The fire at Udvada is claimed to be the oldest continuously tended sacred fire brought out of Persia, and its journey to its present home took the better part of a millennium.
A fire that changed cities repeatedly
Tradition holds the fire now housed at Udvada, known as the Iranshah, was carried by the earliest Zoroastrian migrants from Persia and moved between several successive locations in India over the centuries before finally settling permanently in Udvada in 1742, a long custodial relay rather than a single unbroken installation in one place.
The spiritual capital, not the largest community
Although larger Parsi communities live in cities such as Mumbai, Udvada holds a distinct status as the spiritual centre of Indian Zoroastrianism specifically because it houses the Iranshah, drawing pilgrims from across India's Parsi community to a small town whose religious importance considerably outweighs its modest population and size.
As this entry's companion article covers
The Qissa-i Sanjan, the narrative poem composed centuries after the original migration and serving as the primary surviving account of the Parsi community's arrival in India, is addressed directly in this entry's companion article rather than repeated here.