É. Apor (ed.): Stein, Aurel: Old Routes of Western Iran. (Budapest Oriental Reprints, Ser. B 2.)

Chapter II. —In Kohgalu Tracts

Sec. i] B

ASHT TO KHAIRÄBÄD RIVER 6

3 roofed mud hovels, we took to the high ground on the river's left bank overlooking the wide flood-bed and the patches of irrigated ground along it. Near the tomb of a reputed I mäm-zädeh potsherds of medieval appearance mark a once occupied site, known as Häji 'Ali, and some large millstones lying on the ground are locally believed to have served for pressing oil. A rough path crossing small sandstone ridges and eroded ravines brought us to where the river, winding between steep-faced sandstone terraces, flows in a deep-cut bed contracting at one point to about 60 yards. Of the lower bridge first reached there survives only one arch adjoining the edge of the rocky terrace on the left bank (Fig. 20). It is built with cemented rubble, and by its semicircular arch can be safely recognized as belonging to a bridge of Sasanian times. Its span is 22J feet, its height from the present ground-level to the top of the arch 13 feet, and that of the masonry above this 9 feet. The width of the roadway carried by the arch is 14 feet, and that of the pier, on which the arch rests, about 25 feet at its broken end. The upper flank of the pier, as far as it remains, is faced with carefully fitted slabs of sandstone, and on the lower flank there can be traced what looks like the remnant of a buttress. The rest of this lower and earlier bridge has been completely carried away by the river, no trace being seen of piers or arches on the right bank. Judging from the great width here of the riverbed and the gentle rise of the roadway above the surviving arch, it may be assumed that the river itself was not spanned here by a single arch, but by two arches, the intermediate pier having been completely carried away. The belief that this ruined bridge was of Sasanian