[10] Nishapur is the second most populous city[11] of the province in the northeast of Iran, situated in a fertile plain at the foot of Binalud Mountain Range.

[15] From the Abbasid era to the Mongol invasion of Khwarezmia and Eastern Iran, the city evolved into a significant cultural, commercial, and intellectual center within the Islamic world.

Nishapur, along with Merv, Herat and Balkh, was one of the four great cities of Greater Khorasan and one of the greatest cities of the Old World in the Islamic Golden Age with strategic importance,[16] a seat of governmental power in the eastern section of caliphates, a dwelling place for diverse ethnic and religious groups and a trading stop on commercial routes from Transoxiana, China, Iraq[17] and Egypt.

Unlike its near neighbor Merv, Nishapur managed to recover from these cataclysmic events, and survive until the present day as an active modern city and county in tourism, agriculture, healthcare, industrial production and commerce[19] in Razavi Khorasan Province of Iran; however, many of its older and historical archeological remains are left to be uncovered.

The Area/district 1 of the city comprises the newer urban developments (initiated mostly in the 1980s and the 1990s) made to the north of the Road 44 and is home to most of the main higher educational institutions of Nishapur such as the University of Neyshabur and the IAUN.

Tahir's military victories were rewarded with the gift of lands in the east of Persia, which were subsequently extended by his successors as far as the borders of India.

After defeating the Saffarids, their "empire", with nominal sanction from the Abbasids, extended from India to Iraq, making Nishapur a provincial capital.

[34] Khurasan was thus an international entrepôt, with merchants coming not only from Iraq, India and Egypt, but also from Russia; additionally, Vikings came from Scandinavia to trade with the Bulghars and Khazars on the Caspian Sea.

[citation needed]Nishapur occupies an important strategic position astride the old Silk Road that linked Anatolia and the Mediterranean Sea with China.

In order to become sure that no wounded would survive the massacre, Khan's troops killed and beheaded most of the population of the city and their skulls were reputedly piled in pyramids by the Mongols.

[39] After the massacre a much smaller settlement was established just north of the ancient town, and the once bustling metropolis lay underground—until a team of excavators from the Metropolitan Museum of Art arrived in the mid-20th century.

George Curzon remarked that Nishapur had been destroyed and rebuilt more times than any other city in history,[43] an evocative statement whether or not it is statistically true.

The site of Nishapur has been ransacked for half a century since World War II, to feed the international market demand for early Islamic works of art.

Most people speak Persian and are monolingual, however, there are several private foreign language-teaching institutions in the city that teach English and other languages.

Nishapur is located at an elevation of 1250 meters on a wide fertile plain at the southwestern foot of the Binalud Mountain range in northcentral Razavi Khorasan Province.

Ibn Hawqal has commented the following about the weather and the climate of this city at that time:Throughout all of Khorasan, no such companion as enriched with the health of the air, quantity and the vastness of its mansions can be found.

[46][verification needed]In the same cited work[46][verification needed], Hakim Nishapuri praises Nishapur with many favourable nicknames such as "Persian: نیشابورست، هوای او صافی به صحت آبدان وافی، خالی از خطایا و عاری از وبا و اکثر بلایا… عروس بلدان، خزانه خراسان، دار امارت، لطیف عمارت، موطن ادیبان…" and compares and claims that the weather and climate (or air Persian: هوا) of Nishapur was better and more healthier (according to him, cholera and other such diseases and disasters could not be found in Nishapur) than many neighboring regions such as Sistan (due to its winds), Indus valley (or سند in Persian) and Hindustan (due to their severe hotness), Khwarazm and Turkestan (due to their coldness) and Merv (due to presence of many insects).

The city of Nishapur lies on a Holocene alluvial plain on top of the Pleistocene sediments in the southwestern part of the Binalud Mountains.

The well-known Nishabur turquoise comes from the weathered and broken trachytes and andesites of the Eocene volcanic rocks of this part of the mountain range.

Many agricultural products such as saffron, cereals, cotton, herbs, plums, walnut, wheat, corn, apples, cherries and pistachio are exported from the county of Nishapur.

Most of the water supply of the city is provided from the Binalud Mountain Range's mostly seasonal rivers, qanats, dams and modern wells.

Several hotels, ecolodges, resorts, parks, tourist hot-spots, restaurants, museums, a planetarium, cultural centers, mausoleums, religious pilgrimage sites and historic mosques are in and near the city.

In efforts to uncover the history of life in this city, the Metropolitan Museum of Art put together an excavation team composed of researchers Joseph Upton, Walter Hauser and Charles Wilkinson.

[65] Bowls including bold black inscriptions in the so-called Kufic angular calligraphy were apparently produced in the important ceramic centers of Nishapur in eastern Iran, and Afrasiyab, or Old Samarqand, in present-day Uzbekistan.

One decorative technique specifically utilized by Nishapur potters was the refined use of chattering, a rippled texture achieved when trimming a vessel on the wheel.

This city has been the birthplace and home of many famous Persian poets such as Omar Khayyam, Attar of Nishapur, Heydar Yaghma, Shafiei Kadkani and more.

The 15th World Scout Jamboree was scheduled to be held 15–23 July 1979 and was to be hosted by Pahlavi Iran at Nishapur, but was cancelled due to the Iranian Revolution in 1979.

For at least 2,000 years, Iran, known before as Persia, has remained an important source of turquoise, which was named by Iranians initially "pirouzeh" meaning "victory" and later after Arab invasion "firouzeh".

[citation needed] This deposit, which is blue naturally, and turns green when heated due to dehydration, is restricted to a mine-riddled region in Nishapur, the 2,012-metre (6,601 ft) mountain peak of Ali-mersai, which is tens of kilometers from Mashhad, the capital of Khorasan province, Iran.

A weathered and broken trachyte is host to the turquoise, which is found both in situ between layers of limonite and sandstone, and amongst the scree at the mountain's base.