The 400-year-old Assarkhaneh Shahi, belonging to Safavid period, is located in Isfahan Bazaar.
Assarkhaneh is a place where oil has traditionally been extracted from oilseeds, such as sesame and cottonseed. This was done by grinding the grains with millstones and then squeezing the milled grains to get the oil out of them. The stones of the mill were moved by camels, and the pressing of the milled grains was done by the weight of beams from very large and long trunks of trees.
By entering the Assarkhane Shahi, you enter the space of e few hundred years ago. Here is a large but relatively dark hall with mud walls. The trunk of a very large and stout tree with a length of several meters and a diameter of more than one meter is based horizontally on beams. There are large millstones in the middle of the hall, which were moved by camels.
Oilseeds were first ground into flour. Then they made dough from them. The paste was then squeezed using a very heavy tree trunk to extract their oil. The oil was then collected in vats.
There were several Assarkhane mansions in Isfahan. The huge trees needed for them were imported from India, and they often had to demolish a number of houses along the way to get them inside the assarkhaneh.
Assarkhaneh Shahi is apparently related to the Safavid period . It have been active even until recently, when oil extracting machines had not yet entered the country. Even they have used motors and gearboxes to raise and lower the tree trunk.
Assarkhaneh Shahi has become a place for tourists to visit and it has been named “Assarkhanh Shahi Museum”.
There is another assarkhaneh called Jamaleh near the Isfahan Grand Mosque.
Google map link of Assarkhaneh Shahi Museum
