thumb|280px|The domes of the [[Imam Reza shrine and the Goharshad Mosque, 1976, at Mashhad, a major city in the former Khorasan and now the capital of the Razavi Khorasan province]]
Khorasan ( ; also transcribed as Khurasan, Xorasan and Khorassan), also called Traxiane during Hellenistic and Parthian times, was a province in northeastern Iran until September 2004, when it was divided into three new provinces: North Khorasan, South Khorasan, and Razavi Khorasan.
Khorasan historically referred to a much larger area, comprising the east and the northeast of the Persian Empire. The name is Persian and means "where the sun arrives from". The name was first given to the eastern province of Persia during the Sasanian Empire and was used from the Late Middle Ages in distinction to neighbouring Transoxiana.
This province, whose people are mainly Shia Muslims, roughly encompassed the western portion of the historical Greater Khorasan. The modern boundaries of the Iranian province of Khorasan were formally defined in the late nineteenth century
History
The name Khorāsān (lit. "sunrise"; "east"; or "land of the rising sun") was originally given to the eastern province of Persia during the Sassanian period. Most of the people in the region natively speak closely related modern day dialects of Persian. The region is home to a significant Sunni Muslim minority. The largest cluster of settlements and cultivation stretches around the city of Mashhad northwestward, containing the important towns of Quchan, Shirvan, and Bojnurd.
See also
- Provinces of Iran
- Transoxiana
- Khwarezm
- Afsharid dynasty
- Delhi Multan Road to Mashhad capital of Khorasan province of Iran, providing access to capital city Ashgabat of Turkmenistan.