When was the first Zoroastrian girls’ school established? Most researchers, following the late Rashid Shahmardan’s account in Zoroastrian Luminaries, have long maintained that the earliest institution was the Ardeshiri School in Yazd, founded in 1903 CE (1282 AHS) through the efforts of Arbab Keyumars Vafadar Ardeshir. Yet evidence suggests the origins of girls’ education among Zoroastrians may date even earlier, to a series of schools founded in Kerman by the late Arbab Keikhosrow Shahrokh.
Arbab Keikhosrow Shahrokh (1875–1940 CE / 1254–1319 AHS) recounts in his Notes that upon returning from Bombay, the Zoroastrian community in Kerman had only a single maktab-khaneh in the Mahaleh-Shahr neighborhood— “a lone mud-brick room, without plaster, carpets, or chairs, its courtyard filled with piles of rubble” (Notes, p. 40). Soon after, he reorganized that rundown school and went on to establish three girls’ schools and several boys’ schools across the city.
The girls’ institutions he founded were located in the Qobeh-Sabz district, in Mahaleh-Shahr, and outside the Naseri Gate near the Shah-Varahram Izad fire temple.
Although Keikhosrow did not specify the exact founding dates of these girls’ schools, historian Afshin Marashi notes in Nation and Exile that Keikhosrow returned to Kerman in 1893 CE (1271 AHS) (Marashi, p. 51). He adds that “over the following decade, through local Zoroastrian initiatives and with the support of the Parsis of India, he established three new boys’ schools and three girls’ schools.
Although the precise opening dates of the Zoroastrian girls’ schools in Kerman remain unclear, it is evident that they were founded earlier than the Ardeshiri Girls’ School in Yazd, which Master Keyumars Vafadar Ardeshir established in 1903 CE (1282 AHS). Ardeshiri—long regarded in scholarship as “the first Zoroastrian girls’ school”—was founded in Farvardin 1272 Yazdgerdi, yet Arbab Keikhosrow Shahrokh had already begun operating a girls’ school in Kerman before that date.
Even if one accepts the generous assumption that Keikhosrow’s three girls’ schools were all completed by 1902 CE (1281 AHS), the chronology still places the Kerman institution earlier than its Yazd counterpart. This means that Zoroastrians launched their first girls’ school significantly sooner than the opening of the Ardeshiri school—contrary to widespread claims in existing research.
This earlier date matters because most historical accounts credit one of three Tehran-based schools as the first girls’ school in Iran: Tooba Rushdieh’s short-lived “Parvaresh” School (1903), Bibi Khanom Astarabadi’s “Doushizegan” School (1906), or Tooba Azmoudeh’s “Namous” School (1907). In reality, Arbab Keikhosrow Shahrokh’s establishment of a girls’ school in Kerman predates all of them—as well as the Ardeshiri Girls’ School—marking the Zoroastrian community as a pioneer in girls’ education in Iran.
Reassessing the Early History of Girls’ Schooling in Iran
Historical accounts of modern Iranian education often credit the Armenian community with founding the country’s first girls’ school in Isfahan in 1857, followed by the Jewish community’s establishment of the Etehad Girls’ School in Tehran in 1897 with support from the Alliance Israelite Universelle. Yet both institutions, while important, were communal rather than national schools: instruction was in Armenian and Hebrew respectively, and their student bodies were limited to their own religious communities.
By contrast, the girls’ schools founded by Arbab Keikhosrow Shahrokh in Kerman and later by Arbab Keyumars Vafadar in Yazd were fully Iranian in character, offering all instruction in Persian and serving the broader Iranian public. Thus, although the contributions of Armenian and Jewish Iranians to girls’ education merit respect, the question of who first established girls’ schools in Iran must be reconsidered. The Zoroastrian community emerges as the earliest group to undertake the challenging work of creating formal educational opportunities for girls.
For this reason, the narrative of girls’ education in Iran may need to be rewritten to ensure that the pioneering role of Zoroastrians is properly recognized and preserved.
