Samsam Bakhtiari

Some times, I ask myself if I have not dreamt this entire incredible love story myself. I then have to open once again my familial photo album.to see the jovial Khan smiling back at me with his confident, glittering eyes and the Princess, smiling too, seated in her comfortable armchair and dressed in full Qashqai tribal regalia to make sure that the whole story was not, after all, just one of those extraordinary dreams of mine.

Iran's backbone is the Zagros mountain chain-a real paradise on Earth that is dominated by lofty peaks and water cascading down all of its steep valleys. It is also populated by millions of oak trees and inhabited by the oldest tribe on Earth: the Bakhtiaris.

The tribal name Bakhtiari literally means the 'companions of good fortune." And the twentieth-century discovery of crude oil in this paradise seems to confirm the meaning. An elite family, founded by the great Haydar, has ruled the Bakhtiaris for the past four hundred years. Their leaders marched on Tehran in 1909 to save the young, fragile Constitution and reopen the Parliament. Among those in command was Morteza Quli Khan, a rather unique individual with an extraordinary life. The Last of the Khans recounts his, and the ancient tribe's, great heritage.