Saadat Shahr, Iran

Saadat Shahr (or Sa’adat-Shahr) is a town in Fars Province, southern Iran, 390 miles south of Tehran, the capital of the country. Saadat Shahr (pronounced sah-ah-dat-shawr) is an agricultural town of approximately 16,000. The town has recently made news around the world as a town fascinated by astronomy and stargazing.

Women in the town have sold their jewelry to pay for the town's observatory and telescope, and many of the residents have given part of their salaries toward the project. On one special occasion, the electricity to the entire town was shut off so people could enjoy an astronomical event.

In March 2007, excavations in the vicinity of Saadat Shahr revealed a soil damn dating back to the Achaemenid dynastic era. [http://www.chnpress.com/news/?section=2&id=7033]