La luce nell’oblio: illuminismo e massoneria nella Persia cagiara

Abstract

The link between Iran and European cultures has a much older history than recent geopolitical events and, in the decades immediately preceding the Constitutional Revolution of 1906, the contact between Persia and Europe planted the seed in a ground ready for the growth of modern ideas, ambition, aspirations, new values and, consequently, for the birth of a modern class made up of intellectuals inspired by the Enlightenment and Freemasonry. The following essay will address the history of freemasonry in Persia: from the first contacts that occurred with the first trips of Iranian diplomats to Europe, up to the successful attempt to create a recognized lodge in 1908 in Tehran, passing through the history of the controversial “House of oblivion” in the second half of the nineteenth century.