr

Istakhr, in the Fars region of southwestern Iran near the ruins of Persepolis, was an ancient Persian city and an early provincial capital of Fars under the Sasanians and in the early Islamic period before nearby Shiraz eclipsed it. The geographer al-Istakhri (10th c.), author of a major work of descriptive geography in the 'Balkhi school,' took his nisba from the city.