A Restudy of the Form of Isfahan’s Palace of Hasht Behesht (The Eight Paradises)

The objective of this paper is to reach the architectural “form” of Hasht Behesht palace through its
“figure”. In order to share and to be contemporaneous with the past’s valuable architecture, it’s inevitable
to study their forms. In doing this, the presence and influence of the factors and facts related to the work’s
poetic and artistic form is more tangible than its skeletal form. This article neither claims to record the
history, explain and analyze the architecture of the Palace on the desk of artistic criticism, nor is it limited
to pure sciences or subjective point of view without any proof. In fact, it tries to share and be
contemporaneous with architecture and also attempts, as much as it can, to pay attention and point out to
the reality of life. The essence and truth of the architecture of this Palace is not just the objective source
and material to be researchable as a concrete material in the hands of the scientists of the pure sciences or
in laboratories. In fact, the dissection of mere form of on architecture al work which generates baseless
imitations, and researches like those done by materialists about the materials will themselves be the veil to
understanding its truth; a veil which has unfortunately become dominant nowadays. Mystery in this
architecture along with showing the unity of the components, also leads them toward a “form” beyond the
materialistic mold of the structure’s “figure”. In this article form is studied in the way that the mysteries of
the elements – such as water, light, time –as well as material, and center have realized a good and
perdurable experience in the form of valuable architectures such as Hasht Behesht Palace. The mystery of
water made a transubstantiation of the material world in allegorical forms and was a sign of God’s reflect
and emanation in the universe. Substance, which was like wax in the hands of the form of the artist
architect and its supernatural and spiritual concepts, was considered as the structure’s materials and
substances in the level of figure. In this Palace , continental parameters of the materials, substances, and
natural elements were “manifestation of the truth” and not just as the raw material ready to be extracted
with the most efficiency. They were dignified and - in the meantime- controlled, and were exploited by
man and his life as well. Light in this environment acted as a cognitive factor in the pursuit of exalting the
percept and was animating the various shapes and areas in a spectrum of dark to light. You can not talk
about the truth of architecture in these areas without time. The time of these areas was perceived in
accordance with the inner understanding of the qualitative content of architecture by the evidence. The
connection space of the Palace measured and assessed the surrounding areas as a symbol of the center of
the universe and acted as a focus and a destination for its surroundings. These places shared the
contemporaneousness with the real life at those times.