“Geography of Iran”
Iran is located in West Asia and borders the Caspian Sea, Persian Gulf, and Gulf of Oman. Its mountains have helped to shape both the political and the economic history of the country for several centuries. The mountains encompass several broad plateaus, on which major agricultural and urban settlements are located. Until the 20th century, when major highways and railroads were constructed through the mountains to connect the population centers, these plateaus tended to be relatively isolated from one another.
Map of Iran
Typically, one major town dominated each basin, and there were complex economic relationships between the town and the hundreds of villages that surrounded it. In the higher elevations of the mountains rimming the basins, tribally organized groups practiced transhumance, moving with their flocks of sheep and goats between traditionally established summer and winter grasslands. There are no major river systems in the country, and historically transportation was by means of caravans that followed routes traversing passes in the mountains. The mountains also impeded easy access to the Persian Gulf and the Caspian Sea.
With an area of 1,648,000 square kilometers (636,000 sq. mi), Iran ranks eighteenth in size among the countries of the world. Iran shares its northern borders with three post-Soviet states: Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Turkmenistan. These borders extend for more than 2,000 kilometers (1,200 mi), including nearly 650 kilometers (400 mi) of water along the southern shore of the Caspian Sea. Iran's western borders are with Turkey in the north and Iraq in the south, terminating at the Arvand Rud.
The Persian Gulf and Gulf of Oman shorelines form the entire 1,770 kilometers (1,100 mi) southern border. To the east lie Afghanistan on the north and Pakistan on the south. Iran's diagonal distance from Azerbaijan in the northwest to Sistan and Baluchestan Province in the southeast is approximately 2,333 kilometers (1,450 mi).
Climate:
The climate of Iran is mutable. In the northwest, winters are cold with heavy snowfall and subfreezing temperatures during December and January. Spring and fall are relatively mild, while summers are dry and hot. In the south, winters are mild and the summers are very hot, having average daily temperatures in July exceeding 38 °C (100.4 °F). On the Khuzestan Plain, summer heat is accompanied by high humidity.
In general, Iran has an arid climate in which most of the relatively scant annual precipitation falls from October through April. In most of the country, yearly precipitation averages 250 millimeters (9.8 in) or less. The major exceptions are the higher mountain valleys of the Zagros and the Caspian coastal plain, where precipitation averages at least 500 millimeters (19.7 in) annually. In the western part of the Caspian, rainfall exceeds 1,000 millimeters (39.4 in) annually and is distributed relatively evenly throughout the year. This contrasts with some basins of the Central Plateau that receive ten centimeters or less of precipitation annually.
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