Thanks Turnbull for your insightful comments as always.

I agree that Persia is somehow better sounding, more mysterious and adventurous than Iran, however if you were raised with the Persian literature, you couldn't help but love the name "Iran". All said, I do understand how Iran might be sounding so awful to an American, especially in these past three decades, even if he knows Persian. But to me "Iran" reminds me of our ancient epics. The bellow verses are not such a good translation of a poem by Ferdosi, around 300 years after Arab invasion. These are part of "The Epic of Kings" (Shah-naame), and as he concludes in the ending, he says that he has revived the Persians by spreading the seed of their language once again, what took him thirty years of his life. Prior to this piece of literature everything must had been written in Arabic.

May there be no life left in me to see the day without Iran,
May there be no life left in the bodies of all in this continent,

Better to lose our heads one by one,
Than to betray Iran to her enemies,

May she never become destroyed,
Or become the dwelling of beasts.

But if you don't mind me being picky, of those you mentioned I know for sure that turbans and curved swords belong to Arabs, and if you look into rock embossments left from pre-Arab domination, you could see that they generally were wearing rounded hats, as it is still custom in some villages. But veils for women, is a tricky issue. I'd love to go into detail about that, but I don't know if anyone is interested or not, as I feel that I've hijacked this thread enough already.