Bear

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The ancient Iranians did not like bears. An old story says that when the famous hero, Yima (Jamshid), forgot about God,he married a witch who gave birth to a child who later became a bear. So bears were not considered good animals in ancient Iran.

However, the Sasanians depicted bears in their art. This charging bear is from Sasanian time-6th century AD.

Today we have two kinds of bears in Iran. One is the Asian black bear whose habitat is in Southeast of Iran near Kerman and Sistan and the other is Brown Bear. The picture on the right shows a stuffed brown bear in Tehran Nature Museum.

This picture below shows Wojtek (pronounced Voytek) the brown bear from Hamadan. In 1942, a local boy found a bear cub in the mountains of Hamadan and sold him to Polish soldiers who were stationed in Iran. The Polish soldiers named him Wojtek which means "warrior" in Polish. The brown bear stayed with the soldiers and slept with them in their tent.

Later the Polish soldiers took Wojtek to Italy to fight in the battle of Monte Cassino where he was used to carry ammunition. Wojtek never lost his ammunition and survived the Second World War.

In 1947, Wojtek was taken to Edinburgh zoo in Scotland and he remained there until his death in 1963. 
Many people came to visit this heroic bear in the zoo and he became a frequent guest of BBC’s Blue Peter-a children’s television program.

Although bears are protected animal by law in Iran, their numbers have been decreasing in recent year. Because bears are part of nature and Ahura Mazda’s creation, we need to work for their preservation. If you are interested in helping bears, please check this link and see how you can help.