A Toponymic Research on Batir: An Ancient Name from Anubanini Reign in Sar Pol-e Zahab, Kermanshah

The city of Sar Pol-e Zahab is located in the western part of Kermanshah province close to the Iraqi border. Due to its geographical location it has played an important role in the Iranian history since it has opened the gate entering the central Zagros and to the Iranian central plateau. There have been two bas reliefs remained from Anubanini and Idin-Sin, which are located near the Sar Pol-e Zahab city, both historically are of significant. On the inscriptions engraved on both reliefs, those are referred to a name as Batir. Batir is a single mountain has more likely portraited on the Anubanini reliefs. This mountain, as a defensive wall divided the Sar Pol-e Zahab plain into the eastern and western parts. It is important to cite here that the name of Batir is not limited to the name of the mountain in Sar Pol-e Zahab, but the name is also mentioned by some texts obtained from Tel al-Salimeh, that is located in 75 km west of Sarpol-e Zahab, and near the Hamrin Lake, There have been tablets representing the city’s name as “Batir or Batiri” along with a manifestation of a temple was given to the goddess of Batiritum. The presence of two names, could give rise to the question of what relation might be between these two places? Can these two names refer to a single place? Is it possible that Batir could be a holy Mesopotamian name? It seems that, because of the importance of the land of Ĥelman / Helman (Sar pol-e Zahab) for the Mesopotamians the name of Batir was given by them to a city located near the Batir Mountain. In this paper we tried to provide a clear interpretation of this ancient name based on the texts obtained from Tel al-Salimeh, Anubanini and Idin-Sin inscriptions as well as other Mesopotamian texts.