A Discussion about Bishapur Anahita Temple

Ancient Bishapour is one of first of Cities Sassanid period that it was built by Shapur I. The royal structures in the northeastern city, famous monuments such as the Temple of Anahita ,Audience Hall Shapour, Mosaic Ivan.Plan of temple is square map and made of cleanly shaven stone entirely. Temple has elements that represent the flow of water from outside the building to inner space. On the other hand, some researchers believe the central room or inner space roofed and some bealieves that it without roofs.
The method is comparative cross-sectional study.It seems that probably the name of the two fire temples called Sheberkhashin and Gavsar Gumbaz, which had been mentioned by the very first Muslim authors, are in fact, the name of the two large buildings of the Bishapour city, respectively called building A and building B.
It has been deduced that at the beginning of the Sassanid era, the two elements of water and fire were being worshiped adjacently (like Sorkh Kotal) or in adjacent buildings (like buildings A and B).
Beside this element, the corridor (circumlocution corridor),which surrounds the hall or the main court of Anahita temple, is not merely functioning as the divider of the sacred places from the unclean; probably, the corridor used to emphasize that the building was a private one and was to divide the private buildings from the public ones.
Subsequently, due to the more common usage of the construction of Chārtāghi or the buildings with a cruciform plan, running from the fourth century onward, the corridor loses its religious function and mostly turns into a ceremonial place.
Regarding the function of the Anahita Temple, it can be stated that just on certain days of the year the water used to flow in its ducts. This building was dependent on the two elements of fire and water and the celebrations associated with these two. Due to the proximity of the Deity of Tir to Anahita and based on other certain documents, it can be mentioned that one of the grand celebrations that used to take place every year was the Tirgān celebration. The next question is about what activities or rituals, and on which days of the year were being done in Bishapour Anahita temple? According to the features of Building A of Bishapour, such as being half underground and containing water flow , it can be stated that: this building was not being used the whole year, and in a special ceremony water was let to flow in the ducts and was activated. These ceremonies depended on the two elements of fire and water and the festivities associated with these two.
The ceremonies associated with fire, at present, we know about at least two great celebrations called Sadeh, but we do not know what other significant royal activities needed celebrations to be held? It can probably be stated that whenever a blessed event occurred for the King, or king was fighting a battle, it was needed to set fire and hold a celebration in the Temple.
About festivities associated with water, There were two celebrations that can be named Tirgān and Abāngān. Due to the significance of the deity of Tir in early Sassanid, the author believes that one of the most important celebrations which was being held in Anahita temple, was Tirgan celebration. The celebration was held on 13 Tir month of solar Persian, equals of 4th July with and the cultural residues of this celebration after the Islamic era, can be seen in Abrizān celebration of people of Isfahan.