Revisiting the fall of the Veramin meteorite

Abstract

The Veramin meteorite, believed to have fallen in 1880, near Varamin, Tehran province, Iran (then Persia), is one of few witnessed falls of a mesosiderite, a rare type of stony-iron meteorite. In this review, it is described that historical records show inconsistencies regarding the fall, and consequently, the naming of the meteorite. The earliest printed account, by Ferdinand Dietzsch in 1881, reported that the meteorite fell near the village “Karand” east of Tehran, with a thunder-like sound. The Shah had ordered an examination of it. Later, meteoricist Aristides Brezina named it “Veramin”. Further historical accounts include descriptions by Iranian official Mohammad Hassan Khan Sani’ od-Dowlah and the explorer Sven Hedin. A key document is a Persian text on a cardboard, preserved with the main meteorite mass in Tehran’s Golestan Palace. Members of the nomadic Shahsevan-e Baghdadi tribal confederacy, who had winter settlements west of Tehran, are reported as eyewitnesses. The geologist Henry A. Ward provided a detailed description in 1901, confirming the meteorite’s composition and securing a larger mass for analysis and distribution to museums. The exact location and date of the fall remain uncertain due to imprecise and conflicting sources. The most likely impact field is the Booghin-Eshtehard area west of Tehran, with the event happening sometime in the period February to April 1880. The original mentioning of “Karand” is a confusion with Zarand(ieh), 70 km to the west of Varamin.