WHAT HAS BEEN DONE AND WHAT HAS TO BE DONE? STATISTICAL ASSESSMENT OF IRANIAN PALEOLITHIC RESEARCH 1906-2021

115 years has been passed since the first reports on the Paleolithic research on the Iranian Plateau and all the while, Paleolithic research in Iran has been increasingly and variably expanding. The history of the Iranian Paleolithic archaeology has been the subject of a number of publications in recent years, but no precise statistics has ever been presented regarding the trends, sites and researchers, due to the difficulty of access to the resources, many of which have never been published properly. This research is a statistic review of Paleolithic archaeology of Iran based on the evaluation of all-range resources (from 1906 to 2021 - some published and many non-published) mentioning more than 2800 sites attributed to Paleolithic based on surface materials and 60 by excavations. It has been attempted to assess the patterns of distribution, abundance, and change in the Iranian Paleolithic research over time and whenever possible, the causes and explanations have been discussed. Accordingly, five phases of research have been recognized and described based on statistical and historical backgrounds (1906-1948; 1949-1979; 1980-1998; 1999-2010; 2011-present). Ideally, the extraction of these patterns is expected to contribute to understanding the processes and trends and to predicting and management of the future trajectories of studies in this field.