Days of Ashura

This series describes the feeling of people during the Ashura commemoration in Esfahan (Iran). During the Days of Ashura are organized processions and public meeting where a speaker tells the history of Husayn martyrdom, the people participate actively in the story, beating his chest and and expressing grief and sorrow. The Ashura (the tenth day literally) commemorates the martyrdom of the third prophet Husayn in the plain of Karbala (today's Iraq) by Umayyad tribe, occurrence that marks the schism from Sunni Islamism. It is an important event for Iranian population. The underlying sense of the event is to strengthen the bonds of the community under the sign of injustice and persecution received; it is an aspect of religious feeling that accompanies the every day life of the faithful.