Qualla: Alexandria Carmania

Alexandria Carmania: Introduction

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit George Willis Botsford Ph.D., Public domain. Somewhere near the village of Gulashkird in southeastern Iran lie the remains of a city that Alexander the Great founded in January 324 BC. Or they might not. Alexandria Carmania is one of the seventy-plus cities Alexander founded or renamed during his campaigns, and unlike many of the others, it has never been definitively located. The city was established after one of the most harrowing episodes in military history -- the reunion of Alexander's exhausted army with the fleet of his admiral Nearchus, who had sailed along the coast while Alexander marched his troops through the brutal Gedrosian Desert. The celebration was enormous. The city Alexander built to mark the occasion has been lost ever since.

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Image: George Willis Botsford Ph.D. | Public domain

Alexandria Carmania: The Reunion at Minab

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Sarfatti, CC BY-SA 3.0. Alexander's crossing of Gedrosia -- the arid wasteland of what is now the Makran coast of Iran and Pakistan -- had nearly destroyed his army. Thousands of soldiers, camp followers, and animals perished from heat, thirst, and starvation during the 60-day march through terrain that...

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Image: Sarfatti | CC BY-SA 3.0

Alexandria Carmania: The Search for a Lost City

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Sarfatti, CC BY-SA 3.0. For centuries, scholars have tried to pin Alexandria Carmania to a specific location. The most commonly cited candidate is Gulashkird, a village in Iran at roughly 27 degrees 57 minutes north latitude. The British explorer Percy Sykes argued for Rudbar, 5 kilometers north of Gula...

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Image: Sarfatti | CC BY-SA 3.0

Alexandria Carmania: Survival Through the Centuries

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Sarfatti, CC BY-SA 3.0. If Alexandria Carmania is Gulashkird, then the city survived well into the medieval period under the name Camadi. Marco Polo passed through. The Arab geographer al-Muqaddasi described it as a strongly fortified town with a castle called Kushah, surrounded by lush orchards and fie...

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Image: Sarfatti | CC BY-SA 3.0

Alexandria Carmania: The Ghost of Alexander

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Sarfatti, CC BY-SA 3.0. Alexandria Carmania belongs to a specific category of historical site: the place you know existed but cannot quite find. No systematic archaeological excavation has been conducted at the most likely locations. The ruins northwest of Gulashkird remain unexplored. The Greek pottery...

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Image: Sarfatti | CC BY-SA 3.0