Lurs (also Lors,
Lurish: لورَل,
Persian:لُرها) are an
Iranian people living mainly in western and south-western
Iran. Their population is estimated at around five million. They occupy
Lorestan,
Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad,
Khuzestan and
Fars (especially
Lamerd,
Mamasani and
Rostam),
Bushehr,
Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari,
Hamadan,
Ilam and
Isfahan provinces. The Lur people mostly speak the
Lurish language (sometimes called "Luri"), a Southwestern Iranian language related to
Persian and
Kurdish. According to the
Encyclopaedia of Islam, the Lurish language is the closest living language to Archaic and Middle Persian. According to the linguist Don Still, Lori-Bakhtiari like Persian is derived directly from Old Persian.
Michael M. Gunter states that Lurs people are closely related to the
Kurds but that they "apparently began to be distinguished from the Kurds 1,000 years ago."