Khuzestan province ([xuːzest̪ʰɒːn] ; Persian: استان خوزستان) is one of the 31 Provinces of Iran. Located in the southwest of the country, the province borders Iraq and the Persian Gulf, covering an area of 63,238 square kilometres (24,416 mi). Its capital is the city of Ahvaz. Since 2014, it has been part of Iran's Region 4.
Khuzestan comprises much of what historians refer to as ancient Elam, whose capital was at Susa. It was once one of the most important regions in the Ancient Near East.
Choghā Mīsh (also Chogā Mīsh) (Persian: چغامیش, romanized: čoġā mīš) dating back to about 6800 BC, is the site of a Chalcolithic settlement located in the Khuzistan Province Iran on the eastern Susiana Plain. It was occupied at the beginning of 6800 BC and continuously from the Neolithic up to the Proto-Literate period (Uruk period), thus spanning the time periods from Archaic (7th millennium BC) through Proto-Elamite period (about 3100 BC to 2700 BC). After the decline of the site about 4400 BC, the nearby Susa, on the western Susiana Plain, became culturally dominant in this area. Chogha Mish is located just to the east of Dez River, and about 25 kilometers to the east from the ancient Susa. The similar, though much smaller site of Chogha Bonut lies six kilometers to the west.
Jibāl (Arabic: جبال), also al-Jabal (Arabic: الجبل), was the name given by the Arabs to a region and province located in western Iran, under the Umayyad and Abbasid Caliphates.
Its name means "the Mountains", being the plural of jabal ("mountain, hill"), highlighting the region's mountainous nature in the Zagros. Between the 12th and 14th centuries, the name Jibal was progressively abandoned, and it came to be mistakenly referred to as ʿIrāq ʿAjamī ("Persian Iraq") to distinguish it from "Arab Iraq" in Mesopotamia. The region never had any precisely defined boundaries, but was held to be bounded by the Maranjab Desert in the east, by Fars and Khuzistan in the south, by Iraq in the south-west and west, by Adharbayjan in the north-west and by the Alborz Mountains in the north, making it roughly coterminous with the ancient country of Media.
Chogha Bonut (Persian Choghā bonut) is an archaeological site in south-western Iran, located in the Khuzistan Province. The site is about 20 km southeast of Dezful, and 5 km west of Chogha Mish, another ancient site. It is believed that the site was settled as early as 7200 BCE, making it the oldest lowland village in south-western Iran.
This settlement on the Susiana Plain played a big role in the early Elam civilization. Later, this area became dominated by Susa. The site is important because it preserves a record of preceramic period settlement in Iran.