پیراهن

Color of the پیراهن signals event in Iran. White at weddings, black through Muharram and the forty days of mourning, sober dark blues and grays at the office. The phrase پیراهن عثمان (pirâhan-e Osmân, "the shirt of Osman") is a classic political idiom: holding up a victim's shirt as a banner to inflame a crowd. It comes from early Islamic history and still gets thrown around in modern Iranian political commentary when someone weaponizes a tragedy. Knowing the literal word opens the door to that whole layer of allusion.