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Khuzestan in Encyclopaedia Britannica:
also spelled KHUZISTAN, formerly ARABESTAN, geographic region in southwestern Iran, lying at the head of the Persian Gulf and bordering Iraq on the west. It is notable for its oil resources.
The area that is now Khuzestan was settled about 6000 BC by a people with affinities to the Sumerians, who came from the Zagros Mountains region. Urban centres appeared there nearly contemporaneously with the first cities in Mesopotamia in the 4th millennium. Khuzestan came to constitute the heart of the Elamite kingdom, with Susa as its capital. Beginning with the reign of the legendary Enmebaragesi, about 2700 BC, who (according to a cuneiform inscription) "despoiled the weapons of the land of Elam," Sumerian, Akkadian, Babylonian, Kassite, Neo-Babylonian, and Assyrian invasions periodically crossed Khuzestan in response to Elamite involvement in Babylonian politics; the campaign of Ashurbanipal in 646-639 BC destroyed the Elamite kingdom and its capital, Susa. Incorporated into the Assyrian empire about 639, Khuzestan next passed under Achaemenid control at the collapse of Assyria; and after Cyrus the Great conquered Babylon in 539, it became a satrapy (province) of the Persian empire, with Susa serving as one of the Persians' three great capitals.
Alexander the Great took Susa shortly after the Battle of Gaugamela in 331, and from 311 to 148 Khuzestan was a satrapy (named Susiana) of the Seleucid empire, with its capital at Seleucia on the Eulaeus River. It passed firmly into Parthian control between 148 and 113 BC and then under Sasanian rule about AD 226. It was a frontier zone between the Roman-Byzantine and the Parthian-Sasanian empires and finally was taken by the Arabs about 642. It was part of the Safavid and Qajar dynasties that successively ruled Iran. |
1.They can be Elamites because Khuzestan was the heart of the Elam and Elamites ruled there for thousands years. Susa -> Suzia -> Khuzi
2.They can be also Uxians (those who stole Alexander's favourite horse, Bucephalus!  ) as Britannica says people of Khuzestan came from the Zagros Mountains region where Uxians lived, "Khuzi" can be changed forms of the words "Uxi", "Hukzi" and "huzi".
3.There was a Syrian tribe named "Hauzaye", the plural form of Hauzaye in Syriac is "Ahvaz" and Ahvaz is the capital and the largest city of Khuzastan, Hauzaye (Hoveize) is also itself name of a large city.
4.Some people say Khuzis are Persians and they have called their land Khuzestan which means "The Land of Suger" (Khuze=sugar cane) in Persian, the fertile soil of Khuzestan has a splendid potential for growing this plant, and the best sugar cane is harvested there.
5.Khuzestan was known as "Arabestan" (land of Arabs) even before Islam, Khuzis speak Arabic and there are many Arabic tribes in Khuzestan.
6.It is interesting that in the some historical books such as "Majma-ul-Tavarikh val Ghesas" (The Collection of histories and Tales) Khuzestan has been mentioned as "Hindustan" and there are some cities in Khuzestan with names of Hendijan, Hendemini, Hendorabi, ... maybe it relates to the large number of Indian students and teachers who were in the Great Sassanid university of Gondeshapur in Ahvaz.
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