Mazandaran is a mythical land that has more epic and romantic legends and myths than any place in Iran, which is the most important land of the cultural and identity puzzle of the Iranian people due to its location between the Alborz Mountains, Hyrcanian forests and Caspian Sea.
[2] Dawalpa was an evil being which captured people by winding its flexible, leathery, strap-like legs around their necks,shoulders or waists.
Such captives would then be enslaved; forced, on pain of being clawed or half-strangled, to carry the demon around on their backs until they died of exhaustion - at which point the monster would be obliged to seek a fresh victim.
This being is best-known outside Iran as the Old Man of the Sea (Šayk al-Baḥr) as a result of the popularity of translations of the tales recounting the voyages of Sinbad the Sailor.
One of Sinbad’s voyages features both the noxious entity and the traditional means of defeating him - namely making him drunk/ataxic enough to be dislodged (and preferably killed) by his unfortunate victim.