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The objective of this article is to describe and classify the occasions on which martial musical instruments used to be employed throughout the history of Iran in post- Islamic eras. Should historical, musical and illustrated documents are investigated, it will be realized that, throughout the social history of Iran in post- Islamic eras, martial musical instruments not only were used in wars but also on other occasions on which the high intensity of sound was needed. Presently, the applications of these instruments are regarded as obsolete. Owing to the fact that the most significant reason behind abandoning martial musical instruments was drastic decrease of their usage, identification and descriptions of such occasions on which these instruments were applied, are of great importance. The situations in which martial musical instruments used to be employed, throughout the history of Iran, fall into the following categories: wars, spreading news, flexing military muscles, hunting, travelling, animals’ shows such as olden circuses, athletic competitions and mourning ceremonies. Among which, wars, spreading news and flexing military muscles of rulers were the most significant of all, in as much as playing martial music on such occasions used to play a crucial role. The rest of the occasions comparatively were of less importance, for they had little political and state consequence and sometimes, they were regarded as merely popular situations. The overall method in this research is descriptive – analytic and gathering data is based on library studies.

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The goal of this article is to study the idea of universality of music; especially its status in mystical viewpoint.
An analytical-descriptive methodology has been adopted in this article and the related data have been gathered from libraries and existing documents.
The most important achievement of this study is that a number of musical works have attained a symbolic and spiritual format and have drawn the attention of people toward the supernatural world. Also, many musical instruments have been a symbol of spirituality. Mystical figures, in their musical works, have taken into consideration the manifestations of God Almighty

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The archaeological excavation of ancient Elam has led to the recovery of remnants, showing the rise and fall of a Persian civilization as well as reflecting how music and instruments (musicianship) were popular in those eras. Such archeological findings have mostly been portrayed on rock and pottery. A series of pictograms have depicted musical instruments while the majority of depicted string instruments are harps and tanburs. Wrapped in the Elamite culture, these instruments were passed on to the next civilizations, experiencing transformation over time. This descriptive-analytical research attempts to explore the string instruments in ancient Elam, thereby to review the historical roots of Iranian string instruments. The paper first provides an overview of music in ancient Elam. Then, several pictograms depicting string instruments are examined to determine their diversity and significance. The results indicate that harp and tanbur were the most frequent and diverse string instruments depicted in the paintings of ancient Elam.