A dating for the archaic stuccoes in Buzan and their relationship with Early Abbasid Syrian-Iraqi production

The dating of the stuccoes of the Imamzada Karrar at Buzan (Isfahan) in Iran has been debated since their discovery in the 1930s. Apart from the Seljuk epigraphic panel above the mihrab, the dating of the rest of the stucco decoration is still controversial, as the current hypotheses range from the beginning of the 9th to the early 12th century. The aim of this paper is to highlight the close connection between the archaic stuccoes at Buzan and the Late Umayyad and Early Abbasid Syrian-Iraqi productions and to propose a new dating for these stuccoes, namely in the second half of the 8th century.