Bioarchaeology of the Near East, 12:61–68 (2018) Short fieldwork report Human remains from Hoseiniyeh Khanqah, Bidgol, Iran, 2017 Arkadiusz Sołtysiak *1 , Ali Moloodi 2 , Majid Montazerzohouri 2 1 Department of Bioarchaeology, Institute of Archaeology, University of Warsaw, Krakowskie Przedmieście 26/28, 00-927 Warsaw, Poland email: a.soltysiak@uw.edu.pl (corresponding author) 2 Department of Archaeology, University of Kashan, Qotbe Ravandi Blv., Kashan, Iran Arān va Bidgol is a twin town located 6km NE of Kashan, on the western flanks of the Iranian central desert. One of old cultic centres in the town is Hoseiniyeh Khanqah (34 ◦ 03 ′ 21 ′′ N 51 ◦ 29 ′ 20 ′′ E), located in the historical part of the old city of Bidgol (Figure 1). Hoseiniyeh refers to a specific kind of religious building in the Shi’a branch of Islam, dedicated to the mourning of Husayn ibn Ali, the third Shi’a Imam. On the other hand, khanqah is a central place in the Sufi tradition where major ceremonies are performed. erefore, the name Hoseiniyeh Khanqah suggests that the building was first used by a local Sufi community and was later converted into a sacred place for the Shi’a. Timing of the construction of the building is unknown. e earliest inscription on a metal banner post for Moharram ceremonies dedicated to Hoseiniyeh Khanqah is dated to 1684 CE (AH 1095), but pottery retrieved during restoration activities in and around the building has been attributed to Ilkhanid (13 c. CE) and some sherds to the Seljuq period (11–12 c. CE). A crypt, used by the local women to pray and called Chehl Dokhtarān (’forty girls’ in Persian), was discovered below the western side of the building. It was acces- sible through a door and a staircase from the main courtyard of the building, but at some point it had been filled and closed, possibly for several decades. In 2007 during construction work in the storage room near the entrance to hoseiniyeh, the crypt was re-discovered through a hole in the corner of its roof. After some initial cleaning it was determined that approximately one-third of the crypt, particularly along the eastern wall, contained a heap of soil with some human bone exposed on the surface. Rescue excavations at the site were undertaken between September 30 and Oc- tober 4, 2017 by the staff of the Department of Archaeology at the University of Kashan. e aim of the operation was to understand the stratigraphy of the deposit along the wall of the crypt and to estimate the Minimum Number of Individuals (MNI) buried within.