The Last Empire of Iran 9781463240516

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The Last Empire of Iran

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The Last Empire of Iran

Michael R. Jackson Bonner

gp 2020

Gorgias Press LLC, 954 River Road, Piscataway, NJ, 08854, USA www.gorgiaspress.com Copyright © 2020 by Gorgias Press LLC

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2020

ISBN 978-1-4632-0616-1

ISSN 1935-6838

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A Cataloging-in-Publication Record is available from the Library of Congress. Printed in the United States of America

TABLE OF CONTENTS Table of Contents .......................................................................................................... v Acknowledgements...................................................................................................... vii Introduction .................................................................................................................... 1 I. Eurasia from the Conquests of Alexander to the Fall of Parthia ....................... 7 II. The Establishment of the House of Sasan ......................................................... 25 III. From Shapur I to Shapur II ................................................................................ 49 IV. The World of the Nomad .................................................................................... 93 V. Humiliation and Heresy ....................................................................................... 123 VI. The Iranian Recovery ......................................................................................... 171 VII. Triumph and Tribulation ................................................................................. 237 VIII. The Last War of Antiquity ............................................................................. 267 IX. The Collapse of the House of Sasan ................................................................ 313 X. Observations on the Fall of the Iranian Empire ............................................. 341 Bibliography ................................................................................................................ 349 Index ............................................................................................................................ 389

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I am very thankful to Geoffrey Greatex, Robert Hoyland, Katarzyna Maksymiuk, Nikolaus Schindel, Christelle Jullien, James Howard-Johnston, Philip Wood, Chris Tudor, Monica Green, Miranda Willians, Henry Hopwood-Phillips, and Tom Holland, who read and commented upon drafts of this book. I am grateful also to Amir Askari Yahyavi of the Iran History Forum who made the maps in this book. To the anonymous members of the editorial board of the Gorgias Press who reviewed my manuscript, I am grateful for their encouragement and helpful suggestions. My wife Alexandra, and sons Theodore and Maximilian, endured large piles of books and papers strewn about the house for nearly three years. In the final stages of preparation, in many a nocturnal editing session, Alexandra patiently declaimed every sentence of each chapter to help detect errors and to purge infelicities of style. I am certain that she and my sons are relieved that the toil is over, and I am pleased to dedicate this book to them. MRJB

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INTRODUCTION In the early third century of our era Iran was the scene of an important political revolution, and a new dynasty arose upon the ruins of an old. Circumstances seemed to favour such a change. The royal house which had ruled Iran for nearly five centuries had begun to destroy itself by civil war. Rome, the great power of the Mediterranean, had attained the limit of its greatness, and had begun, as it seemed, to collapse. Far across the huge expanse of Eurasia the failure of the Han dynasty proceeded amidst internal feuds and conflict with nomads of the steppe. Amidst these troubles, Ardashir I reasserted the dignity and power of Iran, and his most important policy was to carry war into the west and to recover the ancient limits of the first Persian empire established by Cyrus the Great. Almost a century and a half passed until the great movement of peoples out of Inner Asia nearly toppled the empires of Iran and Rome: half the Mediterranean world was lost to the people whom the Romans called barbarian, and efforts to hold or to recover the ancient Roman capital and its western empire ended in failure. But the empire of Iran survived, and its government came to portray itself as the defender of sedentary order against the threatening outer world of the nomad. A grim struggle with the Huns of Central Asia led to the erection or refurbishment of vast frontier defences and walls. Campaigns in the north and east of Iran filled the fifth century until the king Peroz perished in battle against that nomadic power. The result of such a humiliation was a subordinate, tributary status to the Huns. But it was not long before the House of Sasan emerged from that shameful condition as a stronger, more centralised, and more autocratic state which remained a formidable rival to eastern Rome in the age of Justinian. The empires of Iran and eastern Rome were capable alike of cooperation and conflict along their mutual frontier. Competition for even the smallest advantage could distract the governments of the two powers. Since the days of the first Ardashir, many an Iranian king had surely meditated the destruction of their Roman rival, but only one attempted to conquer that empire. The resultant war, which began in at the opening of the seventh century, united nearly the entire eastern Roman world with the empire of Iran. Khusro II, whose generals had achieved those conquests, might have passed on to his heir the greatest empire in the world. Successive kings of the Sasanid line might have ruled from North Africa and the waters of the Mediterranean to the roots of the Hindukush mountains, and from the Euphrates to the Strymon; and the dream of re-establishing the first Persian empire might have 1

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been fulfilled. But an alliance between Rome and the Turkish empire of the steppe overthrew the Iranian monarchy, and for a moment the two powers returned to a policy of cooperation. But the exhausted rivals had failed to foresee whence their doom would come, and when the Arabs burst out of the desert and crossed an insecure frontier in the south, the northern defences against the nomads of Asia, were of no avail. After the fall of the Iranian capital at Ctesiphon, the rule of the sedentary world passed to new masters, and the binary order of Rome and Iran gave way to a unitary Arab power. This book is about those transformations.

THE SOURCES OF SASANIAN HISTORY Pieces of the story are strewn across a large mass of historical works in many languages, and some of these yield no more than a useful sentence or two. An indigenous Iranian historical tradition appears to have survived within works composed in Arabic and Persian in the age of Islam. The works of Dinawari and Tabari, and the Shahnameh of Ferdowsi represent what I have called the royal tradition: a full but doubtful narrative of Sasanian dynastic history. An imaginative hypothesis of Theodor Nöldeke would have us believe that those texts repose upon a royal chronicle composed at the instigation of the Iranian government. 1 Though this idea is wrong, 2 it is obvious that later works of the Islamic age include much that can be corroborated by external sources amidst much that defies common sense. Historical sources which originated among the cultures abutting Iran can corroborate, correct, or clarify the strange and fanciful accounts of a later time, and I have given weight to the works of Roman, Armenian, and Syriac writers. The best sources which describe the nomadic world of Inner Asia were composed in a language which I cannot read, and so I have depended upon translations and learned summaries of the dynastic chronicles of China. The surest guides into the heterogeneous mass of sources for Sasanian history are three modern compendia. Dodgeon and Lieu’s Roman Eastern Frontier and the Persian Wars AD 226–363 covers nearly the first century and a half of Sasanid rule, 3 and a second volume of the same title prepared by Greatrex and Lieu covers the years 1

Nöldeke, T., Das Iranische Nationalepos, 1896, §12–13; Nöldeke, T., Geschichte der Perser under Araber zur Zeit der Sasaniden, 1879, p. xiii–xxviii. 2 Hoyland, R. G., The ‘History of the Kings of the Persians’ in Three Arabic Chronicles: the Transmission of the Iranian Past from Late Antiquity to Early Islam, 20018, p. 1–23; Hämeen-Anttila, J., Khwadāynāmag: The Middle Persian Book of Kings, 2018; Jackson Bonner, M. R., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal: An Historiographical Study of Sasanian Iran, 2015, p. 47–57; Jackson Bonner, M. R., Three Neglected Sources of Sasanian History in the Reign of Khusraw Anushirvan, 2011, p. 19–28. 3 Dodgeon, M. H. / Lieu, S. N. C., The Roman Frontier and the Persian Wars AD 226–363, 1991.

INTRODUCTION

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363–630. 4 Dignas and Winter’s Rome and Persia in Antiquity presents analysis of Iranian political history during the Sasanian age, as well as a series of essays on the main themes of that history. I have used those three texts as, I believe, they were intended; and I have supplemented the resultant narrative with the evidence of material culture as much as possible. The series of books called the Sylloge Nummorum Sasanidarum are excellent guides to Sasanid coinage, and the numerous studies of Rika Gyselen provide invaluable information on royal and aristocratic sealings. My narrative is informed by the best modern scholarship available to me. But I have avoided academic debates, and historiographical digressions on the worth of my sources are included within my narrative only when they benefit my argument. The same is true of geographical descriptions, philological arguments, and theological speculations. Though many of the sources which I have consulted have the quality of legend or fantasy, I have tried to determine what historical truth may be at the root of them. But I exercise great scepticism about two aspects of the Persian and Arabic sources which I have consulted. I. The Iranian royal tradition includes a prolix mass of anecdotes recording the splendour of the Sasanid court and the glories of the reigns of certain kings who were long remembered in Abbasid lore. 5 I have either condensed or omitted such long digressions, since they cannot be verified, nor do they add anything to our understanding of political history. II. In my narratives of the career of Muhammad and the Arab conquests, I have cast aside posthumous Muslim tradition in favour of contemporary accounts in Armenian and Syriac – except where the balance of probability or common sense suggest that a genuine historical fact has been preserved on the pages of Baladhuri, Dinawari, or Tabari. 6 The narrative which I have written is a political history. Foreign and domestic policy, warfare, and the other operations of government are my main themes. The neglect of such topics as social or economic history can be blamed on the limitations or defects of my sources, which take almost no notice of the lives of the common people upon whom social and economic change would obviously have had the greatest effect. Some would not consider this a serious problem. The life and activities of a peasant, his food, his religion, must have changed little between the rule of the Arsacids and that of the House of Sasan; and the coin which he held in his hand, bearing the image of the monarch, may have been for the common man the only sign of a new dynasty or a new king. As much as I should wish to know and to transcribe the thoughts and feelings of the people whose involuntary taxes 4

Greatrex, G. / Lieu, S. N. C., The Roman Eastern Frontier and the Persian Wars, Part II AD 363–630, 2002. 5 Christensen’s account of the reign of Khusro I, for example, emphasises the legendary splendour of the court at Ctesiphon to the detriment of political and military affairs (Christensen, L’Iran sous les Sassanides, 1936, p. 419–435). 6 Cf. the learned argument in Hoyland, R., In God’s Path: The Arab Conquests and the Creation of an Islamic Empire, 2015, p. 1–6.

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supported the army, the administrative state, and the domestics of the palace, they would add nothing to the political history of a dynasty whose kings never consulted popular opinion. Ancient historians, moreover, rarely looked beyond the court or the battlefield. Writers, such as Ammianus, Procopius, or Ibn Miskawayh, who were themselves advisers within government and the military may be forgiven for laying so great an emphasis on what they best understood. But we would now consider as serious flaws their ignorance of foreign customs and languages, which yields rarely to a serious attempt to comprehend outsiders, and their frequent unwillingness even to mention commerce (one of mankind’s most natural and important activities). Accordingly, I have attempted to correct the defects of my sources by filling in the gaps which I find with such inferences as can be justified by the available evidence, by the power of common sense, and by my own political acumen. 7 A learned specialist may discover in this book something that he did not know. But I have more interest in informing a more general, but learned, audience if I can. This is why I have avoided systems of transliteration employing macrons and diacritical markings. If there is a commonly accepted English equivalent of a foreign word, I have used it. Accordingly I write Ctesiphon instead of Tespon or Tisfun. But I have tried to remain faithful to the sound of Iranian personal names, and so I have avoided classicising equivalents. I write Mihrdad and Khusro, not Mithridates and Chosroes. The maps, however, give the New Persian forms of all Iranian names of cities, towns, bodies of water, and so forth. I use the pinyin system when transliterating Chinese. I quote my sources liberally, and unless I have indicated otherwise, all the translations are mine. Finally, something should be said about the title of this book. I do not mean that there were no more Iranian empires after the fall of the Sasanid state. The Safavid and Qajar states of more recent ages were indeed empires. But they were not ostensible revivals of the ancient Iranian homeland which Zoroaster called Airyanem Vaejo (the theoretical counterpart of the Vedic Aryavarta) which may be construed as the ‘Abode of the Aryans’. The Sasanian Empire of Iran, or Eranshahr as they called it, was held to be the reconstruction, or at least the spiritual and political heir, of that mythical dominion of the Iranians described in Zoroastrian scripture. It is possible that the Sasanid family had not made the first attempt at such a revival, but theirs was the last.

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See Polybius, XII.28 for the importance of political experience to the writing of history.

INTRODUCTION

Map 1. The Empire of Iran and its Neighbours toward the end of the Sixth Century.

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Map 2. The Iranian Frontier in the West.

I. EURASIA FROM THE CONQUESTS OF ALEXANDER TO THE FALL OF PARTHIA THE SETTLED STATES OF EURASIA When the peoples of the Near East were first gathered into cities, political order took the form of a succession of empires. 1 The consecutive monarchies of Sumer, Akkad, Assyria, Lydia, Media, and Babylon ruled over the Near East until Babylon fell to the arms of the Persian king Cyrus the Great. It is possible to see in these empires the same expression of civilisation which first developed in the lowlands of Mesopotamia. Cyrus portrayed himself as the restorer of an ancient sedentary order which had fallen into ruin, and he associated himself with all the trappings of the Sumerian, the Assyrian, and the Babylonian monarchies. 2 The art and architecture of the antique cities of Assyria and Babylon were imitated under the first Persian empire; and the symbols of royal power adopted by Cyrus and his successors were already ancient when those kings ruled over their empire. 3 The dominion of Cyrus, known to posterity as the Achaemenid empire, stretched from the waters of the Aegean Sea to the sandy wastes of Bactria. The descendants of that great king wished to enlarge their empire, and Cambyses, son and successor to Cyrus, added the lands of Egypt to the conquests of his father. This was the first attempt to unite within a single polity all the civilised peoples of the earth; and a flexible, centralised administrative system oversaw the efficient op-

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Ancient cities were established in order maintain commercial, religious, artistic, and cultural connections. Rivalry provoked conflict, and competition led to the formation of larger political bodies (Chavalas, M., “The Age of Empires, 3100–900 BCE,” in Snell, D. C., A Companion to the Ancient Near East, 2005, p. 34–47; Kuhrt, A., The Ancient Near East c. 3000–330 BC, vol. I, 1995, p. 40–44), and these constituted the earliest empires. See also Van de Mieroop, M., The Ancient Mesopotamian City, 1997, 24–41; and Hawkes, J., The First Great Civilizations: Life in Mesopotamia, the Indus Valley, and Egypt, 1973, p. 31–45. 2 Briant, P., From Cyrus to Alexander, 2002, p. 43–44. 3 Allen, L., The Persian Empire, 2005, p. 15–35; Root, M. C., The King and Kingship in Achaemenid Art: Essays on the Creation of an Iconography of Empire, 1979.

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eration of a great and heterogeneous state. 4 Investment in agriculture on a gigantic scale and the regulation of goods bought and sold at market nourished the growth of populous cities; and a vast network of roads connected Mesopotamia with north Africa and the Mediterranean Sea, as well as with Anatolia and Central Asia. 5

THE WORLD OF THE NOMAD Beyond the limits of the civilised world was the abode of the nomad. A vast and forbidding steppe stretches northeast of Mesopotamia between the Crimea and Manchuria, and the men that dwelt there disdained the labour of agriculture, and refused confinement within a single place as well as the corrupting luxury of a sedentary life. They lived mainly on the milk and meat of their livestock, and the discovery of metal-working gave them the implements both of the hunt and of warfare. For many ages they wandered, driving their flocks before them from one pasture to another, according to the rhythm of the seasons and within the narrow limits imposed by custom and nature. 6 Mastery of the horse carried nomadic peoples across immense distances, and the riders of the north established regular contact with cities on the fringes of the sedentary world. With time the nomads discovered that they could not live on the products of stockbreeding alone. Some nomads practised a rudimentary subsistence farming, but it was far easier to pillage a town in an instant than to toil for months in a field. 7 The borders of sedentary states were solidified and expanded at the expense of the nomads’ pastures, and predatory raids often aimed to regain access to the lands occupied by new towns along the frontier. 8 In such conflicts fortune favoured the nomads, for the great sedentary powers could hardly match the strength of a people whose way of life was better suited to warfare. 9 The great empires of the south taught their soldiers forcibly to disavow the comforts of sedentary life, to en4 Cf. Frankopan, P. Silk Roads: A New History of the World, 2017, p. 3–5; Daryaee, T., Sasanian Persia: The Rise and Fall of an Empire, 2009, p. 1. 5 Colburn, H. P., “Connectivity and Communication in the Achaemenid Empire,” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 56, 2013, 29–52. 6 Beckwith, C. Empires of the Silk Road, 2009, p. 60–62; Benjamin, C.G.R., The Yuezhi, 2007, p. 2–5. 7 Baumer, C., The History of Central Asia: The Age of the Steppe Warriors, v. 1, 2014, p. 84–87; Kim, H. J., The Huns, Rome, and the Birth of Europe, 2013, p. 41–42; Hildinger, E., Warriors of the Steppe, 1997, p. 1–14; Whittow, M., The Making of Orthodox Byzantium 600–1025, 1996, p. 22; Barfield, T. J., The Perilous Frontier, 1989, p. 16–30. 8 Beckwith, C. Empires of the Silk Road, p. 26–27. 9 Graff, D. A., The Eurasian Way of War: Military Practice in Seventh-Century China and Byzantium, 2016, p. 153–155; Hildinger, E., Warriors of the Steppe, p. 1–14; Di Cosmo quotes the analysis of Sima Qian comparing the tactics of the nomadic Xiongnu with those of the sedentary Chinese (Di Cosmo, N., Ancient China and its Enemies: the Rise of Nomadic Power in East Asian History, 2002, p. 203).

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dure the rigours of extreme cold and heat, the exhaustion of the forced march, and the simplicity of the military diet. But the nomad had long been hardened by his dangerous and inhospitable abode. The grasslands of the high plateaux of Asia merge with tangles of rugged mountains, sandy deserts, and a formidable belt of subarctic forest; and even in its most temperate areas and oases the climate of the steppe is very severe. 10 The skills of riding and shooting were necessary to survival in the world of the nomad and were imparted to small children long before their sedentary rivals might learn them; 11 and a nomadic society may deploy a vast number of soldiers without fear of abandoning a field or neglecting a harvest. 12 To avoid contending with the warriors of the north, sedentary states recruited them within their own armies as mercenaries. But this was a dangerous policy. In the seventh century before Christ, the king of Assyria had given his daughter in marriage to a nomadic chieftain, and the military union of those two nations crushed the revolt of Babylon and Media and their assault upon the city of Nineveh. 13 For a brief moment, this marriage alliance saved from destruction the tottering empire of Assyria; but when it collapsed soon thereafter, the nomads, bereft of their sedentary masters, overran the Levant and spread terror and destruction everywhere. 14 The approach of those nomads filled the Hebrew prophet Jeremiah with alarm, and he pronounced this grim warning: ‘Behold a people cometh from the north country…they shall lay hold on bow and spear; they are cruel, and have no mercy; their voice roareth like the sea; and they ride upon horses… Go not forth into the field, nor walk by the way; for the sword of the enemy and fear is on every side’. 15

Those nomads were the people whom the writer Herodotus called Scythian. 16 They were the terror of the ancient world, and theirs was the first penetration by a nomadic power into the sedentary world of the south. The kings of the Achaemenid line endeavoured to secure their empire against such an incursion, and in about the year 530 before our era, Cyrus the Great perished in battle with the nomads of the north. An army of the greatest sedentary empire of the Near East was defeated by the people whom Herodotus calls Massagetae, and that writer was astounded by the size and ferocity of the battle in which Temperatures can vary by eighty degrees Celsius between summer and winter. So Sima Qian observed (Di Cosmo, N., Ancient China and its Enemies, p. 276). 12 I owe this observation to my friend Philip Wood. 13 Roux, G., Ancient Iraq, 1991, p. 668–719. 14 Roux, G., Ancient Iraq, p. 796–813. 15 Jeremiah 6:22–25. 16 Herodotus, describing the same event, also claims that the Egyptian king Psammeticus dissuaded the nomads (called Scythians in Herodotus’ text) from invading his country by means of gifts and prayers (Herodotus, I.104–106). 10 11

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Cyrus fell. 17 His successor Darius I campaigned against the Scythians to the north of the Black Sea; and a feigned retreat, the favourite tactic of nomads, drew the Persian army ever deeper into the steppe before the king abandoned that dangerous expedition. 18

THE CONQUESTS OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT But the ruin of the first Persian empire came not from the Asiatic steppe but from a series of small conflicts on the western fringe of the sedentary world. Darius I had vowed to conquer Greece with an army of two million men, and his invasion might have succeeded. But the ambition of Darius was first checked at Marathon, and his heir Xerxes was resisted at Thermopylae, and defeated at Salamis, Plataea, and Mycale. The national pride of the Greeks will never allow the world to forget their momentary triumph, but the conquest of the first Iranian empire was achieved by a Macedonian. Despite the rustic simplicity of Macedonia’s tribal order and primitive monarchy, the king of Macedon and his court spoke the language, and honoured the culture, of Greece. Archelaus I of Macedon had been the patron of Euripides, and the Grecian painter Zeuxis had decorated his capital at Pella. The rhetoric of Isocrates had speculated that the peoples of Asia would willingly submit to Macedonian rule, and that they would gratefully exchange barbarian despotism for Hellenic protection. 19 But no one had imagined that a Macedonian would destroy the empire of Cyrus and diffuse throughout the world the language and culture of Greece. A great portion of Greek civilisation must trace its origin to oriental models. 20 The use of writing, the alphabet, much of Greek mythology, and a portion of Greek vocabulary were alike transposed from the Near East; and learned Greeks wrote of the culture of the Persian empire with a mixture of envy and admiration. 21 When Alexander established the Macedonian empire upon the ruins of Achaemenid Iran, we may fairly think of the home-coming of Hellenism and a mingling of Greek and Asiatic civilisations. 22 It is true that some Greek colonists had demanded a Greek 17

Herodotus, I.214. Herodotus, IV. 19 Isocrates, Letters, V.154. 20 West, M. L., The East Face of Helicon: West Asiatic Elements in Greek Poetry, 1997. 21 See, for example, the respectful treatments of Iran in Herodotus, I.131; Thucydides, VIII.18; Xenophon, Anabasis, I.ix; Cyropaedia, passim. Consider also, Aeschylus dignified portrayal of the Persian queen Atossa (Aeschylus, Persae, l. 159–172; l. 290–298; l. 598–622; l. 709–713), and Aeschylus seems to consider the empire of Darius a model of civil government and order (Aeschylus, Persae, l. 852–857). Plato is critical, contemptuous, and full of envy in his Laws, III.694a. 22 See a late twentieth-century case-study on the installation of Greek rule in Babylonia (Sherwin-White, S., “Seleucid Babylonia: A Case-Study for the Installation and Development of Greek Rule,” in Kuhrt, A. / Sherwin-White, S. (eds) Hellenism in the East: The Interaction of Greek and Non-Greek Civilizations from Syria to Central Asia after Alexander, 1987, p. 1–31); and a 18

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way of life and a Greek education for their children, and some who longed for the old country rose in revolt. 23 But the form and customs of the Greek city flourished in the very place where civilisation had first appeared, and were swiftly transposed to the far reaches of the earth: a school, a gymnasium, baths, and a theatre arose upon the shore of the Oxus, and the natives of Bactria were taught to declaim the verses of Homer and to sing the tragedies of Sophocles and Euripides. 24 In time it would be rumoured that many a Scythian had committed the Iliad to memory, and that the scholars of India had translated that poem into their own language. 25

THE SELEUCID MONARCHY Alexander is said to have imagined a world in which Greek and Oriental were bound together by ties of blood and the bearing of children. 26 Believing in his late king’s vision of a new world, Alexander’s general Seleucus had married the daughter of the Persian governor of Sogdiana in Central Asia. The House of Seleucus was thus founded upon a union of a Macedonian and an Iranian family, and it was this dynasty which inherited most of the sedentary world after the death of Alexander. 27 The administrative divisions of the late Persian empire, its bureaucracy, and its local customs were not altered under Macedonian rule. The structure of that empire had withstood revolts, problems along its frontiers, and challenges to the royal succession, 28 and so there was no reason to change or to abolish it. Seleucus established his capital at a narrow spot between the rivers Euphrates and Tigris, and with time the city of Seleucia surpassed its neighbour Babylon as the great metropolis between

discussion of the blending of the Greek and oriental art after Alexander’s conquest (Colledge, M., “Greek and Non-Greek Interaction in the Art and Architecture of the Hellenistic East,” in Kuhrt, A. / Sherwin-White, S. (eds), Hellenism in the East: The Interaction of Greek and Non-Greek Civilizations from Syria to Central Asia after Alexander, 1987, p. 134–162). 23 Diodorus, XVIII.7.1. 24 Plutarch, Moralia, IV: de Alexandri magni fortuna ac virtute, 5. For a modern opinion on this transformation, see Frankopan, P. Silk Roads, p. 8–10. On Bactrian Hellenism, see Francfort, H.-P., et al., Il y a 50 ans… la découverte d’Aï Khanoum, Mémoires de la délégation archéologique française en Afghanistan, v. 35, 2014, p. 63–66; Bernard, P., “Deuxième campagne de fouilles d’Aï Khanoum en Bactriane,” Comptes rendus de l’Académie des Insciptions et Belles-Lettres, 1967, p. 318–319. For a general description of city life in the Hellenistic age, see Cook, J. M., The Greeks in Ionia and the East, 1964, p. 180–199. 25 Dio Chrysostom, Orations, 36. 9; 53.6–7. 26 Plutarch, Moralia, IV: de Alexandri magni fortuna ac virtute, 6. 27 For an exhaustive, but rather old, history of the Seleucid empire, see Bevan, E. R., The House of Seleucus, 2 vols, 1902. An informative summary can be found in Bickerman, E., “The Seleucid Period,” in Yarshater, E. (ed.), The Cambridge History of Iran 3 (1): The Seleucid, Parthian, and Sasanian Periods, 1983, p. 3–20. 28 Kuhrt, A., The Ancient Near East c. 3000–330 BC, II, 1995, p. 676–701.

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the two rivers. 29 But at the opening of the third century before Christ, the Seleucid court was transposed to Antioch in northern Syria: ties to the Mediterranean Sea and to mainland Greece were strengthened, and authority sat lightly upon the east and soon failed altogether. A futile war with Egypt, ruled by a rival Macedonian dynasty, distracted the court at Antioch; and about two hundred and fifty years before our era the provinces of Bactria and Parthia asserted their independence and were swiftly overrun by an invasion of nomads known as the Parni.

THE RISE OF PARTHIA Who were the Parni? Herodotus writes of a confederation of nomads known as the Dahae. 30 They dwelt upon the eastern shore of the Caspian Sea to the north of the plain of Gurgan 31 in a land which came to be known as Dahistan, and their reputation as warriors must have been formidable. Biographers of Alexander record that contingents of the Dahae had fought with the Persians against the Macedonian host at the battle of Gaugamela, and that Alexander had later recruited some of the Dahae into his own army. 32 The geographer Strabo records the names of the three tribes within the Dahae confederacy: Xanthii, Pissuri, and the Parni. 33 In the twilight days of the Seleucid provinces of Parthia and Bactria, the chief of the Parni was called Arshak. He is known in the west as Arsaces I, and he gave his name to the Arsacid dynasty. History has not recorded the name that Arshak and his people called themselves and their kingdom; but when they gained mastery of the Seleucid province of Parthia, which had lately risen in revolt, they and their successors were ever thereafter known in the west as Parthians. Over the course of two centuries, the House of Seleucus preoccupied itself with civil wars and conflict with the rival Macedonian rulers of Egypt, and the rising power of Parthia collected the fragments of that crumbling monarchy. Arshak was the father of the dynasty, but the empire of the Parthians was established under the rule of Mihrdad I. 34 That famous king asserted the prestige of his empire by abasing the dignity of Macedonian rule and exalting the memory of the monarchy of Cyrus. Mihrdad had supplanted the power of Seleucus’ descendants in the ancient heartland of their kingdom, and he emphasised this fact by a coronation at the city of Seleucia. At this solemn occasion, the ancient title of King of Kings, which Cyrus 29

Strabo, XVI.i.16. Δάοι (Herodotus, I.125) or Dahae (Tacitus, Annals, XI.x). 31 In classical sources this region is called Hyrcania. 32 Arrian, Anabasis, III.11; V.12.2; Curtius Rufus, IV.12.5, VII.7.32. 33 Strabo, XI.508; 515. 34 Mihrdad I reigned from about 171 to 137 BC. My exposition of Parthian history follows secondary authorities, chief amongst which are Wolski, J., L’Empire des Arsacides, 1993, and Debevoise, N. C., A Political History of Parthia, 1938. 30

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and his successors had used, was attached to the name of the Parthian monarch. 35 It was shortly after this moment that Ctesiphon was founded: a city built according to a circular plan which was destined to overshadow nearby Seleucia. 36 Warfare continued between Parthia and the failing House of Seleucus. In the year 130 before our era Antiochus VII was defeated despite reciprocal damage. But greater threats to Parthia came from the east and from the south. The Parthian king Farhad had engaged nomadic mercenaries to defeat Antiochus, but they arrived too late to the battle. 37 The Parthian king refused payment; the enraged Sakas (as they were called) pillaged eastern Iran; and border skirmishes were inflamed into a sanguinary war when Greek mercenaries in the Parthian army joined the nomadic cause. Farhad and his successor Artaban alike perished in the struggle, and the Sakas penetrated deep into Iran. They settled in Drangiana, which in time came to be known as Saka Country, or Sakastan in the Persian language. 38 To the noble Parthian family of Suren were entrusted the pacification and defence of the eastern frontier, and a chief of that important name expelled the Saka horde from Drangiana, and drove them eastwards into Arrachosia and the Punjab. At the same moment, an Arab king by the name of Hyspaosines captured the city of Antioch upon the estuary of the Euphrates and the Tigris at the Persian Gulf, and thereby established a bridgehead from which he advanced into Babylon.

THE MIGRATION OF THE TOCHARIANS The penetration of the Sakas had been preceded by movements deep within the Asiatic steppe. In the second century before our era, the Chinese Han dynasty began to project power westward into the Hexi corridor: 39 a route of six hundred miles connecting the interior of China with the oasis of Dunhuang upon the edge of the Taklamakan desert. From there two long and dangerous roads departed and followed the northern and the southern flanks of that inhospitable wasteland through the tiny oasis towns upon the edge of the desert, and converged at the city of Kashgar: the junction of the Tian Shan, the Himalaya, and the Pamir mountains. 40 Those two perilous roads were enough to assure communication and trade, however slow 35

Sarkhosh Curtis, V., “The Iranian Revival in the Parthian Period,” in Sarkosh Curtis, V. / Stewart, S. (eds), The Age of the Parthians, The Idea of Iran v. 2, 2007, p. 14–15. 36 The Hippodamian grid of Seleucia was abandoned in favour of the vast circle of Ctesiphon (Kröger, J., “Seleucia,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. VI, fasc. 4, 1993, p. 446–448). This city is called Tespon in Middle Persian, and Tisfun in the modern language. 37 Justin, XLII.1.1–5. 38 It is also contracted to Sistan. 39 This is also called the Gansu corridor. 40 Compare the romantic descriptions of this area in Frankopan, P., Silk Roads, 2017, p. 10– 13 and Grousset, R., The Empire of the Steppes: A History of Central Asia, 1970, p. xii–xiii.

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and precarious, between China and the strange world to the west. 41 To the north arose the Altai mountains, and above them stretched the immeasurable expanse of the steppe. There a tribal confederacy whom the Chinese called Xiongnu, whom we may identify with the Huns, 42 were the dominant nomadic power in the age of the Han. The Huns launched a series of raids westward from the borders of China in about the year 176 before our era. Six years later, they had defeated and displaced another nomadic confederacy known in the west as the Tocharians, and in Chinese sources as the Yuezhi. 43 The Tocharian federation fled to the fertile valley of the Ili river where they attempted to re-establish their nomadic customs. But a people known in Chinese as the Wusun sought and received permission from the Huns to take revenge upon the Tocharians for a recent humiliation. They attacked the Tocharians and expelled them from the Ili valley in about the year 132 before Christ. A portion of those dispirited fugitives began a long march to the west, and it was only two years later that the wanderings of the Tocharians brought them to Bactria, whence they dislodged the Sakas and overran the eastern relics of Alexander’s empire. 44 Upon the ruins of Greek civilisation in the east, the Tocharians established a great kingdom stretching from the borders of Iran to the mountains of the Hindukush. A people known as Kushan, who had formed part of the Tocharian confederacy, rose to prominence and gave their name to the new state. The migration of the Tocharians and the invasion of the Sakas were remembered in the lore of Iran. Fighting along the north-eastern border and conflict between Iranian and Tocharian was raised to the level of the epic, and came to be represented in a later age as the battles between Iran and Turan in Ferdowsi’s Shahnameh. The hero Godarz, who bears the name of a real Parthian king, waged war in the east on behalf of his sovereign, the mythical ruler Kay Khusro, and the armies of Iran were sent to punish the Turanian invaders and their demonic leader Afrasiab. Many an elaborate and legendary scene of battle and single combat fill the pages of the Shahnameh, but at the root of Ferdowsi’s account lie the memory of the great migration set in motion by the Huns. 45 Hansen, V., The Silk Road: A New History, 2012. De la Vaissière, “Huns et Xiongnu,” Central Asiatic Journal, 49/1, 2005, p. 3–26. 43 Kim, H. J., The Huns, Rome, and the Birth of Europe, 2013, p. 31–32; Beckwith, C., Empires of the Silk Road, 2009, p. 83–85; Liu, X., “Migration and Settlement of the Yuezhi-Kushan: Interaction and Interdependence of Nomadic and Sedentary Societies,” Journal of World History, vol. 12, no. 2, 2001, p. 261–292. 44 Benjamin, C. G. R., The Yuezhi, p. 112–124. 45 Ferdowsi, Kay Khusro, passim; Bivar, A.D.H, “Godarz: ii. The Epic Hero,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, Vol. XI, Fasc. 1, 2012, p. 31–39; Bivar, A.D.H., “Gondophares and the IndoParthians” in Sarkosh Curtis, V. / Stewart, S. (eds), The Age of the Parthians, The Idea of Iran v. 2, 2007, p. 28–30; Nöldeke, T., Das iranische Nationalepos, p. 7–9. 41 42

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THE NATURE OF THE PARTHIAN EMPIRE The Parthian empire lay in ruins until it was restored by Mihrdad II, son and successor to Artaban. The power of the renewed monarchy reposed upon the cooperation of the noble families of Parthia and its subordinate kings. Some are known by their names: the Suren and Karen families are attested in sources of the Parthian era; and the Mihran and the Zikh, who are commemorated in sources of a later age, appear to have had roots in Arsacid times also. In the Sasanian period, there were surely others who possessed, or who had invented, a similarly ancient origin, and they may perhaps be identified by their hereditary titles. 46 The loose association of so many powerful aristocrats provoked the contempt of the Sasanian kings and their ministers, and the Persian royal tradition has derided the Arsacid era as the time of ‘factional kings’. 47 Under the rule of Mihrdad II and his successors, the ancient Achaemenid provincial system endured, and the Parthians perhaps united with it their own notions of a tribal confederacy preserved from their nomadic past. 48 The result was an empire embracing a strange agglomeration of principalities and kingdoms commanded by indigenous rulers of unequal rank and inconsistent prestige. 49 Pliny the Elder enrolled under the rule of Parthia eighteen kingdoms between the Red and the Caspian Seas, and Tacitus described other territories whose rulers were appointed directly by the Arsacid monarch. 50 Accordingly, Hyspaosines’ kingdom of Charax Spasinou was not destroyed, but made tributary; and the lords of Persia were permitted to strike their own coins according to a pattern which combined Seleucid and Parthian forms. 51 But perhaps the most illustrative example of the loose style of Parthian rule can be found in the Antiquities of the Jews. The writer Josephus describes the banditry of two Jewish men of Babylonia. Their life of crime had attracted a large following of other outlaws, and so powerful was this gang of bandits that they defeated the local army which had been sent to oppose them. But Artaban II summoned the 46

Pourshariati, P., Decline and Fall of the Sasanian Empire: The Sasanian-Parthian Confederacy and the Arab Conquest of Iran, 2008, p. 37–53. 47 Dinawari, p. 44; Tabari, v. 2, p. 37:

‫م��ك الطوائف‬

Bosworth translates this as ‘party kings’ (Bosworth, C. E., The History of al-Tabari, volume V, 1999, p. 1). 48 Kim, H. J., The Huns, Rome, and the Birth of Europe, p. 9–14. On the organisation of the Achaemenid empire see Allen, L., The Persian Empire, 2005, p. 111–131; Briant, P., From Cyrus to Alexander, 2002, p. 338–347; 507–511. 49 Fowler, R., “King, Bigger King, King of Kings: structuring power in the Parthian world,” Kaizer, T. / Facella, M. (ed.), Kingdoms and Principalities in the Roman Near East, 2010, p. 57–77. 50 Pliny, Natural History, VI.112; Tacitus, Annals, VI.42. 51 Wiesehöfer, J. “Fars under Seleucid and Parthian Rule,” in Sarkosh Curtis, V. / Stewart, S. (eds), The Age of the Parthians, The Idea of Iran v. 2, 2007, p. 44–45.

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Jewish brigands to his court, lavished gifts upon them, and installed them as governors of Babylonia. 52 The rank and position of a local king was variously expressed. The privilege of wearing the diadem or tiara, the use of signet rings and ceremonial swords, elaborate greetings and forms of obeisance, protocol at banquets, and the right to sleep upon a couch of gold – these were some of the symbols of rank and power which the Parthian monarch might bestow upon his favourites. 53 It may be possible to see in this federation of local rulers and elaborate distinctions of privilege something akin to a feudal system. 54 But this imperfect analogy rather better describes a network of aristocratic privilege and the duties of a military nobility than a system of landholding.

PARTHIA AT WAR The Parthian monarchy was the first state to inflict a serious defeat upon the legions of Rome. The humiliation was so severe, that the Roman claim to an empire without end could not survive it. 55 A fratricidal struggle had arisen between the sons of the Parthian king; and a series of Parthian usurpers who are no more than names to us bespeaks grave trouble. Marcus Licinius Crassus, the Roman patrician who had lately risen to the governorship of Syria, wished to exploit Parthian turmoil and win renown in his old age. 56 A great military victory over Parthia (so Crassus believed) would assure him of the political and financial power to equal or to surpass his rivals Caesar and Pompey. 57 But Roman military intelligence was weak, 58 and Crassus ig52

Josephus, Antiquitates Judaicae, XVIII.337. I discovered this anecdote in Sommer, M., “In the Twilight: Hatra Between Rome and Iran” in Dirven, L. (ed.), Hatra: Politics, Culture and Religion Between Parthia and Rome, Oriens et Occidens 21, 2013, p. 33–44. 53 See Josephus’ anecdotes about Izates and Artaban in Antiquitates Judaicae, XX.32–76. And for a detailed modern discussion of them, see Fowler, R., “King, Bigger King, King of Kings,” p. 64–67. 54 This seems to have been the assumption of Debevoise (Debevoise, N. C., A Political History of Parthia, p. 40), and later writers seem to assume it also (Kim, H. J., The Huns, Rome, and the Birth of Europe, p. 10; Wolski, J., L’Empire des Arsacides, p. 110–112). 55 ‘Imperium sine fine dedi’ were the words of Jove, apparently (Aeneid I.279). Vergil’s poem is from a later age, but the sentiment of an empire without end reflects a much older Roman opinion. The historian Justin, who epitomised the work of Pompey Trogus, referred to the Parthians penes quos velut divisione orbis cum Romanis facta nunc orientis imperium est (Justin, XLI.1.1); cf. Wolski, J., L’Empire des Arsacides, p. 133–134 with n. 40. 56 Plutarch, Life of Pompey, 52; Life of Crassus, 16.2. For a modern authority, see Frendo, D., “Roman Expansion and the Graeco-Iranian World: Carrhae, Its Explanation and Aftermath in Plutarch,” Bulletin of the Asia Institute, New Series, vol. 17, 2003, p. 71–81. 57 Ward, A. M., Marcus Crassus and the Late Roman Republic, 1977, p. 262–288. 58 Plutarch describes Crassus’ advance into the Parthian ambush through a dry, trackless wasteland (Plutarch, Life of Crassus, 22). But the country is in fact adorned by rolling hills, oases, and villages. Plutarch’s description must have its origin in a mendacious Roman ex-

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nored the counsel of the king of Armenia who had offered his horsemen together with the useful instruction that Crassus invade Parthia through the hills and valleys of his kingdom: a tactic to weaken the force of the Parthian heavy cavalry. 59 But Crassus immediately crossed the Euphrates at Zeugma and began to follow the river south towards Seleucia. 60 The defence of Parthia had again been entrusted to a general of the illustrious Suren family. He no longer expected an attack through Armenia, and the young Parthian general waited in northern Mesopotamia not far from the Roman army. Word of a feigned retreat came to Crassus: the Roman general commanded pursuit of Suren, his exhausted and ill-fed men obeyed, and when the army reached Carrhae, his clients’ cavalry suddenly deserted him and an ambush was revealed. The power of nomadic military tactics may have been wholly unknown, or unacknowledged at Rome; but upon a hill near Carrhae the Parthian cavalry was revealed. 61 Suren’s horsemen stood in formation upon a height above the Roman army, and the appearance of their silken banners suspended from standards of gold was perhaps the Romans’ first sight of that costly fabric. 62 The nature and size of the Parthian force were concealed under a mass of hides, but the Parthian horsemen suddenly threw off their coverings to reveal the gleam of their swords, their flashing helmets, armour, and the bronze and steel plates which clad their steeds. The advance guard charged down upon the enemy with their heavy lances, the Romans were promptly surrounded, and the Parthian horse-archers descended from the hill, assailing the foreigners with a seemingly endless torrent of arrows until nightfall. 63 Fighting was resumed in the following morning, the Roman host was defeated after a failed parley, twenty-thousand of them perished, ten thousand were taken alive, and Crassus himself was beheaded. 64 This was in the year 53 before Christ. The victorious Suren held a triumph at Seleucia devoted to the insult and mockery of the Romans. A Roman captive who bore a resemblance to his late commander was dressed in the clothes of a woman, and was conducted on horseback into Seleucia as the local prostitutes sang scurrilous and bawdy songs about the planation for Crassus’ defeat. Roman ignorance of the terrain of Mesopotamia and the tactics of Parthians meant that the excuse was believed. 59 Plutarch, Life of Crassus, 19.2; Payaslian, S., The History of Armenia form the Origins to the Present, 2008, p. 23–24. 60 Plutarch, Life of Crassus, 19.3–6. 61 On the Roman ignorance of Parthian tactics, see Wolski, J., L’Empire des Arsacides, p. 130– 131. 62 Florus, I.xlvi.11.8. 63 All the while, the Parthian host filled the air with the deep and frightening tone of kettledrums covered in bronze bells, whose sound Plutarch likens to a blend of the roaring of a wild beast and a peal of thunder (Plutarch, Life of Crassus, 23.6–7). 64 Plutarch, Life of Crassus, 31.7.

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effeminacy and cowardice of Crassus. 65 The head of Crassus appeared before the Parthian king Urud in the midst of a feast with the king of Armenia. The entertainment of the evening (as Plutarch tells us) was a performance of Euripides’ Bacchae. A tragic actor by the name of Jason grasped the lifeless head and, holding it aloft, sang the grim speech of Agave after she had torn apart her own son in a Dionysian frenzy. 66 This strange story must have its origin in Arsacid propaganda, and it proves that the kings of Iran exploited the trappings of Mediterranean civilisation to the discredit of its exponents. 67

CONSEQUENCES OF THE IRANIAN VICTORY Crassus’ defeat taught the vanity of the Romans to acknowledge that the world was divided into two great powers. 68 But this failed to produce peaceful relations. Crassus’ Parthian war had not been provoked, and yet Caesar meditated a war of revenge. 69 Plans for that expedition perished with him. 70 The sclerotic Roman republic sunk rapidly into civil war, and the kings of Parthia attempted to exploit the Roman political contest for their own benefit. 71 In the year 37 before Christ, Mark Antony attempted to intervene in a crisis of succession, and only retreat saved that veteran general from the fate of Crassus. 72 The diplomacy of Augustus achieved the return of the Roman standards, as well as many of the prisoners, captured in the campaigns

65

Plutarch, Life of Crassus, 32.1–3. Plutarch, Life of Crassus, 33.3. The hapless Agave believed that she had slain and dismembered a mountain lion (Euripides, Bacchae, l. 1170). The later history of Cassius Dio argues that Crassus was either cut down by one of his own men, he died of his wounds, or the Parthians poured molten gold down his throat (Cassius Dio, Historia Romana, XL.27.2–4). 67 Suren enjoyed his victory only for a moment: the Parthian king Urud I, fearing the great fame of his young general, commanded his murder (Plutarch, Life of Crassus, 33.5). The life and reign of Urud are alike forgotten, but the immortal fame of Suren, and the family from which he came, outlived the young general, and are still preserved within the Iranian National Epic (Wolski, J., L’Empire des Arsacides, p. 133); and it may be that the figure of the epic hero Rustam is based, in part, upon the victor of Carrhae. 68 Justin, XLI.1.1. 69 Mattern-Parkes, S. P., “The Defeat of Crassus and the Just War,” The Classical World, vol. 96, No. 4, 2003, p. 387–396. 70 It was to be a campaign of three years, and the dictator made many elaborate preparations concerning the Roman government and the organisation of the army (Cassius Dio, Historia Romana, XLIII.51), and Caesar would have set out in a matter of weeks or perhaps days if he had not been murdered. 71 The Parthians intervened on the side of Brutus and Cassius, contributing a small force of mounted archers (Appian, IV.63; 88; 99). 72 Plutarch, Life of Antony, 37–51; Payaslian, S., The History of Armenia, p. 25. 66

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of Crassus and Antony: a small accomplishment of foreign policy which was portrayed as a great Roman victory. 73

ARMENIA BETWEEN ROME AND IRAN Centuries of mingling among indigenous and migrating populations had produced the nation which foreigners have come to call Armenia. 74 Hurrians, Hittites, and Phrygians may perhaps be identified as the most noteworthy populations forming the Armenian people, but the borders of their land varied over time, for the limits of a small state surrounded on all sides by great empires must always be doubtful, unless the powers can respect its autonomy. 75 But the lofty mass of volcanic mountains between the plateaux and highlands of Anatolia and Iran has always been the heartland of Armenia. To the north, the forbidding mountains of the Caucasus isolate that country from the Ukrainian steppe; the Pontic mountains to the northwest face the Black Sea and march into Paphlagonia, and to the south of Lake Van extend the Hakkari, the Taurus, and the Anti-Taurus mountains. 76 Such natural barriers ensured that movement from Anatolia southward into Syria or Mesopotamia, and the reverse, would be impracticable, and that traffic between Asia Minor and Iran would pass through Armenia. Where merchants and goods might travel, so might generals and armies, and two sedentary states with their respective centres in the Mediterranean Sea and the plateau of Iran would be destined to clash in Armenia. The formidable economic resources of Armenia included fertile valleys, which were suited alike to an impressive yield of agriculture and the breeding of horses, and large deposits of gold. 77 A peculiar social order bound a potent hereditary nobility to the Armenian king by ties of martial obligation, and the peasantry owed military service to the lords upon whose lands they resided. 78 The military resources at the disposal of an Armenian king were therefore 73

Suetonius, Divus Augustus, 21.3. The return of the standards was commemorated by the erection of a triumphal arch and the striking of coins throughout the Roman empire (Debevoise, N. C., A Political History of Parthia, p. 140–141). Cf. Payaslian, S., The History of Armenia, p. 26. 74 The indigenous name of Armenia is Hayastan. 75 On the formation of Armenia see Russell, J., “The Formation of the Armenian Nation” in Hovannisian, R. G. (ed.), The Armenian People from Ancient to Modern Times, vol. 1. The Dynastic Periods: From Antiquity to the Fourteenth Century, 1997, p. 19–36 and Garsoïan, N., “The Emergence of Armenia” in Hovannisian, R. G. (ed.), The Armenian People from Ancient to Modern Times, vol. 1. The Dynastic Periods: From Antiquity to the Fourteenth Century, p. 37–62. 76 Cf. the superb analysis of Armenian geography in Whittow, M., The Making of Orthodox Byzantium, 1996, p. 25. 77 Strabo, XI.14.9. Redgate, A. E., The Armenians, 2000, p. 83–87. 78 Payaslian, S., The History of Armenia from the Origins to the Present, Palgrave Macmillan, New York, 2008, p. 29–30; Redgate, A. E., The Armenians, p. 97–98; Adontz, N., Armenia and the

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enormous, and either power sought to ensure that so great an advantage be employed to its benefit alone. Towards the end of his reign, Mihrdad II foresaw the threat posed to Parthia by Rome, and directed most of his energies and attention to his western frontier. In an important campaign, Mihrdad reduced the kingdom of Armenia to vassaldom. Tigran, the eldest son of the Armenian king, had been a hostage among the Parthians, and Mihrdad seated him upon his father’s throne in about the year 100 before our era. The grateful Armenian monarch ceded to Parthia seventy valleys in Armenia, 79 and with time a marriage alliance made the Armenian royal house a branch of the Arsacid family. This was the beginning of the long and miserable tale of diplomatic and military posturing between Rome and Iran in Armenia. 80 Rome refused to tolerate a rival in the Near East. By policy or by accident, the Roman advance into Asia Minor at first threatened, and in time absorbed, the lingering relics of the Seleucid empire along the Parthian frontier. 81 The kingdoms of Pontus and Armenia were first to endure Roman aggression: their kings looked to Parthia for help, but Farhad III offered no assistance. In the year 66 before Christ, when Pompey had risen to the command of the Roman legions in Asia Minor, he sought the help of Farhad against the kings of Pontus and Armenia. The arrogant Roman overestimated his powers of trickery, and promised to cede to Tigran the land of Corduene, which at the time belonged to Parthia. This insult was never forgotten, and it swiftly became the cause of a dispute over boundaries. Pompey’s foolish arbitration in the year 64 before our era united those Asiatic potentates in common cause against the Roman enemy; but warfare was avoided until the disastrous expedition of Crassus. In the reign of the Roman emperor Tiberius, there arose an important dispute over the loyalty of Armenia. Amidst this controversy, the Parthian king Artaban II is said to have announced that he intended to restore the borders of the ancient Persian and Macedonian empires, and that he would seize all lands held first by Cyrus and afterwards by Alexander. 82 A Roman may have been puzzled or insulted by these assertions, but peace between Iran and Rome lasted until the emperor Nero attempted to settle the Armenian question by warfare. Fifty-four years after the Christian era, the Parthian king Walagash I gave his brother Tirdat the throne of Armenia, and (in the language of Tacitus) the Roman general Corbulo was comPeriod of Justinian: the Political Conditions Based on the Naxarar System, 1970, p. 343–361; Toumanoff, C., Studies in Christian Caucasian History, 1963, p. 34–144. 79 Strabo, XI.14.14–15. 80 Payaslian, S., The History of Armenia, p. 19–20. 81 This period, and all relevant sources, are described minutely in Debevoise, N. C., A Political History of Parthia, p. 70–78. 82 simul veteres Persarum ac Macedonum terminos seque invasurum possessa Cyro et post Alexandro per vaniloquentiam ac minas iaciebat (Tacitus, Annals, VI.31).

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manded to keep it. 83 Corbulo’s soldiers had suffered greatly from two summers of constant drilling, and the harsh snows of an Armenian winter added to their miseries. Desertion was frequent and sentries died at their posts. 84 But this demoralised army destroyed the Armenian capital of Artaxata: 85 a testament to the contemporary weakness of the Parthian king who was distracted by internal revolts and the insurrection of a usurper. Tirdat was dislodged from his kingdom, and a Roman client was seated upon the throne of Armenia. A brief Roman victory failed to decide the outcome of this vain contest. Two Parthian counterattacks, when at last they came, restored Tirdat – on condition that he receive his crown at Rome from the hand of the emperor. Ceremonies of great magnificence greeted Tirdat at Rome; and, presenting himself before the emperor, Tirdat addressed Nero in the most flattering terms: ‘I, O master, am a descendent of Arshak and brother to Walagash and Bakur the kings, and I am your slave. I have come to you, my god, to worship you even as I do Mithra. I shall be however you direct, for you are my fate and fortune’. 86

Nero’s reply reminded his new slave that he possessed the power both to bestow and to take away kingdoms, and the Roman emperor placed the Armenian crown upon the head of an Arsacid. 87

THE DECLINE OF THE HOUSE OF ARSHAK The reign of Walagash was the last to assert the greatness of Parthia before a long series of fratricidal civil wars and repeated Roman assaults upon Mesopotamia sapped its strength and buried it in the dust. The Parthian language appeared on coins for the first time, and Walagash founded a city, named for himself, in the vicinity of Seleucia and Ctesiphon on the Tigris. The world of the nomad had been quiet for some time. But in the year 72 of our era towards the end of the reign of Walagash, his north-eastern frontier was assailed and penetrated by the nomads known as Alans. The province of Gurgan revolted and allied itself with those wanderers, and northern Iran was overrun. 88 The Alans ravaged Media, and their invasion of Armenia nearly toppled the monarchy of 83

Domitium Corbulonem retinendae Armeniae praeposuerat (Tacitus, Annals, XIII.8). Corbuloni plus molis adversus ignaviam militum quam contra perfidiam hostium erat, etc (Tacitus, Annals, XIII.35; Payaslian, S., The History of Armenia, p. 28. 85 Tacitus, Annals, XIII.41. 86 ἐγώ, δέσποτα, Ἀρσάκου μὲν ἔκγονος, Οὐολογαίσου δὲ καὶ Πακόρου τῶν βασιλέων ἀδελφός, σὸς δὲ δοῦλός εἰμι. καὶ ἦλθόν τε πρὸς σὲ τὸν ἐμὸν θεόν, προσκυνήσων σε ὡς καὶ τὸν Μίθραν, καὶ ἔσομαι τοῦτο ὅ τι ἂν σὺ ἐπικλώσῃς: σὺ γάρ μοι καὶ μοῖρα εἶ καὶ τύχη (Cassius Dio, Historia Romana, LXIII.v.2). 87 Tacitus, Annale, XLIII.1–6; Payaslian, S., The History of Armenia, p. 29. 88 Josephus, De Bello Judaico, VII.7.4. 84

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Tirdat. But the Alans refused to rule the lands that they had occupied, and returned to the steppe with an immense haul of booty. By the second century of the Christian era, Parthian dynastic squabbling had become interminable. In the year 114 another Roman emperor (this time with greater success) ignored the lessons of Antony and Crassus, and executed an invasion of Parthia. Trajan’s pretext for warfare was political strife in Armenia: the Parthian monarch Husro had dismissed the king of that country without Roman consent. 89 The feeble Parthian king’s disregard of the Armenian settlement made under Nero and Walagash was a foolish diplomatic blunder, but hardly a reason for war. But Trajan ignored Husro’s requests for peace and advanced into Armenia, where he symbolically dissolved the Armenian settlement by refusing to crown its new king. Armenia was to become a province of Rome. 90 In the following two years, Trajan proceeded to annex Parthia’s western provinces; he sacked Ctesiphon and emptied it of its treasures, and it is said that the emperor stood upon the shore of the Persian Gulf and lamented that his age prevented him from further imitation of Alexander. 91 The turmoil of the Roman conquest and the devastation of Ctesiphon shook the Parthian state but failed to destroy it. Parthian prestige endured and Husro and his client kings soon threw off the Roman yoke. Trajan attempted compromise by ceding to Husro Ctesiphon and its hinterland, but on his return through Syria, the Roman emperor tried to wrest the Mesopotamian city of Hatra from its king who had risen in revolt. The burning heat of the Syrian desert, terrifying omens, and a vast cloud of flies compelled the Romans to abandon the siege of that city, 92 and soon thereafter in the year 117 Trajan himself was dead. His successor Hadrian returned to Parthia what Trajan had conquered. 93 For nearly fifty years, Parthia’s internal problems worsened. Throughout the second century after Christ, a long procession of Parthian monarchs, pretenders, and usurpers was shaken successively by an invasion of the nomadic Alans from the north, by a war with the kingdom of the Kushans who had arisen from within the Tocharian confederacy in Central Asia, and by the sudden independence of Gurgan and Bactria to the north-east. But in the year 161 the Parthian king Walagash IV invaded Armenia and precipitated another Roman war which again delivered Ctesi89

Cassius Dio, Historia Romana, LXVIII.17. For concise, modern descriptions of Trajan’s Parthian campaigns, see Edwell, P., “Osrhoene and Mesopotamia between Rome and Arsacid Parthia,” in Schlude, J. M. / Rubin, B. B. (eds.), Arsacids, Romans, and Local Elites, 2017, p. 112–113, and Lightfoot, C. S., “Trajan’s Parthian War and the Fourth-Century Perspective,” The Journal of Roman Studies, vol. 80, 1990, p. 115–121. 90 Cassius Dio, Historia Romana, LXVIII.20.3. 91 Trajan is said to have contemplated further conquests, and εἶπεν ὅτι πάντως ἂν καὶ ἐπὶ τοὺς Ἰνδούς, εἰ νέος ἔτι ἦν, ἐπεραιώθην (Cassius Dio, Historia Romana, LXVIII.29.1). 92 Cassius Dio, Historia Romana, LXVIII.31.4. 93 Cassius Dio, Historia Romana, LXVIII.33.

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23

phon to fire and sword. 94 Parthian revenge enflamed rebellion in the Roman client states of Osroene and Adiabene, and the emperor Septimius Severus vowed to punish Parthia once and for all. Ctesiphon was sacked again in the year 198. 95 This humiliation might not have been fatal, and the nobility of Parthia might have united against a common foe. But dynastic strife continued and deteriorated into civil war. The Roman emperor Caracalla invaded Parthia amidst these troubles; he desecrated the Parthian royal tombs at Arbela, 96 and might have performed further outrages, but his assassination was followed by retreat and a peace settlement. The extinction of the House of Arshak followed swiftly. The triumph of Parthia upon the ruin of the Persian and Macedonian empires had begun amidst an obscure rebellion. An empire of nomads may have seemed an unlikely prospect, but the loose rule of Parthia endured for nearly half a millennium. The Parni had reunited the shattered fragments of the sedentary Near East, and they had humiliated the legions of the republic, and had repelled the aggression of the empire, of Rome. The boasts of Artaban II appeared to revive the vision of a civilised state bestriding the world from the waters of the river Nile to the roots of the Hindukush mountains. But Parthia never realised this vision, and the House of Arshak endured many humiliations before yielding the rule of the Near East to another dynasty. When the end came, the House of Arshak may have been surprised that the stroke which extinguished their rule was dealt neither by a Roman, nor by a nomad, but by a Persian.

94

Cassius Dio, Historia Romana, LXXI.2. See Edwell, P., “Osrhoene and Mesopotamia,” p. 116. 95 Cassius Dio, Historia Romana, LXXV.9.1–12.5; Herodian, III.9.1–12; Edwell, P., “Osrhoene and Mesopotamia,” p. 126–127. This expedition ended with another failed siege of Hatra and another shameful retreat. 96 Cassius Dio, Historia Romana, LXXIX.1.1–2; Edwell, P., “Osrhoene and Mesopotamia,” p. 127–129.

II. THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE HOUSE OF SASAN THE ORIGIN OF THE NEW DYNASTY The origin of the Sasanian dynasty is buried in obscurity, and its claims to royal blood are clouded in a thick fog of fable and propaganda. Ardashir, the first king of that line, appears to have derived his royal dignity from two mysterious persons: Pabag and Sasan. The identity of these figures and their relation to Ardashir are variously explained throughout the relics of Sasanian literature that have come down to us, and with time they became increasingly elaborate and fanciful. It seems probable that Pabag gave Ardashir a surname, and it is certain that the name of Sasan became the appellation of the dynasty. But this is the limit of our certainty. 1 The Middle Persian biography of Ardashir, or the Karnamag, as it is called, is a strange mixture of propaganda and fantasy, but it preserves the received account of Ardashir’s origin. The Middle Persian text that has come down to us was redacted in the early seventh century, 2 but three facts attest that the tale is far older. First, Moses Chorenatsi, the Armenian historian who wrote in the fifth century of our era, knew of a much older and longer text of the Karnamag, and he alludes to it derisively in his History of Armenia. The tale of Ardashir’s origins is attributed by Moses to a certain Khorohbut, a scribe in the service of king Shapur II, and who had been taken prisoner by the Romans in the late fourth century. 3 Khorohbut, as it is said, embraced the new religion of his captors, took the name Eleazar, and (amongst other accomNoteworthy attempts to explain who Sasan and Pabag were include: Olbrycht, M. J., “Dynastic Connections in the Arsacid Empire and the Origins of the House of Sasan” in Sarkosh, V., et al., The Parthian and Early Sasanian Empires: Adaptation and Expansion, The British Institute of Persian Studies, 2016, p. 23–35; Daryaee, T., “Ardaxšīr and the Sasanians’ Rise to Power,” Anabasis: Studia Classica et Orientalia, v. 1, 2010, p. 236–255; and Widengren, G., “The Establishment of the Sasanian Dynasty in the Light of New Evidence” in La Persia nel medioevo, 1971, p. 711–782. 2 Grenet, F., La Geste d’Ardashir fils de Pabag, 2003, p. 26. 3 Այս Խոռոհբուտ դպիր եղեալ Շապհոյ թագաւորին Պարսից (Moses Chorenatsi, II.70). Muraviev seems to agree that this Khorohbut was a real person (Muraviev, A., “The Syriac Julian Romance and its Place in the Literary History,” Khristianskiy Vostok 1(7), 1999, p. 194–206). 1

25

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THE LAST EMPIRE OF IRAN

plishments) translated into Greek a work devoted to the earliest kings of the Sasanian line. This book, as Moses seems to imply, was an earlier and longer redaction of the Karnamag than what has come down to us. 4 Second, apart from the rise of Ardashir, the Karnamag is greatly interested in the royal origin and distinguished youth of Shapur I and Hurmazd I, the second and third Sasanian kings, whom that mysterious text connects respectively with the union of Ardashir and a daughter of the last Parthian king and the congress of Shapur and the daughter of a Parthian nobleman. 5 The Arsacid filiation of Shapur and Hurmazd, whether real or fictive, could only have appeared important at a very early time in the life of the Sasanian dynasty. So we may reasonably infer that the Karnamag is founded upon the legends invented during the reigns of the first three Sasanian kings. 6 The Karnamag asserts that Sasan was a shepherd employed by Pabag, governor of Persia. Sasan appeared to Pabag in three successive dreams: Pabag beheld Sasan with a great light shining from his head; he saw him seated upon a white elephant clad in splendid ornaments and a multitude of men bowed before him, praising and blessing him; and three sacred fires burned within the dwelling of Sasan and gave light to the whole world. 7 Interpreters of dreams assured Pabag that the man whom he saw, or one of his descendants, would rule the world. It was soon revealed that Sasan was descended from one of the Achaemenid kings named Darius, whose progeny had dwelt amongst Kurdish shepherds after Alexander’s conquest of Iran. 8 Pabag had no son to succeed him and was so greatly impressed by the words of the interpreters that he gave his daughter in marriage to this shepherd. 9 Ardashir was born of that union, and Pabag adopted the son of Sasan as his heir. Similar expositions of the origin of Ardashir can be found in the history of Dinawari and the Shahnameh of Ferdowsi. These books attest the endurance of the legend of the Karnamag after the fall of the House of Sasan. 10 But during the reign of the Sasanian dynasty, enemies and critics of the royal house spread about a hostile parody of this 4

Moses is aware of Pabag’s dream and the astrological portents which are familiar from the Middle Persian Karnamag. His allusions to the fire that proceeded from Sasan, and to stories involving goats and various other beasts including an eagle and a crow are unattested elsewhere and imply an older, longer redaction of the Karnamag (Moses Chorenatsi, II.70; cf. Thomson, R. W. (ed. / trans.), History of the Armenians: Translation and Commentary by Robert W. Thomson, 1979, p. 217 with note 6). On the authenticity of Moses’ work, see Mahé, A. / Mahé, J.-P., Histoire de l’Arménie par Moïse de Khorène, 1993, p. 18–24. 5 Karnamag I.8–10. These references are to the edition and translation prepared by Frantz Grenet (Grenet, F., La Geste d’Ardashir fils de Pâbag, 2006). 6 Cf. Grenet, F. La Geste d’Ardashir fils de Pâbag, p. 25–29. 7 Karnamag, I.9–11. 8 Karnamag, I.6–7; II.16–19. 9 Karnamag, I.12–20. 10 But the legend is deprived of much of its Zoroastrian character for the benefit of a Muslim audience.

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27

fable. 11 A Christian spy informed the Greek writer Agathias that Ardashir had issued from the adulterous union of the wife of Pabag, a cobbler, and Sasan, an itinerant soldier; and Pabag and Sasan then quarrelled over the generation of Ardashir. The spy portrayed this absurd lampoon as an extract from the Sasanian royal archives, and Agathias recorded it in his history of the sixth century. 12 The material productions of an ancient culture in the form of epigraphy, coins, works of art, and engineering can often correct the imperfect record of garbled histories or mythology. But not even the monumental inscription of Ardashir’s son and heir, Shapur, can lift us out of the morass of myth and fancy. The second king of the Sasanid line identifies two, and only two, of his male ancestors: his father Ardashir and his grandfather Pabag. The most distant ancestor invoked by the inscription is a woman: Denag, mother of Pabag. 13 But no connection is made with any ancestor named Sasan. That name appears ten times in the inscription, but not even a certain ‘Lord Sasan’ is an ancestor of Pabag, Ardashir, or Shapur. 14 A monumental inscription erected by the later king Narseh derives the ruling house from the family of Sasan, 15 and so we can infer that the link between that mysterious figure and the Iranian monarchy was strengthened with time. It was not only strengthened, but also embellished. Other accounts of Ardashir’s origin were known to, or were invented by, later writers. Tabari asserts that Ardashir was the second son of Pabag, and that Ardashir had outlived his elder brother Shapur and had inherited power from his father, who had overthrown Gochihr, one of the last governors of Persia. 16 In the opinion of Tabari, Sasan was Ardashir’s grandfather, Pabag’s father, and custodian 17 of a fire temple dedicated to 11

Agathias, II.26; cf. Cameron, A., “Agathias on the Sasanians,” Dumbarton Oaks Papers, vol. 22–23, 1969–1970, p. 27–29. 12 Agathias claims that it was recorded ἐν ταῖς βασιλείοις διφθέραις (Agathias, Historiae, II.27); cf. the βασιλικὰ ἀπομνημονεύματα (Agathias, Historiae, IV.30). 13 Back, M., Die Sassanidischen Staatsinschriften, 1978, p. 349–350. Rodag, Ardashir’s own mother is also mentioned. 14 Back, M., Die Sassanidischen Staatsinschriften, p. 338. Rezakhani, K., ReOrienting the Sasanians, p. 44. 15 Paikuli Inscription, p. 10–11. 16 Tabari, v. 2, p. 37–38. Tabari claims that Pabag had received permission from Gochihr to place Ardashir in the care of a certain Tira, who was commandant of the castle at Darabgird. When Tira died, Ardashir succeeded him, and began to extend his power by killing local princes. Ardashir urged Pabag to overthrow Gochihr, the father complied with the son’s request. Pabag requested that the Parthian king recognise the sovereignty of his eldest son Shapur over Istakhr, but the Parthian king refused. This was the beginning of the rebellion which Ardashir supposedly led. Ardashir succeeded his brother Shapur when the latter was killed accidentally by a falling stone at Istakhr. 17 �ّ �‫( ق‬Tabari, v. 2, p. 37): it is not at all clear what role Sasan is supposed to have had at the fire temple.

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the goddess Anahita at Istakhr. Modern historians tend to assume that Tabari’s exposition of Ardashir’s descent is the original and unvarnished truth. Tabari’s claim that Sasan was connected with a fire temple may represent an attempt to assert the religious identity of the Sasanian line at a time when it may have been in doubt. But Tabari’s seemingly more rational genealogy cannot be tested or verified and it is still mingled with the claim, asserted in a letter attributed to the last Parthian king, that Sasan was a shepherd. The king of Parthia addresses Ardashir thus: ‘You have risen beyond your station, and you have brought ruin upon yourself, O shepherd raised among the tents of shepherds! 18 Who allowed you the crown that you wear, and the lands that you have gathered together whose kings you have vanquished?’ 19

Tabari may have thought that he had transmitted a Parthian slur upon Ardashir and his family. But the Persian historian has really preserved an allusion to the same Sasanian myth which is in found in the Karnamag. The final form of this myth is first attested in the history of Dinawari. The Achaemenid king, whom Dinawari calls Bahman, 20 was expected to bestow his kingdom upon his son Sasan, but Bahman’s daughter Khumana ruled in place of him. At this insult, the furious Sasan departed his father’s capital and dwelt as a shepherd amongst the Kurds, and so (says Dinawari) the kings of the Sasanid line have always been reviled for keeping livestock. 21 Khumana ruled for a time and then gave birth to her son and successor Darius III whose empire was destroyed by Alexander the Great. This bizarre story was repeated down to the very last days of the Sasanian dynasty. In the seventh century, during the reign of Khusro II, there arose a usurper by the name of Bistam. He was the reigning king’s uncle, and he claimed descent from Bahman through Darius III. He wrote to Khusro II: ‘I am the son of Darius son of Darius, who fought Alexander. But you (O son of Sasan) took what was rightly ours by art and craft. Your forefather was only a shepherd, and if his father had known better he would not have kept the kingdom from him and given it to his daughter Khumana!’ 22

According to the rebel Bistam, the Parthian kings traced their descent directly to the last Achaemenid king; and so Ardashir, the descendant of Sasan who had never sat 18

Tabari, v. 2, p. 39:

‫أ��ا ال���دي ا��ر�ى َ �ي خيام ا����اد‬

The figurative, not literal, meaning of Kurd is intended, i.e., a shepherd or mountain-dweller, not an ethnic Kurd (cf. Grenet, F., La Geste d’Ardashir fils de Pâbag, p. 31). 19 Tabari, v. 2, p. 39. 20 Bahman seems to be a mythical amalgam of Cyrus the Great and Artaxerxes I. 21 Dinawari, p. 30. 22 Dinawari, p. 108.

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29

upon the Achaemenid throne, had no right to wrest the sceptre from the Arsacid line. We may infer that, at some point, the kings of the Sasanid family asserted their fitness for rule by reason of their descent from an ancient royal ancestor whose patrimony had been unjustly denied. But who was this mysterious royal ancestor Sasan? The truth may be that Sasan was a remote and dimly remembered forefather, as was Achaemenes who had been portrayed as the ancient progenitor of the family of Cyrus. 23 But a different explanation is possible. A curious passage in the Shahnameh of Ferdowsi alleges that Sasan son of Bahman fled the destruction of the Achaemenid empire and transported himself to India. Four generations of the offspring of Sasan dwelt in that distant land, where they worked as camel-drivers and shepherds, until the younger Sasan returned to Iran and Pabag employed him. 24 It is possible that the connection between Sasan and India is a reminiscence that the family of Ardashir, despite its supposed nobility, was foreign to Persia. 25 Could it be that a distant ancestor by the name of Sasan had originated from the branch of the Arsacid family that ruled over a great portion of north-western India? The Indo-Parthian dynasty, as it is called, succeeded to the rule of Sakastan and Sindh between the collapse of Greek rule in Bactria and the conquests of the Kushans. Their history is mysterious and surrounded by controversy. 26 But the evidence of coins shows that the personal name Sasan was common amongst the kings of the Indo-Parthians, 27 and coins struck by Ardashir resemble models which originated in the east. The coins issued by the kings of Parthia and their Persian vassals foreshadowed neither the style of Aramaic letters nor the image of an altar of fire, which adorn the money of Ardashir – a clue, perhaps, that the origin of the first Sasanian king was not in Persia. 28 Bold inferences suggests themselves: Ardashir claimed descent from the Indo-Parthian cadet branch 23 24

Nöldeke, T., Geschichte der Perser und Araber, p. 1. Ferdowsi, Ashkanian, l. 91–93:

‫ز ساسان ی�� کود�ی ما�� ��د‬ ‫��ی نام ساسا�� ��دی ��ر‬ ‫��ه سا�� با ر�ج و ک�ر ��ان‬

‫به هندوستان در به زاری ��رد‬ ��� ‫���ن هم��ان تا چهارم‬ ‫شبانان ����ی و �� ساربان‬

The tale then proceeds as in the Karnamag. 25 Rezakhani, K., ReOrienting the Sasanians, p. 44–45. 26 Rezakhani, K., ReOrienting the Sasanians, p. 30–40; Fröhlich, C., “Indo-Parthian Dynasty,” in Encylopaedia Iranica, vol. XIII, fasc. 1, 2012, p. 100–103. 27 The last two kings of the Indo-Parthian Dynasty bore the names Farn-Sasan son of AdurSasan (Olbrycht, M. J., “Dynastic Connections in the Arsacid Empire and the Origins of the House of Sasan” in Sarkosh Curtis, V., et al. (eds), The Parthian and Early Sasanian Empires: Adaptation and Expansion, 2016, p. 24). 28 Rezakhani, K., ReOrienting the Sasanians, p. 41–45; Rezakhani, K., “From Aramaic to Pahlavi: Epigraphic Observations Based on the Persis Coin Series,” in Sarkosh Curtis, V., et al. (eds), The Parthian and Early Sasanian Empires: Adaptation and Expansion, 2016.

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of the House of Arshak and a mysterious ancestor called Sasan with connections to India was found, or invented, to bolster the claim. There is some corroboration for those inferences in the relics of Persian literature that have survived. The Karnamag indicates that the first Sasanian king relied upon the opinion of an Indian soothsayer who prophesied that the rule of Iran would pass to Ardashir after the destruction of his last rival Mihrag Anoshagzad. 29 It may be possible to connect that notice with the influence of Indian religions upon the Indo-Parthians. We may also recall the white elephant upon which Sasan sat in the vision of Pabag. 30 That strange beast recalls the mythical Airavata: the white elephant which carries the god Indra and which is familiar to the Hindu and the Buddhist religions as a symbol of wisdom and strength. 31 The religion of Zoroaster held a different view of the elephant, which the Bundahishn enrols among the noxious animals created by the evil god Angra Mainyu. 32 But the interpreters of dreams consulted by Pabag made the unusual announcement that the elephant signified bravery, power, and victory. 33 With time, the auspicious vision of Sasan which Pabag beheld in a dream may have won the sanction of Zoroastrian orthodoxy, but its origin must have been Indian. 34 Finally we may invoke Ferdowsi’s claim that the image of Sasan which appeared to Pabag involved both an elephant and the interesting detail that the hand of Sasan grasped the hilt of an Indian sword. 35 We shall never know who Sasan really was, or where he originated, and it is impossible to say exactly when and in what order these fictions were developed and diffused throughout the Iranian world. But it is reasonable to infer that the more elaborate formulas of Ardashir’s descent represent a later evolution of Sasanian propaganda. Ardashir’s mythical genealogy had the benefit of undermining Parthian dignity and prestige by abbreviating Arsacid rule to nearly half its real duration. 36 Five centuries had elapsed between the death of Darius III and the appearance of Ardashir. But the Sasanian legend filled this wide space with only five descendants 29

Karnamag, XII. Mihrag Anoshagzad cannot be identified, but the Indian soothsayer (or ked in Middle Persian) declared that the monarchy of Iran could belong either to Ardashir or to Mihrag, but not to both. 30 Karnamag I.9–11. 31 Airavata appears first in the Mahabharata. For more about this special elephant, see Swami Parmeshwaranand, Encyclopaedic Dictionary of the Puranas, vol. 1, 2001, p. 36–37. 32 Bundahisn, XXIV.38. 33 Karnamag, I.6–7. 34 Daryaee, T., “From Terror to Tactical Usage: Elephants in the Partho-Sasanian Period,” in Sarkosh Curtis, V. et al. (eds.), The Parthian and Early Sasanian Empires: Adaptation and Expansion, 2016, p. 36. 35 Ferdowsi, Ashkanian, l. 100: 36

‫ی�� تیغ هندی ��فته به دست‬

‫�� ساسان به پیل ژ یان ����ست‬

Cf. Taqizadeh, S. H., “Some Chronological Data Relating to the Sasanian Period,” Bulletin of the School of Oriental Studies, University of London, vol. 9, no. 1, 1937, p. 138–139.

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31

of the mythical king Bahman, 37 and imputed only two hundred and sixty years to the Parthian monarchy. This impossible chronology places the rule of Ardashir at about the same time as the life and ministry of Jesus – a strange coincidence which was exploited in the politics of later reigns. 38 A final question must be asked: why is the mythical ancestor of the Sasanid line so often portrayed as a shepherd? The answer seems to lie in the received Achaemenid account of the birth and youth of the founder of the ancient dynasty. 39 Astyages, grandfather to Cyrus and king of Media, feared lest his daughter’s son should take his place upon the throne. Harpagus, an agent of the Median king, was sent to kill the young child; but he shrunk from the task, and so he entrusted the care and upbringing of the infant Cyrus to one Mihrdad: a shepherd employed by king Astyages. The themes of this legend – a child destined to overthrow a kingdom; who was abandoned at birth; and who was raised by a shepherd – have often been repeated throughout Near Eastern history and religion. 40 When those themes were applied to Ardashir, they covered up his obscure origin, connected him with the oldest Persian monarchy, and surrounded his rise with an aura of mystery and predestination.

37

Dinawari reports that Ardashir was the son of Babak, son of Sasan the younger, son of Fafak, son of Mahris, son of Sasan the elder, son of Bahman (Dinawari, p. 44). 38 In the late Sasanian period, there arose a myth that the founder of the Sasanian dynasty was a Christian. One of Christ’s apostles had arrived at the court of Ardashir, and the king and his vizier Abarsam were converted by his preaching (Dinawari, p. 46–47, 85; Nihaya, p. 185–186). Avestan legend held that the conversion of king Gushtasp to the religion of Zoroaster was actuated by the prophet’s healing of the king’s horse (Schilling, A., “L’apôtre du Christ, la conversion du roi Ardashir et celle de son vizir,” in Jullien, C. (ed.), Chrétiens en terre d’Iran II: Controverses des chrétiens dans l’Iran sassanide, 2008, p. 107). In time, this myth took on a Christian form. According to Sasanian legend, the founder of the new dynasty and his vizier embraced Christianity when Christ’s apostle revived one of the royal horses after its death. 39 Herodotus, I.95 et seqq. 40 The legend associated with the youth of Cyrus the Great are very similar to the more celebrated myth of Oedipus, and it is probable that Sophocles drew some inspiration from his friend Herodotus who had communicated the legend to him. The themes of that legend occasionally varied, and they embellished the lives of Moses, Esarhaddon, Sargon of Akkad, and even Shah Isma’il who founded the Safavid dynasty in the sixteenth century (Grenet, F., La Geste d’Ardashir fils de Pâbag, p. 31; and cf. Thompson, T. L., The Messiah Myth: The Near Eastern Roots of Jesus and David, 2007, p. 152–156). Incidentally, Ctesias reports what may be understood as a caricature of the myth record recorded by Herodotus. Ctesias denies any relation between Cyrus and the kingdom of the Medes, and enrolls him among the nomadic tribe of the Mardi. Poverty had reduced Cyrus’ father to banditry, says Ctesias, and his mother herded goats (Stronk, J. P., Ctesias’ Persian History, Part I: Introduction, Text, and Translation, 2010, p. 290).

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THE REIGN OF ARDASHIR The elaborate fables associated with the origin of the Sasanid line give way to a very doubtful narrative of the reign of its first king. Under the successors of Seleucus and Arshak, the province of Persia acknowledged the rule of a Macedonian or a Parthian monarch. 41 The descendants of Arshak claimed for themselves the Achaemenid title of King of Kings, and their Persian vassals inscribed upon their coins the appellation of frataraka: the common Achaemenid title of governor. 42 The lords of Persia ruled amidst the venerable ruins of Persepolis and Pasargadae, and they possessed both the tomb of Cyrus upon the Murghab plain and the Achaemenid royal necropolis at the site of Naqsh-e Rostam. It was in Persia that the memory of the builders of those impressive structures remained vivid, and so its governors commanded a real prestige which the Arsacid king possessed only in theory. Any vassal of the Parthian dominion might have asserted his independence, but only the rulers of Persia in southern Iran could have founded a new dynasty. By the third century of our era, Ardashir had become ruler of Persia. Amidst the decay of the House of Arshak, he began to extend his power into Media, along the coast of the Persian Gulf and northeast Arabia, 43 and as far east as Kirman on the Iranian plateau. The Karnamag transforms these developments into a series vague allusions to subduing Armenia and the abode of the Kurds, and a fantastical story involving a mysterious potentate named Haftowad, whose power over southern Persia was derived from his possession of a gigantic worm. 44 The testimony of Tabari may be more trustworthy: the Parthian king’s attempt to discredit the Persian rebel served rather to irritate than to the subdue the spirit of Ardashir, and the upstart announced that God himself had granted him both crown and power, but this failed to convince the Parthian king. 45 When battle finally came, 46 the vigour of Parthia was broken, Artaban perished in the contest; and, at some point afterward, Ardashir claimed for himself the title of King of Kings. But the defeat of Artaban was

41

Strabo, XV.3.3 Wiesehöfer, J., “Frataraka Rule in Early Seleucid Persis: A New Appraisal” in Erskine, A. / Llewellyn-Jones. L. (eds), A Hellenistic World, 2011, p. 107–121; Wiesehöfer, J., “Frataraka,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, v. 10, fasc. 2, 2002, p. 195. 43 Some of the evidence for this is discussed in Potts, D. T., The Persian Gulf in Antiquity: From Alexander the Great to the Coming of Islam, v. II, 1992, p. 232–233. 44 Karnamag, V; VII–IX. Ardashir destroyed both Haftowad and his strange pet. 45 Tabari, v. 2, p. 40. 46 The decisive battle of Hurmazdagan was fought on 28 April, AD 224 (Nöldeke, Geschichte der Perser und Araber, p. 411). The Karnamag confines this battle to a single sentence, without mentioning its name (Karnamag, V.13). 42

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not the final overthrow of the Arsacid monarchy. Until the year 228, coins were minted in the name of Walagash VI, against whom Artaban had rebelled. 47

PARTHIAN CIVIL WAR, ROMAN AGGRESSION, AND THE TRIUMPH OF ARDASHIR The imaginary account of the Karnamag attributes the triumph of Ardashir to supernatural causes. So great was the prestige of that prince that, when he had attained his fifteenth year, Ardashir was invited to dwell at the court of Artaban. 48 Reading, the game of polo, horsemanship, hunting, and other chivalrous disciplines occupied the young Ardashir. Rivalry arose between Ardashir and the son of Artaban, but the admonishment of Pabag failed to halt that jealous contest, and a favourite concubine of the Parthian king was seduced by the gaze of Ardashir as he sat singing and playing the tambur. 49 An astrological consultation predicted the rise of a new monarchy and that royal authority would pass to whichever of Artaban’s subordinates should flee within the following three days. Hearing these words, Ardashir and the concubine resolved upon immediate escape to Persia. Treasure, armaments, and horses procured by the girl accompanied them, Artaban was enraged at the theft and flight, and the Parthian king commanded the pursuit and apprehension of his rebellious courtier. 50 Four thousand soldiers attempted to intercept Ardashir along the road to Persia. Successive witnesses reported first that a mysterious ram had followed the two fugitive riders, and later that it had reached them and had sat upon Ardashir’s horse. In the opinion of a Parthian hierophant, the ram embodied the royal glory of Ardashir, and signified the doom of Artaban. Returned to Persia, Ardashir received the supplication of other kings, and a united army confronted and defeated the last king of Parthia. 51 But the true account of Ardashir’s rise is different. The triumph of the Sasanian dynasty was assisted by the troubles that had lately assailed the Parthian monarchy. At the close of the second century of our era, the king of Parthia was Walagash V. His eldest son, also called Walagash, succeeded him in about the year 207, but not long thereafter the late Walagash younger son, Artaban, rose in revolt and civil war ensued. With great enthusiasm the Roman emperor Caracalla had devoted his life to 47

Photographs of the coins of Walagash, or Vologases, VI can be seen at http://www.parthia.com/vologases6.htm. I discovered that site in Hauser, S. R., “Where is the Man of Hadr, Who Once Built it and Taxed the land by the Tigris and the Chaboras? On the Significance of the Final Siege of Hatra,” Dirven, L. (ed.) Hatra: Politics, Culture and Religion Between Parthia and Rome, 2013, p. 135. 48 Karnamag, II. 49 Karnamag, III. The tambur is a musical instrument similar in principle to a guitar. 50 Karnamag, IV. 51 Karnamag, V.

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the imitation of Alexander the Great. 52 He called himself Alexander, adopted his symbols, surrounded himself with a Macedonian phalanx, and was eager to conquer Iran. Caracalla had long meditated war and saw his moment to strike at a weakened Parthia. The curious pretext for war was that the emperor demanded the return of two fugitives: a Greek philosopher by the name of Antiochus and a man of seemingly Arsacid extraction called Tiridates. 53 Walagash preferred rather to prosecute his struggle with his brother than to involve Parthia in another war with Rome, and so the emperor’s request was granted. But Walagash perished in the fratricidal contest, and Artaban ascended the Parthian throne. In further imitation of his Macedonian hero, who had taken an Iranian wife, Caracalla immediately demanded Artaban’s daughter in marriage. 54 The refusal of this request was another pretext for war. The war was brief. If the writer Herodian can be believed, the Roman emperor came upon Artaban’s palace at Arbela where he was received by the king, his court, and some of the local inhabitants. On a sudden, Caracalla commanded that his men fall upon his hosts, and the Parthian king and his followers fled in panic. 55 A Parthian counter-attack upon northern Mesopotamia was prepared, but Caracalla perished on his progress to Carrhae, where he intended to perform an act of devotion at the Temple of the Moon. Macrinus, captain of the praetorian guard, had instigated the murder of his commander, and replaced him. The late emperor was blamed for the conflict with Iran, Macrinus returned Parthian prisoners, and sued for peace. 56 Artaban dictated terms which must have represented the will of a great part of the Iranian nobility: the Romans were to vacate all Mesopotamia; they were to rebuild at their own expense all towns and fortresses which they had damaged or destroyed; and they were to pay reparations for the desecration of the Parthian royal tombs at Arbela. Macrinus refused, battle was joined in the vicinity of Nisibis, and the Roman force was worsted. Peace was established by a treaty of the year 218, but the terms which had been required by Artaban formed no part of the settlement. Armenia was confirmed as a protectorate, and northwestern Mesopotamia remained a province, of Rome; the only supposed benefit to Iran was that the Romans were obliged to pay two hundred million sesterces in cash and gifts to Artaban. Macrinus in his turn was promptly murdered by his own men, but his incompetent and cowardly successors,

52

Cassius Dio, LXXVIII.7–9; Herodian, IV; Edwell, P., “Osrhoene and Mesopotamia,” p. 127. 53 Cassius Dio, LXXVIII.19. 54 Cassius Dio, LXXIX.1; Curiously, Herodian claims that this request for an Iranian wife was eventually granted, but this is most doubtful (Herodian, IV.11.1). See Edwell, P., “Osrhoene and Mesopotamia,” p. 128. 55 Herodian, IV.11.3–7. 56 Cassius Dio, LXXIX.26.2.

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Elagabalus and Severus Alexander, made no attempt to alter Roman policy in the east. After sixty years of humiliating warfare with Rome, the terms dictated by Artaban must have aroused the hope that the dignity of Iran would be revived. The demand that Rome relinquish Mesopotamia and Armenia reasserted an older policy of re-establishing the ancient limits of the Iranian monarchy. 57 The government of Artaban failed to implement this policy, and Rome had deprived Parthia of a large part of Mesopotamia. Discontent with the ruling house must have been great. This was the occasion for a great leader to replace the Arsacid king, and the ruler of Persia alone commanded the prestige required for such an enterprise. 58 The success of a great leader depends upon his ability first to perceive and then to command the mood of a multitude. The mendacious informant of the historian Agathias alludes dimly to certain confederates whom Ardashir had gathered to himself, 59 and thereby transforms the rise of the Sasanian dynasty into an obscure conspiracy. The first historians of Armenia are perhaps more trustworthy. The writer known as Agathangelus suggests that a rumour had reached the Armenian king that the Parthians preferred the rule of Ardashir to that of their own countryman. 60 The historian Moses Chorenatsi names two branches of the Suren and Asparapet families who were united with Ardashir, and he informs us that the Armenian king Khosrov was dismayed that so many of his relatives could be found on the side of Persian rebel. 61 The promise of military adventure in the west may have been enough to attract such support, but Ardashir is said to have vowed to restore to the Suren and Asparapet families their ancient capital of Balkh and the region that surrounds it. 62 If Moses can be trusted, the king’s gratitude for the support of Parthian 57

Tacitus notes that such was Parthian policy under Artaban II: simul ac veteres Persarum ac Macedonium terminos, seque invasurum possessa primum Cyro et post Alexandro per vaniloquentiam ac minas iaciebat (Tacitus, Annals, VI.31). See also Shayegan, M. R., Arsacids and Sasanians: Political Ideology in Post-Hellenistic and Late Antique Persia, 2011, p. 293–295; 306. 58 Isaac notes that ‘there is no need to assume a radical change in imperial ideology…to explain Persian counter-attacks in the third century (Isaac, B., “Hatra Against Rome and Persia: From Success to Destruction,” Dirven, L. (ed.) Hatra: Politics, Culture and Religion Between Parthia and Rome, 2013, p. 28–29). 59 Ξυνωμότας ἀγείρας is his expression (Agathias, Historiae, II.26) 60 I am referring to the Armenian text of Agathangelus, 18–20; see Thomson’s English translation (Agathangelus / Thomson, R. W., Agathangelos: History of the Armenians, 1976, p. 35– 39). In the Greek text of Agathangelus, Ardashir sends an embassy to the Parthian king, and among the envoys are leaders of the Karin and Zik families (Dodgeon, M. H. / Lieu, S. N. C., The Roman Eastern Frontier and the Persian Wars, p. 13). 61 Moses Chorenatsi, II.71–74. 62 Moses Chorenatsi, II.74. The circumstance of this promise is Ardashir’s failed attempt to conquer Armenia. For a very recent interpretation of this notice, see Olbrycht, M. J., “Dy-

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noblemen might have ensured the defence of Iran’s northeastern frontier while Ardashir carried war into the west.

SASANIAN PROPAGANDA AND ROMAN ANXIETY The Iranian and Hellenic peoples over whom the Parthian monarchy ruled may have been rallied to a common purpose, or stirred up to a patriotic fervour, by virtue of the fiction that Arsacid rulers had a double lineage. Mihrdad VI, the king of Pontus, had exalted himself over his Roman enemies with the claim that his paternal descent originated with Cyrus and Darius, and that Alexander and Seleucus were the ancestors of his mother. 63 In the time of Ardashir, learned Romans may have remembered the strange vaunt of Mihrdad VI of Pontus, and they may have recalled the furious boast of Artaban II who promised to restore the borders of Iran as they were under both Cyrus and Alexander. 64 The Roman government must have been astounded to hear those claims reiterated by a far more dangerous antagonist. 65 Ardashir is said to have announced that he would win back all lands formerly held by Iran as far as the Aegean Sea, and this claim was reinforced by a Sasanian embassy to Alexander Severus. 66 The embassy alleged that those lands belonged to Ardashir, by right of inheritance, as it is implied, from the Achaemenid kings and their Macedonian conqueror. The association of the new Persian dynasty with the memory of Cyrus and Alexander may have originated within Arsacid propaganda, but it had new significance for Iran’s western foe. By the third century after Christ, the Roman world had been nastic Connections in the Arsacid Empire and the Origins of the House of Sasan” in Sarkosh, V., et al., The Parthian and Early Sasanian Empires: Adaptation and Expansion, 2016, p. 30. 63 Se autem, seu nobilitate illis conparetur, clariorem illa conluuie conuenarum esse, qui paternos maiores suos a Cyro Darioque, conditoribus Persici regni, maternos a magno Alexandro ac Nicatore Seleuco, conditoribus imperii Macedonici, referat (Justin, XXXVIII.7). 64 Tacitus, Annals, VI.31. 65 For the Roman perception of the rise of Ardashir, see Gariboldi, A., “The Birth of the Sasanian Monarchy in Western Sources,” in Sarkosh Curtis, V. et al. (eds.), The Parthian and Early Sasanian Empires: Adaptation and Expansion, 2016, p. 47–52. 66 ὅσα ποτὲ ὁι πάλαι Πέρσαι μέχρι τῆς Ἑλληνικῆς θαλάσσης ἔσχον (Cassius Dio, Historia Romana, LXXXb.4.1). The Aegean Sea is meant. Cf. Herodian VI.2.2. Herodian records that, on the eve of war, Ardashir sent four hundred of the tallest and most richly adorned Persians as an embassy to the Roman emperor. They commanded the Romans to vacate Ionia and all Asia opposite Europe and to allow Ardashir to rule all nations separated by the Aegean Sea and the gulf of the Propontis, because they were his by right of inheritance (Herodian, VI.4.5). For the connection with Alexander the Great and the Achaemenid monarchy, see Cf. Shayegan, M. R., “The Arsacids and Commagene,” in Sarkosh Curtis, V. et al. (eds.), The Parthian and Early Sasanian Empires: Adaptation and Expansion, 2016, p. 8–21; but see especially p. 9–10. There was apparently an old Parthian tradition of invoking both a Macedonian and an Iranian heritage.

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dominated by a succession of princes who were stimulated by a singular obsession. The imitation of Alexander the Great may have revived, or may have appeared to revive, the martial virtue of a degenerate age. 67 The spirit of the conqueror of the Achaemenid empire could not have failed to impress itself upon the Roman mind amidst renewed conflict with Parthia, and many a Roman prince, senator, and bureaucrat must have dreamt of subduing Iran. Who but Alexander had accomplished this before? The Roman people had recently known Trajan and Caracalla: two princes whose chief interests were imitating Alexander and warfare in the east. But at the opening of the third century of our era, the figure of Alexander was an object of general fascination, a singular manifestation of which was noticed by the Roman senator and historian Cassius Dio. A prophecy had announced that ‘an Alexander’ should come from the city of Emesa to replace the emperor Elagabalus, and the truth of the prophecy was strengthened by the appearance of a phantom who claimed to be, and who resembled, the Macedonian conqueror. 68 The prophecy and the ghost, which ranged over a large part of the Roman world, appealed to Roman credulity and accelerated the rise of Elagabalus’ successor: a youth by the name of Alexander Severus. 69 The Sasanian hereditary claim to the empire of Macedon ought to have appeared preposterous, and their claim to descent from Alexander the Great an absurd fantasy. But these fictions were no less ridiculous that the posturing of Trajan and Caracalla, or the fearsome portents attending the rise of Alexander Severus. They were no less ridiculous, in fact, that the celebrated Alexander Romance which lay at the root of many ancient opinions about the conqueror. This romance falsely imputes an Egyptian origin to Alexander, who is portrayed as the offspring of Olympias, wife of Philip of Macedon and the Egyptian king Nectanebo, who had disguised himself as the god Ammon and seduced her. 70 Sasanian propaganda invented a different genealogy whereby Alexander was the product of a union between Darius son of Bahman and the daughter of Philip of Macedon. This strange fiction transformed Alexander into the nephew of Sasan and a cousin of Ardashir; it was inserted into the Middle Persian redaction of the Alexander Romance, and it survives in later Per67

For a brief discussion of this, see Potter, D. S., The Roman Empire at Bay, 2004, p. 214; and Millar, F., A Study of Cassius Dio, 1964, p. 151. 68 Cassius Dio, LXXX.18.1–3. 69 Dio says that the ghost appeared first along the river Ister and proceeded through Moesia and Thrace, as though in solemn procession, as far as Byzantium and Chalcedon. The ghost was attended by a numerous train of associates. It took up lodging amongst the people of Thrace, provisions were offered it at the public expense, and no one dared oppose it. Word of the ghost reached Dio in Asia Minor. No one would have believed in this ghost if it had not fitted into a fantasy which had been widely diffused throughout the Roman world. Millar ventures a rational explanation of the appearance of the ghost (Millar, F., A Study of Cassius Dio, p. 214–218). 70 Pseudo-Callisthenes, I.4–7.

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sian and Arabic histories. 71 The survival of this spurious genealogy suggests that it was widely believed; and because it justified the Sasanian claim to lands which they had never held, no one but they could have invented it.

ARDASHIR’S WESTERN CONQUESTS It may yet be possible to assess the effect of this fable upon the Roman state. Cassius Dio assures us that the rise of Ardashir was an object of universal fear and alarm, 72 for Ardashir’s first purpose was to capture Hatra: a forward base from which to attack the Romans. Trajan and Septimius Severus had failed to take that independent city, and Ardashir could not subdue it either. But moving northward, he seized large portions of Media and Gurgan, 73 and despite a reversal in Armenia, 74 Ardashir now threatened the Roman provinces of Mesopotamia and Syria. Here the stream of Dio’s narrative begins to run dry. But he leaves us with the curious observation that the chief danger posed by Ardashir was that Roman troops either surrendered to him without a fight or joined the Persian side; and the troops in Mesopotamia rose up and murdered their commander. 75 Resuming Dio’s narrative, Herodian presents a scene of general disorder throughout the Roman east. Letters and an embassy could not persuade Ardashir to withdraw behind the river Euphrates. When the Roman state resolved to accomplish by arms what words had failed to achieve, mutiny spread through the emperor’s expeditionary army, and the forces in Syria attempted to proclaim a new emperor. 76 It is possible that Sasanian policy not only exploited these problems, but also exacerbated them. The emperor and his ministers discovered and suppressed those tumults, but they could not subdue the Persian king. War was declared in the year 233. The Roman strategy was to divide the military power into three armies, and each was to attack the enemy respectively by a northern, a middle, and a southern route. The largest force was to be commanded in person by the emperor; but in the event, Alexander shrank from the contest, and entrusted command to another general. This army was cut in pieces by a more numerous host led in person by Ardashir, and Herodian calls the defeat a very great misfortune, the like of which could not easily be 71

For example, see Dinawari, p. 37. Cassius Dio, LXXXb.31. This portion of Dio’s text merits further examination than Millar’s treatment which amounted to half an octavo page (Millar, F., A Study of Cassius Dio, 1964, p. 171). 73 Dio referes to the latter under the name ‘Parthia’. 74 Cassius Dio, LXXXb.3.3; Moses Chorenatsi II.71–73. 75 Cassius Dio, LXXXb.4.1–2. The commander’s name was Flavius Heracleo. Dio arraigns a general licentiousness and lack of discipline among the soldiers of the eastern frontier. 76 Herodian VI.4.7. The usurper was called Taurinus, and, according to an uncertain author, he threw himself into the Euphrates after his insurrection had failed (Epitome de Caesaribus XXIV.2). 72

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remembered. 77 The fate of the Roman army in the north was decided not by arms but by the severity of the Armenian winter which killed most of the soldiers and left many others mutilated. Alexander attempted to unite the wreckage of his three armies at Antioch, where the Romans prepared to respond to another Iranian attack. 78 But there was no further engagement in this doubtful war. It may be true that Ardashir’s army suffered greatly when harrying Roman forces in the north, but it is improbable that Iranian and Roman losses were nearly equal. 79 Neither side vanquished the other but both contestants announced a victory. 80 The Roman emperor appeared to have halted, or at least to have delayed, the westward advance of the Persian king. Ardashir had inflicted a signal humiliation upon a Roman army. Wresting territory from Rome would come with time, and the rule of Pabag’s son was secure and the continuation of his dynasty was certain. But the fate of the Roman emperor was very different. Two years after the Persian war, Alexander made an ignominious peace with the tribes of Germany, and a conspiracy led by the strange usurper Maximin ended the emperor’s life and reign, and extinguished the Severan dynasty. 81

THE CONSOLIDATION OF ARDASHIR’S CONQUESTS AND THE END OF HIS REIGN The death of Alexander Severus in the year 235 was the occasion for Ardashir to renew warfare in the west. 82 Iranian forces swiftly reduced several Mesopotamian fortresses and among these were the important cities of Nisibis, Carrhae, and Hatra. Ardashir had already carried Iranian arms southward to the shores of eastern Arabia, and he possessed the port of Charax Spasinou upon the estuary of the Euphrates and the Tigris at the Persian Gulf. These conquests degraded Roman prestige and confirmed Iranian command of the maritime trading routes from India to the Persian Gulf and overland to the caravan junction at Hatra. Iranian possession of that important city, which had been accomplished perhaps by subterfuge, was achieved in the year 240: the last year of Ardashir’s life and reign. 83

77

μεγίστη τε αὕτη συμφορὰ καὶ οὐ ῥᾳδίως μνημονευθεῖσα (Herodian VI.6.6). Despite this claim, Herodian’s description of the Persian tactics and Roman failure recalls the defeat of Crassus. 78 Herodian VI.6.3–4. 79 But this is what Herodian claims (Herodian VI.6.6.). 80 For a brief summary of the Roman propaganda linked with this conflict, see Dignas, B. / Winter, E., Rome and Persia in Late Antiquity, p. 74–77. 81 Herodian VI.8.4; VII.1.2. 82 Dignas, B. / Winter, E., Rome and Persia in Late Antiquity, p. 19–21. 83 For a modern view of the taking of Hatra see Hauser, S. R., “Where is the Man of Hadr,” p. 119–139.

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ARDASHIR’S EXPANSION EASTWARD The first westward thrust of the Huns had expelled the Tocharians from the borderlands of China, and the consequences of that migration had nearly destroyed the Parthian state. Central Asia was overrun, and the last vestiges of Hellenism and the relics of Alexander’s empire were buried in the sands of Bactria. In the second century before our era, the Tocharians were a federation of five nations; and when they had transposed themselves across the river Oxus, a new state arose under the leadership of one of their constituent peoples. 84 The Kushans had founded their capital at Kapisi to the north of modern Kabul in Afghanistan, and an interesting amalgam of Inner Asian, Indian, and Hellenistic forms adorned an impressive city which commanded the southern foothills of the Hindukush. With time, the Kushan kingdom extended between the two great rivers Oxus and Ganges. A vast system of canals and irrigation works covered the great floodplains of the Zarafshan Valley and the lower Oxus. 85 Terraced fields, tunnels, and aqueducts which improved the yield of agriculture evince a complex and centralised state. Kushan coins imitated those of the Romans and of the Greek kings of Bactria, whose dominions they had inherited, and this uniform and stable currency was a great boon to foreign trade. 86 It was the fate of the Kushans to be the royal patrons of the Buddhist religion under the monarchy of Kanishka. But the Kushan kingdom was absorbed insensibly within the growing power of the Sasanian dynasty, the nomadic world of Inner Asia, and the Gupta empire of northern India. Tabari asserts that a Kushan king submitted himself to Ardashir toward the end of the latter’s reign, 87 but the military or diplomatic operations which preceded this are obscure. 88 The Sasanian portion of the ancient Kushan state was placed under the authority of a viceroy who bore the title of Kushanshah; 89 and with time his 84

Rezakhani, K., ReOrienting the Sasanians, p. 49–71; Liu, X., “Migration and Settlement of the Yuezhi-Kushan: Interaction and Interdependence of Nomadic and Sedentary Societies,” Journal of World History, vol. 12, no. 2, 2001, p. 261–292. For more general discussions, see Liu, X., The Silk Road in World History, 2010, p. 42–61; Thorley, J., “The Roman Empire and the Kushans,” Greece & Rome, vol. 26, no. 2, 1979, p. 181–190; and Baldev, K., The Early Kushans, 1973, p. 14–41. For the Kushans and nomadism, see Grenet, F., “The Nomadic Element in the Kushan Empire (1st–3rd Century AD),” Journal of Central Eurasian Studies, vol. 3, 2012, p. 1–22. 85 Mukhamedjanov, A. R., “Economy and Social System in Central Asia in the Kushan Age,” in History of civilizations of Central Asia Vol. 2 The development of sedentary and nomadic civilizations: 700 B.C. to A.D. 250, 1999, p. 265–273. 86 Mukhamedjanov, A. R., “Economy and Social System in Central Asia,” p. 285–288. 87 Tabari, v. 2, p. 41. 88 Carter, M. L., “A Numismatic Reconstruction of Kushano-Sasanian History,” Museum Notes (American Numismatic Society), vol. 30, 1985, p. 216–218. 89 The first mention of this title is in the Paikuli inscription of about the year 293 (Paikuli Inscription, p. 52); see also Agathias, Historiae, IV.27. For a modern authority, see de la

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dominions became a buffer between Iran and the nomads of the steppe. 90 Iranian might impressed itself gently upon the peoples whom the Kushans had ruled: coins minted by the Kushanshahs amalgamated the symbols of Zoroastrian, Inner Asian, and Indian religions; and a vague titulature 91 appealing alike to the peoples of Bactria and Gandhara implied the necessity of maintaining the favour of a heterogeneous population until the migration of the Huns out of Inner Asia extinguished the Kushan state in the middle of the fourth century. The eastward expansion of Iranian might was assisted by the distraction of the nomads of the Asiatic steppe. For many centuries the Huns had been the great nomadic power in that vast region. In the early second century before our era, the collapse of the Qin dynasty, gave way to the rule of the Han whose seventh emperor Wu inaugurated a policy of offensive warfare which drove the Huns from the Chinese border and which opened the west to Chinese expansion. 92 After the lapse of nearly two centuries, internal feuds and the military efforts of the Chinese succeeded in dividing the Huns into a northern and southern kingdom. Soon we shall follow the destiny of the southern Huns, who were pleased to ally themselves with the Han and to settle within the borders of China; but the northern Huns were crushed and subjugated by the very peoples whom they had dominated. In about the middle of the first century, a confederacy known to the Chinese as the Xianbei triumphed upon the degraded remnants of the northern Huns, and renewed the nomadic cause against the sedentary Chinese. 93 A series of conflicts in the north preoccupied the arms of the Xianbei and those of the Han until that famous dynasty succumbed to civil war in the year 220. The three mutually hostile states which arose upon the ruins of the Han monarchy might have been easy prey to the Xianbei. But the generals of the Wei, Shu, and Wu, and the Jin who succeeded them, resisted all incursions from the steppe throughout the third century, and no great movement of peoples was to issue from Inner Asia again until the middle of the fourth century. 94 Vaissière, E., “Kushanshahs, i. History,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, 2016 online edition. Obviously, the establishment of this power occurred at some point in or after the reign of Ardashir I, but the precise dates and even the order in which Kushanshahs reigned are doubtful (Schindel, N., “Kushanshahs ii. Kushano-Sasanian Coinage,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, 2016, online edition). 90 Rezakhani, K., ReOrienting the Sasanians, p. 72–86. 91 Carter, M. L., “A Numismatic Reconstruction of Kushano-Sasanian History,” Museum Notes (American Numismatic Society), vol. 30, 1985, p. 215–281. 92 Beckwith, C., Empires of the Silk Road, 2011, p. 86–88; Barfield, T., The Perilous Frontier, p. 51–59. 93 I am summarising the detailed exposition in Holcombe, C., “The Xianbei Chinese History,” Early Medieval China, 2013, p. 1–38, which is the fullest treatment of the subject available in English. 94 For more detail, see Barfield, T., The Perilous Frontier, p. 85–97; and Grousset, R., The Empire of the Steppes, 1971, p. 53–54.

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It is a curious fact that the disintegration of the Han, the defeat of the northern Huns, and the ascendancy of the Xianbei coincide with the rise of the House of Sasan. Though the appearance of the new Iranian dynasty cannot of been caused by the political and military condition of Inner Asia, the House of Sasan surely benefited from the preoccupations of the nomadic world which assured a stable frontier in eastern Iran throughout the second century. That region remained calm until the migration of the southern Huns set in motion the vast movement of peoples which nearly overwhelmed the two great powers in the third and fourth centuries.

THE CHARACTER AND LEGACY OF ARDASHIR The first Sasanian king must have been a man of extraordinary energy and confidence, and one who possessed a talent for persuasion. Although it is easier to perturb a foreign enemy that to arouse and maintain domestic support, Ardashir was a master of both. He understood Roman anxieties and he exploited Roman imperial propaganda to his own advantage. Ardashir had convinced an influential portion of the Parthian nobility that he was fit to restore the dignity of Iran and to implement a policy of western warfare. But he maintained the confidence of that nobility despite his failure to achieve the conquest of Hatra in his first Roman war, and he rallied support for a renewed attack after the death of Alexander Severus. Ardashir’s vision of an Iranian revival was convincing and he made others believe in it. The author of the Letter of Tansar, a document of the sixth century, remarks that Ardashir was ‘more richly endowed with virtues than the ancients and…his custom is better than the customs of old’. 95 If this does not commemorate public opinion in Ardashir’s time, it must represent the manner in which Ardashir wished to appear. The political revolution instigated by Ardashir achieved a singular transformation of the Iranian state. The flexible and loose system of Parthian rule gave way to the might of a central power under the dominion of the House of Sasan. A uniform issue of coins, whose purity remained consistent throughout the rule of Sasanid family, replaced the heterogeneous currencies of the Near East. 96 The use of administrative seals issued from a central authority, the regulation of market places, irrigation works on a gigantic scale, and the investment in military infrastructure – 95

The Letter of Tansar, p. 36–40. See the arguments in Howard-Johnston, J., “The Sasanian State: The Evidence of Coinage and Military Construction,” Journal of Ancient History, 2(2), 2014, p. 144–181. Those arguments are based on: Alram, M. / Gyselen, R., Sylloge Nummorum Sasanidarum, Band I, 2003, p. 76–77; p. 81–84; p. 162–167; p. 268–271; Alram, M. / Gyselen, R., Sylloge Nummorum Sasanidarum, Band II, 2012, p. 88–92; p. 98–102; Schindel, N., Sylloge Nummorum Sasanidarum, Band III/1, 2004, p. 17; p. 55–58; p. 103–11; p. 197–209; and Blet-Lemarquand, M. (with Gyselen, R. / Gordus, A. A.), “La question récurrente de la raison d’être de ’pd sur le monnayage de Khusrō II (590–628): Étude préliminaire” in Gyselen, R. (ed.), Sources pour l’histoire et la géographie du monde iranien (224–710), 2009, p. 41–58. 96

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these policies announce a potent central government. 97 The writing of the Middle Persian language involved a complex system of ideograms and phonetic transcription of Iranian words in Aramaic letters. The Achaemenid bureaucracy had bequeathed the use of that Semitic alphabet, and its adaptation to an Indo-Iranian language had evolved slowly. But only a policy of enforcement could have preserved that system of writing and the use of ideograms, and only a central authority could have trained a class of scribes and bureaucrats in the rigours of that cumbrous script and in the use of a language which was written but not pronounced. 98 The nature of the evidence permits only such general observations as I have made. But that no other dynasty ever supplanted the descendants of Ardashir attests alike the effect of those centralising policies and the potency of Sasanian efforts to maintain an organised system of dynastic power. A large state devoted to warfare must have a strong base of resources and taxation. Ardashir’s aim to control and exploit Mesopotamia shows that he understood this important principle. Since the fourth millennium before our era, the arts of irrigation had transformed the fertile alluvium of Mesopotamia into a rich and populous centre of agriculture, commerce, and manufacturing. 99 The cities of Mesopotamia had grown in size, density, and wealth; and the merchants of Mesopotamia and Khuzestan had established contacts overland to Asia Minor and Central Asia and southwards to the Indian Ocean and the western coast of India. Sasanian control over this region assured a large base of taxation and an immense yield of agriculture to pay and to feed the army. Ardashir rightly foresaw the importance of these advantages, took possession of them, and passed them on to his son and successor. Even after the extinction of the Sasanid line, Mesopotamia remained the centre of a great empire. Ardashir’s capital was founded in the vicinity of Ctesiphon, where the Arsacid kings had made their winter palace. The form of an irregular circle was imposed up-

97

Jackson Bonner, M. R., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 137–138; Frankopan, P., Silk Roads, p. 23; Howard-Johnston, J., “The Sasanian State, p. 148–157; Howard-Johnston, J., “The Late Sasanian Army” in Bernheimer, T / Silverstein, A. (eds), Late Antiquity: Eastern Perspectives, 2012, p. 93–108; Gyselen, R., La Géographie administrative de l’empire sassanide: les témoignages sigilographiques, 1989; Rahimi-Laridjani, Die Entwicklung der Bewässerungslandwirtschaft im Iran bis in Sasanidisch-frühislamische Zeit, 1988; Taffazoli, A., “List of Trades and Crafts in the Sasanian Period,” in Archaeologische Mitteilungen aus Iran 7, 1974, p. 192–196. 98 Jackson Bonner, M. R., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 138 with note 844. 99 Adams, R. McC., Heartland of Cities: Surveys of Ancient Settlement and Land Use on the Central Floodplain of the Euphrates, 1981, p. 200–214; Adams, R. McC., “Agriculture and Urban Life in Early South-Western Iran,” in Caldwell, J. R. (ed.) New Roads to Yesterday, 1966, p. 436–465; Adams, R. McC., The Land Behind Baghdad: A History of Settlement in the Diyala Plain, 1965, p. 69–83. I owe these references to Mr James Howard-Johnston, my former supervisor.

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on the ancient settlement known in the Aramaic language as Coche. 100 Veh Ardashir covered slightly more than seventeen-thousand acres, and its formidable circuit wall attained a height of thirty-two feet. The fortifications of Ardashir’s capital included a gigantic citadel, called Garondagan in the Middle Persian language, large towers proceeding from the circuit wall, and a network of trenches and moats. 101 Rectangular blocks of irregular size divided the city, and large streets whose breadth was twentythree feet, diminished into a network of alleys and passages. We may imagine a dense agglomeration of houses constructed of mud bricks surrounding regions in which the shops of tradesmen of all kinds were arranged indiscriminately, and open markets flanked the main streets 102 – an obvious contrast with the more orderly and rectilinear form of ancient Seleucia nearby. We should not be surprised to find that the character of Ardashir is represented in the art which commemorates his reign. A gigantic frieze carved into the side of a mountain near Firuzabad in Persia is Ardashir’s first monument to himself. 103 The leader who commissioned this image had no care for the depiction of individual characteristics: only armour, insignia, and weapons distinguish the combatants. Three pairs of warriors confront one another on the field of battle. At the centre of this frieze the first Sasanian king holds a gigantic lance by means of which Artaban and his horse are arrested in the midst of a gallop and suspended in the air. The scene is stiff and lifeless, and attest a mind satisfied by the crude imitation of older forms on a colossal scale.

THE ZOROASTRIAN RELIGION Two carvings of Ardashir’s investiture announce that king’s belief in the divine sanction of his rule, as well as his pretentions to equality with the supreme god. The first scene of Ardashir’s investiture is also at Firuzabad in a gorge a few hundred yards from the image of Artaban’s defeat. 104 Ardashir and the god Ahura Mazda are of equal size, beholding one another face to face. The king receives from the hand of the god a large ring – an Achaemenid symbol of royal and divine power. 105 Ardashir is attended by three small figures which may represent advisers or perhaps 100

Simpson, St J., “Sasanian Cities: Archaeological Perspectives on the Urban Economy and Built Environment of an Empire,” in Sauer, E. (ed.), Sasanian Persia: Between Rome and the Steppes of Eurasia, 2017, p. 25–27. 101 Simpson, St J., “Sasanian Cities,” p. 33. But it is possible that the moats were added later. 102 Simpson, St J., “Sasanian Cities,” p. 40–41. 103 Ghirshman, R., Iran: Parthes et Sassanides, 1962, p. 125–130. 104 Ghirshman, R., Iran: Parthes et Sassanides, p. 131. 105 This ring is of ancient Mesopotamian origin, and it came to be associated with the Achaemenid dynasty, notably on the tomb of Darius at Naqsh-e Rostam (Root, M. C., The King and Kingship in Achaemenid Art: Essays on the Creation of an Iconography of Empire, 1979, p. 173–174).

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leaders of noble families who supported the new king. A more impressive, and somewhat more lifelike, relief at Naqsh-e Rostam also depicts the investiture of Ardashir. 106 The king and the god appear at the same gigantic size, and the image of one seems to reflect that of the other, as though in a mirror. They are seated upon two stout and impossibly small horses, and Ardashir reaches out to receive the royal ring from the hand of Ahura Mazda. The hooves of their steeds are raised above the heads of their prostrate enemies: the last Arsacid king and the evil god Angra Mainyu. A figure holding a wand, or perhaps a fly-whisk, stands behind Ardashir. The left hand of Ahura Mazda clutches a rod of power, or perhaps the barsom twigs essential to Zoroastrian ritual, and Ardashir raises the first finger of his left hand in a gesture of devotion and humility. An inscription below the image, repeated in three languages, says: ‘this is the image of his Mazda-worshipping majesty Ardashir, king of kings of Iran, whose descent is from the gods, the son of his majesty king Pabag’. 107 Although a philosophical mind would reject Ardashir’s absurd claim to divine lineage, it must be acknowledged that Ardashir understood the political use of religion. He is reputed to have revived and purified the Zoroastrian faith, to have determined the canon of its scriptures, and to have established it as the ideology of an empire. 108 What did Ardashir himself believe in? The question cannot be properly answered. The Zoroastrian religion, like that of the pagan Romans or the modern Hindus, expressed itself variously throughout the Iranian word. The surviving relics of its scriptures are mutilated and incomplete. Though we know that much is missing, we may only guess at what has vanished, and many a regional variation must remain forever obscure; and so I may describe only those beliefs which were probably held by all Zoroastrians. 109 The religious system endorsed by Ardashir belonged properly to a primitive 110 age, for the teachings of Zoroaster had been imposed upon the ancient IndoIranian religion. An assembly of gods reminiscent of the Vedic, the Norse, and the Olympian pantheons, a ritual and symbolism of fire, the cult of the soma, rites of purification employing animal urine, funerary customs, and a peculiar cosmology

106

An impressive recent photograph of this relief appears as figure 6 in Grenet, F., La Geste d’Ardashir fils de Pâbag, p. 14–15. 107 Back, M., Die Sassanidischen Staatsinschriften, p. 281. 108 Daryaee, T., Sasanian Persia, p. 69–71. 109 Cf. Crone, P., The Nativist Prophets of Early Islamic Iran: Rural Revolt and Local Zoroastrianism, 2012, p. 317–320. 110 Cf. Keytenbroek, P. G., “How Pious Was Shapur I? Religion, Church and Propaganda under the Early Sasanians,” in Sarkhosh Curtis, V. / Stewart, S. (eds), The Sasanian Era: The Idea of Iran, v. III, 2008, p. 13–14.

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formed the common heritage of the Indian and Iranian peoples. 111 Such customs and beliefs bespeak the culture and habits of nomads before the great migration which populated the Indian subcontinent and the plateau of Iran in the very remote past. Many centuries later, a vision appeared to a priest of the old religion, and he began to expound a doctrine of the primaeval unity of a single divine being. 112 In the beginning, as Zoroaster explained, there had been but one benevolent deity, the Wise Lord, or Ahura Mazda in the Avestan language. But the prophet also postulated the existence of an evil counterpart, or twin, to the Supreme Being, and he called him the Malign Spirit, or Angra Mainyu. Upon the meeting of these two uncreated antithetical gods, both life and its opposite appeared; and the Wise Lord ordained that the followers of the Lie should be condemned to a base existence, but that righteousness and other bounties were the recompense of those who followed the Truth. 113 Here we have the lineaments of a doctrine of a constant struggle between the forces of good and those of evil, and the obligation of mankind to participate on the side of Ahura Mazda. The prophet reimagined the divinities of the Indo-Iranian pantheon as the first creations of the Wise Lord. 114 The seven Bounteous Immortals, lesser divinities who were also worthy of adoration, 115 and other beings, who might be compared to angels or tutelar divinities, were brought into existence to assist the Wise Lord in the struggle against the evil principle. 116 These divine helpers aided Ahura Mazda’s creation of the world, and all good things that are in it. In the natural processes of time, the revolutions of night and day, summer and winter, life and death, Zoroaster beheld evidence of a great battle. The purpose of this struggle was to restore the original condition of the universe when Ahura Mazda and his assistants had created it. Zoroastrian holy writ foresees eternal bliss for the good within the House of Ahura Mazda, and the wicked shall dwell in misery in the House of the Lie until the end of the world, 117 a consummation ushered in by the successive appearance of three saviours. These saviours, called Ukhshyaterta, Ukhshyatnemah, and Astwaterta, are the sons of three virgins who bathed in a mysterious lake in which the seed of Zoroaster 111

Boyce, Zoroastrians: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices, 1976, p. 3–177; Gnoli, G., “IndoIranian Religion,” in Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. XIII, fasc. 1, 2012, p. 97–100. 112 Rose, J., Zoroastrianism: An Introduction, 2011; Skjærvø, P. O., An Introduction to Zoroastrianism, 2005; Boyce, Zoroastrians, p. 181–191; 192–228. 113 Yasna, XXX: 3–5. 114 Some of these divinities emerge more clearly than others from the darkness of religions speculation. Mithra and Anahita were, respectively, the god of the sun and the goddess of fertility, and were rather prominent. 115 Bundahishn, I.53. There is an excellent and succinct description of the Bounteous Immortals in Skjærvø, P. O., An Introduction to Zoroastrianism, 2005, p. 16–17. 116 Boyce, Zoroastrians, 1976, p. 196; Shaked, S., “The Notions Menog and Getig in the Pahlavi Texts and Their Relation to Eschatology,” Acta Orientalia, vol. 33, 1971, p. 70–72. 117 Videvdad, XIX; Bundahishn, XXX; Menoy Khrad, II.

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had been preserved. 118 The sacrifices performed by each saviour would renew the pristine condition of the world for a period of one thousand years. The age of Ukhshyaterta had terminated in harsh rain and a vehement winter which annihilated nearly all mankind; that of Ukhshyatnemah issued in the escape of the gigantic dragon Azdahag; and Astwaterta, as it was foretold, shall lead the final battle against the forces of Angra Mainyu. Astwaterta shall raise the dead, and every good and evil deed shall then be revealed. All evil men shall be tortured for three days and nights in the House of the Lie, the dragon Gochihr shall fall to the ground and burn the whole earth, and a river of molten metal shall form mankind’s final ordeal. 119 For the good the passage through that river shall be without pain or discomfort, but it shall be a purifying agony for the wicked. A final sacrifice, performed by Zoroaster and the ancient, mythical king Gushtasp, shall achieve the final restoration of the world, the final defeat of the Lie, and the abolition of death. 120 The annual celebration of the Now Ruz, the Zoroastrian New Year, was observed at the spring equinox, and it prefigured the total renewal of the world. That festival, which has survived the triumph of Islam, remains a symbol not of the common belief, but the national unity, of the Iranian people. 121 The hymns composed by Zoroaster suggest that he belonged to a sedentary society in north-eastern Iran, 122 but the imagery which he employs is derived from the pastoral life of the Asiatic steppe and is rooted in the deep past. 123 The prophet called his homeland the Abode of the Aryans, or Airyanem Vaejo as it is written in the Avesta. 124 In the opinion of the prophet, this was the centre of the world and the origin of political order. The confrontation between Ahura Mazda and the forces of evil expressed the primary meaning of the universe; and in that contest the Aryan people was to be the Wise Lord’s most potent ally. A signal achievement of Zoroaster’s religion was its assimilation of the ancient Iranian priesthood, the Magi, to a new spiritual system; and the religion was similarly the strongest, and perhaps the oldest, mystical support for the Iranian monarchy. Achaemenid inscriptions 118

I am following Shaked, S., “Eschatology i. In Zoroastrianism and Zoroastrian Influence,” in Encylopaedia Iranica, vol. VIII, fasc. 6, 2012, p. 565–569 and Boyce, Zoroastrians, 1976, p. 229–246. 119 Bundahishn, XXX.17; the image of molden metal is vaguely adumbrated in the more ancient Yasnas, 30.7; 32.7; and 51.9. 120 Yasht, XIX. 121 Crone, P., Nativist Prophets, p. 378. 122 Malandra, W., “Zoroaster ii General Survey” in Encyclopaedia Iranica, 2009. On the meaning of the word ‘Aryan’, see Bailey, H. W., “Arya” in Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. II, fasc. 7, 1987, p. 681–683. 123 Boyce, Zoroastrians, 1976, p. 3–21. 124 Videvdad, p. 3; Skjaervo, P., “The Avesta as Source for the Early History of the Iranians,” in Erdosy, G., The Indo-Aryans of Ancient South Asia: Language, Material Culture and Ethnicity, 1995, p. 164.

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proclaim the Wise Lord as the tutelar deity of the Iranian monarch, and the enemies of the king are servants of the Lie. 125 But, though the cosmological speculation of the prophet might hold significance for all mankind, the metaphysical system which he established was the exclusive religion of the Iranian people. 126 The faith of Zoroaster was at once a national, a religious, and a political identity. So potent was the force of that identity that it had survived the Macedonian conquest of Iran, and was revived with new vehemence under the House of Sasan. 127 In recollection of the mythical Aryan homeland, the dominion of Ardashir was called Eran Shahr, the empire of Iran, and it was to be the continuation of the rule of the legendary kings of the world who held sway from the Abode of the Aryans. 128 The House of Sasan ruled Iran for nearly four centuries until the metaphysical system attributed to a priest of Bactria gave way to the incantations of a merchant of Mecca. The political order established by Ardashir was the last empire of Iran. So close was the attachment between the religion and the dynasty that the two were buried in a common grave. Yet the vision of an empire governed by a single ruler and one religion outlived both Ardashir and his dynasty; and was imitated and improved by the successors to Constantine and Muhammad. 129

125

Kent, R. G., Old Persian: Grammar, Texts, Lexicon, 1950, p. 117–119; 129–131. Shaked, S., “Human Identity and Classes of People in the Pahlavi Books,” in Cereti, C. G. (ed.), Iranian Identity in the Course of History: Proceedings of the Conference Held in Rome, 21–24 September 2005, 2010, p. 332; Shaked, S., “Religion in the Late Sasanian Period: Eran, Aneran, and Other Religious Designations,” in Sarkosh Curtis, V. / Stewart, S. (eds), The Sasanian Era, vol. 3 of The Idea of Iran, 2008, p. 106; 109; Crone, P. / Cook, M., Hagarism: The Making of the Islamic World, Cambridge, 1977, p. 41–42. 127 Crone, P., Nativist Prophets, p. 375–385; Crone, P. / Cook, M., Hagarism, 1977, p. 43. 128 Gnoli, G., The Idea of Iran: an Essay on its Origin, 1989. 129 Cf. Hoyland, R., “Early Islam as a Late Antique Religion,” in Johnson, S. F. (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Late Antiquity, 2012, p. 1053–1077. 126

III. FROM SHAPUR I TO SHAPUR II THE BEGINNING OF SHAPUR I’S REIGN The birth and youth of Ardashir’s son and successor fall under the same shadow that obscured the origins of the Sasanid dynasty. Shapur was not the natural son of Ardashir, but rather his adopted heir born to an unknown man, and the mother of Shapur was none other than the daughter of the last Arsacid monarch. When the House of Arshak was overthrown, Ardashir took many prisoners and one of these was a royal daughter who was with child. Ardashir had commanded his chief priest to execute this captive, but he could not bring himself to kill a pregnant woman. By some mysterious means, the hierophant concealed the Parthian princess, who in time gave birth to Shapur whom she raised for seven years. The chief priest revealed the identity of the child, and Ardashir adopted him as his son and heir. This is the strange account presented in the Karnamag, 1 and if it is not wholly imaginary, it may conceal a marriage between Ardashir and an Arsacid princess or perhaps merely a noble lady connected with the Parthian aristocracy. An historian might easily surmise that the family of Ardashir appeared more legitimate by virtue of a real or fictive dynastic marriage. But on this topic the monumental inscription, which Shapur himself commissioned, is silent. The second Sasanian king identifies himself as the son of Ardashir and a lady called Mirdod, 2 about whom nothing is known. The inscription of Shapur neither corroborates nor contradicts the mysterious claims of the Karnamag. Later narratives of Shapur’s strange origins either reveal the contents of another redaction of the Karnamag or later embellishments of its legends. In the history of Dinawari and the Shahnameh of Ferdowsi, Ardashir’s anonymous chief priest is replaced by a vizier by the name of Abarsam. This vizier hid the pregnant princess and vouched for the truth of the royal birth by means of a singularly loathsome act. Abarsam removed his testicles and packed them with salt within a sealed box. The shrivelled organs were produced when the boy Shapur was revealed and adopted by 1

Karnamag, X.13–17. Back, M., Die Sassanidischen Staatsinschriften, p. 341. This name is spelt Mirdod in both Parthian and Middle Persian, but ΜΥΡΡΟΔ in Greek. 2

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Ardashir. 3 The inscription of Shapur I confirms that a dignitary named Abarsam served in the court of Ardashir, 4 but there is no independent evidence for the behaviour described in the legends of Dinawari and Ferdowsi. It is possible to imagine that such a story was invented to refute a rumour which associated the child with Abarsam – otherwise it is hard to know what to make of this bizarre tale. Many years pass in the life of Shapur before he emerges from the gloom of mythology and fable. Ardashir and Shapur fought together in the Roman campaign of the year 240, but the activities of the son in his father’s war are obscure. 5 Shapur’s participation in the taking of Hatra is preserved in the Arabian legends associated with the fall of that city. 6 Nadira, daughter of the king of Hatra, is said to have fallen in love with Shapur, and the prince of Persia returned her affections. A lovers’ conspiracy took shape, and the gate of Hatra was opened to the Iranian army by the perfidious princess. We must assume that Shapur had received at least as rigorous a training in the art of war as he had acquired in the art of love. The father must have taken pains to ensure the smooth succession of the son, and the historian Tabari asserts that Shapur was crowned king in his father’s lifetime. 7 Shapur greatly surpassed his father in the field of war. His first battles drew him to the shores of the river Oxus and to the mountains of Media, and thence to the lands of the Gil, the Daylamite, and the Hyrcanian peoples. 8 In the north-east, Shapur defeated a king by the name of Pahlizag, who may have been of Kushan descent, and the city of Nishapur was founded near the battlefield. 9 The Syriac Chronicle of Arbela and the Middle Persian Shahrestaniha-yi Eranshahr, which are the sources for these conflicts, fail to indicate the cause of them. We may suppose that the tribes of those distant countries had attempted to assert their independence from the Sasanid government, perhaps in response to a military levy before war with Rome. Or perhaps Shapur simply pacified his naturally rebellious frontiers in preparation for more serious operations. But these small battles hardly foreshadowed the astonishing wars that followed in the west.

3

Dinawari, p. 45; Ferdowsi, Ardashir, l. 67–72. Back, M., Die Sassanidischen Staatsinschriften, p. 351. 5 Dodgeon, M. H. / Lieu, S. N. C., The Roman Frontier and the Persian Wars, p. 23. 6 The legend of the fall, as well as the archaeological evidence for the siege, of Hatra are discussed thoroughly in Hauser, S. R., “Where is the Man of Hadr, Who Once Built it and Taxed the land by the Tigris and the Chaboras? On the Significance of the Final Siege of Hatra,” Dirven, L. (ed.) Hatra: Politics, Culture and Religion Between Parthia and Rome, 2013, p. 119–139. 7 Tabari v. 2, p. 41. 8 Kawerau, P. / Króll, T., The Chronicle of Arbela, 1985, p. 17–18. 9 Shahrestaniha-i Eranshar §15. 4

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THE OUTBREAK OF WAR The Roman emperor Gordian III had resolved to wrest Hatra from Iranian control, and in the year 243 he led a Roman army into Mesopotamia. Battle was joined at Misiche in the following year. Iranian forces were victorious, the Roman army was disgraced, and Gordian was assassinated. 10 The new emperor was Philip the Arab, upon whom Shapur forced an ignominious peace treaty which compelled the Romans to cede to Iran both Mesopotamia and Armenia. 11 The peace was of short duration, for Roman opinion could not long endure that disgraceful cession of territory. But the cause for renewed conflict is doubtful. Zonaras (the Byzantine epitomist whose testimony is very late, but founded on good sources), claims that the emperor Philip broke his treaty with Iran, so that he might recover what he had been forced to give up. 12 The historian Moses Chorenatsi suggests that Khosrov, the king of Armenia, had requested Roman assistance against Iran. 13 But, whatever the real or stated causes of warfare, a massive Roman counteroffensive was planned, and sixty thousand men were put into the field. But in the year 252 Shapur led the Iranian army deep into Syria and, with a much smaller force, destroyed the Roman field army where it had mustered at Barbalissus. Antioch, Zeugma, and Samosata were put to fire and sword, and the Iranian army ravaged the Syrian countryside – proof, perhaps, that Shapur had not intended, or was unable, to attach that country to his empire. A third Iranian offensive of the year 260 is one of the most memorable confrontations in the annals of war. 14 Shapur overran Syria a second time, devastated Cappadocia, and besieged Edessa; and when Roman and Iranian forces met in Syria, the Roman emperor suffered the double humiliation of defeat and captivity.

10

For a modern historiographical discussion of conflict with Gordian, see Edwell, P. M. Between Rome and Persia: The Middle Euphrates, Mesopotamia, and Palmyra Under Roman Control, 2008, p. 169–172. 11 Σπονδὰς δὲ πρὸς Σαπώρην θέμενος τὸν τῶν Περσῶν βασιλεύοντα, τὸν πρὸς Πέρσας κατέλυσε πόλεμον, παραχωρήσας ἀυτοῖς Μεσοποταμίας καὶ Ἀρμενίας (Zonaras, XII.19). See also Banchich, T. / Lane, E. N., The History of Zonaras from Alexander Severus to the death of Theodosius the Great, 2009, p. 8–11; 46. For a discussion of the controversy surrounding this treaty, see Edwell, P. M. Between Rome and Persia, p.173–181. 12 Μέτ᾽ὀλίγον ἠθέτησε τὰς συνθήκας καὶ τῶν χωρῶν ἐπελάβετο (Zonaras, XII.19). 13 Moses Chorenatsi, II.71. 14 Zosimus, Historia Nova, I.xxxvi–xxxix; Zonaras, XII.23. The chronicler John Malalas mentions the legendary resistance of a furious priest of Aphrodite at the city of Emesa. Sampsigeramus (that was the priest’s name) lead a small battalion of hierophants against Shapur, whom they assaulted with slings. The priest was received as an ambassador; and during the parley, a small stone discharged from an Emesene sling struck Shapur and slew him instantly (Malalas, Chronographia, XII, p. 296).

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The emperor Valerian had hoped that an embassy and an immense quantity of gold might persuade the Persian king to retire. 15 But the ambassadors were detained and at length dismissed, and Shapur set out to confront the emperor in person. The circumstances of Valerian’s capture and the end of his life are alike mysterious. The historical epitome produced by Zonaras records two possibilities. Valerian was either surrounded and taken prisoner outside Edessa, or perhaps he willingly surrendered to Shapur when famine beset that city and his men attempted to overthrow him. In either event, Zonaras assures us that Valerian was treated respectfully by Shapur; but the Byzantine writer omits not only the lurid fable that Shapur used the Roman emperor as a mounting block, 16 but also the gruesome legend that the skin of Valerian was removed from his body, dyed red, stuffed with straw into the human form, and exhibited in a Persian temple as a memorial to the great victories of Shapur. The latter tale, reported by Lactantius, seems to have a looser connection with the truth than with a Christian rhetorician’s hatred of Valerian and the Persian king’s reputation for cruelty. 17 After the capture of Valerian, Shapur stormed the cities of Antioch, Tarsus, and Caesarea. The last of these populous cities was betrayed to the Persian king by one of its inhabitants – not in this case a beautiful princess but rather a physician who revealed a secret entrance to the city under torture. 18 An enormous number of persons was taken prisoner, and the army of Shapur proceeded to pillage a great part of the Roman east. But the Iranian army was halted by the efforts of two generals: one the Roman prefect named Callistus and the other a man from Palmyra known as Odeinath. 19 The first attacked Shapur and captured a part of that king’s baggage train which included the royal harem; and the second harried Iranian forces as they crossed the Euphrates. The retreat of Shapur put an end to the Romans’ troubles, and tales of it were embellished. It was said that Shapur had bribed the soldiers of Edessa, so that the Iranian army might retreat more swiftly, proffering the excuse that he wished to celebrate a festival in his own home. 20 The historian Agathias transmits the hideous and incredible detail that Shapur and his baggage train crossed valleys and gorges only after they had been filled with the corpses of slain captives 15

Petrus Patricius, frag. 9 in Müller, K., Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, v. IV., 1851, p. 187. Epitome de Caesaribus, XXIII.6. 17 Lactantius also claims that the stuffed skin of Valerian was always presented by the Persian to Roman ambassadors, ne nimium viribus suis fiderent cum exuvias capti principis apud deos suos cernerent (Lactantius, De Mortibus Perecutorum, V). These details were transmitted by a Christian adviser to Constantine I who took a fiendish delight in relating the deaths of enemies of his religion. On the fate of Valerian and associated stories, see Reiner, E., “The Reddling of Valerian,” The Classical Quarterly, New Series, vol. 56, No. 1, 2006, p. 325–329. 18 Zonaras, XII.33. 19 Zosimus, Historia Nova, I.xxxix; Historia Augusta, Valerianus, IV.2–4; Gallienus, III.1–5; Gallienus, X.1–8. For a modern authority, see Potter, D., The Roman Empire at bay, p. 25–259. 20 Petrus Patricius, frag. 11 in Müller, K., Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, v. IV., p. 187. 16

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so that the ground reached a more practicable height. 21 But tales of the alliance of Callistus and Odeinath, as well as rumours of Shapur’s flippancy or cruelty, could not counterbalance nearly twenty years of Roman humiliation. The Persian king ensured that his victories would never be forgotten. A relief, now greatly mutilated, near the city of Bishapur, depicts the investiture of Shapur I. It was plainly made in imitation of his father’s scene of investiture, but only the lower portion of it has survived. The horse of the supreme god and that of the Persian king face one another; and their respective enemies, Angra Mainyu and Gordian III, lie dead and rigid below the hooves of their animals. A surprisingly pathetic image of Philip the Arab between them begs mercy of Shapur. 22 The absence of Valerian suggests that this relief was made shortly after Shapur’s first Roman war. A monument to Shapur’s three great victories was inscribed upon a mysterious Achaemenid tower at Naqsh-e Rostam in Persia. 23 In imitation of the great Achaemenid inscription at Behistun, Shapur boasted of his ‘most renowned and manly deeds’ in three languages: Middle Persian, the language of the new dynasty; Parthian, the language of the former ruling house; and Greek, the common tongue of the civilised world. 24 The principle fault of this inscription is that it appears to conflate three military campaigns into a single war, but it corroborates and augments the Roman account. It has been alleged that Shapur claimed to have killed the Roman emperor Gordian, but the inscription merely asserts, with some ambiguity, that Gordian ‘was killed’ after the battle at Misiche, not that the king of Iran had slain him. 25 The inscription speaks with greater clarity elsewhere. Shapur humiliated Philip the Arab, forcing him to cede Armenia and Mesopotamia and pay five hundred thousand denarii; he smashed the Roman field army of sixty thousand men at Barbalissus; he captured the emperor Valerian with his very own hands; and he carried off a vast number of prisoners including senators, the praetorian prefect, and other officers and soldiers. Later Persian historians claim that Shapur settled these captives in the city of Gundishapur, and employed them to build a dam across the river Shushtar in Khuzestan. 26 21

Agathias, Historiae, IV.xxiv.3. This is repeated and embellished in Zonaras XII.23. Ghirshman, R., Parthes et Sassanides, p. 159. 23 Back, M., Die Sassanidischen Staatsinschriften, p. 284–371. 24 The meaning of the Pahlavi and Middle Persian are elucidated by the Greek ΠΟΛΥΟΝΟΜΑ ΚΑΙ ΑΝΔΡΕΙΟΤΗΤΑ ΕΠΟΙΗΣΑΜΕΝ (Back, M., Die Sassanidischen Staatsinschriften, p. 327). On the similarities between the inscription of Shapur and that of Darius I, see Huyse, P., “Les Provinces romaines dans la grande inscription trilingue de Šābuhr Ier sur la Ka’ba-ye Zardošt,” La Crise de l’empire romain: de Marc Aurèle à Constantin, 2006, p. 312. 25 Back, M., De Sassanidischen Staatsinschriften, p. 292 with note 161. Cf. see Huyse, P., “Les Provinces romaines,” p. 311–312. 26 Tabari v. 2., p. 47. Dinawari, p. 49. The fate of Valerian is also doubtful in these sources. Dinawari claims that Valerian was released when the work was complete; Tabari repeats that 22

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The triple victory of Shapur is also commemorated by an enormous relief carved into the side of a mountain near the city of Bishapur. 27 The Persian king sits upon a stout and muscular horse which is in the midst of trampling down the body of a Roman man. This may indicate the emperor Gordian III. Two other Romans are on either side of the monarch: one appears behind the horse and grasps the hand of Shapur; the other kneels before him in a pose of self-abasement. Respectively these may depict Valerian and Philip the Arab. The image of a fat child, perhaps a messenger of the god Ahura Mazda, hovers awkwardly over this strange scene, and he offers the monarch the ring of power. Another similar relief faces the image that I have just described. The central picture of this scene repeats the image of Shapur and his Roman enemies. Both reliefs include asymmetrical rows of mounted knights and courtiers adopting respectful, but mannered, poses around the image of the king. The artist had plainly intended to depict an orderly military aristocracy and the loyal retinue of nobles populating the Persian court; and his work imitates the Achaemenid reliefs of Persepolis. The impression may be compared to the effect of the carvings on Trajan’s column, 28 for it was executed perhaps by Roman prisoners. But the reliefs of Shapur display neither individual characteristics, nor movement. Shapur commissioned another relief of himself humiliating Philip the Arab and Valerian, and he had it engraved upon the tomb of Darius at Naqsh-e Rostam. 29 This represents Shapur’s bold claim to equality with the Achaemenid dynasty.

THE FATE OF ARMENIA The Roman emperor Trajan’s brief annexation of Armenia would have terminated the settlement ratified by Nero and Walagash and reduced that country to a Roman province. The royal house of Armenia, a branch of the Arsacid family, might soon have acquired Roman citizenship and a senatorian rank. But this fate was averted by the emperor Hadrian’s retrocession of Trajan’s conquests. Shapur I achieved for himself precisely the opposite of what Trajan had wanted. 30 The terms which Shapur had settled with Philip the Arab began the process of attaching Armenia to the empire of Iran. Though Philip had attempted to regain what he had ceded to Shapur, he failed; and the Armenian king Khosrov, without Roman protection, was left to face the full force of Sasanian arms and diplomacy. After Shapur’s victory over Gordian III, Khosrov was murdered, and his young son Tirdat followed him tradition and adds two different stories to the effect that Shapur either cut off Valerian’s nose or killed him. The dam is called to this day Caesar’s Dam. There is an interesting picture of this dam in Ghirshman, R., Parthes et Sassanides, p. 137. 27 Ghirshman, R., Parthes et Sassanides, p. 153–158. 28 Ghirshman, R., Parthes et Sassanides, p. 158. 29 Ghirshman, R., Parthes et Sassanides, p. 160–161. 30 I am following Payaslian, S., The History of Armenia, p. 32–34.

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on the Armenian throne, but he was forced to flee to Rome when Shapur annexed Armenia after his second Roman war of the year 252. 31 Thereafter, Armenia became a province of the Iranian empire, and Shapur installed as governor his son and heir Hurmazd-Ardashir. 32

SHAPUR’S LATER REIGN AND THE RISE OF PALMYRA Shapur was a magnificent soldier, but he lacked his father’s political acumen. When the Roman orient trembled at the name of the Persian king, Shapur gave the title of emperor to a Roman citizen who called himself Cyriades. 33 The Augustan History accuses this man of murdering his father, harsh cruelty, and the height of excess, and he is said to have betrayed Antioch to Iranian forces. 34 Shapur rewarded him with a hollow title and a meaningless designation, but despite this unusual achievement Cyriades amounted to nothing and was killed either by the treachery of his followers or by the Persian king. 35 Whatever the truth about this strange man, the elevation of Cyriades seems to be Shapur’s only recorded attempt to press his advantage against Rome after his victory over Valerian. The fate of the Roman east had been decided by an Arab of Palmyra. Odeinath had expelled Shapur from the Levant, and had reclaimed all that Shapur had conquered. He had even advanced to the vicinity of Ctesiphon. 36 The victories of Odeinath transformed a merchant into a hero and his wife into a queen. Zenobia, who was descended from the Macedonian kings of Egypt, administered Palmyra with firmness and confidence; and the grateful emperor Gallienus acknowledged her husband as a colleague, and bestowed upon him the title of imperator. 37 Odeinath was assassinated mysteriously, and Zenobia and her son Wahb-Allat inherited and ruled an empire which extended from the river Euphrates to the border of Bithynia and 31

Agathangelos, I.23–36; Moses Chorenatsi, II.76–78; Zonaras, XII.21. The title of the governor was Great King of Armenia (Back, M., Die Sassanidischen Staatsinschriften, p. 332). 33 Historia Augusta, Triginta Tyranni, II; Ammianus, XXIII.v.3; Malalas, Chronographia, XII, p. 295. Ammianus calls this traitor Mariades, a more Semitic version of the same name. Edwell provides a succinct discussion of the strange career of Mariades (Edwell, P. M. Between Rome and Persia, p. 182–184), and Hartmann has prepared a punctilious historiographical analysis of the life and times of ‘Mareades’, as he calls him (Hartmann, U., “Mareades – ein sasanidischer Quisling?,” Wiesehöfer, J. / Huyse, P., Ērān ud Anērān: Studien zu den Beziehungen zwischen dem Sasanidenreich und der Mittelmeerwelt, 2006, p. 105–142). 34 Parricidium et aspera tyrannis et summa luxuria (Historia Augusta, Triginta Tyranni, II). 35 Contrast Ammianus, XXIII.v.3 with Malalas, Chronographia XII. 36 Zosimus, Historia Nova, I.39. 37 For modern, and sceptical, opinion on Zenobia and her husband, see Burgersdijk, D., “Zenobia’s Biography in the Historia Augusta,” Talanta XXXVI–XXXVII, 2004–2005, p. 139–151 and de Blois, L., “Odaenathus and the Roman-Persian War of 252–264 A.D.,” Talanta, vol. VI, 1975, p. 7–21. 32

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southward into the fertile lands of Egypt. 38 The son of Zenobia gave himself the title of Augustus, and the boy and his mother asserted their independence from Rome. But the empire of Zenobia crumbled before the advance of the emperor Aurelian until her authority was confined within the walls of Palmyra. The besieged queen and her companions held out in the hope that the enemy’s provisions would be exhausted. But the persistence of the Romans compelled Zenobia to flee to Iran. She was conveyed out of her city upon a camel, but was intercepted as she crossed the Euphrates and was taken to Rome. 39 It was at about this moment in the year 272 that Shapur I died. The little city of Palmyra had grown from an important commercial centre into the foremost power between Rome and Iran. 40 This development was seen, at least by the emperor Aurelian, as a great benefit to his empire. 41 That ephemeral state would have been the only bulwark against another Sasanian invasion; and while Palmyra stood between the two great powers, Shapur made no further attempt to prosecute war with Rome. The capture of Valerian was merely the latest in a long procession of calamities which had assailed the Roman state. Over the course of the third century of our era, warfare, pestilence, famine, seditions, usurpations, and military anarchy had conspired for the ruin of the Mediterranean world. 42 If Shapur had crossed the Euphrates a fourth time, he might have destroyed his western antagonist. In her last moments as queen, Zenobia rightly assumed that the empire of Iran was a natural ally against their mutual enemy. Shapur never seems to have held a reciprocal opinion, and his double failure to press his advantage against Rome and to ally himself with Palmyra presents a surprising problem. It is impossible to see what obstacle stood in the way of those two obvious strategies. As his health declined, and as his life drew to an end, Shapur may have calculated that a policy of mutual toleration with Rome was better for his young dynasty, as did later kings, but this fails to explain why he gave no support to the Palmyrene empire. If we cannot

38

Zosimus, Historia Nova, I.xliv.1–2; Historia Augusta, Divus Claudius, XI.i–ii, Probus, IX.v. Zosimus, Historia Nova, I.lv.1; Historia Augusta, Aurelianus, XXII–XXVIII. 40 Zuchowska, M., “Palmyra and the Far Eastern Trade,” Studia Palmyrenskie: Fifty Years of Polish Excavations in Palmyra 1959–2009, 2013, p. 381–387; Millar, F., “Caravan Cities: The Roman Near East and Long-Distance Trade by Land,” Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies, v. 42, Issue S71, 1998, p. 119–137; Howard-Johnston, J., “The Two Great Powers,” p. 188–189. 41 Historia Augusta, Triginta Tyranni, XXX.4–12; especially XXX.6: possum dicere illius esse quod Odaenathus Persas vicit ac fugato Sapore Ctesiphonta usque pervenit. 42 Potter, D. S., The Roman Empire at Bay, p. 211–290; Corcoran, S., “Before Constantine” in Lenski, N. (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Constantine, 2006, p. 35–39; Williams, S., Diocletian and the Roman Recovery, 1985, p. 15–23; Millar, F. et al., The Roman Empire and Its Neighbours, 1967, p. 239–248. 39

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blame Shapur’s lack of political sense, can we infer some domestic distraction or the insecurity of a distant frontier? 43

THE SUCCESSORS TO SHAPUR I AND THE STRUGGLE BETWEEN MANI AND KIRDER The twenty-one years that elapsed between the death of Shapur and the accession of Narseh were wasted in a futile contest for the soul of Iran. An itinerant prophet of a new spirituality and a Zoroastrian priest competed for power and influence at the Sasanian court and throughout the lands ruled by the Persian king. That two religious antagonists sought to persuade members of the royal house, without recourse to powerful aristocrats or local potentates, suggests that an organised system of dynastic power, and a strong central government, were firmly established after the reign of Ardashir. But this vain struggle accuses the weakness of royal power and reveals the triumph of bigotry and priestcraft under the sons of Shapur. Mani 44 was descended from two Parthian aristocratic families. His father, a nobleman by the name of Patik, frequented a shrine where mysterious voices compelled him to abstain from food, from wine, and from the society of women. The father had introduced the son to this obscure gnostic cult, but the son converted his parents to a new religion. A celestial messenger, whom Manichaean tradition calls The Twin, appeared to Mani and summoned him to the office and duties of a prophet. The Twin was a heavenly double of Mani, identical with the Holy Ghost, who bestowed upon his terrestrial counterpart all knowledge of the past and of futurity. His first instruction was to abandon his father’s religion. At the end of the reign of Ardashir, Mani carried his new faith to India where it was improved by the influence of the Buddhist religion. The death of Ardashir and the accession of Shapur recalled Mani to Iran. The prophet’s first great victory was over Shapur’s brother Peroz, and this eager proselyte ensured a favourable reception at the Sasanid court. Shapur granted Mani the privilege of spreading his religion throughout the empire of Iran. Kirder 45 was an ambitious Zoroastrian priest who exerted an ever greater influence upon the Sasanian court. He had been encouraged, as it seems, by the new 43

Cf. Widengren, G., Mani and Manichaeism, 1965, p. 5. Widengren assumed such an insecurity but without precision or detail. 44 My reconstruction of the life and career of Mani follows Gardner, I. / Lieu, S. N. C., Manichaean Texts from the Roman Empire, 2004, p. 3–8 and Widengren, G., Mani and Manichaeism, p. 23–42. The primary sources for the life of Mani are translated and set forth in Gardner, I. / Lieu, S. N. C., Manichaean Texts, p. 46–108. 45 I follow Gignoux, P., “L’inscription de Kartir à Sar Mašhad,” Journal Asiatique CCLVI, 1960, p. 387–417 and Kreyenbroek, P. G., “How Pious Was Shapur I? Religion, Church and Propaganda under the Early Sasanians,” in Sarkosh Curtis, V. / Stewart, S. (eds), The Sasanian

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dynasty’s preference for his religion, and he oversaw its diffusion throughout the lands which Shapur had conquered. In imitation of his rival Mani, he claimed to have a spiritual counterpart which transmitted to his earthly eye visions of heaven and hell. 46 This fanatic claimed that Shapur had placed in his charge the religious affairs of the empire, and that he had empowered him to administer various pious foundations. Under Shapur’s successors, Kirder commissioned a monumental inscription which appeared to usurp royal prerogative, boasting that he had greatly multiplied the rituals of Zoroastrianism throughout Iran; that many public fire temples had been established; that he had sealed their charters; that he had enriched the Zoroastrian clergy; that he had promoted and multiplied the consanguineous marriages favoured by the Magi; that he had punished heretics who had refused to adhere to Zoroastrian orthopraxy; and that he had tormented the votaries of every other sect and religion. It is said that these two men accompanied Shapur on his western campaigns. 47 If this be true, it can only be because Shapur had refused to take a side in a contest which had not yet attained its full vehemence. The prospect of a warrior king listening with equanimity to the hostile speculations of a soothsayer and a bigot is too difficult to credit; and we may rather suppose that Shapur did not know what those two men preached, or did not care. 48 Hurmazd-Ardashir succeeded Shapur, and he appears to have maintained his father’s indifference. His experience as governor of Armenia might have prepared him for a long and stable reign, but he sat upon the Sasanid throne for only a single year, during which he built a city in Khuzestan, 49 and perhaps also the royal residence called Dastgard about sixty miles north-east of Ctesiphon. 50 Hurmazd-Ardashir was replaced by Bahram I who terminated his predecessors’ indifference to the contest between Mani and Kirder. The brief reign of the first Bahram was commemorated by a monumental relief at Bishapur in imitation of those of Ardashir and Shapur I. The king Bahram’s reception of the ring of power from the deity Ahura Mazda takes shape amidst harEra: The Idea of Iran, v. III, 2008, p. 10, and Dignas, B. / Winter, E., Rome and Persia in Late Antiquity, 2007, p. 215. 46 For a comparison and analysis of the two visions, see Dilley, P., “’Hell Exists and We Have Seen the Place Where it is’: Rapture and Religious Competition in Sasanian Iran,” in Gardner, I. et al. (eds.), Mani at the Court of the Persian Kings, 2015, p. 214–224. 47 Alexander Lycopolitanus, §II (see also Gardner, I. / Lieu, S. N. C., Manichaean Texts, p. 116); Gignoux, P., “L’inscription de Kartir à Sar Mašhad,” Journal Asiatique CCLVI, 1960, p. 387–417. 48 Kreyenbroek, P. G., “How Pious Was Shapur I? Religion, Church and Propaganda under the Early Sasanians,” The Sasanian Era, 2008, p. 7–15. 49 Agathias, Historiae, IV.xxiv.5; Shahbazi, S., “Bahrām I,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, III/5, pp. 514–522. 50 Hamza Isfahani, p. 49.

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monious proportions and pleasing balance. 51 This is perhaps the finest example of Sasanid rock sculpture, or at least a noteworthy improvement upon the stiff distortions of an earlier time. The power of Kirder had grown, and he prevailed upon Bahram to arrest, arraign, and murder Mani. Kirder and his associates prepared a syllabus of Mani’s religious crimes, and a hearing was convened. The Sasanian king shared Kirder’s spirit of fanaticism and was insensible to Mani’s pleas for mercy. The prophet was weighed down by heavy chains and cast into prison. He perished not long thereafter – a victory for Kirder and his fellow priests. Mani may have been beheaded; or perhaps, as later sources allege, he was flayed alive, his skin was stuffed with straw, and his lifeless form was displayed above the gate of Gundishapur. 52 The career of Kirder seems to offer some insight into the religious policy of the Iranian government. Official and hieratic opinion ignored the ancient variety of Zoroastrian belief and practice; and it was believed that the long interval between the fall of the Achaemenid monarchy and the appearance of Ardashir had corrupted the primitive unity of the Zoroastrian religion. An ancient uniformity of ritual and doctrine, as it was said, had been shattered into innumerable regional varieties. There was no supreme king, no chief priest; and doubtful faiths, pernicious heresies, unbelief, and various laws had multiplied amidst popular confusion and competition amongst antithetical hieratic schools. 53 Such was the condition of the religion of Zoroaster, whose basic tenets I have already described, when Ardashir overthrew the last Parthian king. The various principalities and kingdoms of the Arsacids fell under the sway of the new monarch and his descendants, but the great variety of belief could never be made uniform, and the Sasanian state could impose only conformity of ritual and orthopraxy. 54 This was Kirder’s purpose, and he was perhaps inspired by a great sense of urgency as the doctrines of Judaism and Christianity were solidified and diffused throughout Iran. 55 Though Kirder boasted of tormenting other sectaries, and though he vanquished his rival Mani, his will was not to destroy all other religions but to compel them to augment their practices with the rites due to the sun, the moon, fire, water, and all the divinities honoured by the Iranian people. Those who had been subjected to such compulsion must have responded with anger and resentment, even if they had agreed to conform. But Kirder and the Sasanian government must have believed that they had demanded nothing more than loyalty to the empire of Iran. 56 51

Schmidt, E. F., Persepolis III: The Royal Tombs and Other Monuments, 1970, p. 129. Tabari, v.2, p. 54. 53 Arda Viraz Namag, I:8–15. 54 Crone, P., Nativist Prophets, p. 379–384. 55 BeDuhn, J., “Mani and the Crystallization of the Concept of ‘Religion’ in Third Century Iran,” in Gardner, I. et al. (eds.), Mani at the Court of the Persian Kings, 2015, p. 247–307. 56 This is the force of the arguments in Payne, R., A State of Mixture, 2015. 52

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THE REIGN OF BAHRAM II The Sasanid monarchy grew weak and unstable, as Kirder reached the height of his power under Bahram II who succeeded in the year 274. 57 This king regarded his high priest as his benefactor and mentor upon whom he bestowed a title, 58 a noble rank, and the position of custodian of the temple at Anahita at Istakhr. The historian Tabari’s claim that the mysterious Sasan had had charge of that temple may represent a later Sasanian justification for wresting it from the Magian priesthood. But if the Sasanid dynasty had claimed a hereditary right to that shrine from the beginning, Kirder’s authority over it may announce the weakness of the royal power. Uprising and civil war proceeded under the shadow of the religious tyranny of Kirder. A rebellion led by Hurmazd, the governor of Sakastan, attracted nomads and frontier peoples, and greatly disturbed the Iranian state. 59 Bahram II maintained his throne: a notice in the history of Agathias suggests that Bahram II crushed the rebellion launched from Sakastan where the king installed his homonymous son as governor. 60

THE REVENGE OF ROME The calamities of civil strife left Iran open to a Roman invasion. The emperor Probus had meditated an expedition in the year 282, but he was murdered by his soldiers before he could lead them to war. His successor accomplished what Probus had planned. Carus broke off hostilities with the people of Sarmatia and proceeded without opposition to Mesopotamia. An oracle had declared that an ill fate awaited the man that would seize the Persian capital, and Roman writers allege that Carus captured Ctesiphon, but could advance no further because he was struck by lightning while encamped upon the Tigris. 61 This story may have been invented to conceal some form of disgrace or mutiny, or perhaps to excuse the soldiers’ fear of advancing deeper into Iran. Numerian, Carus’ successor, was proclaimed emperor: he abandoned Ctesiphon, and vacated Mesopotamia without even suing for peace. It appears that Bahram II recovered Mesopotamia and his capital somehow, but he 57

Little has been written about this obscure king (Shahbazi, S. “Bahrām II,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, III/5, p. 514–522. 58 The title was bokht ruwan i Warahran, which could be construed as ‘saviour of Bahram’s soul’, or ‘whose soul was saved by Bahram’ (Skjærvø, P., “Kartir,” in Encyclopaedia Iranica, online edition, 2011). 59 Ipsos Persas ipsumque regem adscitis Sacis et Rufiis et Gelis petit frater Ormies nec respicit vel pro maiestate quasi regem vel pro pietate quasi fratrem (Panegyrici Latini, III.xvii.2). The name Ormies is plainly a corruption of Hurmazd. 60 Agathias, Historiae, IV.24.6–7. 61 Liber de Caesaribus, XXXVIII.ii–iv; Festus, Breviarium, XXIV.vi–xi; Historia Augusta, Carus, VII.i, VIII.i–ix.

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failed to restore the dignity of Iran. For nearly twenty years thereafter Iran wavered between warfare and diplomatic engagement with Rome.

THE IGNOMINIOUS REIGN OF NARSEH In the year 290 the Roman emperor Diocletian exploited lingering Sasanian weakness to negotiate the return of a portion of Armenia to a ruler of Arsacid descent. Not long thereafter, king Tirdat returned to power in Armenia. 62 Bahram II required peace on his western frontier and was willing to pay a high price for it, and this is surely a sign of some grave internal trouble. When Bahram II died, a nobleman known as Wahnam seized the opportunity to put the young Bahram III 63 upon the throne. But a rival faction of nobles approached Narseh, and persuaded him to take the throne for himself. He raised the standard of revolt at a place called Paikuli where he later erected a monumental inscription. 64 Narseh also tampered with the investiture scene of Bahram I: he substituted his own name for that of his predecessor, and added the image of a fallen enemy beneath the hooves of the king’s horse. 65 Narseh invaded Mesopotamia, killed Wahnam and his creature Bahram, and ruled in his stead. Narseh terminated his inscription with the phrase ‘Caesar and the Romans were grateful, peaceable, and friendly to me’. 66 There is some truth to those words. The Roman state was about to undergo the ambitious reforms of Diocletian which issued in a great expansion of the apparatus of government. After three centuries, the administration of Augustus was obsolete, and it was the firm resolve of Diocletian to dismantle and to replace that system. The imperial office was to be shared amongst two senior and two junior colleagues, a division of the civil and the military powers was rigorously enforced, provinces were divided into smaller units, and the number of officials and functionaries multiplied. 67 A heterogeneous mass of local systems of taxation was replaced by a single tax policy and a single system of fiscal measures. 68 A stable and quiet 62

Agathangelos, I.45–47; Moses Chorenatsi, II.82; Payaslian, S., The History of Armenia, p. 33. This unfortunate man sat upon the throne for only four months (Klíma, O., “Bahrām III,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, III/5, p. 514–522). 64 Paikuli Inscription. 65 Herrmann, G., The Sasanian Rock Relief at Bishapur, pt. 2, 1981, p. 19–20; Schmidt, E. F., Persepolis III: The Royal Tombs and Other Monuments, 1970, p. 129 with note 71. 66 Paikuli Inscription, p. 51 67 Lo Cascio, E., “The New State of Diocletian and Constantine from the Tetrarchy to the Reunification of the Empire,” in Bowman, A. K. / Garnsey, P. / Cameron, A. (eds), The Cambridge Ancient History, vol. 12, The Crisis of Empire A. D. 19–331, 2005, p. 170–183; Williams, S., Diocletian and the Roman Recovery, p. 102–114. More generally, see Corcoran, S., The Empire of the Tetrarchs: Imperial Pronouncements and Government A.D. 284–324, 2000 and Barnes, T. D., The New Empire of Diocletian and Constantine, 1982. 68 Bransbourg, G., “The Later Roman Empire,” in Monson, A. / Scheidel, W. (eds.), Fiscal Regimes and the Political Economy of Premodern States, 2015, p. 258–281; Bowman, A. K., “Diocle63

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eastern frontier would have assisted this enormous venture which was only completed in the reign of Constantine I. But the peace was of short duration. Narseh declared war upon Rome in the year 296, the very year in which Constantius Chlorus had launched his fleet for the invasion of Britain. The Persian king had hoped to profit from a general disorder in the Roman world, and his pretext for war was Roman encroachment upon the Iranian border. 69 Diocletian’s meddling in Armenia and the construction of an imposing Roman fortress in Osrhoene must have been received with alarm. The stronghold of Circesium was built at the junction of the rivers Khabur and Euphrates, the easternmost point of the Roman frontier with Iran. 70 It was both an observation post to guard against a Sasanid invasion of Syria and a forward base from which to attack Iran. We can assume that Narseh, the former Persian governor of Armenia, was understandably enraged by his late king’s abandonment of that country. But the Roman fortifications in Osrhoene were perhaps equally annoying and more dangerous. In the year 297, the armies of Narseh and Galerius met somewhere between Callinicum and Carrhae. An early Iranian victory appeared to recover the prestige of the Sasanian dynasty, but in the following year the same antagonists met at Satala in Armenia and the Iranian host was humiliated. Galerius stormed into the Persian camp and put Narseh to flight. 71 Lactantius, who commemorated this event, notes that the Persian king was aggravated and immobilised by a numerous train of followers which included his own family and harem, as well as a great mass of baggage. The chronicler John Malalas adds the interesting detail that the Persian queen, and presumably many other royal relatives, were captured and taken to Daphne on the Orontes. 72 Roman propaganda remembered this triumph in coins and medals struck in the year 298, Diocletian and his associates adopted epithets of victory, and Galerius erected a monumental arch in Thessalonica which appropriated the Iranian image of two equestrian warriors confronting one another in combat. 73 tian and the First Tetrachy, A. D. 294–305” in Bowman, A. K. / Garnsey, P. / Cameron, A. (eds.), The Cambridge Ancient History, vol. 12, The Crisis of Empire A. D. 19–331, 2000, p. 6–89; Carrié, J. M., “Dioclétien et la fiscalité,” Antiquité tardive 2, 1994, p. 34–64. 69 Eutropius, IX.22.1. Other similar notices are set forth in Dodgeon, M. H. / Lieu, S. N. C. The Roman Frontier and the Persian Wars AD 226–363, 1991, p. 124–125. 70 Ammianus, XXIII.v.1; Procopius, Pellum Persicum, II.5.2–3; Procopius, Aedificia, II.6.1–2. Wiesehöfer, J., “Circesium,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. V, Fasc. 6, 1991, p. 595–596. 71 Lactantius, De Mortibus Persecutorum, IX.5–8. 72 John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 308. 73 See the pictures and the analysis in Dignas, B. / Winter, E., Rome and Persia in Late Antiquity, p. 85–88. The epithets of victory are Persicus maximus II, Armenicus maximus, Medicus maximus, Adiabenicus maximus. It is possible that this triumphal arch was a response to Shapur I’s monumental reliefs.

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THE PEACE TREATY OF 298 Though Galerius appeared to acknowledge Narseh as an opponent of equal rank with himself, the Romans foisted an ignominious peace settlement upon Iran. The treaty, called the Treaty of Nisibis, was signed in year 298. 74 The masters of the Roman world had empowered an obscure secretary to deliver a peace accord. 75 The Persian ambassador presents a surprising contrast. He was a glib aristocrat who was a very close friend of the king, who spoke with a combination of allegory and insinuation. These interesting differences may tell us much about the two great empires: the reforms of Diocletian favoured an immense and inscrutable bureaucracy; and the extreme conservatism of the Sasanids ensured that all important posts would be held by noble relatives and friends of the king. Afarban (that was the name of the Persian ambassador) declared the Sasanian view of Iran’s relationship with Rome: ‘It is obvious to all mankind that the Roman and Persian realms are as it were two lamps; and like eyes, one must be adorned by the radiance of the other, and they must not strive for one another’s destruction. For this is not considered a virtue, but rather levity or weakness’. 76

The wording of this declaration may have been influenced by the rhetoric of a later time, for Peter the Patrician recorded his history in the age of Justinian. 77 But the doctrine of equality, however it was expressed, was surely a policy which the Sasanian court was prepared to assert in a time of weakness. Afarban appeared to seek only the release of his king’s family, and was prepared to make many concessions. He flattered Roman vanity by praising Galerius and by referring the niceties of the peace settlement to the emperor Diocletian alone. But the Persian ambassador also reminded the Caesar of the mutability of human affairs, by which he implied that the present Roman victory might soon be overturned. This remark excited the rage of Galerius, who interrupted in a trembling voice: ‘How well you preserved the measure of victory in Valerian’s case, when you deceived him with tricks, took him captive and did not release him, until extreme old age and his shameful end, when you, after his death, preserved his skin by 74

Petrus Patricius, frag. 13–14 in Müller, K., Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, v. IV., 1851, p. 188–189; Dignas, B. / Winter, E., Rome and Persia in Late Antiquity, p. 122–130; Potter, D. S., The Roman Empire at Bay, p. 285–290. 75 The Roman ambassador is otherwise unknown (Banchich, P. / Banchich, T., The Lost History of Peter the Patrician, 2015, p. 135). 76 Petrus Patricius, frag. 13 (my translation) in Müller, K., Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, v. IV., 1851, p. 188–189; cf. Banchich, P. / Banchich, T., The Lost History of Peter the Patrician, p. 133. 77 Maksymiuk, K., “The Two Eyes of the Earth: The Problem of Respect in Sasanid-Roman Relations,” Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 58, 2018, p. 250.

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THE LAST EMPIRE OF IRAN some loathsome technique and thereby afflicted the mortal body with immortal offense’. 78

The capture of Valerian was still a great irritant to the Romans, or at least to Galerius, and it is possible that Narseh feared some signal outrage upon his family as a token of revenge. But the royal prisoners were released unharmed in accordance with Roman custom. The Persian ambassador’s lesson on the vicissitudes of fortune had failed to persuade Galerius and his senior colleague. Afarban’s first utterance had been more convincing. Diocletian could not assail the Iranian right to an empire, nor impugn its equality with his own, but the formal treaty which followed this meeting was mostly to Rome’s advantage. Sicorius Probus, who bore the strange title of Master of the Memory, was the Roman ambassador. 79 He met the Sasanid king somewhere in Media and presented a treaty which guaranteed Roman control of the three main routes from Mesopotamia into southern Armenia. Iran was to surrender five provinces: Ingilene, Sophanene, Arzanene, Corduene, and Zabdicene. Diocletian left those small lands under the rule of local aristocrats – a policy calculated to establish buffer states between Rome and Iran at a tender spot along the frontier between Mesopotamia and Armenia. But influence over these lands gave Rome control over the approach to the Tigris river through the anti-Taurus mountain range, as well as access to the Bitlis Pass, and mastery of the great plain of Tur-ʿAbdin. Rome now dominated the easiest routes northward from Mesopotamia into Armenia: an area which the Romans promptly fortified. It would be impossible for an Iranian army to move through that region unobserved. Two other provisions were involved in this treaty. The Master of the Memory stipulated that Iberia was to become a Roman protectorate, 80 and that Nisibis was to be established as a place of trade between the two empires. The first provision was another Roman encroachment which put Iran at a strategic disadvantage, but Narseh was in no position to refuse. The second stipulation would have proved most ineffectual and foolish along a porous frontier, and Narseh rejected it. The Master of the Memory replied in the language that we would expect from a bureau78

Petrus Patricius, frag. 13 (my translation) in Müller, K., Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, v. IV., 1851, p. 188–189; cf. Banchich, P. / Banchich, T., The Lost History of Peter the Patrician, p. 134. 79 ἀντιγραφεὺς τῆς μνήμης or magister memoriae (Petrus Patricius, frag. 14 in Müller, K., Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, v. IV., 1851, p. 189); Banchich, P. / Banchich, T., The Lost History of Peter the Patrician, p. 134–136. 80 The provision was τὸν…Ἰβηρίας βασιλέα τῆς οἰκείας βασιλείας τὰ σύμβολα ῾Ρωμαίοις ὀφείλειν (Petrus Patricius, frag. 14 in Müller, K., Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, v. IV., 1851, p. 189). This appears to be the same settlement, mutatis mutandis, which was made for Armenia under Nero.

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crat: ‘concession must be made on this point; the embassy lacks full powers, and nothing has been enjoined by the emperors about it’. 81 The emperor Diocletian might have congratulated himself on a treaty which determined his eastern frontier to his own advantage against Iran. But the great tormenter of Christians could not have foreseen that this settlement would ease the spread of the religion that he hated and persecuted. 82 The culture of Syriac Christianity now bestrode the river Tigris and soon moved northward. The Armenian king Tirdat, ousted by a Zoroastrian Persian and restored by a pagan Roman, would be the first monarch to embrace the Christian religion, and the swift spread of Christianity northward into Iberia was to be a further detriment to Iranian influence in that troublesome region. 83

THE END OF THE FIRST SASANIAN CENTURY The dynasty which Ardashir had established had humble beginnings, but it acquired greater power and importance under the reign of his successor. Shapur I had proved that a strong Persian leader could inflict humiliating defeat upon Rome and spread devastation throughout the Roman orient. The second Sasanian king celebrated his impressive victories by giving himself the grandiose title of ‘King of kings of the Aryans and non-Aryans’, 84 which represented the king’s rule over lands which he had wrested from Rome. Not all his successors could rightly claim to wield power so widely, and Narseh appears not always to have used that appellation. 85 Roman victories and domestic strife may have convinced many Iranians that the Sasanid throne might swiftly be overturned, and that not all kings would be as strong as Ardashir and Shapur. Shapur’s monumental inscription lists the respective dignitaries of his own and his father’s court. Under the reign of Shapur the number of courtiers had greatly multiplied itself; and, we must infer, so did that of an immense train of pages, advisers, scribes, assistants, eunuchs, priests, and other functionaries and staff. 86 Shapur seems even to have enlarged the ranks of the nobility for whimsical and arbitrary 81

Petrus Patricius, frag. 14 in Müller, K., Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, v. IV., 1851, p. 189. On the persecution of Christians under Diocletian, see Williams, S., Diocletian and the Roman Recovery, p. 173–185. 83 Payaslian, S., The History of Armenia, p. 34–38; Potter, D., The Roman Empire at Bay, p. 288– 290. 84 This is my translation of Shahanshah i Eran ud An-Eran which appears on Shapur I’s great inscription (Back, M., Die Sassanidischen Staatsinschriften, p. 284). The Greek version of the inscription (ΒΑΣΙΛΕΥΣ ΒΑΣΙΛΕΥΩΝ ΑΡΙΑΝΩΝ ΚΑΙ ΑΝΑΡΙΑΝΩΝ) justifies my construal. 85 Certain issues of his coins omit this title (Daryaee, T., Sasanian Persia, p. 13). 86 Daryaee, T., Sasanian Persia, 2009, p. 9–10; Frye, R. N., “Notes on the Early Sassanian State and Church,” Studi Orientalistici in Onore di Giorgio Levi Della Vida, vol. I, 1956, p. 25–46. 82

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reasons. There is an inscription accompanying a monument erected by a Sasanian scribe by the name of Apasay. The monument which it adorned was a bust of the king, ‘and when Shapur saw it, he sent Apasay the scribe gold, silver, slaves, girls, a garden, and lands’. 87 If this is the manner in which Shapur exalted a scribe, he cannot have hesitated to reward many others of higher or lower rank with similar favours. No government ever voluntarily reduces its own size, and under the rule of the feeble successors to Shapur the structure of the state may have enlarged itself many times. It is probable that rival factions, usurpations, and Kirder’s diffusion of Zoroastrian orthopraxy abetted this growth. This vast apparatus might rapidly have engulfed the throne and degraded the king into a mere cipher for its own power. But the whims of the nobility would be less obnoxious than the tyranny of the clergy. If Kirder had achieved even a small portion of his claims, a great many people must have hated him. Narseh seems to have taken the salutary measure of curbing the power of that priest. The evidence of this is that Narseh sponsored a Manichaean insurrection in Roman Egypt to the great consternation of the Roman emperor Diocletian. 88 Roman authorities recognised those sectaries as Iranian partisans, and this presupposes a reconciliation between the House of Sasan and the Manichean sect. Our sources conceal what concessions the high priest demanded; and what Narseh may have been prepared to offer to Kirder is likewise obscure.

THE RISE OF SHAPUR II Of the two immediate successors to Narseh, very little is known. The historian Agathias records that the son of Narseh, Hurmazd II, reigned for seven years. Tabari adds the vague claim that the rule of Hurmazd began with harshness and severity and ended with clemency and mildness. 89 We must ask in vain whom this king oppressed or persecuted, and for what reason, or perhaps what violent circumstances attended his accession. A mysterious notice in the Chronicle of Arbela asserts that Hurmazd plundered many Roman cities in revenge for Diocletian’s persecution of Christians. 90 This is hard to credit, and the effect of these razzias, in they ever occurred, must have been small; for the peace treaty of 298 endured for forty years. Adur-Narseh succeeded his father Hurmazd II, and sat upon the throne for a single year. A fragment attributed to the lost the chronicle of John of Antioch relates the legendary account of the king’s inauspicious childhood which presaged a 87

Back, M., Die Sassanidischen Staatsinschriften, p. 378–383. Widengren, G., Mani and Manichaeism, p. 118–119; cf. Dignas, B. / Winter, E., Rome and Persia in Late Antiquity, p. 216. 89 Tabari v. 2., p. 54–55. 90 Kawerau, P. / Króll, T., The Chronicle of Arbela, p. 22. For more on this controversial text, see Jullien, C. / Jullien, F., “La Chronique d’Arbèles. Propositions pour la fin d’une controverse,” Oriens Christianus 85, 2001, p. 41–83 and Fiey, J. M., “Auteur et date de la chronique d'Arbèles,” L'Orient Syrien 12, 1967, 265–302. 88

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brief reign of cruelty. Hurmazd had procured for Adur-Narseh a tent made from the hides of Babylonian animals, and the father asked the son whether it pleased him. ‘When I am king,’ said Adur-Narseh, ‘I shall fashion a more beautiful tent from the skins of men’. 91 It is impossible to know what truth may be represented by this grim remark, but Adur-Narseh appears to have been hated by a faction of the nobility and was swiftly replaced by Shapur II. These scant notices must conceal some internal preoccupation which coincided with the Romans’ fortification of their eastern border. In the third century of our era the strength of the Roman frontier had failed, and the ease with which Shapur I had crossed the Euphrates had permitted him to carry war into the vicinity of populous cities. This taught the Romans the necessity of transforming their border with Iran into a system of well-defended points capable of prolonged resistance. 92 A colossal effort established a new strategy of defence in depth, and proceeded in the long interval of peace that followed the Treaty of Nisibis. Boundary posts, fortresses, and military camps arose along the frontier; these were connected by a paved road called the Street of Diocletian which extended northward from Damascus to Palmyra and thence to Sura; and an enormous system of military roads, fortresses, and watch towers originated in the southern extremity of Syria and proceeded southward to the desert of the Sinai; 93 and Diocletian established armament factories at Edessa and Damascus with which to supply his armies. 94 Hurmazd and AdurNarseh must have been sensible of the danger posed by a fortified and wellprovisioned Roman frontier, and unless we deprive those kings of all political and military sense, they must have begun fortifying their borders also. 95 The coronation of John I of France is said to have occurred on the same day on which he was born. 96 John might have been the youngest person ever to have been made king, but Agathias describes the placement of the royal diadem upon the 91

He said that καλλίονα ταύτης ποιήσει ἐξ ἀνθρωπίνων δερμάτων (Joannes Antiochenus, frag. 178 in Müller, K., Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, v. IV, 1851, p. 605). John of Antioch was a monk. Zonaras repeats and embellishes this bizarre anecdote (Zonaras, XIII.5.19–24). 92 Edwell, P. M. Between Rome and Persia: The Middle Euphrates, Mesopotamia, and Palmyra Under Roman Control, 2008, p. 181–182; Williams, S., Diocletian and the Roman Recovery, p. 91–101. 93 Many of Diocletian’s eastern defences are still visible. For examples, see Kennedy, D. / Riley, D., Rome’s Desert Frontier from the Air, 1990, p. 125–137; 175–176; 179–184; 203–207, and the accompanying pictures. 94 John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 307–308. Malalas claims that there were three such factories, but mentions only two. Other sources detailing Diocletian’s fortifications are set forth in Dodgeon, M. H. / Lieu, S. N. C. The Roman Frontier and the Persian Wars, p. 136–139. See also Dignas, B. / Winter, E., Rome and Persia in Late Antiquity, p. 31–32. Cf. Howard-Johnston, J., “The Two Great Powers,” p. 182–187. 95 Cf. Kennedy, D. / Riley, D., Rome’s Desert Frontier, p. 33. 96 John’s reign, if that is the right word, began at his birth and lasted for five days of the year 1316.

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belly of Shapur’s mother. If we can believe this myth, the Persians were the only people ever to have crowned a foetus. 97 The historian Tabari adds that a faction of the Sasanid nobility ruled in place of Shapur until he reached a mature age. But the partisans of Shapur cannot have known the sex of the royal child; and this story must conceal a struggle associated with a doubtful succession and the growth of noble power. Shapur’s coronation had been contested by a rival faction which had supported his two uncles. 98 One, also called Shapur, was blinded; the other, who was called Hurmazd, was cast into prison, and the faction which supported the embryo king ruled with firmness and stability. In the third year of young Shapur’s life, an Iranian army raided and destroyed the city of Maximianopolis in Osrhoene. 99 This assault was the Iranian reaction to the Roman suppression of a revolt in Armenia, and we must infer that government continued its customary operations during the minority of Shapur. But one noble faction refused to vacate its claim to the throne. Hurmazd had languished in prison until he effected an escape. The historian Zosimus claims that the wife of Hurmazd concealed within the body of a fish a file which the prisoner used to burst his bonds. Several camels laden with food and wine were prepared hy the mother of Hurmazd and they assured the intoxication, and the slumber, of the guards. The royal prisoner then fled to the king of Armenia and thence to the court of the Roman emperor Constantine. 100 A similar tale is found in a fragment attributed to the history composed by John of Antioch. 101 The mother and the wife of Hurmazd are said to have won the favour of the guards who watched over their son and husband. They were admitted to his presence, and they replaced his heavy fetters with lighter chains which, by some contrivance, concealed pearls within them. The mother of Hurmazd prepared for the guards a soporific meal; and while the guards slumbered, the royal prisoner escaped his chains by means of a file and fled on horseback across the Euphrates into the bosom of Rome. The pearls hidden within the chains of Homizd afforded the fugitive some riches during his flight. Licinius, colleague and rival to the emperor Constantine, is said to have received the Persian defector with honour. We may infer that a plot was formed to induce the Roman government to support Hurmazd’s bid for the Sasanid throne; and it is also likely that the Persian pretender had promised help to Licinius amidst his war with Constantine. This was about the year 324. 97

Ἀνεῖτον βασιλέα τὸ ἔμβρυον (the whole narrative is found in Agathias, Historiae, IV.25.2– 5). 98 Joannes Antiochenus, frag. 178 in Müller, K., Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, v. IV, 1851, p. 605. 99 John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 312. 100 Zosimus, Historia Nova, II.27. 101 Joannes Antiochenus, frag. 178 in Müller, K., Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, v. IV, 1851, p. 605.

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CONFRONTATION WITH THE ARABS While the Roman world was convulsed by the contest between Constantine and his antagonists, the empire of Iran faced a new threat which had arisen in the south. Some Bedouins of the Arabian desert burst their sandy confines and crossed the Persian Gulf from the island of Bahrain, and pillaged the district of ArdashirKhwarra near Firuzabad in Persia. Later historians assert that Shapur took revenge upon the Arabs early in his reign, but we can hardly credit the report that the young king led his troops in person at the age of sixteen. 102 Shapur had determined to prohibit another Bedouin advance so far out of the Arabian interior. He devastated the southern desert of Iraq and the Arabian coast of the Persian Gulf, and he destroyed wells in those areas. This drove the enemies of Shapur deeper into the Arabian Peninsula and established Sasanian control over both shores of the Persian Gulf. The Sasanian court established a policy of managing Arab affairs. 103 The importance of the city of Hatra and the astonishing transformation of Palmyra from a nexus of trade into a military power had taught the Sasanid government to respect, and perhaps to fear, the Arabs of the desert. Recent predations were perhaps more destructive, and the Sasanid state required stronger defences. The double expedient of fortifications and a military alliance was the solution upon which the government of Shapur settled. I. A large defensive system arose and shut out the Arabian desert from Mesopotamia. Yaqut, a writer of the thirteenth century, has left us a description of these fortifications. 104 A network of watchtowers was imposed upon the desert and guarded the approach to the Euphrates; and a regular series of turrets and forts were protected by an enormous trench which proceeded from the city of Hit and encircled the area around the modern city of Basra. 105 Smaller forts, such as those discovered at the sites of Ruda, Ukhaydir, and Qusayr, defended routes of communication between larger castles and watch towers. 106 These impressive works guarded the western limit of the alluvial plain of Mesopotamia, where a rise in the height of the land forbade the penetration of canals further into the desert. 102

Tabari, v. 2, p. 55–56. Howard-Johnston, J., “The Two Great Powers,” p. 188–189; Potts, D. T., The Persian Gulf in Antiquity: From Alexander the Great to the Coming of Islam, v. II, 1992, p. 228–241. 104 Yaqut, v. II, p. 479; cf. Daryaee, T., “If These Walls Could Speak: The Barrier of Alexander, Wall of Darband, and Other Defensive Moats,” in Pellò, S. (ed.), Borders: Itineraries on the Edge of Iran, Eurasiatica 5, 2016, p. 81–82. 105 Lawrence, D. / Wilkinson, T. J., “The Northern and Western Borderlands of the Sasanian Empire: Contextualising the Roman/Byzantine and Sasanian Frontier,” in Sauer, E. (ed.), Sasanian Persia: Between Rome and the Steppes of Eurasia, 2017, p. 104–106. This study focuses on the area between Fallujah and Najaf, photographed using high-resolution satellite imagery. 106 Morley, C., “The Arabian Frontier: A Keystone of the Sasanian Empire,” in Sauer, E. (ed.), Sasanian Persia: Between Rome and the Steppes of Eurasia, 2017, p. 273. 103

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II. The monumental inscription at Paikuli, erected by the king Narseh, noticed that a certain ʿAmr king of Lakhm was a vassal and ally of the empire of Iran. 107 We may infer that patronage of that Saracen tribe and arisen before the reign of Shapur II, but it was that Sasanian king whose favour raised the Lakhm and their capital Hira to greater importance than ever before. The purpose of this client kingdom was to police north-eastern Arabia and to keep its tribes quiescent, and it was to be the outermost layer of Sasanian defense in north-eastern Arabia. A Sasanian nobleman by the name of Mihrzad was made superintendent of the Lakhmid client kingdom and overseer of its defences; 108 and to the Lakhmid Arabs Shapur granted dominion over every other tribe allied to the empire of Iran. This relationship was founded upon rewards for service to an imperial patron, and it may remind us of the ties between the Persian king and the noble houses of Armenia. 109 So successful was this system, that the great western antagonist of Iran established the same form of alliance. The emperor Justinian elevated the Ghassanid Arab Harith to the rank of king, and his descendants became the main opponents of the Lakhm, 110 but this was about two centuries after the Iranian example. With time the Lakhmid capital at Hira became the confluence of the three great religions of Zoroastrian Iran, Syrian Christianity, and the heathen rites of Arabia. 111 At Hira a population of learned Christians flourished. Some traditions suggest that a form of the Arabic alphabet was developed there before it was carried southward to Mecca, 112 and the scholars of Hira enriched the Arabic language with a great number of Persian words derived from the administrative, scientific, astrological, and artistic vocabulary of Iran. 113 When the Sasanid line was extinct, and when the triple culture 107

Paikuli Inscription, p. 71. Shahrestaniha i Eranshahr, §25. 109 Morley, C., “The Arabian Frontier,” p. 273. For this reason, Morley argues in favour of calling the Saracen clients of Iran ‘Nasrids’, but I have retained the more conventional term ‘Lakhmid’. 110 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xvii.46–48. Morley, C., “The Arabian Frontier,” p. 274. 111 Toral-Niehoff, I., “Late Antique Iran and the Arabs: The Case of al-Hira,” Journal of Persianate Studies 6, 2013, p. 115–126. 112 On the Christian population of Hira, see Toral-Niehoff, I., Al-Ḥīra: Eine arabische Kulturmetropole im spätantiken Kontext, (Islamic History and Civilization. Studies and Texts 104), Leiden, 2014, Toral-Niehoff, I., “The ʿIbād of al-Ḥīra: An Arab Christian Community in Late Antique Iraq,” in A. Neuwirth / Sinai, N. / Marx, M. (eds), The Qurʾān in Context: Historical and Literary Investigations into the Qurʾānic Milieu, (Texts and Studies on the Qurʾān 6), Leiden, 2010, p. 323–347, Fisher, G., Between Empires: Arabs, Romans, and Sasanians in Late Antiquity, 2011, p. 64–70, and Trimingham, J. S., Christianity among the Arabs in Pre-Islamic Times, 1979, p. 156– 157; 227. 113 Tafazzoli, A., “Arabic Language ii. Iranian Loanwords in Arabic,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. II, fasc. 3, 1986, p. 231–233. 108

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of Hira had yielded to the religion of Muhammad, the poets of Baghdad yet extolled the ruins, and the builders, of the Lakhmid capital: ‘Where are they who built you, Hira the White, And they who prepared habitations within you; They who split the earth from the grass, And made rivers to flow in your clefts; They who honoured guests when the north wind blew, And kindled fires?’ 114

THE RENEWAL OF WARFARE WITH ROME The peace established by the Treaty of Nisibis held until the death of the emperor Constantine. That Roman prince had meditated a Persian campaign, perhaps at the instigation of the fugitive Hormazd, but plans for the invasion perished with him. The settlement of the Treaty of Nisibis had been greatly to Iran’s disadvantage, and the Sasanian court would not long endure Roman influence over Mesopotamia, Armenia, and Iberia. This was the principle stimulus to war. But another cause for war may be discerned. The rise of the emperor Constantine had achieved the public establishment of the Christian religion. That emperor, and most of his immediate successors, connected the worship of Christ with the happiness and prosperity of the Roman empire, and perhaps of the entire world. 115 The churchman Eusebius claims to preserve a letter sent by the emperor Constantine to his Persian colleague congratulating him on the presence of Christians within Iran. ‘May the very best come to you’, wrote Constantine, ‘and at the same time the best for those Christians, since they also are yours…I entrust them to you, putting

114

al-Sharif al-Radi, Diwan, v. 1, p. 509:

‫ـضاء وا��وطئون منك ا��يارا‬ ‫ـــــــــب وأ� �ْ�وا ���ل� ا����ارا‬ ِ ‫ـت �ما�� ً وا��وقدون النارا‬ ْ

‫أ�ن بانوك أ��ا ا�����ة ُ البيـ‬ ‫وا��و�ى شققوا ��اك من العشـ‬ ‫ا��هيبون بالضيوف إذا هبَّـ‬

This is part of a poem composed by al-Sharif al-Radi who died about the year 1016, and he is said to have recited it at Hira towards the end of the year 1003 (Talib, A., “Topoi and Topography in the Histories of al-Hira,” in P. Wood (ed.), History and Identity in the Late Antique Near East, 2013, p. 127–128). 115 See the letter of the emperor Constantine to Shapur II, which Eusebius claims to have translated into Greek. Even if not genuine, it must represent the Roman attitude to the importance of Christianity to good government (Vita Constantini IV.9–13 in Cameron, A. / Hall, S. G., Eusebius: Life of Constantine, 1999, p. 156–158), but Smith has recently vouched for its authenticity (Smith, K., Constantine and the Captive Christians of Persia: Martyrdom and Religious Identity in Late Antiquity, 2016, p. 17–32).

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their very persons in your hands, because you too are renowned for piety’. 116 This letter was sent when Shapur was still a young man, perhaps as early as the year 324, 117 and the Sasanid court would have recognised in the words of Constantine a challenge to the Persian king’s authority over his Christian subjects, and an oblique threat lest those Persian Christians be mistreated. 118 Were they mistreated? The fifth-century historiographical tradition of the Church of the East accuses Shapur II of persecuting his Christian subjects, but that evidence is doubtful. The contemporary Martyrdom of St Simon shows that Christians were at first oppressed by an increase in taxation, that the humiliated bishop Simon bar Shabba’e was compelled to enforce this excessive levy, and that some Christians are said to have found martyrdom for refusing both to collect and to pay taxes. 119 But the Martyrdom of Aqebshma (a somewhat fanciful text of the fifth century) transforms this increase in taxation into a campaign to exterminate every Iranian Christian. 120 The increase in taxation must have remained a painful memory even when the Martyrdom of Aqebshma was written, but its exaggerated claims are probably wrong. Taxes were raised undoubtedly in preparation for warfare; and employing bishops to collect them may have been a method of integrating Christians within the Iranian fiscal system – not a means by which to exterminate them. But there was a persecution. 121 This is confirmed by a letter composed by the Syrian churchman Afrahat who wrote at the beginning of Shapur’s persecution: ‘I wrote this letter to you, my friend, in the month of Ab, in the year six hundred and fifty-six of Alexander, the son of Philip of Macedon; the thirty-sixth year of the reign of Shapur the Persian king, who began the persecution; the fifth year of

116

I have made a paraphrase of Vita Constantini IV.13 in Cameron, A. / Hall, S. G., Eusebius: Life of Constantine, 1999, p. 158). There is a new translation of the letter in Smith, K., Constantine and the Captive Christians of Persia, p. 181–183. 117 On the date of the letter, see Fowden, E., “Constantine and the Peoples of the Eastern Frontier” in Lenski, N., The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Constantine, 2006, p. 389 and Frendo, D., “Constantine’s Letter to Shapur II, Its Authenticity, Occasion, and Attendant Circumstances,” Bulletin of the Asia Institute, New Series, vol. 15, 2001, p. 57–69. 118 Frankopan, a modern writer, has also detected a threat in the language of Constantine’s letter (Frankopan, P., Silk Roads, p. 43). 119 The evidence for this is found in the Martyrdom of St Simon, p. 715–778; for a rigorous and somewhat sceptical analysis, see Smith, K., Constantine and the Captive Christians of Persia, p. 109–124. 120 Martyrdom of Aqebshma, p. 361–362. 121 Contra Payne, R., A State of Mixture, 2015, p. 38–44.

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the destruction of churches; the year of the great slaughter of martyrs in the east’. 122

The moment at which the persecution became violent was about the year 345, and this coincides with the first phase of Shapur’s Roman war. 123 Before that time, contemporary evidence refers only to taxation and the destruction of churches. Afrahat’s brief description gives us an idea of the substance of Shapur’s persecution as it was perceived by a contemporary Christian. But we must look elsewhere for the reason for it. We have already observed that the land of Armenia connected the highlands of Anatolia with those of Iran, and that the two great powers competed for power and influence in that region. The influence of Iran had always been stronger, and it had shaped the culture of Armenia, its institutions, and the customs of its aristocracy. Grand hunts, banquets, and the recitation of courtly poetry imitated Iranian models and maintained the prestige of the Armenian nobility, whose local supremacy, whose castles, and whose surnames remind us of European feudalism. 124 Such a system of regional power and competing prestige was naturally resistant to any higher authority; but as long as Armenia remained Iranian, the Persian government had little cause for concern in the northwest. But in the early fourth century, the Armenian king Tirdat III and some of his nobility embraced the Christian religion. The new faith was intended perhaps to distinguish the Armenian nation from the two great powers which surrounded it, but this was a doubtful and ephemeral advantage. Many, perhaps most, among the Armenian nobility adhered to their ancient cults and disdained the worship of Christ, which they viewed as a foreign influence and a divisive religion. 125 Nobles who held this opinion were pleased to make common cause with Shapur against their Christian compatriots. But when the Roman empire had adopted the religion of Christ, that state appeared to be a natural ally of Armenian and Iranian Christians alike; and the growth of Christianity appeared to be an extension of Roman power. A delegation of Armenian noblemen arrived in Constantinople in the year 336. Perceiving the threat of Iranian conquest, those Armenians pledged their obedience to the Roman emperor in expectation of military support against their eastern opponent. The moment of their absence was the occasion for Iranian meddling: the 122

Afrahat, Demonstratio XXIII.69. I note, however, that Smith raises some doubts about the use of Afrahat’s Demonstrations as evidence Shapur’s persecutions (Smith, K., Constantine and the Captive Christians of Persia, p. 103–109. 123 See Nöldeke, T., Die Geschichte der Perser, p. 441, note 1. 124 Thomson, R. W. / Howard-Johnston, J. / Greenwood, T., The Armenian History Attributed to Sebeos, Part II: historical commentary, 1999, p. xii–xiv; Garsoïan, N., “Prolegomena to a Study of Iranian Aspects in Arsacid Armenia,” in Hande’s Amso’reay 90, 1976, p. 17–234; Toumanoff, C., Studies in Christian Caucasian History, p. 112–141. 125 Payaslian, S., The History of Armenia, p. 38.

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Armenian king Tirdat was blinded and deposed, and Shapur’s brother Narseh ascended the vacant throne of Armenia. 126 Tensions between the two powers rose, and an Iranian embassy of the year 337 failed to halt the emperor’s preparations for conquest of the east. 127 The end of these plans came suddenly on the twenty-second of May when Constantine died, and this was the moment for Shapur II to invade Roman territory through Armenia – the beginning of nearly fifteen years of constant and doubtful fighting. 128

THE OUTBREAK OF WAR The war began with clashes at Singara, Eleia, and Constantina. But these produced no decisive outcome. Nisibis endured three sieges which the historian Festus judged to be more injurious to the army of Shapur than to the city. 129 According to the church historian and bishop Theodoret of Cyrrus, Shapur employed every tactic in order to capture Nisibis. A large army of horse and foot, as well as a great many elephants surrounded the city. Siege engines and towers were constructed, but no attempt to take the city succeeded supposedly because the prayers of a holy man, Jacob of Nisibis, averted the missiles and arrows of the Iranian army. One of these sieges involved the singular tactic of assaulting Nisibis with a gigantic wave. 130 The river Mygdonius that runs past that city was dammed behind a vast wall of earth; and when it was released, the huge force of the water destroyed a portion of the outer bulwarks of Nisibis. Jacob, bishop of that city, kept morale high as the citizens laboured to rebuild their defences. The writings of Theodoret notes the seemingly incredible detail that Shapur beheld Jacob upon the battlements of Nisibis and mistook him for the emperor Constantius. Though Shapur was greatly disturbed by this, the Christian writer claims that a worse calamity befell the Persian king. The prayers of the holy man raised up a vast cloud of gnats and mosquitoes which assailed the Iranian force: the insects filled the hollow trunks of Shapur’s elephants as well as the ears and nostrils of other animals, and Shapur’s host fled in confusion. But the progress of Shapur was retarded less by the prayers of a bishop than by the demands of nature and the fortifications erected by Diocletian. The vast pool of water which Shapur had created would have attracted many insects to annoy his 126

Paustos Buzandatsi, III.21. For a modern authority, see Fowden, E., “Constantine and the Peoples of the Eastern Frontier” in Lenski, N., The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Constantine, 2006, p. 391–392. 127 For the embassy, see John Lydus, De Magistratibus, III.33–34. For Constantine’s elaborate plans for the conquest of Iran, see Eusebius, Vita Constantini, IV.56–57. 128 Payaslian, S., The History of Armenia, p. 38–39. 129 Ter autem est a Persis obsessa Nisibis: sed maiore suo detrimento, dum obsideret, hostis affectus est (Festus, Breviarium XXVII). Other, minor sources for these battles are set forth and analysed in Dodgeon, M. H. / Lieu, S. N. C., The Roman Frontier and the Persian War, p. 165–210. 130 Theodoret, Historia Religiosa, I.11–12; Theodoret, Historia Ecclesiastica, II.30.

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troops and the wet earth would have needed some time to dry before the Iranian army could renew its assault upon the city. It was in this interval that the inhabitants of Nisibis repaired the walls of their city. The obstinacy of the Persian king won no important victory, nor did the system of Roman defences persuade him to retire altogether. This conflict might have continued as a war of attrition to the utter exhaustion of the belligerents. But in the early 350s, Shapur suddenly relinquished the siege of Nisibis, and his armies vacated Mesopotamia. A very serious threat had imposed itself upon north-eastern Iran, and Shapur hastened to the relief of that beleaguered frontier.

THE MIGRATION OF THE HUNS One thousand years before Attila had impressed the Roman people with the terrors of his name, his ferocious ancestors were already considered enemies of civilisation. 131 The origin of the Huns 132 was in the high steppe of the Ordos region of Inner Mongolia which is surrounded on three sides by the Great Bend of the Yellow River. Fear of the strange world of the northern barbarian compelled the imagination of the very ancient Chinese to populate the lands beyond their frontier with stout, ugly men with the heads of beasts, or the bodies of fish. One-eyed men dwelt beside others with only a single foot and a single hand. Others lacked bellies or had hollow eyes. They knew nothing of agriculture. Demons haunted their tenebrous and ice-ridden abode, from which they only emerged to torment the rich and settled land to the south like birds of prey. It is only upon the pages of the great historian Sima Qian, who died about a century before our era, that we meet the first rational description of the Huns in the literature of China. 133 Sima Qian situates the first certain appearance of the Huns, or at least their distant ancestors, seven hundred and seventy-one years before our era. Raids launched from the Ordos region are said to have issued in the destruction of the Zhou capital at Haojing. Thereafter the Huns spread terror throughout China until the armies of the first Qin emperor expelled them from the Ordos region. Earlier Chinese kingdoms had attempted to block the advance of the Huns by means of ramparts and watch towers. The Qin state connected and strengthened those fortifications into a

131

Graff, D. A., The Eurasian Way of War: Military Practice in Seventh-Century China and Byzantium, 2016, p. 153–156. 132 The main authorities which have shaped my thinking on the Huns are: Kim, J., The Huns, 2016, p. 12–16; Kim, H. J., The Huns, Rome, and the Birth of Europe, 2013, p. 17–35; Grousset, R., The Empire of the Steppes, 1970, p. 19–60; and, to a small extent, Sinor, D., “The Hun Period,” The Cambridge History of Early Inner Asia, 1990, p. 177–180. 133 For a learned analysis of the Huns in Chinese historiography, see Di Cosmo, N., Ancient China and its Enemies, p. 267–293.

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vast defensive system, and the Great Wall established a grim boundary between ‘the men with bows and arrows and those with hats and girdles’. 134 The collapse of the Qin dynasty in the late third century before Christ proceeded amidst rebellion and factional strife, and the Huns returned to the Ordos region. The Han state arose upon the ruins of the Qin, and at about the same moment the leadership of the Hunnish king Modu forced the Han to pay an annual tribute. In place of generals, the Han sent their daughters into the steppe, and successive marriage alliances suggested the parity of two mutually hostile states. 135 Modu led the westward expansion of the Huns into the Tarim Basin, and his conquests united nearly all Inner Asia within a single nomadic confederacy. In the second century before our era, it was the son of Modu, Laoshang, who crushed the Tocharians and forced them to flee southwest, where they overthrew the remnants of Greek civilisation in Bactria and overran Parthian Iran. Hereafter, internal feuds began to disrupt the Hunnish state; and with time a northern and a southern faction became permanent distinctions. A series of humiliations inflicted by the armies of the Han emperor Wu, and assaults by other nomads, deprived the northern Huns of an empire. The Han occupied the Hexi corridor and seized control of the Taklamakan desert and its two perilous, but profitable trade routes. The northern Huns were then beaten back and confined to the region of the Altai mountains; and the Xianbei, their former subjects, triumphed over them. The fortune of the southern Huns was different. In the middle of the first century of our era, the leader of the southern Huns was a man by the name of Bi. Bi, and the eight hordes that he commanded, threw off their allegiance to the supreme ruler of the northern Huns, and submitted themselves to the Han emperor Guangwu. Like the Germanic federates who guarded the outer limits of the Roman empire, the southern Huns were entrusted with the defence of the borders of the Gobi and the marches of Gansu and Shaanxi, and the son of Bi dwelt as a hostage at Luoyang. A century and a half later, when Ardashir I had established himself as sole ruler of Iran, the Han state dissolved into three mutually hostile kingdoms. One of these kingdoms was established by a military dictator known as Cao Cao. Fearing Hunnish power, he separated that nation into five divisions over which he placed Chinese superintendents, and he detained the leader of the Hunnish federates within the Chinese capital at Luoyang. Cao Cao had employed contingents of Huns in his efforts to reassemble the fragments of the Han empire, but the reunification of China was achieved not by the armies of Cao Cao but by the short-lived Jin dynasty. Towards the end of the third century of our era, civil wars threatened to topple the Jin empire, and Hunnish federates advanced ever further southward below the 134

Di Cosmo, N., “The Northern Frontier in Pre-Imperial China,” Loewe, M. / Shaughnessy, E. L., The Cambridge history of ancient China: from the origins of civilization to 221 B.C., p. 1999, p. 893. 135 Barfield, T., The Perilous Frontier, p. 45–46.

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Great Wall. On a sudden Liu Yuan, a direct descendent of Modu, who dwelt at Luoyang, declared his independence from the authority of the Jin; and, recalling that a distant ancestor of his had been a Han princess, Liu Yuan announced himself as the legitimate continuator of the Han dynasty. His son and successor, Liu Cong, triumphed over Jin China in the year 311 and again in 316. The capitals of Luoyang and Chang’an were successively delivered to fire and sword, and two Jin emperors were taken prisoner and forced to serve their Hunnish masters as cupbearers before their ignominious executions. 136 It is yet possible to sense the mood of that grim time; for, in a personal letter which yet survives, a Sogdian merchant resident in China lamented the total destruction of Luoyang, the occupation of Chang’an, and the horrors of famine which had spread throughout China. 137 Dynastic squabbling within the Hunnish state was followed by Chinese revenge. In the year 350 the general Ran Min seized power and commanded the murder of all foreigners within China: his purpose was to destroy the Huns and their allies, but it is said that anyone with a high nose and a full beard was murdered. The severed heads of slain barbarians were exchanged for rewards, and in this manner many tens of thousands of foreigners perished in a promiscuous massacre. In the end two hundred thousand corpses arose outside the walls of the imperial capital where they were devoured by jackals, wolves, and wild dogs. 138 Organised migration followed organised slaughter. A modern scientific study has proven that, in the middle of the fourth century, the region of the Altai had become uninhabitable by reason of a fall in temperature and a shortage of pasturelands for Hunnish livestock. 139 The southern Huns, who were to put a vast distance between themselves and the turbulent state of China, could not follow their northern cousins to the Altai. They moved to the southwest, perhaps following the same route which the Tocharians had used nearly half a millennium earlier, and they appeared upon the eastern borders of Iran when the army of Shapur was engaged in 136

Barfield, T., The Perilous Frontier, p. 101–103. A member of the Jin imperial family and his court relinquished northern China to the barbarians and fled to Jiankang, near the modern site of Nanjing, where a second Jin dynasty was established in the year 317. This memorable development has been compared with the establishment of Constantine’s capital at Byzantium (Grousset, R., The Empire of the Steppes, p. 56–57). 137 See the evidence of Sogdian Ancient Letter II in Livšic, V. A., “Sogian Ancient Letters (II, IV, V),” Scrinium, vol. 5, Issue 1, 2009, p. 344–352, and the analysis of de la Vaissière, É., Histoire des Marchands Sogdiens, 2002, p. 48–51. 138 Kim, H. J., The Huns, 2016, p. 30. The evidence for this can be found in the Jin Shu which I cannot read (for a summary of it, see Graff, D. A., Medieval Chinese Warfare, 300–900, 2002, p. 62–63). 139 Schlütz, F. / Lemkuhl, F., “Climatic change in the Russian Altai, southern Siberia, based on palynological and geomorphological results, with implications for climatic teleconnections and human history since the middle Holocene,” Vegetation History and Archaeobotany, 2007, p. 101–118.

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that doubtful struggle along the Roman frontier. The sudden end to this conflict, without a formal armistice, demonstrates that the arrival of the Huns was apprehended as a grave emergency requiring the presence of the Sasanid king and the full weight of the Iranian army. The Persian historical tradition passes over this momentous occasion in silence. The best contemporary Roman historian has left us some slim but informative notices in which the Huns are invoked under the half-Iranian, half-classicising name of Chionitae. 140

SHAPUR II’S RETURN TO THE WESTERN FRONT Nearly ten years were consumed in fighting and diplomatic engagements with the Huns until Shapur returned to his western front in the year 359. 141 Gurumbad, 142 king of the Huns, and much of his people, would soon fight at the side of Shapur, along with contingents of Kushans. 143 But first, the Roman praetorian prefect in the east, Musonian, met in secret with an Iranian governor by the name of Tamshapur. The praetorian prefect suggested to the governor that he persuade the Persian monarch to put an end to warfare between their empires. This secret conference revealed weakness and hinted at distant military difficulties in the Roman west, and this intelligence was communicated to the royal court at Ctesiphon. Shapur was determined to profit from Roman distraction, and he swiftly dispatched an embassy demanding that the Treaty of Nisibis be overturned. The ambassador delivered Shapur’s letter to Constantius whom the Sasanian king acknowledged in the language of flattery as his brother. But the force of the letter was not fraternal: ‘I shall state my proposal in brief terms, mindful that what I am about to say I have oft repeated. Even your own ancient records testify that the empire of my forefathers reached as far as the river Strymon and the boundaries of Macedonia. 140

Ammianus, XVI.ix; Rezakhani, K., ReOrienting the Sasanians, p. 87–93; Kim, H. J., The Huns, Rome, and the Birth of Europe, 2013, p. 36; Howard-Johnston, J., “The Sasanian Strategic Dilemma,” in Börm, H. / Wiesehöfer, J. (eds), Commutatio et Contentio: Studies in the Late Roman, Sasanian, and Early Islamic Near East in Memory of Zeev Rubin, 2010, p. 41–43; de la Vaissière, É., Histoire des Marchands Sogdiens, 2002, p. 102–104; Frye, R. N., The Golden Age of Persia, 1975, p. 32; Bivar, A. D. H., “The History of Eastern Iran,” in Yarshater, E. (ed.), The Cambridge History of Iran, vol. III.1: The Seleucid, Parthian, and Sasanian Periods, p. 211. 141 Destruction in the regions of Bamiyan and Begram have been associated in the archaeological record with the war between Shapur II and the Huns (Tarzi, Z., “Les fouilles strasbourgeoises de la maison Z. Tarzi à Bāmiyān (2002–2008)” in Ducœur, G. (ed.), Autour de Bāmiyān: De la Bactriane hellénisée à l’Inde bouddhique, 2012, p. 86–87). 142 The name which Ammianus renders as Grumbates must be the same name as Gurumbad, or Kurumpat, attested in Bactrian documents dated between AD 420 and 460 (SimsWilliams, N., “The Sasanians in the East. A Bactrian archive from Northern Afghanistan,” in Sarkosh Curtis, V. / S. Stewart (eds), The Sasanian Era. The Idea of Iran III, 2008, p. 93). 143 Ammianus’ expression Eusenos (XVI.ix.4) should be emended to Cusenos.

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It is fitting that I should demand these lands…But…I have never allowed myself to do anything for which I had cause to repent…And thus it is my duty to recover Armenia and Mesopotamia, which had been wrested from my grandfather by fraud.’ 144

The Persian king’s letter appears to relinquish the Sasanian claim to the lands between Asia Minor and Macedonia – a prudent omission since the Roman capital had been transferred to Byzantium. The Sasanian claim to those lands was perhaps always fanciful, and Iranian policy now appeared to acknowledge publicly that the annexation of the Roman empire was impossible. 145 The rest of the letter is less conciliatory. Constantius is instructed to heed the lesson of the wolf or the beaver. Those animals, as it was said, would detach voluntarily the bodily organs for which they were hunted; 146 the wolf would relinquish a tuft of hair, and the beaver would gnaw off his testicles. With an oblique hint at these strange examples, Shapur declared that war would be renewed if the Roman emperor failed to cede Armenia and Mesopotamia. The reply of the emperor disavowed the activities of his praetorian prefect, and asserted his indifference to the peace which had been suggested. 147 ‘It was not through slackness,’ the emperor Constantius declared, ‘but through self-restraint that we have sometimes accepted rather than offered battle, and when we are attacked we defend ourselves with the most forceful spirit of a clear conscience.’ 148 Warfare was resumed in the spring of the year 359.

SHAPUR II RESUMES THE WAR The native Iranian tradition offers a paltry commemoration of the last twenty years of Shapur II’s reign. But the exiguous and fragmentary collection of historical notices, upon which we have so far depended, at last gives way to a copious and circumstantial narrative composed by a Roman historian. Ammianus Marcellinus was a Greek-speaking native of Antioch. 149 He was a man of liberal education, and in his 144

Ammianus, XVII.v.3–8 (my translation). Frendo, D., “Sasanian Irredentism and the Foundation of Constantinople: Historical Truth and Historical Reality,” Bulletin of the Asia Institute, v. 6, 1992, p. 59–66. 146 The letter refers to animals quae cum advertant cur maximo opere capiantur, illud propria sponte amittunt ut vivere deinde possint inpavidae (Ammianus, XVII.v.7). 147 A modern writer has suggested that Constantius may have authorised back-channel communication in order to be free to deny and condemn it later (Marcos, M., “Some Notes on the Backchannel Communications of the Prefect Musonianus with the Persians,” Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte, Bd. 61, H. 4, 2012, p. 507–510). 148 I have summarised the letter. The last phrase is fortissimo benevolentiae spiritu (Ammianus, XVII.v.14). 149 Rohrbacher, D. Historians of Late Antiquity, 2002, p. 14–41; Barnes, T., Ammianus Marcellinus and the Representation of Historical Reality, 1998, p. 54–64. 145

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early twenties he had been attached to the staff of Ursicinus, commander of the Roman army in the east. 150 The singular literary task of Ammianus was to carry the history of Tacitus down to his own day. When warfare was renewed in Mesopotamia, Ammianus had attained the maturity of about thirty years, and his account of the conflict is the record of a soldier and a man of letters. His history is the work of an eye-witness composed in Latin; but it is marred by a mannered and ornamental style, involving at times a strained and unnatural syntax, a poetic vocabulary, and occasional lapses into colloquial usages. He often struggles to express a trivial meaning amidst laboured antiquarianism and pompous literary allusions. But we rarely have an alternative to Ammianus, and he is the first Roman historian to offer any great insight into Iranian affairs. We must assume that Iranian spies had attempted to induce defections, had probed Roman cities for weaknesses, and had recommended an attack upon the northern Mesopotamian city of Amida. These operations would have preceded Shapur’s invasion by a long interval. But the military historian mentions only one Roman defector: Antoninus, a former merchant and accountant to the Roman commander of Mesopotamia, and a man who had ascended the ranks of the Roman bureaucracy and abused his position to find out secrets. 151 The traitor had purchased a remote estate upon the river Tigris; and with the help of loyal servants who had mastered the art of swimming across the river, Antoninus communicated to the Persian governor Tamshapur the inner affairs of the Roman orient and every preparation which had been made for warfare. Persian authorities then ferried the defector, his family, and all his possessions across the river into Iran. The campaign that followed could not have proceeded without the intelligence provided by Antoninus, and it is probable that he was not the only defector. 152 Iranian disinformation seems to have attempted to convince the Romans that an invasion would be further south in Osrhoene – not at Amida as must have been planned from the beginning. According to Ammianus, notice of the Persian advance was transmitted by means of a parchment hidden within a scabbard at Antioch, and this obscure document was interpreted to mean that the Persian king had crossed the Greater Zab and Tigris rivers, led on by the traitor Antoninus. 153 The Roman response was to investigate the truth of this report, and Ammianus, escorted by a centurion, was sent on a mission of reconnaissance. The military historian claims that an Iranian governor, who bore the Roman name of Jovinian, had passed his 150

Ammianus calls himself miles quondam et Graecus (Ammianus, XXXI.xvi.9). Ammianus, XVIII.v.1–4. 152 An Iranian effort to seduce a part of the local Roman population may be reflected in an anecdote about Shapur’s manipulation of a beautiful woman captured at a fortress in northern Mesopotamia (Ammianus, XVIII.x). This lady’s husband dwelt in the city of Nisibis, and Shapur promised to reunite that couple and thereby achieve the conquest of that city. 153 Ammianus, XVIII.vi.17. 151

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youth as a hostage in Syria; and his secret sympathy with the Romans prompted him to defect. 154 We must assume that Jovinian was something akin to a double-agent; otherwise he would not have maintained his position, nor would he have been privy to any important political or military information. Jovinian received Ammianus and the centurion and sent them on with a guide who led them to a lofty cliff, perhaps near Dohuk or Yakmala which are now in Iraqi Kurdistan. 155 There Ammianus and his companions waited for two days. On the third day, Ammianus beheld upon the wide plain below him the mustering of the Iranian army. Shapur was conspicuous at the head of a vast host, and upon his left was Gurumbad, king of the Huns; and the king of the Albanians was on his right. There followed a great multitude populated by various chieftains of high rank and the strongest soldiers of the countries that surround Iran. 156

THE FALL OF AMIDA The Roman army seems to have expected an attack near Edessa or Carrhae. The countryside was evacuated, people took shelter in fortresses, and the river Euphrates was fortified with towers, stakes, and catapults. Fields were set on fire to prevent the Persians from gathering fodder. 157 But these tactics neither slowed nor deterred the Iranian invasion, for the Roman defector Antoninus led the enemies of his people northwards towards Amida through a part of Mesopotamia which had not been ravaged. 158 The city of Amida is situate upon the plain which commands the western bank of the upper Tigris river. This position places the city at the intersection of two ancient highways: one running from Karput in the north to Mardin in the south, and from east to west from the edge of the Caspian to the shore of the Mediterranean Sea. 159 The emperor Constantius recognised the vulnerable importance of Amida and fortified it in the early fourth century of our era, and the Fifth Legion Parthica was installed there. 160 The capture of Amida would require a difficult siege, but it would give the Persians control over the Roman province of Mesopotamia and perhaps authority over other disputed lands also. Ammianus wrongly ascribes the siege and fall of Amida not to Iranian strategy but rather to a series of accidents. The 154

Ammianus, XVIII.vi.20. At Dohuk mountains rise about three thousand feet; at Yakmala more than six thousand feet. For a learned discussion of this matter, see Kelly, G., Ammianus Marcellinus: the Allusive Historian, 2008, p. 81–83. 156 Ammianus, XVIII.vi.22–23. 157 Ammianus, XVIII.vii.1–4. 158 Ammianus, XVIII.vii.7–11. 159 Sellwood, D., “Amida,” Encyclopedia Iranica, vol. 1., 1989, p. 438. Amida is the modern Diyarbekir in southern Turkey. 160 Ammianus, XVIII.ix.3. 155

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cowardice of seven hundred Illyrian horsemen allowed twenty thousand Iranians to occupy the hills near Amida, and the inhabitants of the countryside took shelter in a disorderly panic within the ramparts of that city. The Persian king and his Hunnish ally are said to have provoked the Roman garrison by riding too near the walls. A missile launched from a Roman ballista amidst a general bombardment slew the son of Gurumbad, and the king of the Huns demanded the destruction of Amida in revenge. 161 Amida endured a siege of seventy-three days. 162 The defenders of that city fought manfully against Iranian engines and they endured the hideous sight of the elephants which had accompanied the warriors of Sakastan. 163 The bodies of the slain accumulated within Amida, and an outbreak of epidemic disease elicits from Ammianus less sympathy for the victims than a series of learned allusions to the History of Thucydides and the Iliad. 164 Spontaneous sallies 165 and raids 166 troubled now one side and now another, but Ammianus’ oblique hints at the inexperience of Gaulish auxiliaries and a conflict between two commanders at Amida suggest that the Romans were bound to lose. But when the host of Shapur finally stormed Amida, Ammianus blames neither a want of Roman endurance nor the strength of the Persian attack, but the collapse of a heap of earth behind a part of the city walls. 167

THE RISE OF THE EMPEROR JULIAN AND THE ESCALATION OF WARFARE The fall of Amida was the first of many disasters 168 which beset the Roman world at the end of Constantius’ reign. Ammianus describes distant and domestic disturbances, an eclipse of the sun and other grim celestial portents, and an uprising in the west which ended in the proclamation of Julian, cousin of the emperor Constantius, as sole emperor of the Romans. 169

Ammianus, XIX.ii.1. The rhetor has overpowered the military historian: the events before the walls of Amida have been transformed into a miniature Trojan War, and the death of Gurumbad’s son is likened to that of Patroclus (Ammianus, XIX.i.7–9). 162 Ammianus, XIX.ix.9. 163 Ammianus hates elephants quorum stridore inmanitateque corporum nihil humanae mentes terribilius cernunt (Ammianus, XIX.vii.6). 164 Ammianus, XIX.iv. 165 Ammianus, XIX.v. 166 Ammianus, XIX.vi.7. 167 Ammianus, XIX.viii. 168 Ammianus’ word is sollicitudines (Ammianus, XIX.xii.1), is something of an understatement. 169 Ammianus, XX.ii–iv. For a modern summary of the events of Julian’s elevation and march to Constantinople, see Bowersock, G. W., Julian the Apostate, 1978, p. 46–65. 161

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Amidst these calamities, Shapur pressed his advantage against his western foe. He besieged and captured Singara with the aid of a gigantic battering ram. 170 Everyone in that city, including the two legions which had defended it, were carried off into captivity. An offer of peace and the demand of capitulation were sent to Bezabde and refused. The fall of that city is blamed on a perfidious bishop who had been given leave to parley with the Persian king. It is reported that he either asked the king to retire in peace or that he indicated to him precisely which portion of the city wall was weakest and best to bombard. Ammianus claims to disavow the more insidious rumour, but after the parley it was not long before the Persian battering ram had pierced the wall of Bezabde. 171 Shapur tried and failed to capture the fortress which Ammianus calls Virta, and then withdrew. The emperor Constantius failed to retake the city of Bezabde, and the Iranian garrison proved that it was as skilled in resisting as in prosecuting a siege. 172 The military contest had ended plainly to the advantage of Shapur, and the Roman emperor could not risk further warfare while Julian steadily gained control of the Roman world. But neither could Constantius relinquish the east to Shapur. The Romans turned to diplomacy, and attempted to ensure the loyalty of their Armenian and Iberian clients. 173 Shapur must have known of the unstable position of Constantius and the advance of Julian, and there are some slender notices in Ammianus which suggest that Shapur took advantage of this trouble. The Persian king increased a general state of alarm and confusion by means of a campaign of disinformation. He put about the rumour that the Iranian army had gathered again and was prepared for another imminent attack. 174 Iranian scouts and supposed deserters transmitted conflicting information, 175 and Constantius was detained in the east while Julian invaded Thrace and prepared to occupy Constantinople. But as the Roman world appeared to descend into civil war, Shapur returned to his capital and Constantius retired to Antioch where he developed a fever and died. 176 Julian became sole emperor of the Romans, and civil war was avoided by Constantius’ endorsement of his cousin upon his deathbed. Shapur II had humiliated the Romans. Bezabde was fortified with new walls and a garrison of veterans, Singara was deprived of its defences and left a solitary ruin, and when Constantius visited the site of Amida he found it a heap of ashes. At this grim sight, the Roman treasurer who had accompanied the emperor remarked dryly that the enormous burden of maintaining the defence of cities such as Amida Ammianus, XX.vi. Ammianus, XX.vii.13. 172 Ammianus, XX.xi. 173 Ammianus, XXI.vi.7–9. 174 Ammianus, XXI.vii.6–7. Roman intelligence could not verify this rumour. 175 Ammianus, XXI.xiii.4. 176 Ammianus, XXI.xiii.8; xv.1–3. 170 171

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was likely to exhaust the imperial treasury and to no good purpose. 177 The Roman state and military apparatus had been thrown into confusion. A great number of Roman civil and military leaders had been captured or executed. Ursicinus, commander of the Roman army in the east, was blamed for the fall of Amida and dismissed. Courts martial followed, as did trials and condemnations for high treason. Shapur must have rejoiced at these humiliations, but the aims of his renewed warfare had not yet been achieved, and the ignominious Treaty of Nisibis yet held.

THE EXPEDITION OF JULIAN Shapur made several offers of peace to the new emperor, but Julian refused them. 178 In his youth, the philosophical emperor had written a humorous treatise on the lives of his imperial predecessors in which he laments the Roman failure to conquer Persia. 179 Now Julian resolved to surpass the successors to Augustus and to punish once and for all the insolence of Rome’s greatest foe. 180 In a harangue before his assembled army, Julian compared the present antagonism with Iran to Rome’s ancient struggle against Carthage and to the Numantine and Social wars. 181 But the outcome of the war with Iran was otherwise than the issue of those memorable contests. The war was to end in the death of the emperor, the shameful retreat of the Romans, and reversal of the Treaty of Nisibis. The Roman plan was to march boldly into the heartland of the Iranian empire, seize the capital of Ctesiphon in a pincer movement, and install the pretender Hurmazd upon the Persian throne. 182 The Iranian strategy appears to have consisted alike of diplomatic and military subterfuge. The Roman emperor had commanded the king of Armenia to gather and send an army; 183 but no such force appeared and En quibus animis urbes a milite defenduntur cui ut abundare stipendium possit imperii opes iam fatiscunt (Ammianus, XX.xi.5) were the words of the treasurer. 178 Libanius, Orationes, XII.76; XVII.19; XVIII.164. 179 Julian, Caesares, p. 324. 180 Ammianus, XII.xii.1. 181 Julian also claims that abolenda nobis natio molestissima gladiis nondum nostrae propinquitatis exaruit cruor (Ammianus, XXIII.v.19). These comparisons may rather reflect the antiquarianism of Ammianus than the real address of an emperor before a battle, but it must be admitted that such historical reminiscences would have appealed to Julian and perhaps to his officers also. 182 The pagan sophist Libanius hoped τὸν βασιλέα (i.e., the emperor Julian) τὸν μὲν νῦν ἄρχοντα (i.e., Shapur II) ἄγοντα παραδόντα δὲ τῷ φεύγοντι (i.e., Hurmazd) τὴν ἀρχήν (Libanius, Epistula 1402.3), and this discloses the Roman aim of the war (Shayegan, M. R., Arsacids and Sasanians, p. 368; Nöldeke, T., Die Geschichte der Perser und Araber, p. 51 with note 3), which can be inferred only with great difficulty from Ammianus’ text (Matthews, J., The Roman Empire of Ammianus, 1989, p. 138–140). For brief summaries of the campaign see Bowersock, G. W., Julian, p. 106–119; Browning, R., The Emperor Julian, 1975, p. 181–216. 183 Ammianus, XXIII.ii.1–8. 177

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it is possible to suspect that Iranian influence persuaded the Armenian monarch to withhold help to the Romans. Julian’s progress from Antioch down the river Euphrates was harried only once by a Persian raid until the Roman army came to the environs of the Persian capital. 184 Despite a small ambush at the walls of Mahoze, the Romans stormed that city, and a member of the illustrious Suren family assailed the Roman pack-animals and then withdrew. 185 The fortress of Peroz-Shapur, which is now the modern town of Anbar in Iraq, was defended by a double wall and encircled by a branch of the river Euphrates. During an obstinate siege of two days, the defenders repeatedly called for a parley with the defector Hurmazd only to assail that traitor and deserter with insults and abuse. The stroke of a battering ram destroyed a portion of the wall of Peroz-Shapur, and the soldiers of Julian rushed into the city and occupied it. 186 The Romans proceeded to the ancient Royal Canal which connected the two great rivers of Mesopotamia. 187 A tributary of this aquifer was an artificial river dug by the emperor Trajan amidst his Parthian war. This channel delivered the waters of the Royal Canal into the Tigris above the city of Ctesiphon: a tactic which Trajan had employed to threaten Ctesiphon with total inundation. The Iranian government had blocked Trajan’s canal; but without opposition the Romans released the blockage, and the water which filled that channel bore the Roman fleet from the Euphrates to the Tigris above the Iranian capital. When the Roman army was disbarked, Julian gave the order to burn the ships that had carried his troops, equipment, and provisions. 188 The observations of an ancient military historian are often of high value to a modern writer, but Ammianus failed to recognise a series of feigned retreats and a campaign of disinformation which lured the army of Julian into a trap. Ammianus acknowledges the influence of Persian deceit, but he is at pains to excuse Julian’s foolish command. The testimony of a Doctor of the Roman Church and an archbishop of Constantinople surpasses the work of the military historian on this matter. Gregory Nazianzen claims with perfect credibility that a clever Persian, pretending to be in conflict with Shapur, had won Julian’s confidence and had promised to lead him by a shortcut in order to avoid a bend in the river Tigris. To make this easier, the false defector convinced the emperor to incinerate his fleet. 189

The raid is described in Ammianus, XIII.iii.4. Ammianus, XXIV.iv.1–7. 186 Ammianus, XXIV.v. 187 Ammianus, XXIV.vi. 188 Ammianus, XXIV.vii.3–5. The deceit of the Iranian defectors was confessed under torture (tortique perfugae aperte faterentur se fefellisse) (Ammianus, XXIV.vii.5). 189 Gregory Nazianzen, Oratio V.10–12. 184 185

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THE BATTLE OF CTESIPHON AND THE RETREAT OF THE ROMANS The region of the Persian capital was an agglomeration of several cities and towns which had superseded one another over the course of many centuries. One of these was Seleucia upon the Tigris river, which antique writers honoured as one of the finest cities of the east. 190 An ancient mixture of the Semitic and Iranian peoples had blended with the culture of their Macedonian conquerors, and adorned the favourable position of that city between the Euphrates and Tigris rivers. Nearby, across the Tigris was Ctesiphon which the Parthian kings had erected as their winter palace. In time, it became an important centre of trade, and the decay of Seleucia yielded to the flourishing of Ctesiphon. On the western bank of the Tigris, the first Sasanian monarch had founded Veh-Ardashir. With time the shifting of that river had divided Veh-Ardashir, and its eastern half was gradually absorbed into the city of Ctesiphon as its western portion fell into ruin. These cities were intersected and surrounded by the ancient dikes and canals of Mesopotamia. Some of these had been burst or diverted to retard the progress of the Roman army. Irrigation works in the fertile alluvium of Babylon, its shallow reed beds, fields of wheat and barley, and date groves announced the Sasanid capacity for agriculture and hydraulic infrastructure on a gigantic scale. 191 Julian and his men would have beheld structures of mud bricks dried by the heat of the sun and cemented by bitumen, ancient water mills, circular rafts fashioned of reeds, or boats made of hollow trees and covered with pitch, and plumes of smoke wafting from bitumen springs. 192 A learned Christian in Julian’s army would have recalled the journey of Abraham from Ur to Harran, or remembered the Psalmist’s invocation of the waters of Babylon where the captive Israelites lamented the loss of their homeland. 193 The imposing ruin of sand-strewn Seleucia and its derelict port clogged with silt would have formed a strange contrast with the impregnable ramparts of Ctesiphon; and nearby, Julian beheld a luxurious park filled with the animals of the Persian king, the melancholy frame of a palace in the Roman style, relics of the emperor Carus’ failed campaign, and the grim sight of corpses lately impaled in Veh-

190

Strabo, XVI.i.16; ii.5; Pliny, Natural History, VI.122. Adams, R. McC., Land Behind Baghdad: A History of Settlement on the Diyala Plains, 1965, p. 69–83. 192 Cf. Matthews, J., The Roman Empire of Ammianus, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989, p. 140–143. Ammianus specifically mentions a bitumen spring (Ammianus, XXIV.ii.3), the use of baked bricks (Ammianus, XXIV.ii.12), and a raft made of a hollow tree (Ammianus, XXIV.iv.8). I have supplied sights which were, and which remain, characteristic of lower Mesopotamia (cf. Pollock, S., Ancient Mesopotamia: The Eden That Never Was, 1999, p. 28–44). 193 Genesis 11:31 to 12:4; Acts 7:2–4; Psalm 137. 191

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Ardashir – a dreadful punishment for the men who had surrendered the fortress of Peroz-Shapur. 194 Below the walls of Ctesiphon, Iranian heavy cavalry assembled in close formation before the Roman army. Ammianus took note of the densely-fitted plate mail which clad the horsemen, and the raw hides covering their steeds: a dazzling spectacle under the light of the Mesopotamian sun. Behind them stood the infantry, armed with bows and arrows and oblong shields fashioned of wickerwork and hides. Last were the elephants, objects of fear and loathing, which Ammianus compares to walking hills. 195 A short battle ensued, and Ammianus claims that two-thousand five-hundred Persians were slain. Again the army of Shapur withdrew, some within the walls of the capital, and others dispersed themselves throughout the surrounding countryside. Neither the emperor nor his historian apprehended the severe danger to the Roman forces; and buoyed up by the appearance of a victory, Julian attempted to sacrifice ten bulls to Mars the Avenger. Nine of these animals fell to the ground willingly, and the tenth burst his bonds and fled. When the fugitive animal had been caught and slaughtered, the reading of its entrails was grim, and the fanatical emperor cried out to Jove in superstitious indignation. 196 Shapur was preoccupied with more serious matters. Only twelve ships survived Julian’s rash order, and a swift retreat was now impossible. Shapur immediately ordered the incineration of the circumjacent fields in order to restrict the Romans to a single place and to hinder the arrival of any allied force. Famine began to afflict Julian’s forces, his soldiers loudly demanded a retreat, and the word of the Etruscan soothsayers (which Julian vehemently rejected) warned against battle. Julian resolved to withdraw to Corduene, and on that melancholy journey divisions of the Persian army harried the Roman force. There were some small skirmishes over the course of a few days. Julian plunged himself into the midst of a mellay, having forgotten his coat of mail. A cavalryman’s spear pierced Julian’s right side and lodged itself in his liver, and the last pagan emperor of the Romans expired in his tent a few hours later – but not, Ammianus assures us, before pronouncing a turgid oration upon the course of his life and the necessity of death. 197

THE END OF THE WAR AND THE TREATY OF 363 Word of Julian’s death reached Shapur, who ordered an immediate assault upon the Roman rear guard. But the strength of Roman discipline held, and a retreat followed the elevation of the new emperor Jovian. 198 The Iranian army renewed its harassment of the Romans as they withdrew up the Tigris. Weary, famished, and muti194

Ammianus, XXIV.v.3. Ammianus, XXIV.vi.8. 196 Ammianus, XXIV.vi.17. 197 Ammianus, XXIV.iii.6–23. 198 Ammianus, XXV.vi. 195

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nous, Jovian’s force had not even crossed into Roman territory when Shapur’s offer of peace was made and accepted near Dura. Ammianus foolishly suggests that Shapur surrendered in fear of Roman revenge, but the Persian king plainly dictated terms to a humbled opponent. 199 The retreat of Jovian from the field gave way to a rout at the negotiating table. At the head of the Roman embassy were Arintheus and Salutius, two officers among Jovian’s senior staff, whose diplomatic antagonist was a member of the Suren family who vastly outwitted his Roman rivals. Ammianus laments that it would have been better to fight ten battles than to yield to a single Iranian demand, but Suren asked for and received Arzanene, Moxoene, Zabdicene, Rehimene, Corduene, as well as Nisibis, Singara, Castra Maurorum and fifteen other fortresses, and the Romans promised never again to ally themselves the Arsacid monarch of Armenia. 200 This treaty was to hold for thirty years. 201 The transfer of the city of Nisibis to Iranian control was a moment of high importance in both the history of the Near East and that of the Christian religion. The emperor Jovian commanded the evacuation of the populace of Nisibis, for which he allowed a mere three days. 202 The Iranian standard was hoisted above the city by its new governor, a Persian magnate called Binesh. The Roman army threatened with death the civilian population who would not vacate Nisibis, and Ammianus describes the melancholy scene which followed. No sound was heard but universal wailing, weeping throngs clung to the doors of their houses; and the countryside was filled with displaced persons transporting as much property as they could carry and going wherever they could find refuge. 203 Many were received at Amida, and the famous Syrian theological school at Nisibis was removed to Edessa where it was united with a similar institution under the leadership of St Ephraim the Syrian. 204

THE DISSOLUTION OF THE TREATY OF NISIBIS The Treaty of 363 had two other important effects. Although Ingilene and Sophene remained Roman, all lands to the east and south-east of the Nymphius and Tigris rivers were ceded to Iran. The Treaty of Nisibis had therefore been undone, and the Iranian sphere of influence was enlarged along the border with Rome. The cession of the fortresses at Singara and Nisibis undermined the Roman defensive system in eastern Mesopotamia. Iran now controlled the main routes to the Euphrates and

Ammianus, XXV.vii. Ammianus, XXV.vii.9–12. 201 For a analysis of the terms of the treaty, see Blockley, R. C., “The Romano-Persian Peace Treaties of A.D. 299 and 363,” Florilegium vol. 6, 1984, p. 34–38. 202 Ammianus, XXV.vii.11; XXV.ix.4. 203 Ammianus, XXV.ix.5–6. 204 Wood, P., The Chronicle of Seert: Christian Historical Imagination in Late Antique Iraq, Oxford, 2013, p. 27–28; Baum, B. / Winkler, D. W., The Church of the East, p. 11. 199 200

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Syria, the Tur ʿAbdin plain, and the Sinjar mountain range. The thirty years’ duration of the treaty provided time for Iran to consolidate her new position. 205

THE STATE OF ARMENIA AND THE EVENTS WHICH LED TO ITS DIVISION BETWEEN ROME AND IRAN Additional humiliations were forced upon the Romans, and their effect was greatly to increase Iranian influence in Armenia and the Transcaucasus. The embassy of Shapur had submitted the provision to the effect that the king of Armenia never be allowed to help the Romans against Iran – a clause designed to assure Iranian control over Armenia. The emperor’s ambassadors unwittingly agreed to this; and when Jovian died, Shapur felt no impediment to seizing the portion of Armenia which borders on Media, and he captured its king Arshak. 206 In the opinion of Ammianus, a dinner party was the occasion of this abduction, and Arshak was blinded, bound in chains of silver, and cast into the fortress of Agabana where he was tortured and killed. 207 The rule of Armenia passed to Pap, the son of Arshak, but Shapur instructed two Roman deserters, a eunuch by the name of Cylaces and a commander called Arraban, to watch over the new king. 208 This was a grim punishment for Armenia’s former alliance with Rome. Shapur then turned to Iberia and expelled the Roman client-king Sauromaces. In his place, an Iranian loyalist by the name of Asparug was appointed, and Ammianus interpreted this as an insult to Roman authority. 209 Ammianus describes a plot to persuade king Pap to betray his capital Artogerassa to Iran. Cylaces and Arraban were then ordered to threaten that Armenian fortress with total destruction, and a menacing Persian force was gathered before it. 210 But the interview between Shapur’s lieutenants and the Armenian king achieved the opposite of its intended effect. We cannot know what Pap promised, but Cylaces and Arraban defected to him, the gate of Artogerassa was thrown open, and an Armenian army sallied forth and attacked the Iranian camp. 211 Pap and his Blockley, R.C., “The Romano-Persian Peace Treaties,” p. 35. Ammianus, XXV.vii.12. 207 Ammianus, XXVII.xii.3. 208 Ammianus, XXVII.xii.5. In the work of Pawstos Buzandatsi, who narrates this episode also, these figures are not Roman deserters but the Iranian noblemen Zikh and Karen (Pawstos Buzandatsi, IV.55). 209 Ammianus claims that Shapur did this ut arbitrio se monstraret insultare nostrorum (Ammianus, XXVII.xii.4). Ammianus renders the name Asparug as Aspacures (Braund, D., Georgia in Antiquity, p. 215; 260). 210 Ammianus, XXVII.xii.5. For a modern summary and analysis of the Pap affair, see Blockley, R. C., Ammianus Marcellinus: A Study of his Historiography and Political Thought, 1975, p. 62– 72. 211 Ammianus, XXVII.xii.7–9. 205 206

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followers left the Roman defectors in Artogerassa, and fled to Roman territory. But Valens capitulated to a demand that Pap be returned to his throne on condition that he be denied royal insignia. 212 By the stipulation of this condition, Valens had hoped to avoid violating the peace treaty signed under Jovian and Shapur, but he failed. In a transport of rage, Shapur commanded the devastation of Armenia. 213 Many strongholds were taken by force or betrayal; and Shapur stormed Artogerassa, and carried off the wife of the late Arshak and mother of Pap, and emptied the city of all its treasures. Cylaces and Arraban were murdered and their severed heads were tokens of Pap’s submission to Shapur. The Roman response to Pap’s Persian obedience was to return the client king Sauromaces to the throne of Iberia. But the Persian loyalist Asparug, who yet ruled that nation, proposed the intolerable plan that he and Sauromaces rule Iberia together. 214 The emperor Valens suggested a partition of Iberia, Shapur refused, and war was resumed without a decisive outcome. 215 Intrigue and subterfuge continued until the Gothic invasion of Thrace forced the Romans to withdraw from the contest to the south of the Caucasus. A plot organised by the Roman commander in Armenia ended the life and reign of Pap. 216 A Persian embassy to Valens presented the choice of vacating Armenia or withdrawing from Roman Iberia. 217 Valens refused the choice, and sent a vague ultimatum to Shapur to the effect that the Persian king would soon be forced to do what he would not do willingly. This antagonism issued in the partition of Armenia between Iran and Rome in the year 387: a settlement which appeared to remove the greatest cause of dispute between the two great powers. 218 Ammianus’ narrative of the troubles in Armenia is largely reliable. 219 But the pagan historian omits the important facts that the party which opposed Pap was the faction of Christian Armenia led by Narses, the patriarch of that nation; and that Pap, his antagonist, inclined to the old religion and disdained the worship of Christ, and his party had sympathies with Iran. The religious and social character of this contest was of great importance in the history of the Armenian nation, and was the Ammianus, XXVII.xii.10. Shapur was ultra hominem efferatus (Ammianus, XXVII.xii.11). 214 The two men were, after all, cousins. 215 Ammianus, XXVII.xii.18; XXIX.i.4; Braund, D., Georgia in Antiquity, 1994, p. 260–261. 216 Pap was killed at a luncheon by an assassin (Ammianus, XXX.i.18–21). 217 Ammianus, XXX.ii.2. 218 According to Ammianus, Armenia was perpetua aerumnarum causa (Ammianus, XXX.ii.2). The date of the partition has been controversial (Blockley, R. C. “The Division of Armenia Between the Romans and the Persians at the end of the Fourth Century A.D.,” Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte, Bd. 36, H. 2, 1987, p. 222–234). But I am inclined to adopt the dating proposed by Greatrex (Greatrex, G. B., “The Background and Aftermath of the Partition of Armenia in A.D. 387,” The Ancient History Bulletin, 14.1–1, 2000, p. 35–48). For the partition in the Armenian historical tradition, see Pawstos Buzandatsi, VI.I. 219 Blockley, R. C., Ammianus Marcellinus, p. 68–70. 212 213

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chief interest of its historians, but the indigenous history of Iran takes no notice of it.

THE COLLAPSE OF IRAN’S EASTERN FRONTIER Exerting control over Armenia was not Shapur’s sole preoccupation toward the end of his reign. Two slim notices in the Epic Histories of Armenian historian Pawstos Buzandatsi describe warfare in the northeast against a foreign enemy. That Armenian historian invokes the foreigners under the archaising name of Kushan. But to judge by later developments, Shapur’s antagonists were most certainly the same confederation of Huns whom he had confronted in the 350s, but they had been united under a new ruling house. In the year 367 Shapur led his forces in person and was defeated. 220 He had brought with him a large contingent of Armenian soldiers, many of whom were captured by the enemy, but they fought with equal bravery and loyalty. It was said that, in the midst of battle, Shapur was surrounded by Huns and was rescued by an Arsacid eunuch. A later confrontation in about the year 375 ended in a worse humiliation. 221 Shapur, who had not commanded the host a second time, avoided capture and death; but of the army which he had assembled not a single Iranian soldier survived: only two Armenians, Manuel and Koms Mamikonean, escaped to bring word of defeat to Shapur. The most serious consequence of Shapur’s contest with the Huns was the collapse of Sasanian power in the east. The Sasanian Kushan state had been founded as a buffer between Iran and the Asiatic steppe. But towards the end of the fourth century this buffer was overwhelmed by the Huns, repeated efforts to retain it failed, and these grim reverses foreshadowed the troubles which nearly destroyed the Iranian empire in the century that followed. 222

220

Pawstos Buzandatsi, V.7. Pawstos Buzandatsi, V.37. 222 Rezakhani, K., ReOrienting the Sasanians, 2017, p. 85; de la Vaissière, E., “Kushanshahs, i. History,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, online edition, 2016. 221

IV. THE WORLD OF THE NOMAD Shapur II had restored the honour of the Sasanian state and raised its military and diplomatic powers higher than ever before. The establishment of a secure border along the desert frontage of Arabia; the transformation of a portion of the Huns into an ally; the total humiliation of the Romans; and the dissolution of the Treaty of Nisibis were the achievements of a vigorous and energetic king. But the victory of the year 363 had come at a high cost. A large portion of the agricultural heartland of Iran was in ruins: canals had been diverted, dikes burst, plains flooded, and vast swathes of Mesopotamia had been trampled or reduced to ashes. Much of Shapur’s later reign must have been devoted to repairing, and perhaps to augmenting Iranian infrastructure and defences. In the interval of peace which followed the death of Shapur in 379, that king’s successors continued a project of renewal.

THE AUGMENTATION OF SASANIAN DEFENCES The first task must have been to restore Iran’s western infrastructure. So sensible were the Sasanian monarchs of the importance of lower Mesopotamia that it was their most serious care to fortify and defend it. The lowlands of Babylon were alike the political and economic heartland of the empire: here was the seat of the Sasanid monarchy, and here the fruits of agriculture and land taxes sustained a large standing army. Herodotus had observed that the plain of Babylon was the most fertile land in the world, and that the absence of rain in that country necessitated a network of canals which conveyed the waters of the Euphrates and Tigris rivers to vast plantations of wheat, millet, and sesame. 1 But under the rule of the Sasanids, the size and complexity of those irrigation works reached a height that had not been seen before and which has never been equalled. 2 These works would have been rehabilitated immediately, as was, perhaps, much of the local industry.

1

Herodotus, I.193.1–3. Butzer, K. W., “Environmental Change in the Near East,” p. 123–151; Adams, R. McC., Heartland of Cities:, p. 200–214; Adams, R. McC., “Agriculture and Urban Life in Early SouthWestern Iran,” p. 436–465; Adams, R. McC., Land Behind Baghdad, p. 69–83. 2

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The forward defences which guarded the approach to the Iranian capital would also have been repaired and perhaps strengthened. A line of island fortresses supported by the heavily fortified city of Peroz-Shapur augmented the natural bulwark of the Euphrates river. 3 Many of these forts had been damaged or destroyed in the emperor Julian’s progress towards Ctesiphon. The fosse which ran from Hit to Peroz-Shapur may have been restored or strengthened also. The river Tigris was reinforced and defended by the imposing fortress of Nisibis, lately wrested from Roman control, and it is probable that other Roman forts in the upper Tigris valley were taken over also. The fortress of Chlomaron and several other forts, guarded Arzanene and the frontier on the river Batman. 4 The defence of Persian Armenia appears to have been entrusted to local noblemen and an Iranian garrison at Dvin – an important administrative matter, but entailing comparatively little infrastructure.

PEACE IN THE WEST AND ROMAN DISTRACTION The Treaty of 363 had promised thirty years of peace with Iran’s Roman foe. But the western frontier remained stable for longer than expected. The partition of Armenia between Iran and Rome removed a perpetual stimulus to warfare, but the abasement of the Roman state after a military disaster compelled that power to relinquish its hostility to Iran. The flight of the Huns had displaced many other peoples; and a population of Huns, who had moved far westward into the vicinity of the northern shores of the Caspian Sea, expelled from the Ukrainian steppe a people whose name is associated with the extinction of Roman government in western Europe. The Goths fled southward below the Danube river, and the Roman struggle to control these dangerous migrants and to restore order in the plains of Thrace gave way to the worst military disaster in Roman history. 5 In the year 378, at the Battle of Adrianople, most of the Roman army was destroyed and the emperor Valens himself perished. The example of the Roman defeat must have suggested that incursions from the steppe were more threatening to the great powers than either was to the other.

THE HUNNISH INVASIONS OF THE LATE FOURTH CENTURY AND THEIR CONSEQUENCES Echoes of Tocharian troubles under the reign of the Parthian kings reverberated in Iranian lore. The Alan invasion through the Gurgan plain down into Media in the reign of Walagash I may have made a similar impression. But the historian must wonder in vain whether the Sasanid administration retained any institutional 3

Some of these are described in Ammianus, XXIV.i.6; ii.1–2. Cf. Howard-Johnston, J., “The Two Great Powers,” p. 181–186; 188–189. 4 Howard-Johnston, J., “The Two Great Powers,” p. 190. 5 On the Germanic migrations, see Heather, P., Empires and Barbarians: the Fall of Rome and the Birth of Europe, 2009, p. 151–188.

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memory of those events, for it was only at the end of the fourth century that the Sasanian monarchy began the project of fortifying their northern and eastern borders against nomadic incursions. Shapur II had waged two wars against the Huns in years 367 and 376. These had issued in defeat and humiliation, and had perhaps invited further antagonism. In the year 395, the sudden penetration of the Huns through the Caucasus passes, down the Euphrates, and into the vicinity of Ctesiphon 6 precipitated a change of policy. The Huns spread devastation on both sides of Iran’s border with Rome, and captives were seized and deported from Armenia, Mesopotamia, Syria, Cappadocia, and Galatia. In Iran, villages between the two rivers were destroyed and fields were devastated, but the Persian capital was spared aggression. A similar but less destructive invasion was reiterated in the year 397 or 398. A counterattack was prepared, a contingent of Huns fell to the arms of Iran, their haul of booty was retrieved, and eighteen thousand Roman captives were rescued from that ferocious nation. Bahram IV, the Sasanian monarch at that time, treated the Roman peace with such respect that he allowed the Roman captives to live in Veh-Ardashir and Ctesiphon, and he granted them rations of bread, wine made of both the grape and the date, and oil; and he sent most of them back to their own lands. The few prisoners remaining thereafter were returned in the reign of Yazdgard I. The Hunnish invasions taught the Sasanid monarchy that gaps in Iran’s natural defences must be plugged and fortified. The two great powers were especially vulnerable in the Caucasus: a region which possessed strategic importance and which was naturally troublesome. The empires of Iran and Rome had a mutual interest in protecting the terrestrial and maritime trade which passed through the Caucasus, and commercial relations might be conducted there without trespassing upon the territory of a rival power. But few roads crossed this forbidding and mountainous area, through which invaders were likely to be concentrated as they swarmed southward towards the settled powers of the Near East. Routes along the shores of the Black and Caspian seas, the Darial Pass, and the Caucasian and Caspian gates (as they were known) were the principal weakness in the Caucasus which the Empire of Iran was at pains to secure. 7 The small, but important, countries of Iberia and Alba-

6

Chronicle to 724, p. 136–137. For a discussion of this, and sources related to it, see Greatrex, G. / Lieu, S. N. C., The Roman Eastern Front and the Persian Wars, p. 17–19 and Greatrex, G. / Greatrex, M., “The Hunnic Invasion of the East of 395 and the Fortress of Ziatha,” Byzantion, tome LXIX, fascicule 1, 1999, p. 65–75. 7 John Lydus, De Magistratibus, III.52; Priscus, frag. 41.1 in Blockley, R. C., The Fragmentary Classicising Historians of the Later Roman Empire: Eunapius, Olympiodorus, Priscus, and Malchus, II, 1983, p. 344–346; Dignas, B. / Winter, E., Rome and Persia in Late Antiquity, p. 188–189; Braund, D., Georgia in Antiquity: A History of Colchis and Transcaucasian Iberia 550 BC – AD 562, 1994, p. 44–46.

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nia held many Iranian fortresses including the Caucasian Gates, and so maintaining peace and order in that region was vitally important to the security of Iran. The passage between the foothills of the Caucasus and the western shore of the Caspian was the easiest route from the northern steppe southward into Transcaucasia. It was this narrow strip of land which, nearly a millennium earlier, had conducted the Scythians into Media, 8 and it may have been the route of the marauding Alans also. The Sasanid state strengthened this vulnerable area with a series of walls at Darband. 9 Two parallel walls there were about thirteen feet in thickness and sixty-five feet high, and were strengthened by a procession of seventy-three enormous watch towers placed about two hundred and thirty feet apart. Twenty-seven round towers were built about every five-hundred and fifty to six-hundred and fifty feet. By the sixth century, limestone slabs covered those walls; and in their final form, the defences at Darband linked a fortified harbour to the foot of the Caucasus. A third stone wall marched westward for about twenty-one miles into the mountains, and was adorned by towers and forty small forts, and to the south were two more defensive walls. A large fortified compound about twelve miles to the south of the outer Darband wall served as a place to muster troops, and perhaps as a garrison for reinforcements. At the river Ghilghilchay, in what is now called Azerbaijan, was a wall of mud brick about twenty-three feet in thickness and twenty-three feet high. 10 This wall extended for five miles and terminated in a large, square fortified camp at the base of the Caucasus. A long moat, thirty-three feet wide, followed the wall in parallel. One hundred and ninety towers, separated by intervals of one hundred and twentyeight feet defended this wall as it proceeded for twenty-two miles into the Caucasus. The security of that region was assured by blocking the passes and narrow defiles in those formidable mountains, and the most important fortification closed and defended the Darial Pass. 11 The defensive works which established and fortified the 8

Herodotus, I.104. My views of Iran’s eastern defences are founded on Lawrence, D. / Wilkinson, T. J., “The Northern and Western Borderlands of the Sasanian Empire,” p. 99–125; Howard-Johnston, J., “The Sasanian State,” p. 148–157; Howard-Johnston, J., “The Late Sasanian Army,” p. 100–104, and Howard-Johnston, J., “The Two Great Powers,” p. 192–195. All measurements are expressed in imperial units which are more familiar to an Anglo-Saxon and NorthAmerican audience. 10 For a thorough historiographical and archaeological discussion of this wall, see Aliev, A. A., et al., “The Ghilghilchay Defensive Long Wall: New Investigations,” Ancient West and East 5, 2006, p. 143–177. 11 Priscus, frag. 47 in Blockley, R. C., The Fragmentary Classicising Historians, p. 352–354. The name of this fortress is written defectively in Prsicus’ history as Ἰουροειπαὰχ and in John Lydus as Βιραπαράχ (John Lydus, de Magistratibus, III.52). Kettenhofen believes that this was the name of the fortress at Darial Pass, and the name is probably a corruption of Vrkaparakh: the Armenian words for ‘Iberian fortress’ (Kettenhofen, E., “Darband,” in Encyclo9

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limits of the Iranian empire in the Caucasus served a double purpose. Evidence suggests that the fields behind those defences were carefully irrigated by means of long canals, and the yield of agriculture and taxation must have been formidable. The Caucasian bulwarks ensured that the Iranian government might profit fully from arable land to the south of that dangerous region. 12

THE WALL OF GURGAN But Iran was most vulnerable on the eastern side of the Caspian Sea. Here an inviting, fertile plain was a constant enticement to marauders from the steppe. Here the civilised empire of the Sasanids passed insensibly into the abode of demons and the habitation of the nomad. 13 Fear of this strange outer world and its inhabitants was expressed in literary form in the grim struggle between Iran and Turan narrated in the Shahnameh. It found physical expression in the largest and most heavily defended wall in western Asia. The wall of Gurgan 14 ran one hundred and twenty-one miles from the eastern shore of the Caspian Sea to the Pishkamar mountains and into those of the Arab Dagh. It was such an imposing fortification that the Iranian Christian imagination transformed it into a barrier erected by Alexander the Great to retard the advance of Gog and Magog. 15 The wall was enclosed by a large moat to the north and to the south flowed the Gurgan river, and this triple line of defence was punctuated by a series of thirty-six fortresses. A well-fortified base overlooking the fertile plain of Gurgan was an important command centre for operations south of the wall and the river. A smaller wall, known as the wall of Tammishe, defended the southern coast of the Caspian and its approach to Tabaristan, terminating at the foothills of the Alburz mountains; and a cluster of forts secured the Atrek valley which penetrates deep into Khurasan. Further to the east Sasanian defensive policy paedia Iranica, Vol. VII, Fasc. 1, 1994, p. 13–19). This is, alas, the only fortress in the Caucasus mentioned in the historical record, but there were nine passes through the Caucasus (Braund, D., Georgia in Antiquity, p. 44), and so there was surely a similar number of fortresses. 12 Alizadeh, K., “Borderland Projects of Sasanian Empire: Intersection of Domestic and Foreign Policies,” Journal of Ancient History, 2(2), 2014, p. 93–115. 13 Afrasiab, the principal antagonist of Iranian mythology who dwells in the Asiatic steppe, is portrayed a demon in Zoroastrian holy writ (Denkard, III.110; Bundahishn, XXXIII.5–6). See also Cereti, C., “Xiiaona and Xyon in Zoroastrian Texts,” in Alram, M. (ed.), Coins, Art, and Chronology, vol. 2: The First Millennium, C. E. in the Indo-Iranian Borderlands, 2010, p. 59–72. 14 My understanding of the wall of Gurgan, its construction, and purpose is founded upon Sauer, E. W. / Rekavandi, H. O. / Wilkinson, T. J. / Nokandeh, J., Persia’s Imperial Power in Late Antiquity: The Great Wall of Gorgan and Frontier Landscapes of Sasanian Iran, 2013, and Howard-Johnston, J., “The Sasanian State,” p. 155–156. 15 See Ferdowsi, Sikander, l. 1621–1682. For an exhaustive treatment of the legends associated with Gog and Magog, see van Donzel, E. J. et al., Gog and Magog in Early Christian and Islamic Sources: Sallam’s Quest for Alexander’s Wall, 2010.

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aimed at deploying massive force in order to intercept an invader. The ancient Achaemenid city of Marv became a Sasanian outpost on the fringe of Central Asia, a place from which to launch missions of reconnaissance and perhaps to analyse intelligence. The city of Nishapur, capital of Khurasan, was the main base from which eastern Iran was defended. Cavalry, which formed the core of the Sasanian military, would have been stationed there in large numbers.

THE CHRONOLOGY OF SASANIAN FORTIFICATIONS The defences, which I have just described, were augmented or installed over the course of about a century and a half. We cannot know the dates or the precise order of each phase of rehabilitation or construction. But it is reasonable to assume that work began soon after the peace of 363, was repeated after the Hunnish raids of the 390s, and proceeded far into the fifth century. The fortification in stone represent a later phase of construction – perhaps as late as the reigns of Kavad I or Khusro I. 16 The wall of Gurgan was Iran’s largest investment in military infrastructure at any time in Antiquity or the Middle Ages, and it announced the Sasanian capacity for planning and executing defensive projects on a gigantic scale. Radio-carbon dating places the construction of the wall between the early fifth and the early sixth centuries, and it was surely complete before Peroz’ disastrous Hephthalite war in the year 484. 17

THE HUNS AND THEIR INFLUENCE UPON IRAN The government of Ardashir I had aimed to restore the dignity of Iran and that king had inaugurated a project of warfare in the west. That contest between Iran and Rome might have proceeded without interruption, or decisive outcome, as long as the eastern borderlands of Iran were secure. The tranquillity of the east gave way to disorder and confusion in the reign of Shapur II, and the westward migration of the Huns forced Iran to look to the north and the east from the middle of the fourth century onward. In earlier ages, the Huns left the steppe to pillage, and sometimes to destroy, the sedentary lands of China. The payment of tribute and the formation of marriage alliances were calculated to appease the northern barbarians and to protect China from destructive incursions. 18 The Huns were to enforce upon the Sasanid state a similar tributary condition; 19 and the formidable ramparts at Gurgan and 16

Howard-Johnston, J., “The Sasanian State,” p. 151; Aliev, A. A., et al., “The Ghilghilchay Defensive Long Wall,” p. 145–147. 17 Sauer, E. W. / Rekavandi, H. O. / Wilkinson, T. J. / Nokandeh, J., Persia’s Imperial Power, p. 616–619; Howard-Johnston, J., “The Sasanian State,” p. 155–156. 18 Barfield, T. J., The Perilous Frontier, p. 45–49. 19 My view of the Huns follows Payne, R. “The Reinvention of Iran: The Sasanian Empire and the Huns” in Maas, M. (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Attila, 2015, p. 282– 299, and Kim, H. J., The Huns, Rome, and the Birth of Europe, p. 59.

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in the Caucasus may be compared with those raised by the first Qin emperor to divide the agricultural, sedentary world from the mobile horsemen of the north. The kings of Iran had been accustomed to assert the majesty of an empire which subordinated to itself all other earthly powers, and claimed an hereditary right to the patrimony of both Cyrus and Alexander. With the passage of time, such ideas gave way to an admission of equality with Iran’s principal western antagonist. Together Iran and Rome were transmuted into the two robust supports of human civilisation and sedentary order, and this idea took shape amidst implacable warfare with the Huns. Iranian lore and holy writ represented the Asiatic steppe as the abode of the most ancient enemies of Iran. The struggles against the new rulers of the steppe revived the memory of those antique conflicts, and the contest between Iran and the Huns acquired a religious and epic character reminiscent of the holy books of Zoroastrianism. 20 The word Hun is not an ethnic name. 21 We must not think of a homogeneous band of wandering marauders who remained a single nation over the course of a millennium, but rather of a political expression which united various peoples under a curious amalgam of the customs of the steppe and the bureaucratic apparatus of China which they had imitated. 22 Chinese textual evidence proves that the Huns had been in Central Asia at about the same time as they appeared upon Shapur II’s eastern frontier. A single wave of migration had transported the Huns out of China; but the successive clans which ruled over them may be mistaken for different nations, and the consequences of an imaginary invasion have often falsely explained the fall of an old, and the rise of a new, clan. There may have been many Hunnish clans, but only two are known for certain: they were called Kidiro and Ebodalo in the Bactrian language, and Jiduoluo and Yeda in Chinese. 23 Classicising sources call them the Kir-

20

Cf. Payne, R. “The Reinvention of Iran,” p. 284. De la Vaissière, E., “The Steppe World and the Rise of the Huns” in Maas, M. (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Attila, 2015, p. 178–182. Most of the main Chinese sources on the Huns are set forth, translated, and analysed in de la Vaissière, E., “The Nationality of the Hephthalites?” Bulletin of the Asia Institute, New Series, vol. 17, 2003, p. 119–132. 22 One of the main points of Kim’s study of the Huns is that that people possessed a complex and well-developed form of government (Kim, H. J., The Huns, Rome, and the Birth of Europe, 2013); Payne, R. “The Making of Turan: The Fall and Transformation of the Iranian East in Late Antiquity” in Journal of Late Antiquity, Volume 9, Number 1, Spring 2016, p. 10. Crossley calls the Huns a ‘hierarchical booty network’ (Crossley, P. K., Hammer and Anvil: Nomad Rulers at the Forge of the Modern World, 2019, p. 48). 23 Rezakhani, K., ReOrienting the Sasanians, p. 93; 134; Grenet, F., “Kidarites,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, 2005; Alram, M., “Hunnic Coinage,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, Vol. XII, Fasc. 6, 2005, p. 570–573. The name of the ruling clan of the Huns whom Shapur II confronted is not known, but it is possible that it was Kidarite also. 21

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darite and Hepthalite Huns. 24 The indigenous Iranian tradition confounds both clans under the anachronistic name of Turk, although the word Haital is occasionally used for the Hephthalite Huns. At the end of the reign of Yazdgard I, the Kidarite Huns dominated much of Inner Asia. They maintained their Hunnish identity, but they promoted the culture of the sedentary peoples over whom they ruled. They preserved the title ‘King of the Kushans’ and built cities according to a Hellenistic grid plan. The Kidarite Huns had conquered territories on either side of the Hindukush mountains, and they posed a very grave threat to the Gupta empire of India. During the reign of king Kumaragupta I, 25 the Kidarite Huns invaded the Punjab and very nearly destroyed the Gupta empire later in the fifth century. It was only the revolution which installed the Hephthalite clan that delayed the extinction of that Indian state. 26 The Kidarite Huns defeated the armies of Iran many times, and they imposed a tribute upon the Sasanian dynasty. The payment of subsidies to the Huns was not a burden upon the Iranian treasury, but it was nonetheless humiliating. 27 The purity of the Sasanian drachm had replaced nearly every heterogeneous currency of the Near East and had united in a common imperial project the noble houses of Parthia. The drachm was alike a symbol of the Sasanian empire and a reward for participating in that structure of power. Assuring a steady supply of Sasanian silver coins overstruck with their own legends gave the Huns the appearance of legitimacy: it allowed them to retain the military services of other nomads, and it helped them to persuade the settled peoples over whom they ruled that the customary fiscal system and economic order had not changed. The conquest and use of Sasanian mints assisted this policy also. There is perhaps no more convincing proof that the Huns had formed a potent state and that they represented a threat which could not easily be removed. Tribute may have begun in, or before, the reign of Yazdgard I when Iran required peace on all fronts. Payment continued throughout the reign of his son and successor Bahram V, but was halted in the reign of Yazdgard II. 28 This was cause for a war in which Iran achieved some important victories. Toward the end of that same reign, the Sasanian state attempted to reverse the tribute to which it had been subjected: another war ensued, Iran was again humiliated, and all previous gains over the Huns were overturned. The empire of Iran descended into civil war, but the Hephthalite Huns intervened on the side of Peroz who became the next Sasanian king. Toward the end of the fifth century, the Hephthalite clan cooperated with Iran for the destruction of their mutual rival the Kidarites. But the ascendancy of 24

To take just two examples see Priscus, frag. 33 in Blockley, R. C., The Fragmentary Classicising Historians, p. 336, and Procopius I.iii.1–7. 25 He reigned AD 413 to 455. 26 Kim, J., The Huns, 2016, p. 50. 27 Payne, R. “The Making of Turan,” p. 11–19. 28 Priscus, frag. 41.3 in Blockley, R. C., The Fragmentary Classicising Historians, p. 348.

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the Hephthalite Huns would soon prove to be the most formidable threat confronted by the House of Sasan, 29 and a war in the year 484 was to end in the death of Peroz, the annihilation of the Iranian army, and immense strain upon the Iranian social order.

THE SUCCESSORS TO SHAPUR II The Persian royal tradition offers only meagre treatment of the three reigns which followed the death of Shapur II. Such scant notices can hardly form the basis of a narrative, and they offer little insight into the grim conflict waged along Iran’s north-eastern frontier, and so the historian must often turn to the evidence of foreign sources, royal monuments, and coins. Ardashir II reigned for four years. He was not the son, but rather the younger brother of his predecessor Shapur II. 30 The Persian royal tradition reports a brief and troubled reign: according the historian Tabari, Ardashir II was an unpopular king who murdered a great number of his nobility and was deposed. 31 Ardashir’s short reign is commemorated in the rock of Taq-e Bostan near the modern city of Kermanshah. His forefathers had carved their images in Persia near the site of Persepolis, but this custom ceased toward the end of the fourth century. 32 The style and execution of the relief of Ardashir differ from earlier models which emphasised the king’s equestrian and divine attributes. Ardashir II is rather depicted standing on the lifeless body of a Roman, and he is flanked by the divinity Mithra and another figure which may represent the god Ahura Mazda, or perhaps Shapur II. 33 The god, or the king, bestows the ring of power upon the new Sasanian monarch. If the body of the Roman may be said to represent the emperor Julian, 34 we may perhaps infer that Ardashir had assisted at the mellay in which that emperor perished. But despite the innovative themes of Ardashir’s investiture, the execution of the relief is crude, and may signify extreme haste or that the workmen were unskilled in the art of carving. 35 For the two kings who followed Ardahsir II upon the throne, the Persian tradition provides only exiguous notices of murder. Shapur III (son of Shapur II) and 483F

48F

485F

486F

487F

48F

29

Kim, J., The Huns, 2016, p. 52–53. Agathias, Historiae, IV.26; For other opinions, see Shahbazi, S., “Ardašīr III” in Encyclopaedia Iranica, Vol. II, Fasc. 4, 1986, p. 380–381. 31 Tabari, v. 2, p. 62: 30

32

.���‫ ��لعه الناس بعد أربع سن�ن من مل‬،ً ‫ فقتل م��م �لقا ً كث��ا‬،‫ف�� ّا استقر ّ به ا��ل� قراره عطف ا�ى العظماء وذوى ا�� ياسة‬

This must mean that the political centre of Iran had shifted from the ancient Achaemenid heartland towards Mesopotamia. 33 Ghirshman, R., Iran: Parthes et Sassanides, p. 190–191. I have supplied the inference that one of the figures may represent Shapur II. 34 Shahbazi, S., “Ardašīr III,” p. 380–381. 35 Ghirshman, R., Iran: Parthes et Sassanides, p. 191.

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Bahram IV (son of Shapur III) 36 alike perished on hunting expeditions: the former is said to have died in his tent when a band of assassins caused that structure to collapse upon him; and the latter was shot with arrows, apparently by accident. 37 These notices may conceal plots to bring down two unpopular or weak kings and may adumbrate fratricidal contests and factional strife within the Sasanian court amidst the grim struggle with the Huns. It is not surprising that numismatic evidence connects the reign of Shapur III with an important reverse in the east. A population of Huns had taken control of the mint at Kabul, and the drachms which were produced there were overstruck with a Bactrian inscription representing the origin of the conquerors and announcing that those Huns had both usurped the power and prestige of the Sasanian monarchy and extended it into Central Asia. 38 This conquest must have been received with great alarm at the court of Shapur III, and would have added to the troubles of his reign.

THE REIGN OF YAZDGARD I A measure of stability returned with the reign of Yazdgard I. It was the policy of that king to pacify his frontier with Rome, and so sensible was Yazdgard of the necessity of peace in the west that he reversed the attitude of his government to Christianity. 39 By the end of the third century, the number of Christian proselytes within the empire of Iran had grown into a significant minority. Those sectaries had attracted the attention of the priest Kirder, who boasted of tormenting them. The intolerance of Bahram II failed to distinguish between the votaries of Christ and those of Mani, and the Chronicle of Seert holds that a persecution of both religions continued until the differences between either faith were explained to the Persian king. 40 But such real or imaginary suffering failed to halt the spread of the new religion within Iran, and greater troubles awaited. In the late third and early fourth centuries, the bishop of Seleucia-Ctesiphon, the see connected with the Persian capital, was Papa bar Aggai, and it was his solemn purpose to unite the jarring sects of Iranian Christendom, to establish a regular episcopal succession, and to make himself the primate or cathol-

36

There is some confusion as to his genealogy (Klíma, O., “Bahrām IV,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, III/5, p. 514–522. 37 Dinawari, p. 53. 38 Schindel, N., Sylloge Nummorum Sasanidarum, Band III/1, p. 282–284. See also Payne, R. “The Making of Turan,” p. 11–12. 39 Decret, F., “Les Consequences sure le Christianisme en Perse de l’affrontement des empires romain et sassanide: de Shapur Ier à Yazdgard Ier,” Recherches Augustiniennes XIV, 1979, p. 149–152. 40 Chronicle of Seert I(1), p. 237–238.

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icus, of all Iranian Christians. 41 The various names under which Iranian Christians were known announce the absence of ecclesiastical uniformity and discipline to which Papa reacted. ‘Christian’ was regularly applied to persons deported from the Roman empire: the Messians and Nazorenes may have differed from them on points of doctrine and ritual, and a single city may have hosted more than one bishop. 42 But the efforts of Papa were initially defeated at a synod of the year 315, and his principle opponent was Simon bar Sabbaʿe, his own deacon. But the intervention of bishops from across the Roman frontier, to whom Papa appealed, swung a later vote in his favour, and Simon was induced to favour the new arrangement by a promise that the patriarchal throne would pass to him at the death of Papa. 43 The community of Iranian Jews enjoyed a special relationship with the Persian king though their leader the Exilarch, and it was surely this example which prompted the organisation which Papa had imagined. The deacon Simon, as it was said, had enjoyed the favour of Shapur II, and the Christians of Iran may have looked forward to orderly and harmonious relations with the court at Ctesiphon. But this was not to be, for Simon and his colleagues were caught up in the violence of the 340s, they perished as martyrs, and the project of Iranian Christian unity and royal patronage, or at least toleration, was suspended until the reign of Yazdgard I. Enforcing the maxims of intolerance and hatred is an operation of great cost requiring the full participation of the apparatus of government. Cancelling the base expedient of persecuting the real or imaginary allies of Rome allowed the resources of the state to be deployed more fully and with greater effect for the project of fortifying the north-eastern borders of Iran. But even at the distance of more than fifteen centuries, it is possible to perceive that the policy of Yazdgard divided his nobility and clergy. Persian tradition preserves the relics of noble and clerical hatred

41

Baum, W. / Winkler, D. W., The Church of the East, p. 9–10. The person and activities of Papa may be entirely legendary. On the title catholicus, see De Vries, W., “Der KatholikosPatriarch der persischen Kirche,” Ostkirchliche Studien 33/1, 1984, p. 21–45 and Fiey, J. M., “Les étapes de la prise de conscience de son identité patriarcale par l’église syrienne orientale,” L’Orient Syrien 12/1, 1967, p. 3–22. I owe the last two references to Christelle Jullien. 42 I am following Smith, K., Constantine and the Captive Christians of Persia, p. 132–135, and Greatrex, G., “The Romano-Persian Frontier and the Context of the Book of Steps,” Heal, K. S. / Kitchen, R., Breaking the Mind: New Studies in the Syriac Book of Steps, 2014, p. 24–27, who summarise the copious evidence for this problem. However, the Jullien twins have noted that the term, which I construe as Nazorene, may have been one of abuse without reference to liturgical or ecclesiastical differences (Jullien, C. / Jullien, F., “Aux frontières de l’iranité : “nāṣrāyē” et “krīstyonē” des inscriptions du mobad Kirdīr. Enquête littéraire et historique,” Numen 49, 2002, p. 282–335). 43 This curious affair is narrated only in the Chronicle of Arbela (Kawerau, P. / Króll, T., The Chronicle of Arbela, 1985, p. 22–23).

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for the tolerance of Christianity and for peace with Rome. 44 The warmongering of aristocrats and the bigotry of hierophants imposed themselves upon the will and confidence of a king who saw what was in the best interests of his empire. But three facts allow us to judge that Yazdgard was not only realistic but also sincere. I. The Roman emperor Arcadius, who reigned until the year 408, is said to have asked Yazdgard to be the guardian of his son and successor Theodosius. This important request is reported first by Procopius, the most important historian of the reign of the emperor Justinian, but the truth of that report is vehemently denied by the historian Agathias. 45 Later emperors of Rome and Sasanian kings were united by ties similar to what Procopius alleges, but there is no evidence that the proposed adoption occurred. But stronger bonds between Ctesiphon and Constantinople were more than merely a political symbol. The Chronography of Theophanes, a work of the ninth century of our era, records that Yazdgard dispatched to the court at Constantinople a eunuch by the name of Antiochus whose task was to assure a smooth transfer of power to Theodosius. 46 The very fact that the adoption was mooted announces an easing of tension between the two great powers, but the career of Antiochus suggests that the belligerency of Shapur II had given way to a policy of intimate diplomatic involvement in Roman affairs. 47 II. A law within the Code of Justinian refers to an agreement of about the year 408 which regulated trade between the two great powers. 48 The exchange of goods was limited to the cities of Callinicum, Nisibis, and the Armenian city of Artaxata, the last two of which were controlled by Iran. The experience of warfare under Shapur II had perhaps taught the Romans to fear Iranian spies, and so Yazdgard conceded that espionage by merchants should be rigorously punished by exile and confiscation of property. This agreement represents a genuine effort to protect and to regulate the border with Rome. It proves that Yazdgard exerted himself in defence of the financial interests of his empire but willingly paid a high price for peace by reducing Iran’s capacity to gather intelligence along its western frontier.

44

Dinawari, p. 53; Tabari, v. 2, p. 63–65. This is why Yazdgard I is called ‘the sinner’ in the Persian royal tradition (cf. Mosig-Walburg, K., “Yazdgerd I., „der Sünder“,” in Gignoux, P. / Jullien, C. / Jullien, F. (eds), Trésors d’Orient: Mélanges offerts à Rika Gyselen, (Studia Iranica, Cahier 42), Paris, 2009, p. 245–268). 45 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.ii.6–10; Agathias, Historiae, IV.26.3–7. 46 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 80. 47 Dignas, B. / Winter, E., Rome and Persia in Late Antiquity, 2007, p. 94–96. On the career of Antiochus, see Greatrex, G. / Bardill, J., “Antiochos the Praepositus: a Persian eunuch at the court of Theodosius II,” in Dumbarton Oaks Papers 50, 1996, p. 171–197. 48 Codex Justinianus, IV.63.4

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III. In imitation of the Roman precedent, Yazdgard began the process which led to the establishment of an indigenous Iranian church. 49 Contact between Rome and the court of Yazdgard had been opened by the Roman ambassador Marutha; and the advice of this bishop may have aided the Persian king and his ministers in framing a policy of toleration throughout the empire of Iran. 50 But Marutha also advised Yazdgard to convene a synod at the city of Seleucia in the year 410. The decisions of this synod, which yet survive, 51 endorsed the faith of Nicaea and proclaimed twentyone canons for the regulation of the Iranian church and its ministers, and Mar Isaac was confirmed as bishop of Ctesiphon and archbishop of all the Orient. In the preamble to the canons of that synod, Yazdgard is saluted as the bringer of peace and tranquillity to the Christians of Iran. The tempest of persecution had been dispersed, ruined churches were rebuilt, altars which had been demolished were carefully restored, votaries of Christ who had languished in prison were released, and the hierarchy of the church was permitted to circulate freely and without fear. This remarkable change of policy, which can be compared to the emperor Constantine’s Edict of Milan, 52 required some explanation; and with reference to the Proverbs of Solomon it was announced that the heart of the king was as a stream of water in the hands of the Lord who can direct it whithersoever he will. 53 Yazdgard commanded that his edict of tolerance be distributed throughout the empire of Iran, and he proclaimed joyfully that ‘East and West are one dominion under the power of my monarchy’ 54 – a splendid achievement of both policy and political communication, which the Roman delegation at the Synod would have heard in the same year in which Alaric sacked the city of Rome. Another example of Yazdgard’s clemency is embodied in the legendary claim that he had married the daughter of the leader of the Jews resident in Iran. The exilarch’s daughter was called Shishin-Dukht, and it was said that she was the mother to Bahram V, son and successor to Yazdgard I. This doubtful descent is affirmed by a brief notice within the Shahrestaniha-yi Eranshahr, and cannot be corroborated. 55 If true, it 49 I am following, somewhat loosely, Labourt, J., Le Christianisme dans l’empire perse sous la dynastie sassanide (224–632), 1904, p. 92–99. 50 Socrates Scholasticus, VII.8.1–20; Chronicle of Seert, I(2), p. 318. 51 The record of this synod is preserved in Synodicon Orientale, p. 17–36. A brilliant analysis of the significance of that council can be found in Wood, P., “Collaborators and Dissidents: Christians in Sasanian Iraq in the Early Fifth Century,” in Bernheimer, T. / Silverstein, A. (eds), Late Antiquity Eastern Perspectives, 2012, p. 58–62. 52 Cf. McDonough, S., “A Second Constantine? The Sasanian King Yazdgard in Christian History and Historiography,” Journal of Late Antiquity 1.1 (Spring), 2008, p. 127–141. 53 Synodicon Orientale, p. 19; Proverbs, XXI.1. 54 Synodicon Orientale, p. 19: 55

Shahrestaniha i Eranshahr, §47.

̈ ‫ܡܕܢܚܐ ܘܡܥܪܒܐ ܚܕ ܫܘܠܛܢܐ‬ .‫ܗܘܝ �ܘܚܕܢܐ ܕܡܠܟܘܬܝ‬

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may mean that differences of religion were of small importance to Yazdgard I. If false, the origin of this claim may be either Sasanian propaganda designed to assure the loyalty of the Jews, or it may adumbrate a Jewish fable reminiscent of the romance of Esther and Ahasuerus. 56

THE END OF YAZDGARD’S REIGN The relationship between Yazdgard and Marutha merits our attention. Socrates, an ecclesiastical historian, reports that Yazdgard was greatly impressed by the piety and medical knowledge of Marutha. 57 The bishop is said to have cured the king of the headaches that had afflicted him, and to have expelled from the king’s son a demon which Zoroastrian physicians had failed to exorcise. But the high honour in which Marutha was held aroused the envy and hatred of the Zoroastrian clergy. If the historian Socrates can be believed, in the ensuing contest Zoroastrian priests employed stratagems to prove the falsity of the Christian faith and to impose the truth of their own religion upon the mind of their king. Yazdgard frequented a fire shrine, and a man was commanded to hide under the floor of it and to declare, as though he were the voice of the fire, that the king must be deposed because he had favoured a Christian priest. But the source of the divine voice was found out and the trick was revealed. The Zoroastrian hierophants plotted a second time, and contrived that a foul smell should be diffused wherever the king appeared. This stench was blamed upon Christians, but the real perpetrators were discovered. The ties of friendship and loyalty between Yazdgard and Marutha were renewed and strengthened, and the influence of the bishop grew. The force of Socrates’ narrative suggests that the Persian king had meditated a conversion to the religion of Christ. But the ecclesiastical historian asserts that Yazdgard died before receiving the sacrament of baptism. 58 The narrative of Socrates conceals great tensions within the court of Yazdgard. The policy of tolerance may have appeared to give way to exclusive favour of Christians, and jealous Zoroastrians would have perceived in the advice of Marutha the influence of the Roman government. Persian tradition takes slim notice of a conflict between Yazdgard and his vizier Mihr-Narseh who appears to have represented noble and clerical interests against the supposedly tyrannical policy of the king. 59 Contemporary accounts of martyrdom, composed in Syriac, are perhaps more instructive. Toward the end of the life and reign of Yazdgard, demands for a renewal of persecution grew in vehemence until a zealous bishop, and a mob of Christian en56

Neusner, J., A History of the Jews in Babylonia, vol. 5, 1970, p. 9–11. Wood, P., “Collaborators and Dissidents,” p. 62–64. 58 Καὶ ὁ Ἰσδιγέρδης μὲν ἔφθασε τελευτῆσαι, πρὶν τελείως Χριστιανίσαι (Socrates Scholasticus, Historia Ecclesiastica, VII.8.20). 59 Tabari, v. 2, p. 64. 57

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thusiasts, destroyed a fire shrine. 60 ‘I destroyed the building and I extinguished the flame, for it was not a house of God, neither is the fire the daughter of God’. 61 Such were the words of ʿAbda (that was the name of the offending priest) when he was summoned before Yazdgard; and the Sasanid monarch attempted to persuade that bishop to restore the ruined temple. The liberal spirit of the ecclesiastical historian Theodoret condemns the destruction of the shrine, but he applauds the bishop’s refusal to rebuild it. 62 The Persian king responded to ʿAbda’s defiance by executing him and perhaps by allowing the Zoroastrian hierarchy to revenge themselves upon some other refractory Christians. A similar fate awaited Narseh, a notable convert and martyr. An Iranian nobleman had embraced the faith of Christ and erected a church; but his ephemeral conversion ended in a return to the religion of Zoroaster, and the sanctuary, which he had built, became a temple of fire. In a transport of rage Narseh entered the shrine, put out the fire, and removed all trappings of Zoroastrian worship. The civil and religious authorities proposed that Narseh preserve his life by repairing the damage which he had wrought, but the ascetic zealot refused; and a brief imprisonment terminated in his execution. 63 Such was the limit of Yazdgard’s tolerance. But we can scarcely believe Theodoret’s claim that Yazdgard threatened the destruction of all Iranian churches as additional punishment for the behaviour of a small cabal of fanatics. 64 The destruction wrought by ʿAbda, Narseh, and their associates demonstrates that Yazdgard and his successors would never fully succeed in involving the Church within the hierarchies of power of the Iranian empire. Though many a noble Iranian might be loyal both to Christ and to the House of Sasan, it would be impossible to control the lower clergy and their invincible hatred of indigenous Iranian religion. 65 The policy of the Sasanid court attempted to portray the destruction perpetrated by Christian partisans as damage to public institutions which those enthusiasts refused to correct or reverse; and such refusal necessitated the supreme penalty. 66 But no one can have seriously believed that Christians would have agreed to repair, or to rebuild, a temple of fire.

60

Theodoret, Historia Ecclesiastica, V.39.1–6. For modern analysis of this period, see Wood, P., “Collaborators and Dissidents,” p. 64–65, and Smith, K., Constantine and the Captive Christians of Persia, p. 145–153. 61 The Martyrdom of Mar Abda, p. 252. 62 ἴσον γὰρ μοι δοκεῖ, says Theodoret, τοῦ προσκυνῆσαι τὸ πῦρ τὸ τούτῳ τέμενος δείμασθαι (Theodoret, Historia Ecclesiastica, V.39.4). 63 The Martyrdom of Narsai, p. 172–173. 64 Theodoret, Historia Ecclesiastica, V.39. The testimony of the Chronicle of Seert is similar, but somewhat more realistic (Chronicle of Seert, I(2), p. 326–328). 65 Wood, P., “Collaborators and Dissidents,” p. 70. 66 Payne, R., A State of Mixture, p. 47–48.

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The reign of Yazdgard ended in a revival of the intolerance which he had striven to extirpate. The execution of ʿAbda and Narseh, and the renewal of persecution seems to have elicited Roman sympathy for the victims, and threatened to disrupt the tranquillity which had followed the wars of Shapur II. But we can sense only indirectly that peace in the west had been threatened. In the final year of the life and reign of Yazdgard I, the archbishop of the Orient was Mar Yahballaha. This man was sent to the Roman emperor as an ambassador in order to assure ‘the tranquillity and reconciliation of the two empires which constitute the mighty supports of the world’. 67 The mission of Yahballaha was successful, and conflict was averted for a brief moment, despite the strain upon relations between the two great powers. The ecclesiastical historian Socrates implies that Yazdgard I died a natural death. But the historian Tabari reports that a horse kicked that king with such vehemence that he died instantly. 68 This important event is said to have occurred in the region of Gurgan. From a window of his palace in that country, Yazdgard beheld a mysterious horse galloping toward him. The horse halted at the gate of the palace and would allow no one but the king to apply the accoutrements of riding, but the king’s attempt to adjust the crupper elicited the kick which slew him. The horse fled mysteriously and was never seen again. This strange notice most probably conceals a royal assassination while the Persian king was engaged in some important business away from the Persian capital. 69 The mention of Gurgan is noteworthy, and may recall Yazdgard’s attention to his north-eastern frontier.

FROM BAHRAM V TO PEROZ I A conspiracy of noblemen had deprived Yazdgard I of his life and reign, and those zealous aristocrats vowed that no son of Yazdgard should ever sit upon the Sasanid throne. Yazdgard had achieved much for the tranquillity of Iran, but his toleration of Christianity had elicited from his grandees and hierophants only envy and hatred. The historian Dinawari records the names of the conspirators, 70 and notes that they appointed a man bearing the name of Khusro as the successor to Yazdgard. Shapur, the eldest son of Yazdgard who had governed Iranian Armenia, had attempted to mount the throne, but did not survive his return to Ctesiphon. But Bahram, a younger son to the last king, would not relinquish his hereditary right, and chal67 68

Synodicon Orientale, p. 37–38:

̈ ‫ܕܡܠܟܘܬܐ ܣܠܝܢ ܬܪܝܬܝܗܝܢ ܕܐܝܬܝܗܝܢ ܟ‬ ̈ ̈ ‫ܚܝܠܬܢܝܬܐ ܕܥܠܡܐ‬ ‫ܬܦܬܗ‬ ‫ܠܫܝܢܐ ܘܠܬܪܥܘܬܐ‬

Tabari, v. 2, p. 64. Dinawari, p. 57. 70 These were: Bistam of the Ispahbudan family who held the rank of Hazaraft, YazdGushnnasp whose rank was Padgosban, Pirak of the Mihran family, Godarz the scribe of the army, Goshnasp Adurbish, who was a bureaucrat connected with the tax system, Panna Khusro master of alms-giving, and other amongst the nobility and the royal house (Dinawari, p. 57). 69

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lenged Khusro. 71 A civil war takes shape upon the pages of Tabari and Dinawari, and this important struggle merits our attention and requires explanation.

THE POWER OF IRAN’S ARAB CLIENTS The Lakhmid capital at Hira had formed an important part of Iran’s south-western fortifications since the time of Shapur I, and Yazdgard I cultivated that court also. Relations between the Persian monarch and the Lakhmid king Mundhir must have involved the granting and the demand of favours, and the consolidation of Iran’s frontier defences must have included Iran’s Saracen client; but we know of only one important exchange in the early fifth century. The son of Yazdgard had been sent to the court of Hira for his upbringing and education. Upon the death of his father and the elevation of the pretender Khusro, the young Bahram left Hira escorted by Mundhir and a numerous train of Arab soldiers. A series of razzias and abductions in the vicinity of the Iranian capital compelled the partisans of Khusro to negotiate, and Bahram was made king in place of the usurper. We cannot know the details of the negotiation which issued in the elevation of Bahram. The aristocratic and clerical parties must have demanded a reversal of the empire’s policy on Christianity, and perhaps other demands also. But the indigenous Persian tradition transforms the negotiation into a fabulous ordeal in which the royal accoutrements were placed before two ferocious lions, and the rule of Iran was granted to Bahram who slew both animals with a mace and who fearlessly claimed the regalia for himself. 72 The ordeal of the lions gives way to a long procession of chivalrous, heroic, sybaritic, and erotic notices concerning Bahram V. Indigenous Iranian tradition associates the reign of Bahram V with tales of that king’s prowess in war, his skill at hunting and polo, his fondness for wine, his memorable combat with an elephant, and his connection with a songstress called Azada, a Roman slave girl who would sing to him whilst seated upon the back of a camel. 73 He is said to have composed poetry in the Arabic language, and because he was a lover of entertainments, he transported a great number of musical Gypsies from India to Iran. 74 Even after the passage of seven hundred years, the Persian poet Nizami (who wrote in the twelfth century) was inspired to compose a romance about the life of Bahram. The Seven Princesses, as it is often called in English, remains one of the most important poetical creations of all time, and it is a masterpiece of erotic literature. 75 Nothing can entire71

Tabari, v. 2, p. 71. Syvänne argues that this ordeal was likely to have occurred (Syvänne, I., “The Reign of Bahrām V Gōr: The Revitalization of the Empire through Mounted Archery,” Historia i Świat, nr 4, 2015, p. 77), but I doubt it. 73 Dinawari, p. 57; Tabari, v. 2, p. 78–79; Ferdowsi, Yazdgard-i-Bazagar, l. 166–233. See also Christensen, L’Iran sous les Sassanides, p. 271–272. 74 Hamza Isfahani, p. 55. 75 De Blois, F. “Haft Peykar” in Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. XI, fasc. 5, 2002, p. 522–524. 72

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ly disperse the mist of fable and romance that surrounds the reign of Bahram, and it is perhaps fitting that the historian Dinawari asserts that that king vanished on a hunting expedition and was never seen again. 76 The lot of Iranian Christians worsened under Bahram V and provoked Roman intervention. Three writers (Quodvultdeus, the person called Pseudo-Dionysus, and St Augustine of Hippo) demonstrate that the force and violence of the Iranian persecution was felt throughout the Roman world. 77 Punishment and torment was visited even upon those Iranian Christians who served in the royal administration, for sixteen scribes were arrested and compelled on pain of death to renounce the worship of Jesus. 78 Cyril of Scythopolis adds the important detail that the Zoroastrian hierarchy wished to hunt down, and (we may presume) to kill, the Christians of Iran. 79 The evidence of St Augustine asserts that Christians fled to Roman territory; and from the severity of the persecution, that saint inferred that the church would perhaps endure anguish and affliction until doomsday. 80 Amidst a general campaign of intimidation and terror, one of the torments inflicted was the disinterment of Christians whose bodies had been buried in the earth for some time. 81 Cyril adds that the Zoroastrian hierophants had commanded Arabian soldiers to erect roadblocks upon the highways which crossed the Roman frontier, and those Saracens were to prevent the escape of the fugitives. But one of the Saracen commanders, who bore the Iranian title of Aspebet, felt compassion for the persecuted Christians, and helped many of them to seek refuge among the Romans. The Aspebet was ac76

Dinawari claims that Bahram pursued a herd of wild asses into the vicinity of a bottomless swamp, and then fell into it mysteriously (Dinawari, p. 59–60). 77 Quodvultdeus, Liber Promissorum III.34.36; Pseudo-Dionysus I.193.10–12; Augustine, De Civitate Dei XVIII.52. Payne (Payne, R., A State of Mixture, 2015) makes no reference to these pious authors’ notices of the persecutions in Iran. 78 Labourt, J., Le Christianisme, p. 113–117. 79 Cyril of Scythopolis, Vita Euthymi, 10. 80 Sed…adfirmare aliquas futuras a regibus praeter illam novissimam, de qua nullus ambigit Christianus, non minoris est temeritatis. Itaque hoc in medio relinquimus neutram partem quaestionis huius astruentes sive destruentes, sed tantummodo ab adfirmandi quodlibet horum audaci praesumptione revocantes (Augustine, De Civitate Dei XVIII.52). 81 The order for this atrocious element of the persecution was given by Bahram’s chief mobad whose name was Mihr-Shabur (The Martyrdom of Peroz, p. 254): ̈ ‫ܫܢܝ ܐܒܘܗܝ ܩܦܐ ܐܪܕܘ ܐܢܘܢ ܠܥܝܢ‬ ̈ ̈ ‫ܡܝܬܐ ܕ ܩܒܝܪܝܢ ܗܘܘ ܡܢ‬ .‫ܫܡܫܐ‬ This persecution is discussed in Brock, S., “Christians in the Sasanian Empire: A Case of Divided Loyalties,” Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies, II, 1976, p. 9 with note 37. The Chronicle of Seert appears to confirm the disinterment (Chronicle of Seert I(2), p. 332): .‫ابتدأ ��دم البيع ور�ى عظام ال��دآء ا��دفونة ف��ا‬

Despite the weight of the evidence, Payne appears to deny that any such persecution occurred (Payne, R., A State of Mixture, p. 46–48).

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cused before the Persian king, and that noble Saracen fled to the Roman general of the east, who made him commander of Rome’s Arabian clients. 82

WAR WITH ROME War with Rome broke out in the year 421 and lasted a single year. The fullest account of this momentary conflict is provided by the ecclesiastical historian Socrates. 83 That writer alleges that the court of Theodosius had sought to avenge the persecuted Christians of Iran. That was the principle cause of war. But other grievances were: that Iran had refused to return a company of Roman gold miners hired by the Sasanian government; that Iranian officials pursued a policy of seizing the wares of Roman merchants; and that the ambassadors of the Iranian court had demanded the extradition of Christian fugitives. The bias of Socrates ensured that he would take a special interest in the fate of his fellow votaries of Christ, but he is not wrong about the religious stimulus to warfare. Immediately before the outbreak of war, a jewelled cross was erected upon the place of Christ’s crucifixion by the Roman emperor’s sister Pulcheria, and a gold solidus was issued bearing the image of Victory supporting a long cross, and the cloaks of the Roman soldiers were adorned with crosses of bronze. These signs have been interpreted to mean that the Roman state treated the conflict with Iran as a holy war. 84 The course of the war may be narrated briefly. The emperor Theodosius sent to the east the general Ardaburius, who invaded Arzanene through Armenia. The Iranian army commanded by Mihr-Narseh was defeated, and the Roman force proceeded to besiege the city of Nisibis. Bahram, who commanded his army in person, brought with him a large army of Saracen clients, and they compelled the Romans to relinquish the siege of that fortress. But the reciprocal attack upon Antioch was not crowned with success: the Saracens were thrown into confusion and many of them fell into the river Euphrates and perished. Another battle followed, the Roman general Areobindus worsted the host of Bahram, and a truce was negotiated. 85 82

Cyril of Scythopolis (Vita Euthymi, 10) claims that the king at the time was Yazdgard I, but the more reliable chronology of the ecclesiastical historian Socrates proves that these events occurred in the reign of Bahram V (Socrates, Historia Ecclesiastica VII.18). 83 Socrates, Historia Ecclesiastica VII.18. Syriac sources provide some small details of this war also (Schrier, O. J. “Syriac Evidence for the Roman-Persian War of 421–422,” Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies, 33, 1992, p. 75–86. For a modern treatment of this war, see Greatrex, G. “The Two Fifth-Century Wars Between Rome and Persia,” Florilegium, 12, 1993, p. 1–14. 84 Holum, K. G., “Pulcheria’s Crusade A.D. 421–422 and the Ideology of Imperial Victory,” Greek Roman and Byzantine Studies 18, 1977, p. 153–172. 85 The terms of the peace were not settled (we are told) until a contingent of Persians, called ‘the Immortals’, had been defeated by the armies of a certain Procopius who had recently been appointed magister militum per orientem (Socrates, Historia Ecclesiastica II.20; Theodoret Historia Ecclesiastica V.37.6–10). See also Greatrex, G. “The Two Fifth-Century Wars.”

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In the midst of that war between Iran and Rome, a large force of Huns penetrated through the Caucasus into Media. 86 Basich and Cursich, who commanded the Hunnish host, plundered that land and were only halted by the missiles of an Iranian army sent to oppose them. The danger to the Sasanid state was enormous: for a brief moment the Huns of Europe and those of Inner Asia threatened Iran on all sides but its southern coast. According to the writer Priscus, Attila, king of the European Huns, contemplated the annihilation of the empire of Iran. Hearing of this, the Romans prayed for the extinction of their eastern foe, but Constantiolus (a Roman ambassador familiar with the court of Attila) feared that the Roman state would not long survive the Hunnish subdual of Iran. 87 From this we may judge the fear which united the two sedentary powers in a policy of mutual defence against the Huns.

THE TREATY OF 422 The treaty of peace which followed that brief war was advantageous both to Iran and Rome. Neither great power had sought to destroy the other, and so it was easy to reassert and to strengthen a policy of cooperation. Four terms of the treaty can be reconstructed. 88 Both powers agreed not to allow defections from their respective Saracen clients, as Rome had lately received the renegade Aspebet; the construction of border fortifications was immediately halted, the latest example of which was the Roman fortification of Theodosiopolis; and Rome agreed to pay a subsidy for the defence of the Caucasus passes, which both powers regarded as a common weakness, although only one empire maintained those defences. 89 The final term was a promise to end the persecution of Christians within the empire of Iran, and 86

Priscus, frag. XI.2 in in Blockley, R. C., The Fragmentary Classicising Historians, p. 278; Kim, H. J., The Huns, Rome, and the Birth of Europe, p. 54–55. 87 Ἡμῶν δὲ κατὰ Περσῶν ἐλθεῖν αὐτὸν ἐπευξαμένων καὶ ἐπ᾽ ἐκείνους τρέψαι τὸν πόλεμον, ὁ Κωνσταντίολος ἔλεγε δεδιέναι μήποτε καὶ Πέρσας ῥᾳδίως παραστησάμενος ἀντὶ φίλου δεσπότης ἐπανήξει (Priscus, frag. XI.2 in in Blockley, R. C., The Fragmentary Classicising Historians, p. 278). 88 The sources are Marcellinus Comes, a.c. 422; Malchus, frag. 1. in Blockley, R. C., The Fragmentary Classicising Historians, p. 404–406; Kawerau, P. / Króll, T., The Chronicle of Arbela, p. 31; Procopius, Bellum Persicum I.2.11–15. For a modern analysis, see Holum, K. G., “Pulcheria’s Crusade,” p. 170–171. 89 I believe that the matter of the Caucasian defences was most probably agreed to in the context of this treaty since it appears to fit the context well. John the Lydian seems to think that there was such an agreement in the year 363, but this is most doubtful (John Lydus, de Magistratibus III.52). The main reasons for my rejection of an earlier agreement is that the project of fortifying the Caucasus was not undertaken until the fifth century and the agreement mentioned in the reign of Yazdgard I is the first of which we can be certain (Blockley, R. C., “Subsidies and Diplomacy: Rome and Persia in Late Antiquity,” Phoenix, vol. 39, no. 1, 1985, p. 62–74).

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Rome undertook in return to spare Zoroastrians within its own borders – a token promise since those sectaries were not numerous outside Iran. The provision concerning the Caucasian defences merits further attention. This important matter is noticed briefly in one of the surviving fragments of the writings of Priscus. That man had served in what we might call the foreign ministry of the emperor Theodosius II, and Priscus’ Byzantine History preserves the Iranian attitude to those important bulwarks in the Caucasus. 90 Priscus’ mention of them occurs in the circumstance of an embassy in the later reign of the king Peroz, but the arguments of the Iranian diplomats must have been the same as those put forth in the 420s. It was not right, as Iranian ambassadors argued, that Iran alone should have the burden of defending the Caucasus, and the Romans were asked either to pay or to send troops to guard that turbulent and forbidding region. 91 If the Romans fail to help, they said, ‘the evil wrought by the circumjacent nations shall come not only upon the Persians but also upon the Romans; and so it is right that the Romans should help with money in the war against the Kidarite Huns since they would have an advantage if the Persians were victorious, for that nation would not be permitted to cross into the Roman dominion.’ 92 Priscus notes that those words were pronounced in a later reign, but the Iranian embassy in the year 422 must have expressed the same sentiment. The words of the Iranian embassy could be construed to imply the equality of the two great powers. But the payment of a subsidy allowed the government of Bahram V to announce that the Roman state had been made tributary to the empire of Iran. This appears to be concealed within a remark by the historian Tabari to the effect that, in the reign of Bahram V, an embassy lead by Mihr-Narseh came to Constantinople for the purpose of making a truce and discussing tribute to be paid to Iran. 93 The testimony of the writer commonly called Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite confirms that, by late fifth century, a formal agreement on the subsidy had been reached. A treaty had stipulated that either power should send, whenever necessary, 90

The history of Priscus covered the years 434 to 474 (or thereabouts) and survives only in large fragments. The history is written in a clear and straightforward style; and, in my view, this suggests that he had experience outside the imperial bureaucracy. For other views, see Blockley, R. C., The Fragmentary Classicising Historians, p. 48–70). 91 Priscus, frag. 41.1; 47 in Blockley, R. C., The Fragmentary Classicising Historians, p. 344–346; 352–354). 92 Εἰ γὰρ ἐνδοῖεν, οὐκ ἐς Πέρσας μόνους, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἐς Ῥωμαίους τὰ ἐκ τῶν παροικούντων ἐθνῶν κακὰ ῥᾳδίως ἀφίξεσθαι. Χρῆναι δὲ αὐτοὺς ἔλεγον καὶ χρήμασιν ἐπικουρεῖν ἐπὶ τῷ πρὸς Οὔννους πολέμῳ τοὺς Κιδαρίτας λεγομένους· ἔσεσθαι γὰρ σφίσιν αὐτῶν νικώντων ὄνησιν, μὴ συγχρωρουμένου τοῦ ἔθνους καὶ ἐς τὴν Ῥωμαϊκὴν διαβαίνειν ἐπικράτειαν (Priscus, frag. 41 in Blockley, R. C., The Fragmentary Classicising Historians, p. 346). 93 Tabari, v. 2, p. 79. We must also assume that the Roman government had agreed to pay the subsidy, or else it could not have cancelled it in the time of Peroz.

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three hundred men with their arms and horses, or three hundred staters in place of each man. 94 The Stylite’s hatred for the Iranian empire suggests that he has not misrepresented the provisions of the treaty. His persistent denial confirms that the government of Iran portrayed the payment as a form of tribute. 95 But Iranian diplomacy prudently concealed this exaggeration in formal exchanges with Rome. Toward the middle of the six century, a letter of Kavad I addressed the emperor Justinian as his brother, and referred to the same agreement described by the Stylite. 96 The Roman government was zealous to respect this agreement – at least at first. An inscription at the fortress at Darband commemorated an important subvention in the middle of the fifth century. ‘Marcian, the autocratic Caesar, built this city and these towers with money from his own treasury’, or so says the Armenian historian Lewond. 97 But successive emperors were not always as generous as Marcian, and some withheld payment altogether.

BAHRAM V IN THE EAST At the conclusion of the war with Rome, Bahram turned to the east. If the history of Dinawari can be trusted, Bahram was the first Sasanian king to confront and defeat the Kidarite Huns. 98 Sasanian policy settled upon a feint. An embassy bearing treasure and tribute was dispatched to the Kidarite court in order to persuade that people to spare Iran. Although a diplomatic exchange had been expected, Bahram had assembled an army of seven thousand men who came upon the Huns at a desert place six parasangs from the city of Marv. The Huns were thrown into confusion, and Bahram slew their king, plundered their treasures, captured the Hunnish queen, traversed the river Oxus, and achieved the total submission of that nation. The Huns are supposed to have asked the Persian king to establish a barrier beyond 94

Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, VIII. Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, VIII; IX–X. 96 ηὕραμεν ἐν τοῖς ἡμετέροις ἀρχαίοις ἀναγεγραμμένα…ἐάν τις ἐπιδεηθῇ σωμάτων ἢ χρημάτων, παρέχειν τὸν ἕτερον (John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 449–450). 97 Lewond, XII. Marcian reigned in the years 450–457. This curious notice in the Armenian history of Lewond claims that the Arabs, who conquered the fortress at Darband in the year 717, discovered that inscription. The text predicted (says Lewond) that ‘the sons of Ishmael’ would one day destroy and rebuild Darband, but this supposed prophecy may have less to do with Arab vanity than with Christian apocalyptic imagery concerning both Ishmael and the barrier which restrained the nations of Gog and Magog. I am inclined to doubt that the second part of the inscription is genuine, but it is not impossible. ‘The sons of Ishmael’ had apocalyptic significance before the rise of Islam (Grypeou, E. / Spurling, H., The Book of Genesis is Late Antiquity: Encounters Between Jewish and Christian Exegesis, 2014, p. 248–249). Aliev vouches for the authenticity of the first half of the inscription and omits the second (Aliev, A. A., et al., “The Ghilghilchay Defensive Long Wall,” p. 144). 98 Dinawari, p. 57–59. The Kidarite Huns are invoked anachronistically under the name of Turk. 95

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which they should never pass, and Bahram commanded the erection of an imposing tower. That legendary account implies that an event of some significance occurred on Iran’s north-eastern frontier early in the reign of Bahram V. The historian Dinawari states that Bahram left his brother to rule in his stead, and so we may infer that the enterprise in the north-east was attended by the risk that the king might not survive it. It is possible to infer that Dinawari has preserved a fanciful reminiscence that Bahram V opened relations with the Kidarite Huns, and it is likely that both a military demonstration and a diplomatic exchange occurred. But it cannot be true that the Sasanian state inflicted so serious defeat upon the Huns as Dinawari’s source led him to report. Bahram V most probably halted the westward expansion of the Kidarite Huns at Marv, and diverted them southward into Gandhara. It was only in the following reign of Yazdgard II that the Kidarites resumed their expansion into Sogdiana and conquered the important city of Samarqand. 99

THE ABOLITION OF THE ARMENIAN MONARCHY AND ITS CONSEQUENCES The partition of Armenia had divided that country between the two great powers. The king of Roman Armenia had died in the year 390, and the government at Constantinople had allowed no successor to ascend the throne. But the nobles of that country were not ruled directly by the Roman emperor, for a viceroy bearing the title of Count of Armenia was installed at Theodosiopolis. In the reign of Bahram V, the fate of Iranian Armenia was similar, and the extinction of the Armenian monarchy had consequences which extended across the reigns of Yazdgard II and Peroz I. 100 Since the reign of Ardashir I, one Armenian monarch after another had been enthroned or deposed with the connivance of the Persian court. This arrangement came to an end in the fifth century. The Persian monarch appointed Artashes IV son of Vramshapuh to rule over Armenia, but the reign of that Arsacid descendant irritated the princes of Armenia. The noble houses of that country demanded the removal of Artashes, and he was replaced by an Iranian governor in the year 428. For the moment the nobles of Armenia were content with the expansion of their power under the rule of a Sasanid viceroy. But the view of the Christian hierarchy was different. The princes of Armenia adhered to the culture and to the religion of Iran, and that obedience was repugnant to the sensibilities of Christians. Many noble houses held the religion of Jesus in contempt, and considered its votaries to be Roman spies and traitors. At the behest of the nobility, the Armenian patriarch Sahak, 99

De la Vaissière, É., Histoire des Marchands Sogdiens, p. 113–114. For the expansion of the Kidarites, the author cites evidence from Chinese sources which I am incapable of reading. 100 My summary of Armenian history at this point follows Payaslian, S., The History of Armenia, p. 40–44 and Toumanoff, C., “Introduction to Christian Caucasian History,” p. 3–6.

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who led the opposition to the Iranian governor, was arrested and detained for a few years. In time Sahak was released and he resumed his office, but this failed to resolve the problem of an incipient civil war.

THE BATTLE OF AVARAYR The contest in Armenia attained its full vehemence in the reign of Yazdgard II. A memorable battle in the year 451 may be seen as a contest for the soul of Armenia waged between rival princes and their Christian and Zoroastrian associates. 101 The nobleman Vardan Mamikonean led an army of Armenian Christians against their magian and Iranophile antagonists. The Sasanian government had promoted a policy of forcible conversion, and intervened on the side of Zoroastrian Armenia. The Christian party suffered a disastrous defeat; many churchmen attained martyrdom, and the Christian nobility and hierophants were led away into captivity. All Transcaucasia was embroiled in warfare, and the Sasanian government was greatly disturbed by these convulsions. According to Armenian tradition, it was better to die than to be an apostate, and the martyrdom of Vartan and his companions assured the continuance of Armenian Christianity, which had come to be seen as the heritage of their nation. Iranian fears of Roman intervention proved to be unfounded, for appeals to that Christian empire were unanswered. The heroic defeat at Avarayr, a little to the south-east of the snowy peak of Ararat, is remembered to this day with intense feeling, and its anniversary remains an important day in the Armenian liturgical year. 102 The policy of forcible conversion was instigated by the grand vizier who had served Yazdgard I, Bahram V, and Yazdgard II. In the year 450, Mihr-Narseh issued a letter which commanded the Armenians to convert to the religion of Iran. The letter is recorded in the Armenian history composed by Elishe. ‘You must know’, the letter announced, ‘that every man who dwells below heaven and who keeps not the laws of the Zoroastrian religion is deaf and blind, and is deceived by the demons of Angra Mainyu. 103 This aggressive beginning gives way to an exposition of the origins of the universe, the doctrine of a good and an evil creation, a mocking rebuttal 101

It is a popular misconception that the Armenian and Iberian peoples were not originally votaries of the Zoroastrian religion; and it is commonly, but wrongly, asserted that they adhered to local and indigenous cults influenced only mildly by Iranian ideas (de Jong, A., “Armenian and Georgian Zoroastrianism” in Stausberg, M. / Sohrab-Dinshaw Vivaina, Y. / Tessmann, A. (eds), The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Zoroastrianism, 2015, p. 83–102). 102 Van Lint, T. M., “The Formation of Armenian Identity in the First Millennium,” Church History and Religious Culture, vol. 89, No. 1/3, Religious Origins of Nations? The Christian Communities of the Middle East, 2009, p. 273–274. 103 The letter from Mihr-Narseh and its response can be found in Elishe, p. 24–27. For a modern translation, with some useful notes, see Thomson, R. W. (trans.), History of Vardan and the Armenian War, 1982, p. 77–80.

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of the Christian religion, and an invitation to join the ranks of the Persian king’s Zoroastrian nobility. We cannot be surprised that the letter failed to achieve its intended aim. A written response announced the Armenians’ refusal to relinquish their ancestral customs; and an enraged assembly of prelates and noblemen launched the revolt which issued in the confrontation at Avarayr and the devastation of much of the Caucasus. In the successive reigns of Peroz and Balash these troubles were resolved, but only with great difficulty.

THE REIGN OF YAZDGARD II Persian tradition passes over the reign of the second Yazdgard in nearly complete silence. Dinawari merely notices his name, 104 and Tabari’s only statements are that the new king had promised to uphold the policies, and to continue the legacy, of Bahram V, and that the term of the grand vizier Mihr-Narseh was to be renewed. 105 The reign of Yazdgard II was not as uneventful as those writers suggest, but so few sources have survived that is not possible to write a satisfactory history of that king’s reign. 106 Only a small glimpse of the domestic policy of Yazdgard has been preserved for us. A strange hagiographical text, known as The History of Karkha de Beth Slokh, 107 records a campaign of murder and intimidation in northern Mesopotamia against land-owning Christians of the middle rank of the provincial nobility; and worse torments, including banishment and castration, were visited upon disobedient officers within the Iranian army. A violent purge of the Sasanid court which ended the life of the king’s own daughter is also noticed in that text, as is the castration of eight thousand Zoroastrian priests. Although some of these details may represent the imaginative efforts of a pious writer to blacken the character of the monarch, it may be possible to see in the cruelty operated by the government of Yazdgard the rigid enforcement of aristocratic discipline, the punishment of refractory noble houses, and the strengthening of the sovereign’s personal rule. 108 But devotion to the religion of Iran’s most potent antagonist was surely an aggravating element, if not the primary cause, of the brutality and violence in the reign of the second Yazdgard. 104

Dinawari, p. 60. Tabari, v. 2, p. 82. 106 For a modern reconstruction of this king’s reign, which takes account of numismatic evidence, see Schindel, N., Sylloge Nummorum Sasanidarum III/1, p. 384–387. 107 History of Karkha de Beth Slokh, p. 507–535. The town of Karkha is the modern Kirkuk in northern Iraq. 108 Payne, R., A State of Mixture, p. 45–46; McDonough, S. J., “A Question of Faith? Persecution and Political Centralization in the Sasanian Empire of Yazdgard II (438–457 CE)” in Drake, H. A. (ed.), Violence in Late Antiquity: Perceptions and Practices, 2006, p. 69–81. 105

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A BRIEF WAR WITH ROME A moment of Roman distraction afforded an opportunity for warfare. Under the leadership of Attila, the Huns of Europe posed a great threat to the Roman empire, and Yazdgard II wished to take advantage of that problem. But the incursion of the Iranian army as far as Nisibis was halted by a payment of money and treasure. 109 The emperor Theodosius and his successor Marcian wished to leave intact the peace treaty of 422. Anatolius (the general of the east) was dispatched to perform the negotiation with the Sasanian king, and the emperor Marcian provided money for the refurbishment of the castle at Darband – a subvention commemorated in an inscription upon one of the walls of that fortress. 110 It is noteworthy that even an Armenian writer who hated Yazdgard approved of this settlement between the two great powers. 111

YAZDGARD II’S WAR WITH THE HUNS The history of Yazdgard’s wars against the Huns is delineated incidentally in the writings of two Armenians. The principle theme of both Lazar Parpetsi and Elishe Vardapet was the great uprising and the Battle of Avarayr in the year 451, but the two narratives differ greatly. 112 The phraseology of Lazar is terse and laconic and Elishe is verbose and effusive, but both men readily deploy biblical allusions and declamatory rhetoric. The former ascribes the origin of the Armenian revolt to a conflict between noble houses, but the latter accuses only the malevolence of the Persian king and his evil associates, and yet both Lazar and Elishe were animated by such a vehement hatred of Yazdgard II and his government that their histories regularly descend into scurrilous slander and abuse. But we must rely upon the testimony of these men. It is sometimes hard to comprehend those Armenian accounts of Yazdgard’s eastern campaigns. Elishe appears to interpret warfare in the east as a means to torment Armenian Christians who had been pressed into military service or imprisoned in distant fortresses. A royal edict called upon the soldiers of Armenia and the whole empire of Iran to join an expedition into the land of the Huns, and Elishe implies that many Armenians expected to die in that distant country. That historian also seems to connect Yazdgard’s warfare with the demand of the Magian hierarchy to enforce the religion of Zoroaster throughout Iran. The Zoroastrian priesthood, we are told, had persuaded Yazdgard that victory over the Huns would be assured if the Christians of Iran were exterminated. It may be that Elishe’s own paranoia has blended itself with a misunderstanding of Iranian propaganda which portrayed the 109

Theodoret, Historia Ecclesiastica V.37.5–6; Moses Chorenatsi, III.67; Elishe, p. 7. Lewond, XII. 111 In the opinion of Elishe, the behaviour of the emperor Theodosius apparently restrained anger of Yazdgard (Elishe, p. 7). 112 See Elishe, p. 3–9, and Lazar, p. 1–33. 110

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struggle against the Huns as a holy war. But Iranian policy plainly intended to remove Christian leaders as far from Armenia as possible. The principle contributions of Lazar are his inclusion of the date at which Yazdgard shifted operations from Gurgan to Khurasan, and his brief description of warfare in that distant country. But Lazar fails to take note of warfare in Gurgan, and appears to believe that the campaign at Nishapur was merely an opportunity for Yazdgard II to afflict his Armenian captives with new torments. Nevertheless, it is possible to reconstruct the following narrative. Yazdgard II cancelled the tribute paid to the Huns, and opened such a fierce and prolonged war that it continued into the reign of his successor. 113 Yazdgard’s Hunnish war was prosecuted in two phases. In the first phase, operations were conducted in the region of Gurgan, where two years of fighting achieved nothing against the Huns. But an annual levy of fresh troops improved the military fortune of the Persian king; and in the place of an annual expedition, Yazdgard II transposed his capital to the northeast for a long series of battles. The Persian king established a forward base at a place which he called the City of Yazdgard, 114 and he dwelt there from the fourth to the eleventh year of his reign. Yazdgard ascribed his success to his empire’s adherence to the Zoroastrian religion: he multiplied the sacrifices which occurred in the fire temples of Iran, he lavished honours and distinctions upon the Magian clergy, and he commanded that all goods and possessions of the Iranian Christians should be seized. In the year 450, the twelfth year of his reign, Yazdgard undertook a massive assault upon the Huns. If Elishe can be believed, the Iranian army pursued a flying enemy deep into Central Asia, pillaging as they went, capturing fortresses and cities, and accruing an immense haul of captives and booty. The second phase of fighting began when operations were further east. The Armenian historian Lazar adds the important detail that Yazdgard’s forward base was transposed from Gurgan to Nishapur in the year 454, 115 and fighting continued. The opening of that new front was followed by a grievous defeat inflicted by the Huns; but a fragment of Priscus’ history indicates that, two years later, the Persian king had continued to wage war upon the Kidarites, 116 despite that earlier reversal.

113

Priscus, frag. 41.3 in Blockley, R. C., The Fragmentary Classicising Historians, p. 348. It was called Shahrestan-i Yazdgard or Eran-Khwarra-Yazdgard in Persian (Gyselen, R., La Géographie administrative, p. 47–48). It is not clear precisely where in Gurgan this city was. 115 Lazar situates this shift in the sixteenth year of Yazdgard’s reign (Lazar, p. 86). 116 The attendant circumstance was the Roman seizure of Lazica, to which the Iranian king could not react: ὁ μὲν τῶν Πάρθων μόναρχος, ὡς πολέμου αὐτῷ συνισταμένου πρὸς Οὔννους τοὺς Κιδαρίτας καλούμενους, ἀπεσείσατο παρ᾽αὐτὸν τοὺς Λαζοὺς κατφεύγοντας (Priscus, frag. 33.1 in Blockley, R. C., The Fragmentary Classicising Historians, p. 336). The use of the term ‘king of the Parthians’ is an obvious anachronism. 114

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The revolution which exalted the Hephthalite Huns must have placed great strain upon the Iranian frontier, and Iran was compelled to resist that pressure. 117 It is probable that Yazdgard intervened in the struggle between the rival Hephthalite and Kidarite clans. As Elishe implies, an enormous number of men must have been required to do this. A secure base at or near the wall of Gurgan, made it possible to assemble and to supply such a large army, and to carry on a war for nearly a decade. The campaign of Yazdgard may have demonstrated to the Huns that their southern neighbour was an important military power; and Iran’s intervention upon the steppe may have precipitated the issue of a civil war. 118 The warfare at Gurgan had perhaps succeeded in driving the Huns away from that portion of the Iranian frontier. But Yazdgard’s energetic fighting in the east continued long into his reign, and apparently without resolution. The great expenditure of blood and treasure is represented by the disproportionately high production of the mints at Gurgan and Nishapur throughout the reign of Yazdgard. 119

THE END OF THE REIGN OF YAZDGARD II The religious and military policies of Yazdgard promoted instability and provoked a violent reaction. Social and religious struggles might have been confined to Armenia without the intervention of the Persian king, and his wars with the Kidarite Huns appear to have accelerated the rise of a more dangerous enemy. These troubles outlived the reign of Yazdgard, and some of them grew worse. Neither the conflict within Central Asia, nor the disorders in the Caucasus, were resolved until the disastrous reign of Peroz. It was perhaps a symptom of Yazdgard’s failure that the empire of Iran was plunged into civil war at his death.

REFLECTIONS ON THE STATE OF THE IRANIAN EMPIRE IN THE FIFTH CENTURY We have already observed that the loose rule of the Arsacids gave way to the more organised system of dynastic power established by the House of Sasan. But Ardashir I had merely begun the process of centralisation which his successors were to perfect. In the narrative that I have rehearsed in this chapter two facts suggest that that transformation had been very gradual until the fifth century, when we suddenly detect that the Iranian state had undergone important changes. 117

The struggles between Hephthalites, Kidarites, and the Sasanian empire is adumbrated in De la Vaissière, É., Histoire des Marchands Sogdiens, p. 114–115. 118 It may be possible to connect the campaigns of Yazdgard II with the end of Kidarite rule in Gandhara (Vondrovec, K., Coinage of the Iranian Huns and their Successors from Bactria to Gandhara (4th to 8th century CE), vol. 1, 2014, p. 47–48. 119 Schindel, N., Sylloge Nummorum Sasanidarum III/1, p. 384–387. I suspect that the king would have contemplated, and soldiers would have demanded, higher pay in those long and difficult campaigns.

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I. The huge scale of military infrastructure, which I have described in this chapter, could not have been erected without the cooperation of many branches of government. We may be certain that the military and the financial administrations worked with those organs of government overseeing the treasury and public works. The troops required for the garrisons of the new fortifications may have numbered about one hundred and eighty-thousand men, who required armour, provisions, and accommodation. 120 So large an army stationed along the frontier suggests a commensurate number of military and civilian staff to serve them and to maintain good order and high morale in those grim fortifications. This presupposes the rigorous management of supply lines, procurement of goods, and regular communication between the centre and the frontier. There can be no question that the new defence policy was formed at the centre of the Iranian government, and that the various organs of the administrative state were directed by a single, supreme authority. We may judge Sasanian defence policy, and the administrative structure which it required, by their results. The Iranian army had already matched and defeated its western antagonist in the third and fourth centuries. Iranian offensive operations, siege warfare, armour, and other equipment had equalled those of Rome. But the fifth century saw the construction of fortresses and walls which surpassed in size and strength their Roman counterparts. 121 It may fairly be argued that the Sasanian state of the fifth century attained the military supremacy of Eurasia, and we may perhaps ascribe the disastrous defeat of Peroz in the year 484 not to any material weakness, but to an excess of confidence. 122 II. A strong central government requires powerful functionaries to command its operations and to see that the ruler’s will be enacted. An influential bureaucrat rarely emerges from the shadow of the throne, and so the historian must struggle to perceive the activities, the deliberations, and the advice of high officials. But in the fifth century, the life and career of Mihr-Narseh present incontrovertible evidence of the centralised Iranian government, and the powers of its chief minister. The position of the wuzurg framadar, often construed as grand vizier, was not new. That office had been held by the mysterious Abarsam who served Ardashir I, and under Yazdgard I a certain Khusro-Yazdgard bore the same title, and there were surely others, who 120

Howard-Johnston, J., “The Late Sasanian Army,” p. 108–113. Howard-Johnston generalises from the size of the thirty-six garrisons found along the Gurgan wall which could have accommodated twenty- to thirty-thousand men each. 121 The Sasanian fortress at the modern site of Qaleh-ye Gabri in Kerman was perhaps the largest fortress in the ancient world. See the evidence and arguments presented in Sauer, E. / Nokandeh, J., / Pitskhelauri, K. / Rekavandi, H. O., “Innovation and Stagnation: Military Infrastructure and the Shifting Balance of Power Between Rome and Persia,” in Sauer, E. (ed.), Sasanian Persia: Between Rome and the Steppes of Eurasia, 2017, p. 241–267. 122 Sauer, E. / Nokandeh, J., / Pitskhelauri, K. / Rekavandi, H. O., “Innovation and Stagnation,” p. 263.

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are not represented in the historical record, who filled that office in the interval between those reigns. 123 That the career of Mihr-Narseh announces an expansion of the grand vizier’s powers is well attested by two of his bullas, which have survived; 124 and together with the high priest Kirder, Mihr-Narseh is the only other official to have commissioned an inscription. Near the scene of the first Ardashir’s investiture, Mihr-Narseh erected, at his own expense, a bridge across the river Tange Ab, and beside it is written: ‘This bridge was built by the order of Mihr-Narseh, the grand vizier, for the benefit of his soul, at his own expense. Whoever shall come upon this road, let him perform a prayer for Mihr-Narseh and his sons because he built this crossing. And so long as the gods be his help, may there be no violence or deceit in him.’ 125

The civil, military, diplomatic, and religious policies overseen by Mihr-Narseh throughout his time in office are consistent with a consolidation of power at the centre of government, and it is no surprise that the man who exerted such authority wished to commemorate himself. But our Armenian writers would not have agreed with Mihr-Narseh’s favourable appraisal of himself and his own piety, for in the opinion of Elishe and Lazar the grand vizier was a man who could be compared only with Satan. None could escape the clutches of the ‘prince and commander of the whole Persian empire’, who was an old and poisonous snake, alternately roaring and hissing at those far and near; he fed on the flesh of the saints and drank the blood of the innocent. 126 Even the king obeyed the commands, and cooperated in the sinister schemes, of that ‘malicious and evil-minded man’, whose greatest care was the destruction of weak souls. 127 It is easy to conceive of reasons to detest the functionaries of a powerful state, but the hatred common to Elishe and Lazar was enflamed by the efforts of Mihr-Narseh to enforce within their country the rites and doctrines favoured by a Zoroastrian government. Yet we may note that neither writer doubted, or attempted to diminish, the power of the grand vizier and the might of the centralised state which he served. 128

123

See the evidence presented in Chaumont, M. L., “Framadar,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, 2012, online edition. 124 Gyselen, R. Great-Commander (vuzurg-faramadār) and Court Counsellor (dar-andarzbed) in the Sasanian Empire (224–651): The Sigillographic Evidence, 2008. 125 Back, M., Die sassanidischen Staatsinschriften, p. 498. 126 Elishe, p. 89–90. 127 Lazar, p. 39. 128 A neat summary of this man’s career, which I have followed, is found in Daryaee, T., “Mehr Narseh,” Encyclopaedia Irania, 2012, online edition.

V. HUMILIATION AND HERESY A great cloud of ignorance hangs over the long and disastrous reign of Peroz down to the end of the fifth century. The Persian royal tradition is especially lacunary for that period, our Armenian writers (who are normally informative) take little interest in Iranian affairs which had no bearing upon their country, and chronology is difficult to determine. Small but important details may be extracted from Syriac chronicles and church histories, the fragments of the Byzantine History attributed to Priscus, and the history of Procopius. But it is impossible to write a satisfactory narrative of the sad reign of Peroz on the warrant of a few seemingly unconnected notices. I have tried to set forth the facts as clearly as possible, and to fill in missing intervals with whatever inferences may be justified by the evidence and the balance of probabilities.

CIVIL WAR AND THE RISE OF PEROZ Yazdgard II and his wife Denak had two sons. The elder was Hurmazd, and the younger Peroz. These two brothers disputed the succession at the death of their father. Hurmazd III appears to have reigned for two years, but a curious notice in the history of Tabari suggests that Denak was ruler in Ctesiphon whilst her two sons vied for supremacy. 1 That is the limit of our knowledge of Denak. The brief reign of Hurmazd III may have yielded only one historical notice. 2 The biography of the Iberian king Vakhtang remarks that Shahendukht, the daughter of Hurmazd III, was given in marriage to that Caucasian monarch 3 – proof of the continuing importance of that region to Iranian affairs even in the midst of civil war. 1

Tabari, v. 2, p. 82:

.�‫ وك�نت با��دا�ن ��� ّ� ما يل��ا من مل‬، ‫ وا�مها دين َك‬، ‫ك�نت أ�ّ�ما وا�دة‬

But Ferdowsi computes his reign at a single year (Ferdowsi, Hurmazd-i Yazdgard, l. 1–18). 2 Schindel, however, rejects the reign of Hurmazd III altogether, judging the coins attributed to him to be fakes (Schindel, N., Sylloge Nummorum Sasanidarum, III/1, p. 388–389). 3 The History of King Vakhtang Gorgasali, p. 173; Rapp, S. H., The Sasanian World through Georgian Eyes: Caucasia and the Iranian Commonwealth in Late Antique Georgian Literature, 2014, p. 318; see also p. 313–314; 322; 341. The name is written ‘Balendukht’ in Georgian, but this must be a

123

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It is difficult to describe this war between Peroz and Hurmazd. But the Armenian historians Lazar and Elishe have preserved the important fact that the victory of Peroz was achieved by the intervention of the ancient noble family of Mihran. Those two accounts are otherwise different. Lazar claims that Peroz was the foster son of Ashtad Mihran who personally slew Hurmazd III and installed the new king upon the throne. 4 Elishe asserts that the tutor to young Peroz was a man named Raham of the Mihran family whose army defeated the host of Hurmazd, and the tutor captured and murdered Hurmazd, and then crowned his brother Peroz. 5 The involvement of the Mihran family is the most important feature of both accounts. That the two sources disagree as to which Mihran and the nature of his relationship with Peroz is of smaller significance. Three letters composed in the Bactrian language, which can be dated between the years 457 and 459, seem to corroborate the fact of a civil war. Those letters mention a certain Kirdir-Warahran who was ruler of the Bactrian city of Rob between Kabul and Balkh. The man Kirdir-Wahrahan is otherwise unknown, but two of those texts salute him as ‘glorious through Hurmazd’, and the other describes him as ‘true to Peroz’. 6 The activities of Kirdir-Warahran, and his involvement in Sasanian affairs, are obscure; but it seems that, shifting his allegiance from one Sasanian faction to the other, that local potentate received consecutive honorific titles from both royal brothers. This may adumbrate Iranian diplomatic efforts to involve within the Sasanid civil war the masters of Bactria who, at that moment, were the Hephthalite Huns. Might Kirdir-Warahran have performed the work of an ambassador after Peroz drew his allegiance away from his brother? However that may be, the Persian royal tradition alleges that Hephthalite intervention decided the struggle between Peroz and Hurmazd. But the testimony of that tradition is somewhat garbled and fanciful. The historian Dinawari reverses the Armenian consensus, and alleges that Peroz was the elder brother of Hurmazd. When the younger brother unfairly mounted the throne, the elder fled to the court of the Hephthalite king who offered to lend thirty thousand of his troops for the struggle against Hurmazd. ‘But,’ said the Hephthalite king, ‘I shall not answer your request, unless you swear that you are older than your brother by one year’. 7 The solemn oath of Peroz satisfied the king of the Hephthalites, Hurmazd was dislodged from the throne, and the younger was forgiven and set free by his elder brother. The price of Hephthalite assistance was, as Dinawari says, the establishment of the eastern city misunderstanding of the name ‘Shahendukht’ (Gippert, J., “Onomastica Irano-Iberica: I. The Name of Vakhtang Gorgasali’s Persian Wife,” Enat’mec’nierabis sakit’xebi, 2011, p, 91–98. 4 Lazar, p. 108; 113. 5 Elishe, p. 197. 6 Sims-Williams, N., “The Sasanians in the East: A Bactrian Archive from Northern Afghanistan,” p. 93–94. 7 Dinawari, p. 60.

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of Tirmiz as the border between the abode of the Hephthalites and the Empire of Iran – a detail which may adumbrate the Iranian cession of Talaqan mentioned by the historian Tabari. 8 The testimony of the indigenous Persian tradition and that of Lazar and Elishe cannot be fully reconciled, and a rational account of the reign of Peroz must prefer the contemporary Armenian witnesses to the claims of a later time which reverse the ages of Peroz and his brother. But a Hunnish intervention is neither impossible nor improbable. 9 A part of the Persian royal tradition may be harmonised with the evidence of Lazar and Elishe if we infer that the Mihran family had enlisted Hephthalite help in the civil war between Hurmazd and Peroz. 10 It is also likely that Peroz had allied himself with the Hephthalite clan in order to overthrow a mutual enemy. 11 The eastern policy of Yazdgard II had been to pacify, to maintain, and perhaps to extend his frontier with the Kidarite Huns, and there can be no doubt that a state of war with that people continued into the reign of Peroz. The rise of the Hephthalites, which vanquished the power of the Kidarite Huns, may well have been assisted by an alliance with the faction that put Peroz upon the throne. Dinawari and Tabari appear to preserve only one term of that alliance, but there is circumstantial evidence to reconstruct other elements of it. Fragments of Priscus’ Byzantine History announce that the removal of the Kidarites was so important an aim of Peroz’ government, that an earlier Iranian embassy had invited the Romans to assist in destroying those foreigners although they posed no direct threat to Rome. 12 Diplomatic overtures to the Chinese court of the Northern

8

Tabari, v. 2, p. 81. Christensen rejected the alliance between Peroz and the Hephthalites on the doubtful ground that ‘les Hephtalites n’avaient pas encore pénétré jusqu’aux frontiers de l’Iran’ (Christensen, L’Iran sous les Sassanides, p. 284, with note 5). But Zeimal considers it almost certain (Zeimal, E. V., “The Kidarite kingdom in Central Asia” in Litvinsky, B. A. (ed.), History of civilizations of Central Asia. The crossroads of civilizations: A.D. 250 to 750 III, 1996, p. 120. 10 It is of course impossible to reconcile our sources’ differing views of the relative ages of Peroz and Hurmazd. 11 Such an alliance is inferred in Rezakhani, K., ReOrienting the Sasanians, p. 99. 12 In this connection, Priscus narrates the legendary origin of Peroz’ conflict with the Kidarite Huns. A marriage alliance had been contracted, and Peroz attempted to trick the Kidarite monarch by dispatching a low-born woman in place of his sister (Priscus, frag. 41.3 in Blockley, R. C., The Fragmentary Classicising Historians, p. 348–349). This is nearly the same as Herodotus’ tale of Cambyses and the Egyptian king Amasis and his daughter (Herodotus, III.1), and so we may fairly dismiss it – although it is possible that a marriage alliance with the Kidarite Huns and the House of Sasan may have been proposed at some time (Christensen, L’Iran sous les Sassanides, p. 288 with note 1). 9

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Wei in the years 461 and 466 may have had a similar purpose; but the precise nature of those embassies is not known. 13 When the Kidarite capital at Balkh had fallen, the Iranian government issued a series of gold dinars bearing the name of Peroz and his title in the language of Bactria, 14 and an Iranian embassy, described by the historian Priscus, boasted to the Romans of a great victory over the Huns. 15 But Chinese sources attest that Bactria (of which Balkh was the chief city) was possessed by the Hephthalites at about the same time. 16 This may imply that the territories of Iran and those of the Huns now abutted one another directly in the east, or that Bactria was disputed between those two powers. The arrival of a Persian embassy at Constantinople in about the year 467, the seventh year of Peroz’ reign, was the occasion for the boasting noticed by Priscus; and this important fact permits the conclusion that the Kidarite monarchy fell no later than that year. An Iranian embassy to the court of the Northern Wei which arrived in the year 468, may perhaps have announced the Iranian victory also. 17

THE THREAT OF WAR WITH ROME Intermittent tension with Rome afflicted the reign of Peroz down to its ignominious conclusion. Early in that reign, in the mid-460s, a plot was disclosed to the Roman emperor Leo I. The government of Iran had welcomed the defection of Ardaburius, the Roman commander in the east; and the defector had urged Peroz to attack his western foe, and promised military assistance and, we may presume, intelligence also. 18 The only source for this is the Life of St Daniel the Stylite. The secret conspiracy was discovered by the future Roman emperor Zeno, who at the time was perhaps a member of the imperial bodyguard. The incriminating letters of Ardaburius were intercepted and conveyed to the emperor Leo I who deprived that traitor of all military office, and summoned him to Constantinople. Nothing more is known of this 13

Tashakori, A., Iran in Chinese Dynastic Histories: A Study of Iran’s Relations with China prior to the Arab Conquest, unpublished MA thesis, Australian National University, 1974, p. 42–34; Ecsedy, I., “Early Persian Envoys in Chinese Courts (5th–6th Centuries A. D.),” Acta Antiqua Academiae Scientarum Hungaricae 25, 1977, p. 229. 14 Sims-Williams, N., “The Sasanians in the East: A Bactrian Archive from Northern Afghanistan,” p. 94 with fig. 2. 15 ἐμήνυον δὲ τὴν νίκην καὶ βαρβαρικὼς ἐπεκόμπαζον τὴν παροῦσαν αὐτοῖς μεγίστην δύναμιν ἀποφαίνειν ἐθέλοντες (Priscus, frag. 51.1 in Blockley, R. C., The Fragmentary Classicising Historians, p. 360–361). The name of the city of Balkh is corrupt and appears as Βαλαὰμ on the pages of Priscus. 16 De la Vaissière, E., “Is there a Nationality of the Hephthalites?,” p. 121–122. 17 Tashakori, A., Iran in Chinese Dynastic Histories, p. 42–34; Ecsedy, I., “Early Persian Envoys in Chinese Courts (5th–6th Centuries A. D.),” p. 229. We do not know what was said during these embassies: my guess about the embassy of 468 is most speculative. 18 Vita Sancti Danielis Stylitae, 55 (p. 53–54).

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interesting plot; but much may be inferred from the slim notice of it. The government of Peroz had successfully perverted the loyalty of a Roman general of the highest rank. The plot may have involved considerable military preparations, as well as promises perhaps to install Ardaburius as a new emperor loyal to Iran. But if Peroz had not aimed at conquering his western antagonist, the purpose of the plot may have been to foment instability and confusion in the eastern lands of the Roman Empire. The Roman government responded to this tension in three important ways, all of which might have been construed as small steps towards war. I. The emperor Leo I strengthened his eastern border by fortifying the city of Callinicum in Osrhoene 19 – a project which reinvigorated the policy of reinforcing the Mesopotamian frontier and which promoted a tense atmosphere between the two great powers. II. Leo I cancelled the Roman subsidy of Iran’s Caucasian defences. In the atmosphere of distrust and suspicion which followed the threat of warfare in the mid460s, the Roman government understandably refused to assist a foreign power whose aspect had become increasingly hostile. The historian Priscus notes that the emperor Leo I refused payment in the year 467, 20 shortly after the exposure of the treachery of Ardaburius. Another refusal is noted when Peroz was on the point of war with the Huns in the reign of Leo II. This matter had become an irritating diplomatic problem which demanded constant management. Priscus records that an embassy, which was surely one of many, was sent to Peroz from Constantinople to discuss in detail the Caucasian defences. 21 But no resolution to the problem was found, and the subsidy was not renewed until the time of Zeno whose reign began in the year 474. 22 III. The Roman government began to demand the return of the city of Nisibis. The fortress of Nisibis had been ceded to Iran under the reign of Shapur II in the year 363, and the transfer of that important city had exercised the pen and the vocabulary of Ammianus Marcellinus. 23 The eyewitness testimony of that writer assumed that Nisibis was to be a permanent possession of Iran. But the later chronicle of Joshua the Stylite reflects the Roman claim that Nisibis was to be returned after a term of one hundred and twenty years. 24 It is most improbable that this retrocession was mentioned in the original treaty; but if it had been a real provision of the agreement, 19

Chronicon Edessenum, LXX, p. 8. Priscus, frag. 41.1 in Blockley, R. C., The Fragmentary Classicising Historians, p. 344–346. 21 Priscus, frag. 41.1 in Blockley, R. C., The Fragmentary Classicising Historians, p. 346. 22 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, VIII–IX. On the high worth of this source, see Trombley, F. R. / Watt, J. W., The Chronicle of Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, 2000, p. xxx–xxxvii. 23 Ammianus, XXV.ix.5–6. 24 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, VII. 20

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it is unlikely that the Romans could ever seriously have expected its fulfilment without conflict. The two great powers crept slowly towards warfare until the reign of the emperor Zeno, who eased much of that tension when he ransomed Peroz who had been taken captive by the Huns. 25 That same emperor renewed the payment of annual subsidies and dispatched an embassy to assist Peroz in his struggles against the Hephthalites. But the pacific spirit of the first Yazdgard had dissipated from within the Iranian government, and Iranian Christendom was soon to be convulsed by forces of theological dispute and mutual hatred which were to achieve the permanent division of the Roman and Iranian churches. But open war was avoided until the beginning of the sixth century.

THE DOMESTIC POLICIES OF PEROZ The Persian royal tradition claims that the reign of Peroz was afflicted by a drought of seven years. 26 Tabari asserts that the king managed this disaster with such competence that only one person died of want throughout that calamity. No taxes were levied, and public money was distributed to persons in need of it. Dinawari is more effusive, but equally doubtful. 27 The waters of the rivers Tigris and Euphrates diminished, and we may infer that the fertile plain of Babylon failed to produce its normal yield of food. The unhappy governor who allowed a subject to die of hunger was himself threatened with death; peasants were exempted from taxation and an increase in rents upon uncultivated fields encouraged an industrious people to work the land with redoubled effort. A letter composed by Barsauma, metropolitan of Nisibis, in the early 480s makes mention of a drought. ‘For two successive years now’, wrote Barsauma to his colleague Acacius, ‘we have been afflicted by an absence of rain and a shortage of commodities’, and ‘famine reigns everywhere’. 28 The drought of two years forced Iran’s Arab clients to move northward and to encroach upon the territory of Rome. War was very nearly the result of this intrusion, but Qardag (an Iranian nobleman stationed along the western frontier with Rome) intervened both to pacify Arab raiders on either side of the border and to negotiate a treaty of peace with Rome. 29 It is easy to believe that the Persian royal tradition might have exaggerated the importance, and prolonged the duration, of this calamity. But the competing accounts of the drought bear almost no resemblance to one another. 25

Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, X. Tabari, v. 2., p. 82–83. 27 Dinawari, p. 60–61. 28 Barsauma, epistle 2 in Synodicon Orientale, p. 526–527. 29 Barsauma, epistle 4 in Synodicon Orientale, p. 529. Barsauma refers to the marzban Qardag Nakoragan. 26

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Though the Persian royal tradition lauds Peroz’ management of the drought, it is a curious fact that the historian Dinawari declares that Peroz was a feeble king who achieved little. 30 Such criticism of Peroz is found in no other similar source. But it is found in Christian chroniclers and historians, such as Joshua the Stylite, Agathias, and the Armenian writer Lazar Parpetsi. The common belief of those men was that Peroz was a rash and aggressive ruler, who refused to follow advice, and who brought ruin upon himself and his empire. 31 The criticism recorded by Lazar is the most vehement. It emerges from the mouth of one Zarmihr, potentate of the illustrious Karen family. Peroz ‘merely acted as a tyrant,’ said Zarmihr, ‘and at his own whim; without regard for anyone’s person or consulting anyone, he did whatever he wanted and despotically carried out his own wishes. The result of his neglecting his advisers was the destruction and downfall not only of himself but of all the empire of Iran also’. 32 Such accusations, expressed by a representative of the House of Karen, may be intended as political bluster directed at the rival Mihran family which favoured the rise of Peroz. But that opprobrium originated amongst Iranian Christians. 33

PEROZ AND THE CHRISTIANS OF IRAN Christian hatred of Peroz would have been justified for many reasons. Though persecution had been relaxed somewhat since the reign of Yazdgard II, it had not been halted altogether. 34 Early in his reign, the government of Peroz tormented Jews and Christians alike, and the catholicos of Iran was cast into prison where he languished for two years on account of his apostasy from the religion of the Magi. Religious tensions in the Caucasus, provoked by the malevolence of the second Yazdgard and his minister Mihr-Narseh, remained a serious problem even after the death of Peroz. But the reign of that king is especially connected with a bitter revolution in theological opinion which yet divides the Christian world. The fifth century was preoccupied by attempts to establish the limits of Christian orthodoxy, and the churches of Iran and Rome alike sought to purge themselves of theological error. Christendom was divided by different opinions of the nature of Christ, and the history of these debates is essential to an understanding of 30

Dinawari, p. 60. Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, IX–XI; Agathias, Historiae, IV.27; Lazar, p. 157. 32 The whole speech is found in Lazar, p. 157. Աշխարհ Արեաց is the phrase which I have construed as ‘empire of Iran’. It could mean, literally, ‘country of the Aryans’, but it is etymologically the same as Eranshahr. 33 This was first noticed (as far as I know) by Averil Cameron (Cameron, A., “Agathias on the Sasanians,” p. 113; 153). 34 Again I follow Labourt, J., Le Christianisme, p. 129–130. But I do not share Labourt’s doubts concerning the testimony of Barhebraeus. 31

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the theological revolution which occurred in the reign of Peroz. 35 In the first half of the fifth century, Nestorius, the archbishop of Constantinople, had proclaimed that a distinction must be made between the Son of God, who shares his essence with God the Father, and the human person of Jesus who was born a man, lived in Jerusalem, and died upon the cross. 36 The opposite view was that the salvation of mankind depended upon the unambiguous divinity of the Son of God, and so the divine nature of Christ received special emphasis. Christians who hold this opinion are now called monophysite, but their ancient antagonists associated them with an archimandrite by the name of Eutyches whose views of the single, divine nature of Christ were especially extreme. 37 A council held at Ephesus in the year 431 was the first important attempt to resolve the problems raised by the opinion of Nestorius. 38 This unhappy synod was disgraced by division, controversy, and violence. The partisans of a single divine nature were led by Cyril, archbishop of Alexandria, who rigorously condemned the teachings of Nestorius. But the Nestorian party, whose leader was John of Antioch, arrived late to the synod, and established their own rival council at which monophysite opinions were condemned. This hostile body pronounced the deposition both of Cyril and the bishop of Ephesus. Representatives of the bishop of Rome arrived yet later, and declared themselves for the monophysite and Cyrillian party. Months passed while the two antithetical factions refused to meet and while they exchanged a disgraceful correspondence of accusation and self-justification with the emperor Theodosius in Constantinople. In the end the Roman government endorsed the opinions of Cyril, Nestorius was deposed, and he returned to his convent in Syria. For the next several years, the policy of Theodosius was to urge the party of John of Antioch towards some form of reconciliation with that of Cyril. No explicit condemnation of Nestorius emerged from the court at Constantinople until the year 436 when Nestorius was sent into exile. But conflict arose again in the 440s, and the extreme monophysite opinion of Eutyches were declared orthodox at the second Ephesian synod of the year 448. The Synod held at Chalcedon in the year 451 represented an attempt to find a middle way between the opposite opinions of Nestorius and those of Eutyches by affirming both the divine and the human natures of

35 My summary of Christological differences follows Grillmeier, A., Christ in Christian Tradition: From the Apostolic Age to Chalcedon (451), v. 1, John Knox Press, 1975, p. 447–463; 473– 484 and Millar, F., A Greek Roman Empire, 2006, p. 157–167. 36 The words of Nestorius: τῆς δὲ θεότητος καὶ ἀνθρωπότητος ἔστι διαίρεσις, etc (Rouët de Journel, M. J., Enchiridion Patristicum, 1959, p. 641). 37 Eutyches seemed to teach that the incarnate Son of God was a fusion of divine and human natures (Cf. Denzinger, H. / Bannwart, C. (eds.), Enchiridion Symbolorum, 1928, p. 63–64, in which Pope Leo I refutes the opinions of Eutyches). 38 Grillmeier, A., Christ in Christian Tradition, p. 484–487.

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Christ, but without mixture or division. 39 But this failed to pacify the theological antagonists, and the parties of the single and the double nature continued their feud. The Roman emperor Basiliscus mounted the throne when the monophysite cause was ascendant, and his attempts to reconcile that faction with Orthodox opinion miscarried dreadfully. An encyclical letter which he issued in the year 476 provoked a violent reaction from monastic communities as well as the opposition of the patriarch of Constantinople. 40 In the year 481, the Roman emperor Zeno addressed a letter to the churches of Egypt which announced a common faith founded upon the councils of Nicaea and Constantinople. The Henoticon, as this letter was called, condemned the opposite errors of Nestorius and Eutyches; but its apparent rejection of the Chalcedonian synod seemed to justify monophysite opinion and provoked a schism with the western half of Christendom under the authority of the Bishop of Rome. 41 But the Encyclical of Basiliscus and the Henoticon of Zeno plainly demonstrated that the imperial government had assumed the authority and operations of an ecumenical synod and had begun to dictate, or at least to endorse, doctrine. It was not long before the government of Iran imitated this example. The Roman government had rejected the teaching, or at least the person, of Nestorius; but dyophysite Christology which its critics called Nestorian, soon found welcome in the Empire of Iran. 42 The triumph of a non-Chalcedonian, dyophysite Christology, which occurred in the reign of Peroz, established an independent Iranian church, and divided the Christians of Iran from those of Rome. The principal architect of this unhappy transformation was a former student and teacher at the theological school of Edessa. Barsauma, 43 whose enemies called him a disciple of Nestorius, rigorously distinguished the divine from the human person of Christ, and he had been condemned as a heretic at the Ephesian Synod of 431. His later withdrawal to the Iranian Empire afforded him greater room to expound his teachings. Grillmeier, A., Christ in Christian Tradition, p. 488–554. The creed of Chalcedon confessed Christ ἐν δύο φύσεσιν ἀσυγκρέτως, ἀτρέπτως. ἀδιαιρέτως, ἀχωρίστως γνωριζόμενον, οὐδαμοῦ τῆς ἰδιότητος ἑκατέρας φύσεως, καὶ εἰς ἕν πρόσωπον καὶ μίαν ὑπόστασιν συντρεχούσης; and, in further contradistinction to the Nestorian doctrine, οὐκ εἰς δύω πρόσωπα μεριζόμενον ἢ διαιρούμενον, etc (Denzinger, H. / Bannwart, C. (eds.), Enchiridion Symbolorum, p. 66). 40 The Encyclical of Basiliscus may be read in Evagrius, Historia Ecclesiastica, III.iv. 41 For the Henoticon of Zeno, see Evagrius, Historia Ecclesiastica, III.xiv. 42 I cannot pursue the subtleties of the argument here, but it should be observed that the theology of Iranian Christianity was not properly Nestorian (Brock, S. P., “The “Nestorian” Church: a lamentable misnomer,” Bulletin of the John Rylands University Library of Manchester 78/3, 1996, p. 23–35). 43 For a brief summary of this man’s career, see Vööbus, A., “Barsauma” in Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. III, fasc. 8, 1988, p. 824. For a longer, more thorough exposition of the same, see Gerö, S., Barsauma of Nisibis and Persian Christianity in the fifth Century, (Corpus Scriptorum Christianorum Orientalium 426, subsidia 63), Louvain, 1981. 39

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With time, Barsauma became metropolitan of Nisibis, and he ingratiated himself with the Sasanian monarch who preferred the pliant sycophancy of that bishop to the more rigorous attitude of the patriarch of Seleucia-Ctesiphon, whom he regarded as a Romanising traitor. Conflict between Baboy (that was the patriarch’s name) and Barsauma was inevitable. The two churchmen fought alike over the nature of Christ and the legality of married bishops amongst perhaps other minute points of doctrine and ecclesiology. The dispute terminated in the execution of Baboy on a charge of treachery. Baboy (as it was alleged) had attempted to involve the Roman emperor in his contest with his allegedly Nestorian antagonist; but Barsauma claimed to have intercepted a letter dispatched to the emperor Zeno and revealed it to Peroz who commanded that Baboy be crucified, suspended by his ring finger, and flogged to death. 44 The death of Baboy allowed Barsauma to place the Iranian church under the influence, if not the patronage, of the Sasanian court. Barsauma’s embrace of diophysite Christology and his disavowal of clerical celibacy made the Christian religion somewhat more appealing to a nation of Zoroastrians; and Barsauma’s vision of an alliance between throne and altar would have appealed to the royal court. But the process by which this was achieved is obscured by the hatred of Barsauma’s opponents. ‘Unless’, Barsauma is supposed to have said to Peroz, ‘unless the faith of the Christians in your dominions be separated from the faith of the Christians in the dominions of the Greeks, their hearts and feelings shall never be loyal to you’. 45 It was the view of his enemies that Barsauma had promised (if given the proper means) to make Nestorians of all Iranian Christians and to establish reciprocal hatred between Iranian and Roman Christians. 46 So vehement was the zeal of Barsauma that, as his antagonists alleged, seven thousand and seven hundred Orthodox Christians perished in Nisibis at his behest. 47 However this may be, Barsauma succeeded in severing the churches of the two great powers, and the final separation was ratified at a synod of the year 486, two years after the death of Peroz. 48 The independence of the Iranian church has been portrayed as a political victory for the Sasanid monarchy. 49 This is true only insofar as the Roman emperor would have been deprived of all real or theoretical responsibility for Iranian Christians. But the supposed Nestorian, or at least dyophiste, settlement made nonsense 44

Barhebraeus, v. III, p. 66. Barhebraeus, v. III, p. 66. 46 Barhebraeus, v. III, p. 68: 45

̈ ‫ܘܐܢ ܝܗܒ ܐܢܬ ܠܝ ܚܝ� ܐܢܐ ܠܟܠܗܘܢ ܟ�ܝܣܛܝܢܐ ܕܒܐܬ�ܘܬܟ‬ ‫ܒܢܝ ܬܪܠܝܬܗ ܕܓܒܪܐ ܗܘ ܥܒܕ ܐܢܐ‬

The man to which the passage refers is Nestorius. 47 Barhebraeus, v. III, p. 70; though I note that Labourt seems to reject this notice (Labourt, J., Le Christianisme, p. 136). 48 The canons of this synod are preserved in Synodicon Orientale, p. 55–59. 49 Christensen, A., L’Iran sous les Sassanides, p. 287.

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of the first Yazdgard’s claim to be equal to, or greater than, the Roman emperor by uniting Christians of both east and west under the Sasanid monarchy; and it promoted division amongst the followers of Christ within the empire of Iran and amongst her Transcaucasian clients, who were soon to reject both the formulas of Chalcedon and those of the so-called Nestorian church of Iran. 50

TROUBLE IN THE TRANSCAUCASUS The effects of the Vardan’s uprising and the Battle of Avarayr were yet felt as the fifth century proceeded toward its end. By the middle of the reign of Yazdgard II, a great part of Transcaucasia was in ruins, the Christian peoples of that region were united in a common struggle against the empire of Iran, and companies of Huns fought on both sides. An army of Albanians joined itself to the Armenian host and the common army of those two nations destroyed Sasanian fortresses in Albania. That army proceeded to seize and occupy Iran’s Caucasian defences: their garrisons were slaughtered and a large part of them was destroyed. 51 An important fortress guarding one of the Caucasian passes was occupied by a man of the Albanian royal family who bore the name Vahan, and this magnate contracted an alliance with the Huns who dwelt in the Caucasus and beyond the borders of Iran. At the behest of Vahan those Huns began to assault the Iranian frontier with devastating effect. 52 The Armenian historian Elishe notes that these attacks were received with alarm at the Sasanid court, and the loss of Caucasian fortifications was perceived as a very serious humiliation. Albanian occupation of Iran’s Caucasian defences endured until the year 463, the fifth year of the reign of Peroz. 53 Dislodging those foreigners was attended by reciprocal calamities. At the behest of the Albanian king Vache, successive waves of Hunnish invaders with a numerous train of nomadic federates had inflicted great damage upon Iranian forces. The Sasanian government employed its own Hunnish allies against the Albanian king, and a great part of Albania was devoted to fire and sword. 54 The details are rather vague, but when both sides had exhausted them-

50

The Synod of Dvin in the year 505 united the bishops of Armenia, Georgia, and Albania; and the heresy of Nestorius was rigorously condemned (Thompson, R. W., “Mission, Conversion, and Christianization: The Armenian Example,” Harvard Ukrainian Studies, Vol. 12/13, 1988–1989, p. 39–40). 51 Elishe, p. 77–78. 52 Elishe, p. 127–129. 53 Elishe, p. 198–199. 54 For a modern authority, see Bíró, M., “On the Presence of the Huns in the Caucasus: to the Chronology of the ‘Ovs’ Raid Mentioned in Juanšer’s Chronicle,” Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae, Vol. 50, No. 1/3, 1997, p. 55–56.

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selves, a settlement was reached; and Vache relinquished the Caucasian fortress which he had seized and returned to his own country. 55 Amidst these convulsions, Lazar (who was an Armenian Christian) accuses the Iranian king of cultivating a disdain for his countrymen. ‘Of all the peoples under my power’, said Peroz, ‘the least useful and the worst brigade is the Syrian, but the Armenian is even worse than the Syrian’. But this arraignment of Armenians and their martial prowess was balanced by a policy of respectful conciliation. In the first year of Peroz’ reign, peace with Yazdgard’s Armenian captives was assured by freedom from bondage and by the allocation of stipends. 56 In Peroz’ sixth regnal year, the Sasanian court sent those Armenians back to their ancestral lands. 57 It may be possible to see in these details the beginning of an Iranian policy of toleration for the Christians of Armenia and the Caucasus which achieved its final form in the reign of Balash. 58 But that policy was slow to change and the calamitous state of the Transcaucasus endured to the end of Peroz’ reign. The most obvious sign of trouble was a direct attack upon Sasanian loyalists in Armenia in the year 482, two years before the death of Peroz. The Iberian king Vakhtang killed Vazgen, a governor of the Armenian province of Gugark. Vazgen had embraced the Zoroastrian religion, and his position of favour with the House of Sasan was intolerable to his Christian antagonist. 59 It was Vakhtang’s solemn promise to unite all Caucasian Christians in common cause against Iran, and to set loose so great a multitude of Huns that the armies of Iran could not possibly resist them. 60 Violence ensued with renewed enthusiasm, and Peroz ordered his general stationed in the Caucasus to kill, capture, or expel king Vakhtang. That general was a man by the name of Zarmihr whose lineage was of the House of Karen, and his orders were dispatched immediately before Peroz’ departure for war against the Hephthalite Huns in the year 484. 61

55

The Armenian writer seems to say that the Persian king’s sister and niece had been captured by the Albanian king and converted to Christianity. Their liberty is the only condition mentioned by Elishe (Elishe, p. 198). It was said that Vahan relinquished the monarchy of Albania and became a monk. 56 Lazar, p. 108; Elishe, p.199. 57 Lazar, p. 110. 58 The writer Lazar also includes an anecdote about a dialogue between Peroz’ minister Ashtad Mihran and the Armenian catholicos Giwt (Lazar, p. 113–116). 59 To this day, king Vakhtang is commemorated as a saint of the Georgian church. 60 Lazar, p. 118. For a brief analysis see Thomson, R. W., The History of Łazar Pʻarpecʻi, p. 171 with note 6. In the event, however, it appears that a mere three hundred Huns were assembled (Lazar, 126. 61 Lazar, p. 126.

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WAR WITH THE HEPHTHALITE HUNS Peroz made war upon the Hephthalite Huns three times. The Syriac chronicle attributed to Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite is the most important source for these conflicts. 62 This chronicle has reduced the wars of Peroz to mere statements of fact: little of the attendant circumstances are revealed, and no convincing reason for constant warfare is presented. But Joshua’s attestation of three battles may be corroborated by the three issues of Peroz’ coins, each of which displays a different crown probably signifying his first accession and his two restorations after defeat and capture by the Hephthalite Huns. 63 Some important details are added by Procopius, whose narration of the wars of Peroz and Kavad form a lengthy introduction in his history of the age of Justinian. Although the exiguous consensus of the Stylite and Procopius is trustworthy, their narratives are disfigured by imperfections and omissions. Procopius has reduced the number of confrontations with the Huns to only two 64 – and it is only the last battle, in which Peroz himself perished, that bears an obvious resemblance to the same conflict as described by Joshua. Moreover the chronology of Peroz’ battles is difficult to infer from those texts alone, and so we must turn to the evidence of numismatics for a more secure dating. 65 But it is perhaps the absence of a clear motive or purpose for warfare that is most troubling to a modern historian. Joshua appears to suggest that the original reason for warfare was connected with an Iranian policy of keeping Huns out of Iranian and Roman territory, and Procopius accuses an interminable dispute over borders. 66 Arguments touching the Hephthalite and Iranian frontier in Bactria may well have been the origin of this problem, but neither Procopius nor Joshua provide clarity or detail. The precise circumstances which transformed the Huns into the enemy of Peroz are likewise obscure, and the reiteration of hostility after two humiliating reverses demands some explanation. It may be that Peroz’ rule was never secure, and that he desired an important military victory to establish his fitness to occupy the Sasanid throne. Hephthalite intervention had delivered the Iranian Empire to Peroz, and rival noble houses may have looked upon him as a Hephthalite stooge. To make war upon his former benefactors was perhaps the only convincing proof that Peroz was an independent king. But the Heph62

Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, X. I am drawing an inference from evidence presented in Schindel, N., Sylloge Nummorum Sasanidarum, Band III/1, p. 402–410. Schindel himself, in a personal communication, disagrees with my inference. 64 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.iii–iv. 65 Heidemann, S., “The Hephthalite Drachms Minted in Balkh: A Hoard, A Sequence and a New Reading,” Coin Hoards 2015, p. 331–332. 66 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, VIII. The Hephthalites (says Procopius) dwelt to the north of Iran, οὗ δὴ πόλις Γοργὼ ὄνομα πρὸς αὐταῖς που ταῖς Περσῶν ἐσχατιαῖς ἐστιν, ἐνταῦθα δὲ περὶ γῆς ὁρίων διαμάχεσθαι πρὸς ἀλλήλους εἰώθασιν (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.iii.3). 63

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thalite reaction ensured that Iranian aristocratic opinion would remain divided: capturing and releasing Peroz would provoke further doubts about his loyalty and invite further warfare in which the Huns expected to be victorious. The first invasion of Peroz involved the recovery of certain lands from Hunnish possession, but in the end Peroz was taken prisoner. Zeno, the Roman emperor, ransomed the Iranian king in the year 474, and reconciled the House of Sasan with the Hephthalite Huns. 67 A formal treaty (says Joshua the Stylite) stipulated that Peroz should never again bring war into the land of the Hephthalites. Roman interests were perhaps best served by maintaining a weakened Sasanid state, but not by allowing it to be destroyed altogether. This may explain the involvement of the Roman emperor in rescuing Peroz. Procopius has recorded what appears to be an accurate account of Peroz’ first Hepthalite war. The Greek historian writes that a Roman ambassador by the name of Eusebius had been sent to the court of Peroz by the emperor Zeno, and that he had accompanied the Sasanian king on a second expedition against the Huns. The Roman eye-witness transmitted to Procopius the Hephthalite use of the feigned retreat which induced Iranian forces to pursue a flying enemy into a circle of mountains beyond the frontier at Gurgan. 68 Soon an ambush was suspected, Iranian forces became sensible of their peril, but Peroz continued pursuit. Iranian troops prevailed upon the Roman ambassador to explain the present danger to the Sasanian king. The words of Eusebius achieved their intended effect, the Iranian army halted, and the king of the Huns dispatched an embassy to Peroz. Hunnish diplomats vituperated the Iranian king for his foolhardiness, but promised to release him on the condition that he prostrate himself before the Hephthalite king and solemnly swear never again to attack the Huns. In the deliberations which ensued, clerics of the Magian religion advised the Sasanian king to obviate the enemy’s demand by guile. Following the counsel of the Magi, Peroz met the Hephthalite ruler at dawn and performed a prostration before the rising sun, thereby escaping the shame of adoring a foreign potentate. We can only speculate as to what effect this strange display would have had upon the Hephthalite Huns, if indeed it occurred at all. But the enemies of Iran were perhaps more greatly concerned with creating the appearance of a weak and foolish Sasanian monarch than the extraction of real obeisance. An Iranian embassy to the court of the Northern Wei of the year 476 is noticed in Chinese annals. 69 After the capture and ransom of Peroz, the Sasanid government may have assured the Chinese court that the Iranian monarchy had not collapsed and that the trade which passed through Iran from China would not be interrupted. 67

Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, X. Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.iii.8–22. It is not obvious how this information was transmitted. 69 Tashakori, A., Iran in Chinese Dynastic Histories, p. 42–34; Ecsedy, I., “Early Persian Envoys in Chinese Courts (5th–6th Centuries A. D.),” p. 229. 68

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But this is speculative, since only the mere fact of the embassy, and not its purpose, has been preserved. The next conflict arose in the late 470s or early 480s when the Sasanid monarch broke the treaty to which he had agreed, and invaded a second time. Like Zedekiah (says the Stylite) who was installed by, and who revolted against, the king of Babylon, Peroz was taken into Hephthalite captivity again. The Iranian king offered to purchase his freedom with thirty mules laden with silver coin: an offer which he was unable to fulfil. A depleted treasury could yield a mere twenty mule loads of silver; and in place of the other ten which had been promised, Peroz dispatched his son, the future king Kavad I, as a pledge and hostage to the Hephthalite monarch until what remained of the money should be paid. A second treaty was signed, Peroz vowed yet again never to renew his attack upon the Huns, and he returned to Iran. 70 The imposition of a poll-tax amassed the ten mule loads of silver which had previously been omitted, the young Kavad was ransomed, an army was collected, and for the third and final time Peroz assailed the Hephthalite Huns. The war of the year 484 that ended Peroz’ life and reign is narrated in circumstantial detail by Procopius. 71 The humiliation which the Huns had inflicted upon the Sasanian king urged him to recover the honour of his nation, and he proceeded to battle with a vast retinue of followers and allies, including apparently thirty of his sons. But Kavad, the youngest son of Peroz, remained in Iran. Peroz advanced into the land of the Hephthalites without opposition, and the two antagonists confronted one another in a broad plain in which the Hepthalites had dug a prodigious trench of great depth. The trench proceeded across the plain in a straight line, but a small portion in the middle of it was left intact, enough for the passage of ten horses as Procopius says. Reeds and earth disguised the Hephthalite stratagem. A small detachment of Huns lured the Iranian host into the plain, and feigned a retreat while the forces of Peroz charged at full speed toward the large Hunnish army which waited in formation behind the trench. Every man, says Procopius, plunged into the trench and perished; and Peroz, his army, and his thirty sons were involved in a common ruin. 72 70

The second armistice noticed by Joshua is corroborated by another writer. The Armenian historian Lazar writes that the survivors of the Hephthalite war reported a curious detail (Lazar, p. 155). On the eve of Peroz’ last campaign, the Hephthalite king sent a letter to Peroz which portrayed Iranian aggression as unjust and perfidious. According to this letter, Peroz’ previous Hephthalite war had ended in his capture, and the Hunnish king had demanded a written oath to the effect that the Iranian king should never again fight against him. A boundary between the two states had been established, and dire warnings were invoked against future treachery. 71 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.iv.1–35. Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite is far too vague to be useful in this connexion. 72 Dinawari claims that the Hunnish king occupied Peroz’ camp, and captured all his possessions, the chief mobad, and the daught of Peroz also (Dinawari, p. 61). The death of Peroz

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AFTERMATH OF DEFEAT News of Peroz’ defeat was received with horror in Iran. Procopius alleges that a law was established forbidding an Iranian army from pursuing a retreating enemy. 73 When Mihran Shapuh (says the writer Lazar) was acquainted with the disaster by a messenger, he sank into a state of dismayed terror, lost his powers of speech, and fell into a swoon for many hours. 74 Recovering himself, Mihran demanded to know the reason of the defeat; and the messenger accused the rashness of a king who demanded, without warning, that his troops face an enemy that was certain to annihilate them. Zarmihr Karen, who yet remained in Iberia, was stricken with horror and wracked by doubt when he received the ill news: without delay Zarmihr abandoned operations in the region of the Caucasus and returned to Iran. The surviving remnants of the nobility joined Mihran Shapuh and Zarmihr Karen at the Sasanian court, where they consulted amongst themselves for the purpose of choosing the successor to the dead monarch. 75 This was the beginning of nearly fifty years of confusion and disorder in the Empire of Iran.

THE REIGN OF BALASH Zarmihr Karen and Mihran Shapuh presided over a conclave which chose a certain Balash as the next Sasanian king of Iran. This unfortunate man was not the son, but the brother of Peroz. 76 This election was contested by a third brother, who bore the name of Zareh, and the energies of the House of Sasan were again wasted in civil war. The outcome of this fratricidal contest was decided by the intervention of Armenian troops. The partisans of Balash dispatched the Iranian general Nikhor Gushnaspdad, who solicited the help of the Armenian rebel movement led by Vawas the occasion for Procopius to insert into his narrative a tale which he dismisses as untrustworthy. A pearl of extraordinary size depended from the right ear of Peroz; and as he plunged into the Hephthalite trench, Peroz seized this adornment and flung it from him (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.iv.14). The Roman Emperor Zeno exerted himself to buy the pearl, but a laborious search failed to recover that treasure until the reign of Kavad who purchased it from the Hephthalite Huns. This incredible tale gives way to a legendary account of the origin of the pearl. A fabulous monster guarded that gem which was the largest and most beautiful of its kind in the world: Peroz greatly desired to possess it and which a fisherman retrieved it for him. The lineaments of the story recall the Syriac Hymn of the Pearl which is a work of Manichaean or Gnostic allegory, as well as Christ’s parable of the Pearl of Great Price (Jackson Bonner, M. R., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 56; Ferreira, J., The Syriac Hymn of the Pearl, 2002, p. 2–5; Matthew 13:45–46). The account of Procopius must have been influenced by a source which had been shaped by the mystical opinions of Syriac Christianity. 73 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.iv.33. 74 Lazar, p. 154. 75 Lazar, p. 157–158. 76 Contra Dinawari, p. 62.

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han Mamikonean. 77 According to Zarmihr (as Lazar records), it was vitally important to bring the Armenian rebellion to an end, to pacify the Caucasus, and to reintegrate that region within the Empire of Iran. 78 The involvement of Armenia on the side of Balash came at a price; and Vahan required the destruction of every temple of fire in Armenia, and he demanded the official tolerance of the Christian religion. 79 A grateful Balash granted these conditions and appointed Vahan governor of Armenia. This was the beginning of a new Iranian policy of respect for Caucasian Christianity, but official endorsement of the Nestorian doctrine assured that the Iranian and Caucasian churches would in time be permanently estranged. The chronicle of Joshua the Stylite allows us a small glimpse at the disorders that afflicted Iran at the end of the fifth century. 80 The reign of Balash was disgraced by financial embarrassment. The expenses of warfare, and tribute paid in defeat, had exhausted the Iranian treasury. The eastern possessions of Iran had been wasted by the Huns, and their populations had been carried off or driven away. This was the opportunity for the Roman emperor Zeno to withhold the subsidy which he had renewed in the reign of Peroz; and that emperor instructed Balash to content himself with the taxes of Nisibis. A spirit of mutiny spread throughout the Iranian army, which Balash had failed to pay, and the soldiers began to look upon the monarch with contempt. The Iranian clergy likewise accused Balash of seeking to abolish their customs; and their wrath (says the Stylite) was peculiarly aroused by that king’s project of adorning the cities of Iran with Roman baths – a symbol, perhaps, of other more annoying innovations. It was a mere four years before Balash was deposed, blinded, and replaced in the year 488 by his nephew and Peroz’ son Kavad. A part of the Iranian aristocracy may have hated Balash because it was his government that proclaimed full tolerance of Armenian Christianity. The Stylite’s reference to the abolition of Zoroastrian customs most probably refers to the destruction of fire shrines in Armenia – another cause of hatred and resentment. But the historians Dinawari and Tabari offer surprisingly laudatory descriptions of Balash whose reign hardly filled a page of their respective works. 81 We may infer that those brief descriptions of Balash repose upon Christian opinions, and that the Stylite was informed by the hostile accusations of the Persian court. 77

Lazar, p. 171–172. Lazar, p. 158. 79 Lazar, p. 161; 174. The narrative of Lazar suggests that the intervention of Vahan and his troops preceded the pacification of Armenia, but the participation of Armenian forces in the Iranian civil war must have been a condition upon which the toleration of Christianity reposed (Jackson Bonner, M. R., “Six Problèmes d’interprétation dans les règnes de Pērōz, Balāš, Jāmāsp et Kavād,” Historia i Swiat, nr 4, 2015, p. 106–107). 80 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, XVIII–XIX. 81 Dinawari, p. 61; Tabari, v. 2, p. 90. Dinawari allocates a single sentence; Tabari a short paragraph. 78

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THE END OF THE FIFTH CENTURY AND THE RISE OF KAVAD Kavad was the only man of the Sasanid line to occupy the throne for two periods of rule which were not consecutive. The first reign of Kavad proceeded from the year 488 and lasted nine years; and his second reign began in the year 498 and filled the following thirty-four years until his death in the year 531. In the interval of three years between those two periods, the empire of Iran was ruled by Jamasp, the younger brother of Kavad. The figure of a king who was deprived of his throne, who survived that ordeal, and who returned to power, exhibits a strange paradox of royal infirmity, power, and endurance. Kavad mounted the throne as a young man under the influence of noble power, and a faction of the Iranian aristocracy deposed the young king because he had favoured a strange religion. A contest between noble parties diminished the power and prestige of the House of Sasan, and might have extinguished them forever. But Kavad’s return to power began a series of military and administrative reforms which restored the might of the monarchy and established a new era of warfare with Rome. But our sources form a great mass of contradiction, fantasy, and exaggeration; and large gaps and omissions mean that an harmonious narrative cannot be written. I must therefore organise that imperfect material in the form of four themes: I. the ascendancy and decline of noble power; II. the royal patronage of heresy; III. the removal of Kavad and his return to the throne; and IV. the reform of the Iranian state.

THE ASCENDANCY AND DECLINE OF NOBLE POWER I. Kavad ascended the Sasanid throne at a young age, and the influence of the House of Karen overshadowed his early reign. The writer Procopius reports that Kavad was a boy at the moment of his father’s disastrous Hephthalite war, 82 and Dinawari asserts that his reign began when he had attained fifteen years. 83 Other circumstantial details corroborate the young accession of Kavad. Balash, the brother of Peroz, reigned in place of the young son of the former king, and the face of a youth with short whiskers appears upon most coins struck in the first reign of Kavad. 84 If Kavad was aged fifteen years in the year 488 when his first reign began, the year 473 must have been the moment of his birth. The year 531 was the time of Kavad’s death; and so that king’s life filled only fifty-eight years. The certainty of arithmetic makes nonsense of the claims of John Malalas and Ferdowsi who allege that Kavad died at about the age of eighty years. 85 We may infer that this fable was disseminated by the Iranian court in order to excuse or expunge the weakness of 82

Τηνικαῦτα…ἡβεκὼς ἔτυχε (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.iv.2). Dinawari, p. 66. 84 See the examples in Schindel, N., Sylloge Nummorum Sasanidarum III/1, p. 461. 85 John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 471; Ferdowsi, Qubad, l. 368. Malalas gives Kavad 82, and Ferdowsi 80, years at the time of his death. 83

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Kavad’s first reign, for it was the nobleman Zarmihr of the House of Karen who was then the power behind the throne. I must pause here and describe one of the worst defects in the sources of Kavad’s reign. The stream of Lazar’s history begins to run dry after the introduction of the figure of Zarmihr, and so we must follow his career elsewhere. Though the Persian royal tradition agrees that a man of the House of Karen elected Balash and Kavad, those texts invoke that aristocrat under the name, or a variant of the name, of Sukhra. 86 There can be no doubt that Sukhra is the same man whom Lazar Parpetsi calls Zarmihr, 87 but it is impossible to explain the discrepancy of names. Our confusion is worsened because Dinawari and Tabari claim that the son of Sukhra was a man by the name of Zarmihr who also exerted influence over the Sasanid throne. 88 No resolution to this problem may be considered wholly satisfactory, but hereafter I shall refer to the elder and to the younger, as well as to the first and to the second, Zarmihr. According to Dinawari, the empire of Iran was entrusted to Zarmihr the elder when Peroz fought the Hephthalites, and that aristocrat prosecuted a war of revenge against the Huns who had slain his sovereign. The elder Zarmihr went forth with an immense host into the land of the Hephthalites; and at the sight of the Iranian army, the Hunnish king relinquished all prisoners and booty which had been captured from the forces of Peroz. 89 No contemporary source records such a war of revenge upon the Hephthalites after the death of Peroz, and we must assume that this tradition was invented to compensate for the embarrassment of defeat and the humiliation of tribute. An army so imposing as to frighten the Hephthalites at the mere sight of it could not have been raised as swiftly as the royal tradition implies; nor may we believe that the victorious Huns were persuaded to negotiate so easily. The other deeds of the first Zarmihr are less entertaining but more important and more probable. Having appointed Balash, the elder Zarmihr instantly involved himself in a feud with the rival house of Mihran, which issued in the affirmation of Sasanian power and the abasement of the House of Karen. 90 It was the first Zarmihr who persuaded Balash to send his rival Mihran Shapuh away from the Persian court and into Armenia for the pacification of Vahan’s rebellion – a mission attended by 86

Dinawari calls him Shukhar (Dinawari, p. 62); Tabari spells the name Sukhra (Tabari, v. 2, p. 82), and Ferdowsi renders it Sufra (Peroz, l. 46). It is the Middle Persian form of the name Suhrab. 87 Jackson Bonner, M. R., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 81; Bosworth, C. E., The History of al-Tabari, p. 127 with note 325; Christensen, L’Iran sous les Sassanides, p. 289–290 with note 5; Nöldeke, Die Geschichte der Perser, p. 134 with note 1. 88 Dinawari, p. 67; Tabari, v. 2, p. 86. 89 Dinawari claims that this included the daughter of Peroz and a mobad of high rank (Dinawari, p. 63). 90 Dinawari, p. 62–67; Tabari, v. 2, p. 85–90.

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many dangers. 91 The Shahnameh of Ferdowsi alleges, without clarity or detail, the outbreak of domestic warfare between the noble houses of Mihran and Karen. 92 Toward the end of Kavad’s first reign, came the triumph of the House of Mihran. Mihran Shapuh, whom Persian tradition identifies as Shapur of Rey, plotted with Kavad who commanded the murder of the elder Zarmihr, and humiliated the House of Karen.

THE ROYAL PATRONAGE OF HERESY II. A bizarre heresy reasserted itself in the reign of Kavad, and that king favoured its return and propagation. The doctrine, which in time was associated with a certain Mazdak, was founded upon the opinions of a priest of the Zoroastrian religion called Zaradusht, son of Khurrag. Zaradusht was perhaps a contemporary of the prophet Mani who flourished in the reign of Shapur I and who was executed in the reign of Bahram I, but nothing certain is known of him. 93 The followers of Zaradusht believed that all strife arose from an unequal distribution of wealth and women. Community of all possessions and the sharing of wives were therefore the most celebrated teachings of what came to be called Mazdakism, 94 and these doctrines have inspired the obsessional interest of modern communists. 95 But Joshua the Stylite notices only what he found most troubling: Kavad ‘reestablished an abominable 91

Lazar, p. 158–159. Ferdowsi, Qubad, l. 51–60. 93 The evidence for this is in the History of Karkha de Beth Slokh which was composed in the sixth century. That text clearly makes Zaradusht a contemporary of Mani. For the primary evidence, see Acta Martyrum et Sanctorum Syriace, v. II, p. 517, and for a modern analysis, see de Blois, F., “Mazdak the Ancient and Mazdak the Last: Further Remarks on the History and Religious Typology of Mazdakism,” in Jullien, C., Husraw Ier: Reconstructions d’un règne, sources et documents, 2015, p. 143–144. 94 de Blois, F., “Mazdak the Ancient and Mazdak the Last,” p. 147–149. 95 Here are some of the more prominent treatments of Mazdakism: Jackson Bonner, M. R., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 86–90; de Blois, F., “A New Look at Mazdak,” in Bernheimer, T. / Silverstein, A (eds), Late Antiquity: Eastern Perspectives, 2012, p. 1–24; Wiesehöfer, J., “Kawad, Khusro I and the Mazdakites: A New Proposal,” in Gignoux, P. / Jullien, C. / Jullien, F. (eds), Trésor d’Orient: Mélanges offerts à Rika Gyselen, 2009, p. 391–409; Crone, P., “Kavad’s Heresy and Mazdak’s Revolt,” Iran, v. 29, 1991, p. 21–42; Gaube, H., “Mazdak: Historical Reality or Invention,” Studia Iranica 11, 1982, p. 111–122; Klíma, O., Beiträge zur Geschichte des Mazdakismus, 1977; Pigulevskaja, N. V., Les Villes de l’état iranien aux époques parthe et sassanide: contribution à l’histoire sociale de la basse antiquité, 1964, p. 105, 206; Klíma, O., Mazdak: Geschichte einer sozialen Bewegung im sasanidischen Persien, 1957; Altheim, F. / Stiehl, R., Ein Asiatischer Staat: Feudalismus unter den Sasanidischen und ihren Nachbarn, 1954, p. 189 et seqq.; Christensen, A., Le Règne du roi Kawadh I et le communisme mazdakite, 1925. Mazdakism has attracted to itself perhaps more attention than any other individual aspect of Sasanian history. 92

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Magian sect called the Zaradushtaqan,’ which advocated wife-sharing and communal sex, 96 but he neglects the doctrine of holding property in common. Kavad’s endorsement of these ideas provoked a severe reaction from his nobility. 97 Kavad was removed from the throne and replaced by his brother Jamasp, and an aristocratic conclave hesitated to recommend either execution or imprisonment. The latter opinion prevailed and was suggested to the new king, and Kavad was immured within the Castle of Oblivion, as it was called, whence he escaped and sought refuge at the court of the Hephthalite Huns. 98 This was Kavad’s punishment for endorsing the heresy of Mazdakism. But who was Mazdak? According to Iranian legend, Mazdak was the man who expounded the heresy which Kavad endorsed, and which continued to afflict the Iranian state into the reign of Khusro I. Zoroastrian holy writ blames Mazdak without hesitation or ambiguity for leading Kavad into error: During the reign of Kavad, Mazdak, son of Bamdad, appeared and laid down the law of Mazdakism. Kavad was deceived and led astray. He ordered that wives, children, and property be held in common and be shared. He discontinued the Mazdayasnian tradition until the blessed Khusro, son of Kavad, came of age, killed Mazdak, and re-established the Mazdayasnian tradition… 99

But, despite the sanction of Zoroastrian orthodoxy, this account is not wholly truthful. No contemporary sources notice Mazdak, and his very existence may fairly be doubted. 100 Overwhelming unrest is attributed to the votaries of that heresiarch – but only upon the pages of the Persian royal tradition. 101 The troubles rehearsed by Dinawari and Tabari have been construed as consequences of a policy calculated to undermine the power of the nobility and to overthrow the Sasanian class system. 102 But when Kavad was returned to power he made war on Rome almost immediately, and this successful campaign cannot have been sustained if the heretic king had alienated his nobles and destroyed the hierarchies of aristocratic privilege. 103 In the reign of Kavad’s successor Khusro, orphans and widows were easily reintegrated 96

Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, XIII. Dinawari, p. 66–67; Tabari, v. 2, p. 92–93; Procopius, I.v.1; Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, XXIII. 98 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, XXIV; Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.vi.1–10. 99 Bundahisn, XXXIII.19. The quotation is modified from Skjærvø’s modern translation (Skjærvø, P. D. (ed. / trans.), The Spirit of Zoroastrianism, 2011, p. 121). 100 Gaube, H., “Mazdak,” p. 116–180. 101 Tabari, v. 2, p. 99: 97

Wiesehöfer, J., “Kawad, Khusro I and the Mazdakites,” p. 395–397. 102 Crone, P., “Kavad’s Heresy,” p. 30. 103 Wiesehöfer, J., “Kawad, Khusro I and the Mazdakites,” p. 401–402.

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into a robust system of social class, 104 and the evidence of aristocratic seals proves that the same noble houses held the same positions before and after the Mazdakite troubles. 105 Royal endorsement of Mazdakism seems to have been confined to Kavad’s first reign. Joshua the Stylite and the Persian royal tradition agree that Kavad was removed from power because of his patronage of that heresy, and his return to the throne was founded upon a declaration that he had renounced the doctrines of Mazdak. 106 But the end of royal patronage was not the extinction of Mazdakism, and its votaries lingered amongst the Iranian clergy and aristocracy and were gradually purged by Kavad and his son Khusro. That Mazdak survived the first reign of Kavad is an important problem which historians have struggled to explain. Ibn Nadim, the bibliophilic writer of the tenth century, opined that there were two men called Mazdak who afflicted the respective reigns of Kavad and Khusro. They were called Mazdak the Ancient and Mazdak the Last, 107 and the first of these men may be the same as Zaradusht son of Khurrag. 108 This hypothesis may be difficult to credit, but the potency of Mazdakism was so great that it informed the social and metaphysical opinions of Iranian spiritual movements even in the age of Islam, and so we must believe that Mazdakism and its exponents survived the first reign of Kavad. 109 The continuance of Mazdakite teaching has not hindered a modern writer from suggesting that Mazdakism was expunged in two waves of suppression: one which destroyed the Mazdakite leadership, and another which terminated the popular expression of those doctrines. 110 But speculation on the activities of Mazdak and his opinions could be protracted without end, and I may go no deeper into the strange morass of Mazdakism without abandoning hope of emerging.

THE REMOVAL OF KAVAD AND HIS RETURN TO THE THRONE III. When Kavad was removed from the throne, Iran was afflicted by many calamities. Joshua the Stylite alleges a new uprising in Armenia which devastated temples of fire, and which attempted to make common cause with the empire of Rome. 111 104

Tabari, v. 2, p. 101–102; Jackson Bonner, M. R., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 88–89. 105 Gyselen, R., “The Great Families in the Sasanian Empire: Some Sigillographic Evidence,” in Kennet, D. / Luft, P. (eds.), Current Research in Sasanian Archeology, Art and History. Proceedings of a Conference Held at Durham University, November 3rd and 5th, 2008, p. 109. 106 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, XIII; Dinawari, p. 66–68. 107 Ibn Nadim, p. 342. Ibn Nadim implies that his source is an investigation published by the theologian Abu’l-Qasim Al-Balkhi al-Kaʿbi. 108 De Blois, F., “Mazdak the Ancient and Mazdak the Last,” p. 142–143. 109 Crone, P., Nativist Prophets, 2012. 110 Wiesehöfer, J., “Kawad, Khusro I and the Mazdakites.” 111 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, XX–XXI.

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No intervention came from Iran or Rome. But two subject peoples, the Qadishaye and Tamurayye, revolted against the authority of the Sasanid king. They assaulted the city of Nisibis and pillaged the countryside, and a series of raids perpetrated by Arabs spread disorder along the Roman frontier and deep into Iran also. 112 Amidst these disorders, the Iranian nobility declared their hatred of Kavad’s corrupt morals and perverse customs, which had encouraged aristocratic wives to commit adultery, 113 and the young king failed to win the respect of a part of his nobility. Kavad demanded from the emperor of the Romans the subsidy which had been cancelled in the reign of Peroz, but Anastasius refused to provide anything but a loan. His failure to extract money from the Roman emperor humiliated the Persian king, a party of nobles plotted to slay him, and Kavad relinquished his kingdom and fled to the Hephthalite Huns. 114 The writer Procopius records that the innovations which Kavad had introduced were intolerable, and the Iranian people condemned a law which required communal intercourse with women. 115 But that Roman historian avers that Kavad’s flight to the Hephthalites was not instantaneous. A portion of the nobility deposed Kavad, bound him in chains, and kept him under guard. The royal successor 116 to Kavad presided over a council which decided the fate of the deposed monarch. In the narrative of Procopius, our attention is drawn to the advice of one Persian nobleman. Nikhor Gushnaspdad 117 had earlier persuaded the Armenian rebel Vahan Mamikonean to participate in the Iranian civil war which followed the death of Peroz. With the help of Armenian troops, it was Nikhor who had collaborated with Zarmihr the elder to install Balash upon the Sasanid throne. Nikhor must have remained an ally of Zarmihr when Kavad was elected, but he now recommended the murder of his sovereign. ‘Look upon this knife,’ he said, ‘though it be small, at the present moment it may accomplish a deed which, a little later, two myriads of armed men could not achieve’. 118 But the advice of Nikhor Gushnaspdad failed to sway the opinion of the conclave. Noble sentiment was divided, but the council resolved to confine the Sasanid monarch within the Castle of Oblivion. 119 This punishment im-

112 113

Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, XXII. Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, XXIII:

‫ܪܘܪܒܢܐ ܕܝܢ ܕܦܪܣܝܐ ܐܬܚܫܒ ܗܘܘ ܒܟܣܝܐ ܕܢܩܛܠܘ ܢܝܗܝ ܠܩܘܕ ܡܛܠ ܕܘܒܪܘܗܝ ܛܡܐܐ ܘܢܡܘܣܘܗ ܝܗܦܝܟܐ‬

114

Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, XXIII. Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.v.1. 116 Procopius wrongly identifies the successor to Kavad as Balash (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.v.3), but his name was Jamasp. 117 Procopius uses the garbled name Γουσαναστάδης, but it is obvious to whom he refers (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.v.4). 118 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.v.5. 119 ἐν φρουρίῳ…ὅπερ τῆς Λήθης καλεῖν νενομίκασιν (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.v.7). 115

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plied that the prisoner should never be spoken of again, and that death awaited whoever dared to pronounce the name of Kavad. The narrative of Procopius now begins to remind us of another improbable series of events. The prince Hurmazd, who had attempted to deprive Shapur II of the Sasanian throne, had escaped confinement with the help of his mother and sister who had drugged the keepers of his prison. The tale of Kavad’s escape is yet more fabulous. That Kavad’s wife seduced the jailer, that she exchanged clothing with her husband, and that the Persian king departed the Castle of Oblivion in the garb of a woman are impossible to believe. 120 The historian Agathias refused to credit the narrative of Procopius, 121 but the tale was so widely diffused throughout Iran that it was embellished and recorded in the Persian royal tradition. 122 But this fable betrays the influence and involvement of a nobleman who assisted Kavad’s escape from prison, and who accompanied him on his flight to the Huns. In the narrative of Procopius, this mysterious man is called Seoses; but Zarmihr is his name in the Persian royal tradition. The figure whom Procopius calls Seoses may perhaps be identified with Zarmihr the younger. Like the second Zarmihr, Seoses delivered Kavad from prison and was unexpectedly executed in later life. 123 It was Seoses who had kept watch near the Castle of Oblivion with men and horses at the ready, and when Kavad emerged from confinement this band departed in secret for the land of the Hephthalites. Seoses and Kavad negotiated an alliance with those Huns, a royal daughter, who had remained amongst the Huns since the days of Peroz, was promised to the Hephthalite king, and a great army of Huns conducted Kavad into Iran. 124 Kavad’s first act was to revenge himself upon the man who had advocated the murder of the Persian king. Nikhor Gushnaspdad was immediately executed and replaced by his relative Adurgundbad, 125 who received the rank of Margrave of the Eastern Marches, or kanarang as it was called in the Persian language. 126 Jamasp, the king who had ruled in place of Kavad, was deposed and made blind; or perhaps he willingly abdicated as Agathias alleges. 127 The gratitude of Kavad improved the rank and dignity of Seoses who had assisted both the flight and the return of the Persian king. Chief of the Warriors was the new title of Kavad’s benefactor, but Procopius is

120

Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.vi.1–9. Agathias, Historiae, IV.28.3. 122 Dinawari, p. 67; Tabari, v. 2, p. 93–94. But in the Persian royal tradition, the woman in question is not the wife, but the sister, of Kavad. 123 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I. vi.3; Dinawari, p. 67; Tabari, v. 2, p. 93. 124 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.vi.10–11; Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, XXIV. 125 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.vi.18. 126 Frye, R. N., “Adergoudounbades,” Encyclopædia Iranica, vol. I, fasc. 5, 1983, p. 456 127 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xi.17; Agathias, Historiae, IV.28.7. 121

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wrong to assert that Seoses was the first and last man to occupy that exalted and ancient position. 128 The beginning of Kavad’s second reign was believed to be auspicious. ‘Kavad ruled the empire and guarded it with steadfastness; for no one was more sagacious or vigorous’. 129 Those words of Procopius signal that Kavad’s return to the throne inaugurated an era of confidence and activity, and Joshua the Stylite adds that the troubles afflicting Iran were swiftly resolved. 130 These notices must imply that Kavad, and the noble faction which supported him, had gained the advantage over their opponents. Violent purges and executions, which are attested later, may have begun with the destruction of Nikhor Gushnaspdad.

THE REFORM OF THE IRANIAN STATE IV. The contemporary testimony of Procopius and Agathias acknowledges no project of reform in the reigns of Kavad and his successor. Only the Persian royal tradition alleges that a thorough reformation of the Iranian state began in the reign of Kavad and proceeded into that of his son. Agrarian, fiscal, and military improvements are believed to have led to a monetised system of taxation and to the establishment of the first standing army in the history of the Sasanian dynasty. 131 Such claims are almost certainly wrong. 132 To insist on a barter economy before the reforms of Kavad and Khusro is to render nearly all Sasanian achievements, especially international trade, incomprehensible; and it is to deny the copious evidence of numismatics. To deprive the successors of Ardashir of a standing army is to make inexplicable the military performance of Iran which equalled, and often surpassed, the power of Rome. But a candid discussion of these reforms must begin amidst extreme doubt. 133 It is not even possible to determine when all elements of the supposed reforms were begun and when they were completed. Although Kavad is said to have begun the cadastral survey which was the foundation of the reform of the land tax, later tradition requires us to believe that all innovations were achieved un128

Ἀδρασταδάραν σαλάνης (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.vi.18; Ι.xi.38). The title was in fact quite old (Sunderman, W., “Artēštārān sālār,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. II, fasc. 6, 1986, p. 662). See also Christensen, L’Iran sous les Sassanides, p. 126–127. 129 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.vi.19. 130 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, XXIV. 131 This erroneous view is expounded in Rubin, Z., “The Sasanid Monarchy,” in Cameron A. (ed.), The Cambridge Ancient History 14, Late Antiquity: Empire and Successors, A.D. 425–600, 2000, p. 655 and Rubin, Z., “The Reforms of Khusro Anoshirvan,” in Cameron, A. (ed.), The Byzantine and Early Islamic Near East III: States, Resources and Armies, 1995, p. 227–292. 132 Howard-Johnston, J., “The Two Great Powers in Late Antiquity,” p. 211–212. 133 All my doubts are disclosed and discussed in Jackson Bonner, M. R., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 91–98. Adams refers to ‘the vague, remote, and generally unsatisfactory picture of the agricultural regime’ which emerges from literary sources (Adams, R. McC., Heartland of Cities, p. 202).

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der the reign of Khusro I. 134 But this may mean nothing more than that Khusro claimed the credit for everything. Dinawari notes that a poll tax was levied on four classes, and the nobility, knights, scribes, and anyone in the service of the king were exempt. 135 No one (says Dinawari) was compelled to pay if he had not attained twenty, or if he had passed fifty, years. Tabari includes those details, and adds that this tax had previously been a fixed sum, 136 and that the new tax was set at twelve, eight, six, and four drachms, in accordance with status. 137 Though this tax may well have been fair, as it was probably proportional to wealth, its payment amounted to an acknowledgement of inferiority, and this new method of taxation may have reinforced the Iranian class system, which the Mazdakite trouble had perhaps disturbed but not destroyed. Dinawari, Tabari, and Ferdowsi also describe the imposition of a land tax. 138 Taxes which had formerly been paid in kind, were to be paid in money. Each jarib 139 of land planted with trefoil and clover was taxed at seven drachms, every four Persian date palms in a jarib were taxed at one drachm, and the same amount was levied on every six foreign date palms, and on every six olive trees in a jarib. Dinawari adds the important point that taxation also varied with the degree of cultivation and proximity to cities. We can assess the effect of this new system of taxation only in the most general manner. The agricultural production of Iran had always been formidable, and the taxes levied upon it would always have yielded vast revenues. But the reforms of Kavad and Khusro would have made the collection of taxes more orderly and systematic, and a fixed sum paid to the government regardless of yield may have encouraged farmers to increase their rates of return by means of more intense cultivation. 140 But it is possible that, in some instances, the cultivation of land became more costly than before. This is perhaps why, in the opinion of Ferdowsi, Khusro I promised to inflict a very severe penalty upon anyone who refused to farm his land: ‘If fields within my land be desolate, And flourish not under the shadow of my glory, Whoever be in charge of them, If he find the work contemptible,

Masʿudi, Kitab al-Tanbih w’al-ishraf, p. 101–102. Dinawari, p. 73. I assume that this means the civil administration. 136 Tabari, v. 2, p. 150. 137 Tabari, v. 2, p. 152. 138 Dinawari, p. 72–73; Tabari, v. 2, p. 150–152; Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 70–179. 139 A jarib might have varied from time to time and place to place, and may have been a little less than half an acre in this era. 140 Adams, R. McC., Heartland of Cities, p. 201. 134 135

V. HUMILIATION AND HERESY

149

Him I shall hang alive from the gibbet right where he is, Be he high or be he lowly!’ 141

Other elements of the reform also required royal attention. No policy implemented by any government is immune from abuse and corruption, and there is reason to believe that the new tax system had deteriorated by the reign of Khusro I. A purported fragment of the autobiography of Khusro alleges that corrupt officials embezzled tax revenues and that the head tax was improperly levied upon young children and upon persons who had died. 142 The Iranian bureaucracy attempted to remedy this problem by appointing judges to oversee the payment of taxes and to issue official receipts – a novel practice, apparently. The reform of the tax system was followed by a renovation of the Iranian army. Whereas there had been one supreme commander of the army, called the spahbad, this office and rank was divided among four men. 143 Each general oversaw a region of the empire, which was, as our sources agree, divided into four parts. No sources agree on the areas included within the quarters, and Dinawari, Tabari, and Ferdowsi give them different names. 144 But the worst defect of these sources is an 141

142 143

Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 151–153:

‫نتا�� �� سايه ى ف ّر من‬ ‫ا�� گ��د ا�ن ك�ر د��وار خوار‬ .‫ا�� �� فراز ست و �� ز��دست‬

Ibn Miskawayh, Tajarib al-Umam, v. 1, p. 133. Tabari, v. 2, p. 99:

‫�� و��ان بود بوم در � ّ� من‬ ‫ك�� را �� باشد ���ن پايك�ر‬ ‫ك�� ز��ه �� دار �اى �� هست‬

. ‫فر ّق ك��ى هذه الو��ية و ا��رتبة ب�ن أربعة اص��بذ�ن‬ ‫ اص��بذة‬is an Arabicised form of the Middle Persian word spah-pat, which means literally ‘over-

seer of the army,” but ‘general’ is the usual translation (Nyberg, H. S., A Manual of Pahlavi, Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden, 1964, p. 177). This is how Tabari defines it (Tabari, v. 2, p. 99):

144

ٔ ‫ك�ن ي�� ا��ص��بذة و�ي‬ .‫ا��اسة ��� ا��نوب‬

Only the four-fold division is common to our sources. Dinawari gives each quarter an ordinal number, and then describes its contents (Dinawari, p. 69). The first quarter was Khurasan, Sakastan, and Kirman; the second was Ispahan, Qum, Jabal, Azarbaijan, and Armenia; the third was Persia, Khuzestan down to Bahrain; the fourth was Iraq unto the border with the kingdom of Rome. Tabari and Ferdowsi name the quarters after the points of the compass. The east (says Tabari) included Khurasan and its adjoining regions. The west must have included the territories bordering on the Roman Empire, though Tabari does not say so. That there was an ‫ اص��بذ ا��غرب‬is all that we are told (Tabari, v. 2, p. 99). The south, or Nimroz as Tabari calls it in Persian, was the land of Yemen. The north was Azarbaijan and its surrounding regions, which Tabari calls ‘the land of the Khazars. Ferdowsi retains the fourfold division (Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 70), but the territories listed are not the same. Qum and Ispahan are confounded with Azarbaijan and Armenia, which are much further north (Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 72–74). Persia and Khuzestan are grouped with the ‘marches of the Khazars’, but the two regions are not near one another, and Ferdowsi seems also include Bactria here (Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 75). Ferdowsi makes no mention of Yemen, and Iraq

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alarming disagreement over whether this was a military measure at all. Neither Dinawari, nor Ferdowsi uses the term spahbad, and Dinawari claims that Khusro appointed over each quarter of the empire not a general, but rather ‘a trustworthy man’. 145 Coins issued by the government of Kavad seem to suggest that the quartering of the empire began in one of his reigns, perhaps originally as an administrative reform when Kavad had returned to the throne. Mint signatures stamped upon Kavad’s coins may indicate the four-fold division of the southwest, the region of the capital, the northwest, and the northeast, 146 and the quartering of the empire of Iran is established alike by the evidence of sigillography and Armenian and Persian geographical works. Seals whose inscriptions include a personal name followed by one of the cardinal points and title spahbad attest the reality of the quadripartition, and they establish that it was a military development. 147 The Armenian Geography of Ananias of Shirak is the earliest textual evidence for the quadripartition, as it was composed in the middle decades of the seventh century. 148 In this important book, the four quarters are named after the directions of the compass. Similar testimony is offered by the Shahrestaniha-yi Eranshahr which was completed in the eighth century. 149 But even these sources disagree upon the contents of each division of the Iranian empire, nor do they specify in whose reign the quadripartition occurred. The purpose of dividing the military power amongst four generals was most probably to make it easier to fight on more than one front at once. To discourage competition and internal feuds, those four commands must have been associated with specific and clearly defined territories. Each general would have been attended by his own civilian and military staff, and each must have received his orders, and his budget, from a central war office answerable to the Sasanian king. It is possible that this office was the Chief of the Warriors which had lately been awarded to Seoses. and ‘the land of Rome’ are his final quarter (Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 76). We must dismiss the recurrence of the land of the Khazars, as it is an anachronism. Ferdowsi and Tabari probably mean nothing more than the Caucasus, but Ferdowsi’s claim that Rome was included in these military is obviously wrong. 145 Dinawari, p. 69: 146

.‫� ر ُبع ر��� من ثقا‬ ّ ‫و�ّى ك‬

The mint signatures are discussed in Schindel, N., Sylloge Nummorum Sasanidarum III/1, p. 477–478 (and Schindel has some doubts about what they really mean); Daryaee, T., Sasanian Persia, p. 124–125; Gurnet, F., “Deux notes à propos du monnayage de Xosro II,” Revue belge de Numismatique, tome CXL, 1994, p. 36–37. 147 Gyselen, R., “The Great Families in the Sasanian Empire”; Gyselen, R., The Four Generals of the Sasanian Empire: Some Sigillographic Evidence, 2001. 148 Ananias of Shirak / Hewsen, H. R., The Geography of Ananias of Shirak: Ashxarhacoyc, the Long and the Short Recension, 1992, p. 72. 149 Shahrestaniha-yi Eranshar, passim.

V. HUMILIATION AND HERESY

151

THE WAR WITH ROME OF 502 Peace along the Roman frontier endured from the reign of Yazdgard II until the return of Kavad. Sasanian distraction in the east might have afforded an opportunity to afflict Iran with new torments, and the Iranian state might have been crushed between the power of Rome and that of the Hephthalite Huns. But even amidst the diplomatic tensions in the reign of Peroz and the supposed disorders of Mazdakism, the peace was not disturbed until the year 502. The Iranian motive for war is obscure. The Sasanian monarchy remained tributary to the Hephthalite Huns, and that nation provided a small army to assist the Iranian war effort. 150 It is therefore possible to conjecture that the Huns had approved, endorsed, and perhaps inspired the war, and their purpose was to preoccupy Iranian arms in the west. 151 The military aristocracy of Kavad’s court may have sought only to vindicate Sasanian honour after the defeat of Peroz with a swift victory against an ill-prepared adversary; 152 or Kavad may have wished to assert his authority by uniting a fractious nobility in a military adventure. But our sources speak mostly of the need to collect money with which to pay tribute to the Hephthalite Huns. A curious notice in the ecclesiastical history doubtfully attributed to Zachariah the Rhetor asserts that a portion of Kavad’s nobility blamed Rome for tensions between Iran and the Huns. In the reign of Peroz, says Zachariah, the Roman government had promised to give the Hephthalites twice as much money as Kavad was accustomed to pay. This had induced the Huns to demand ever greater sums from Iran, and had aroused a vehement hatred of the Romans and a desire for revenge. 153 The Stylite also adduces pecuniary troubles. Balash had failed to pay his troops, and the Roman subsidy of Iran’s Caucasian defences had been cancelled. Kavad inherited these troubles, and had hoped that an embassy and the gift of a large elephant would persuade the emperor Zeno to renew the subsidy. 154 But Zeno died while Kavad’s embassy lingered at Antioch, Anastasius succeeded him as emperor, and an ambassador returned to Iran to inform the court of the change of government. If the Stylite is to be believed, Kavad’s response was neither a greeting nor a congratulatory word, but rather a more strident demand for money and a threat of war. 155 Anastasius, who was disgusted by the flagitious maxims of Mazdaksim, sent a per150

Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.vii.8–11; I.viii.13. Jackson Bonner, M. R., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 84–86. 152 The Roman frontier defences had fallen into disrepair (Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, 502–532, 1998, p. 40–42). 153 Pseudo-Zachariah of Mytilene, Historia Ecclesiastica, v. 2, p. 25–26. On the confusing identity of the author and the origins of this useful source, see Greatrex, G. et al., The Chronicle of Pseudo-Zachariah Rhetor: Church and War in Late Antiquity, 2011, p. 3–65. 154 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, XIX. 155 The fate of Kavad’s elephant is unknown, alas. 151

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THE LAST EMPIRE OF IRAN

sonal letter to the Persian king. ‘As Zeno who was emperor before me sent no money’, wrote Anastasius, ‘so I will not send it, until you restore Nisibis to me’ 156 – a condition which Kavad would obviously refuse. When Kavad later reiterated his demand for money, the Roman emperor agreed to provide a loan, but shortly thereafter Kavad was deprived of power. 157 The matter of the loan reasserted itself when Kavad was restored to the monarchy of Iran. Procopius avers that the ministers of Anastasius forbade that emperor from lending the money. 158 It was wrong (the advisers argued) to strengthen the friendship between Iran and the Huns, for whatever disturbed that relationship was deemed advantageous to Rome; and so Roman policy was to deprive Kavad of the promised loan and to prevent him from paying tribute to the Hephthalites. Procopius, who struggled to explain the sudden outbreak of war, adduces this as its only cause. 159 Sasanian numismatics reveals that no gold coins were issued in the reigns of Balash and Jamasp, and this signals perhaps an absence or shortage of that metal, and may corroborate our sources’ emphasis on an empty Iranian treasury. 160 But the war was not a frivolous undertaking. Raids carried out by Iranian Arab clients at the turn of the fifth century were missions of reconnaissance which gathered intelligence of the ruinous state of Roman defences. 161 It is also likely that Iranian spies played on the fears of Christians who expected the imminent end of the world at the opening of the sixth millennium since the creation. 162 The outbreak of warfare coincided with the diffusion of a frightening prophecy originating from an oracle at Heliopolis: ‘the Persians shall arise in the times of Anastasius; with the sword they shall overturn the cities of the east together with the multitude of Roman soldiers’. 163 The Stylite reports that celestial portents, earthquakes, disease, crop failure, and the rising price of food preceded the arrival of Kavad, and seemed to announce a universal calamity. 164 The testimony of the Stylite shows that the policy of Kavad’s government was to unite within a single army all the rebellious peoples who had afflicted his first 156 157

Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, XX:

.‫ܐܝܟ ܕ� ܙܝܢܘܢ ܗܘ ܕܡܡܠܟ ܗܘܐ ܩܕܡܝ ܫܕܪ ܘ� ܐܢܐ ܕܪܡܫ ܐܢܐ ܝܕܡܐ ܕܬܦܢܐ ܠܝ ܢܨܒܝܢ‬

Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, XXIII. 158 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.vii.1–2. 159 Διὸ δὴ Καβάδης ἐξ αἰτίας οὐδεμιᾶς ἔγνω ἐπὶ Ῥωμαίους στρατεύεσθαι (Procopius, I.vii.3). 160 Göbl, R., Sasanian Numismatics, 1971, p. 49–51. 161 Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 78 with notes 20–22. 162 Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 5–7. 163 Καὶ ἀναστήσονται ἐν τοῖς καιροῖς αὐτοῦ Περσαι καὶ καταστρέψουσι τὰς πόλεις τῆς Ἀνατολῆς μετὰ τοῦ πλήθους τῶν στρατιωτῶν τῆς Ῥωμανίας μαχαίρᾳ (Oracle of Baalbek, l. 170–172 in Alexander, P. J., The Oracle of Baalbek: the Tiburtine Sibyl in Greek Dress, 1967, p. 28). Mine is a very loose translation. Heliopolis is the modern city of Baalbek. 164 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, XXV–XLVII; XLIX.

V. HUMILIATION AND HERESY

153

reign – a considerable military and political effort. 165 To the tribes of the Tamurayye and the Qadishaye Kavad promised total destruction if they failed to submit themselves and plunder if they joined his expeditionary army. The Arabs, who had lately ravaged south-western Mesopotamia, were attracted by the prospect of fighting with Rome. Persian Armenia at first resisted the Sasanian king’s call to arms, and an Iranian force invaded and fought an Armenian army to the brink of annihilation. Kavad swiftly promised to terminate that brief war, and to guarantee tolerance of Christianity, on condition that Armenian troops participate in his Roman invasion.

THE OPENING OF THE WAR In the year 359, the Sasanian king Shapur II had taken the city of Amida after a siege of seventy-three days, 166 and this victory led to an astonishing reversal of Iranian fortune after a period of abasement. That campaign occurred one hundred and forty-three years before Kavad and his ministers executed another invasion of Roman territory and a second capture of Amida. It is possible that Kavad’s attack was inspired in part by an institutional memory of that earlier war. But Iranian strategy was not the same, and it is noteworthy that both powers employed their Arabian clients to greater effect than ever before. 167 Kavad’s plan was to cross the frontier in the north, and so the Iranian army invaded Roman Armenia and swiftly captured its capital Theodosiopolis. That city was weakly defended, and Constantine (who was governor of that city) threw off his allegiance to the Roman emperor and surrendered the city to Kavad. The host of Iran plundered the city, ravaged the surrounding area, and carried off a great number of captives. Kavad bestowed upon Constantine the rank of general and left him with a small garrison in his ruined capital. 168 The invasion proceeded, and terror at the Iranian advance into Mesopotamia filled the Roman people. Kavad and his army proceeded to the city of Martyropolis in the country of Sophanene – a day’s journey from Amida. 169 Theodore, the governor of Sophanene, purchased the freedom of his country by paying Kavad the public taxes of two years. 170 The governor remained in his position, and the emperor Anastasius acknowledged the prudence of Theodore, for the city of Martyropolis was poorly defended and could not have withstood a siege. But the Roman emperor immediately dispatched his minister Rufinus with a large sum of gold. His instructions were to pay Kavad and to urge his immediate withdrawal. But the interview between Rufi165

Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, XXIV. Ammianus, XIX.ix.9. 167 The best modern analysis of Kavad’s war of 502 is Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 79–118. 168 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, XLVIII; Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 79–80. 169 Procopius, Aedificia, III.ii.4. 170 Procopius, Aedificia, III.ii.5–6. 166

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THE LAST EMPIRE OF IRAN

nus and the Persian king failed to achieve what Anastasius had desired. That Roman minister had deposited the gold at Caesarea, and he urged Kavad to claim it there. The Persian king refused and Rufinus was seized and kept under guard. 171 Kavad’s refusal to retrieve the gold from Caesarea may be proof that money was not the only aim of the war, but the distance between Martyropolis and Caesarea meant that it could be retrieved neither swiftly nor easily. 172

THE SIEGE OF AMIDA A vivid account of the siege of Amida is embedded within the chronicle attributed to Zachariah the Rhetor: a monk who dwelt in that city and who witnessed the calamity. 173 The shorter account of Joshua the Stylite is similar, and we may rely on his accurate dates. The account of Procopius appears to repose upon the same information employed by those churchmen, but the Greek is less informative than those Syrian writers, and he rarely contributes anything of substance. 174 It was a hard and painful siege which began in the month of October and proceeded for ninety-seven days into the winter. When the assaults of arrows and battering-rams had failed to shatter the wall of Amida, the armies of Iran heaped up a great pile of earth against it. But the tactic of the defenders was to pierce the wall where it met the pile of earth, and to burrow through it. Earth was extracted from within the mound, and the resultant cavity was reinforced by beams supporting the weight of the artificial hill and the men who stood upon it. Amidene forces flung oxhides soaked in resin upon the mound so as to make it slippery, and they filled the cavity with combustible materials and set fire to them. 175 The beams which supported the cavity were consumed by the flames, the mound collapsed, and the Iranian host withdrew for a moment in shame and grief. 176 According to Procopius, as the Iranian army prepared to abandon Amida, the inhabitants of that city began to heap the most scurrilous abuse upon Kavad and his soldiers. Some prostitutes mounted the rampart of Amida and, hoisting their garments, displayed to Kavad the parts of

171

Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, L. The distance between Martyropolis and Caesarea is about 700 miles. 173 This text, its high worth, its sources, its transmission, and the identity of its author are discussed in detail in Greatrex, G., “Le Pseudo-Zacharie de Mylitène et l’historiographie syriaque au sixième siècle” in Debié (ed.), L’Historiographie syriaque, 2009, p. 33–55. 174 Greatrex, G., “Procopius and Pseudo-Zachariah on the Siege of Amida and its Aftermath (502–506),” in Börm, H. / Wiesehöfer, J. (eds.) Commutatio et Contentio: Studies on the Late Roman, Sasanian, and Early Islamic Near East in Memory of Zeev Ruben, 2010, p. 227–251. 175 Pseudo-Zacharias of Mytilene, Historia Ecclesiastica, v. 2, p. 23–24. 176 Pseudo-Zacharias of Mytilene, Historia Ecclesiastica, v. 2, p. 24: 172

.‫ܘܗܦܟ ܡܠܟܐ ܒܒܗܬܬܐ ܘܒܟܪܝܘܬܐ‬

V. HUMILIATION AND HERESY

155

the female body which (in the opinion of Procopius) men should not see naked. 177 This insult may have added to the perception of disgrace. But the hierophants, who had accompanied the Persian king, interpreted this display as a sign that people of Amida would soon discover to Kavad all their secret and hidden things. At about this moment, Kavad attempted to divert Roman attention from his siege, and harass the enemy deep within his own territory. Kavad ordered his Lakhmid allies to proceed to Carrhae and Constantina, where they ravaged the surrounding countryside. Nuʿman who commanded the Lakhmid horsemen encountered vigorous resistance from the Roman commander Olympius, but the Arabs were victorious, took many prisoners, and penetrated as far as Edessa. The Romans, however, achieved an important victory when Eugenius (who was commander in Armenia) attacked and recovered the city of Theodosiopolis. 178 Iranian embarrassment and the victory of Eugenius almost induced Kavad to abandon his war. The Sasanian king announced to the defenders of Amida that he was prepared to withdraw on condition that he receive from them a small gift of silver. The insolent reply of the Amidene governor and his ministers was to demand payment for the foodstuffs that the Iranian army had plundered from the countryside. After the construction of a second mound had failed, the Iranian host prepared to relinquish the siege of Amida. But upon the evening of the tenth day of January, 179 an Iranian general pursued a thief who was accustomed to sneaking out of Amida and stealing from Kavad’s army, and he came and went through the opening of an old drain 180 below the part of the walls called the Tripyrgion, or triple tower. Some monks were accustomed to keeping watch in that tower; but having drunk wine and fallen asleep, they failed to notice the Iranian general and his men entering Amida in pursuit of the thief. The monks were slain, the Tripyrgion and its adjoining ramparts were invested, and word of that occupation was sent to Kavad. The bold defenders of Amida discharged a torrent of missiles as the soldiers of Iran scaled the walls of the city. The Amidenes attempted to loosen and to dislodge the keystone of the Tripyrgion, thereby to destroy the invaders’ point of entry, but one tower after another was taken and held by the Iranian army until they possessed the full circuit of the walls.

177

Καί τινες ἑταῖραι ἀνελκύσασαι κόσμῳ οὐδενὶ τὴν ἐσθῆτα Καβάδῃ ἅγχιστά που ἑστηκότι ἐδείκνυον ὅσα τῶν γυναικῶν γυμνὰ φανῆναι ἀνδράσιν οὐ θέμις (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.vii.17–18). 178 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, LI–LII. 179 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, LIII. 180 Procopius mentions ἐκβολὴν ὑπονόμου παλαιοῦ (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.vii.20), which was hidden only by some stones. Zacharias does not describe the way into the Tripyrgion.

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The gates of Amida were at last thrown open after three days and nights of obstinate fighting. 181 Zachariah dwells on the treasures and captives seized by Kavad, and the promiscuous slaughter of eighty thousand Amidenes without distinction of age or sex. 182 But the rhetorical churchman reports an interesting legend connected with the fall of Amida. The drunken monks, whose slumber had relinquished the city to the Persian king, were merely the instruments of divine chastisement. A vision of Christ had appeared to Kavad in a dream, and the Son of God promised to deliver Amida to the Sasanid monarch as punishment for the sins of its inhabitants. That vision, and the entreaties of a Christian suppliant, prompted Kavad to preserve from destruction the Church of the Forty Martyrs. Entering the sanctuary of that temple, the Persian king beheld an image of Jesus, at whose familiar likeness Kavad bowed his head and declared: ‘it was he that said to me, “stay and receive from me the city and its inhabitants who sinned against me”.’ 183 Asserting a divine sanction to the Persian king’s seizure of Amida, and preserving its church, may have pacified a humiliated population of Christians. But it may be that Kavad attempted to exploit the fear of imminent doom and the anticipation of the end of the world which were vividly described by Joshua the Stylite, and which were diffused throughout the Roman orient.

THE AFTERMATH OF THE SIEGE AND THE ROMAN RESPONSE A small navy of rafts carried the booty of Amida down the Tigris river into Iran. Two Roman dignitaries, the chief councillor Leontius and Cyrus, who was governor of Amida, were clothed in rags, forced to carry swine, and were exposed to public ridicule throughout the city. Survivors of the siege were assembled and led away into captivity. A city founded in south-eastern Khuzestan bore the name Kavad’s Better Amida, and became the new abode of those unhappy Romans. 184 At Amida Kavad installed one of his generals by the name of Glon, two marzbans, and threethousand troops to rule and to defend the city. 185 Rufinus, the Roman envoy whom Kavad had detained, was released, and he transmitted to his countrymen news of the fall of Amida. 186 The immediate reaction of Anastasius was to dispatch a large 181

Pseudo-Zacharias of Mytilene, Historia Ecclesiastica, v. 2, p. 25–28. Pseudo-Zacharias of Mytilene, Historia Ecclesiastica, v. 2, p. 29–30; the Stylite repeats a similar number of slain Amidenes (Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, LIII). See Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 92–93. 183 Pseudo-Zacharias of Mytilene, Historia Ecclesiastica, v. 2, p. 28: 182

̈ .‫ܘܥܡܘܪܝܗ ܕܚܛܘ ܠܝ‬ ‫ܗܢܐ ܐܡܪ ܠܝ ܕܟܬܪ ܘܣܝܒ ܡܢܝ ܡܕܝܢܬܐ‬

The Stylite was unaware of this story, but it reappears in the Chronicle of Seert (Chronicle of Seert, I(2), p. 132–133) which was composed in Arabic no later than the year 1020. 184 Dinawari, p. 68; Tabari, v.2, p. 94. The Persian name of the city was Weh-az-Amid-Kawad. 185 Pseudo-Zacharias of Mytilene, Historia Ecclesiastica, v. 2, p. 30. 186 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, LIV.

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number of soldiers to fortify the cities in the Roman east. When winter had passed, the Persian king renewed his demand for money, but the Roman government refused and began to prosecute a war of revenge. 187 The Roman force was the largest army put into the field since the disastrous expedition of Julian. 188 But command was divided amongst Areobindus, Patricius, and Hypatius, and these three generals failed to coordinate their movements. In the month of July, the army of Kavad, despite an early reverse, repelled the troops of Areobindus near Nisibis and plundered the Roman camp. 189 Roman forces commanded by Patricius and Hypatius, who had attempted to retake Amida, raised the siege of that city, but could not intercept the Iranian army. The Roman effort to capture Amida by guile failed, but the commander in Osrhoene routed Iran’s Arab clients; and the Ghassanid Saracens, 190 who were loyal to Rome, raided as far as the Lakhmid capital at Hira. 191 In the month of August, another muster of the Roman armies miscarried, and Kavad led another attack from Nisibis which scattered the forces of Patricius and Hypatius. Kavad then proceeded south-westward toward Constantina. A population of Jews had been persuaded to betray that city to the Persian king, but a Roman prisoner leaked intelligence of the plot, and the bishop Bar-Hadad induced the Iranian army to spare Constantina with blandishments and gifts of provisions. 192 In September, Iran’s Arabian clients ravaged the countryside of Osrhoene, and the Edessenes destroyed whatever was in the immediate vicinity of their walls, and prepared for an obstinate siege. Areobindus refused to yield to Kavad’s demand for ten thousand pounds of gold, and the army of the Persian king surrounded the city of Edessa. 193

THE END OF KAVAD’S FIRST ROMAN WAR Kavad perhaps expected the Edessenes to surrender without a fight, for an attack was not immediate. 194 But when the onslaught came, Edessa resisted, and its survival was credited to the special protection of Christ who had promised that no enemy should ever take that city. 195 Prisoners were exchanged, demands for gold were issued and refused, and the Iranian army withdrew as the winter of the year 503 approached. The city of Batnae fell to a division of Iranian horsemen, and a retreat 187

This was in the month of April (Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, LIII). Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 96. 189 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, LV. 190 Joshua calls them the Thaʿalibite Saracens, but the Ghassanids are meant (Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 99). 191 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, LVI–LVII. 192 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, LVIII; Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xiii.8–15. 193 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, LIX–LX. 194 Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 105–106. 195 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xii.7–30. 188

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along the river Euphrates brought the Sasanid host to Callinicum. The Roman general Celer failed to intercept the Iranian army before Timostratus, commander at Callinicum, surrendered that city to the Persian king. 196 Skirmishes and punitive raids filled the months of March and April, and the general Celer spread destruction across the Iranian border. In May the Romans renewed the effort to retake Amida by starvation, and they formed a blockade which proceeded into the year 504. 197 Want of supplies and famine oppressed that city, and a portion of the Amidenes, who had turned to killing, roasting, and eating their fellow citizens, were punished with death. 198 Hostages were returned, and an armistice of seven years was proposed and negotiated over the following year by the Roman commander Celer and an Iranian general by the name of Bawi. 199 Negotiations were interrupted by mutual suspicion and the death of Bawi, and his successor was appointed after a delay of five months. The two conditions of the armistice, of which we may be certain, were that Amida return to Rome and that Kavad receive one thousand pounds of gold, 200 and it is likely that Kavad demanded, and received, the renewal of the Roman subsidy of Iran’s Caucasian defences. 201 The writer Procopius justly blames Roman negligence for the appalling state in Amida was found. 202 The hardship which the Iranian garrison had endured, and famine amongst the Roman inhabitants, had perhaps persuaded Kavad to relinquish his chief prize of the war. But the principle motive for concluding the truce was, says Procopius, a renewal of warfare between Iran and the Huns.

RENEWED CONFLICT WITH THE HUNS The details of this supposed war are obscure and confused. The ‘long war’, as Procopius calls it, was supposed to have begun with an invasion of the year 503 in the north of Iran. 203 But Procopius discusses only a later conflict in the Caucasus. A certain elderly Hun was a friend to the emperor Anastasius. Ambazuk (that was the Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, LI–LV. Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.ix.1. 198 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, LVI–LXXXI. 199 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.ix.24; Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 115–117. 200 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.ix.4. 201 John the Lydian mentions that the negotiation touched on the Iberian fortress of Virapakh: ὁ Πέρσης λόγους ἐκίνησε πρὸς Κέλερα…περὶ Βιριπαράχ…καὶ τῆς κατὰ μόνας ὑπὸ Περσῶν γενομένης περὶ αὐτοῦ δαπάνης (John Lydus, de Magistratibus, III.53). Contra Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 118. 202 Procopius, Bellum Persicum I.ix.20. The writer John the Lydian accuses the weakness of Areobindus and the cowardice of Hypatius and Patricius (John Lydus, De Magistratibus, III.53). 203 ἔπειτα δὲ Καβάδης, Οὕννων πολεμίων ἐς γῆν τὴν αὐτοῦ ἐσβεβληκότων, παντὶ τῷ στρατῷ ἐπ᾽ οἴκου ἀνεχώρησε, πόλεμόν τε μακρὸν πρὸς τὸ ἔθνος τοῦτο ἐς τῆς χώρας τὰ πρὸς ἄρκτον διέφερεν (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.viii.19). 196 197

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name of the Hun) was on the point of death, and he asked the Roman government to pay him in exchange for ceding to Rome some Caucasian fortresses and the Caspian Gates. 204 It would have been impossible for the Romans to support a garrison in such a distant country, surrounded on all sides by enemies, and destitute of resources; moreover, so brazen an irritant to Iran was perhaps best avoided. Anastasius refused, Ambazuk died, his sons inherited what had been promised to Rome, and Kavad fought the progeny of Ambazuk, defeated them, and took possession of their inheritance. A legendary recollection of this is preserved within the Georgian Royal Annals, which divide the figure of Ambazuk into two gigantic brothers called Bazuk and Abazuk. They were kings of the Ossetes, and their names recall the nations of Gog and Magog: allies of Satan in the final war against Christ and his saints. Those two brothers spread destruction throughout the region of the Caucasus and were slain by the Armenian prince Smbat Bagratuni. 205 This notice in the Georgian Royal Annals adds nothing to our understanding of the historical facts; but from it we can sense that the occupation of Ambazuk was perceived as a serious calamity, which reminded a Georgian writer of the end of the world. The testimony of Procopius seems to suggest that this was the moment at which Iran delivered itself of the Hephthalite yoke. But this is not entirely true. Iran continued to pay tribute to the Hephthalites into the middle of the sixth century, when those Huns were vanquished altogether in the reign of Khusro I. Moreover, the people to whom Procopius refers must have had a weak connection, if any, with the Hephthalites, and the so-called Caucasian Huns are properly known as Sabirs who may be the western relics of the people whom the Chinese called Xianbei. They had left their ancient abode in the region of the Middle Volga and crossed into the northern Caucasus in the decade of the 460s. 206 So fearsome was the memory of the Huns, that our historians preserved that name and applied it to the Sabirs; but a victory over them would not have overpowered the Hephthalites. Nevertheless, in the year 512, the eastern mints of Khurasan (those at Abarshahr, Herat, and Marv) resumed production of Sasanian coins for the first time since the death of Peroz, and so we may infer that those lands were recovered from Hephthalite dominion at that moment. 207 Procopius was perhaps aware of this recovery, but wrongly attributed the cause to operations in the Caucasus.

204

Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.x.1–12. History of the Kings of K’art’li, p. 53. Cf. Rapp, S. H., The Sasanian World through Georgian Eyes, p. 226. 206 Sinor, D., “The Hun Period,” in Sinor D. (ed.), The Cambridge History of Inner Asia, Cambridge, 1990, p. 200; Golden, P. B., “The Peoples of the south Russian steppe,” in Sinor, D. (ed.), The Cambridge History of Inner Asia, 1990, p. 258–259. 207 Schindel, N., Sylloge Nummorum Sasanidarum, Band III/1, p. 489–490. 205The

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THE APPEARANCE OF THE ROURAN AND THE DECLINE OF THE HEPHTHALITE HUNS The restoration of Khurasan, however it was achieved, was assisted by Hephthalite distraction. If Kavad had recovered his eastern provinces by force, Hephthalite resistance may have been weak; if by diplomacy, the masters of Central Asia may have been grateful for a peaceable frontier while their armies were engaged elsewhere. Some interesting scraps of evidence in Chinese sources support either possibility. Two impressive military expansions drew Hephthalite arms far from the Iranian frontier. Chinese dynastic annals record that, by the last decade of the fifth century, Hephthalite power had penetrated Kashmir, Kashgar, Khotan, Karashahr, Kucha, and the surrounding region of the Taklamakan desert; and in the early sixth century the Hephthalites undertook the conquest of India. 208 Toramana, a Hephthalite vassal king, destroyed the Gupta empire, and subdued a large portion of the Indian subcontinent. 209 But there is evidence that the insecurity of the Hephthalites’ northern frontier was a problem of increasing importance. In the fourth century of our era, the threat of the Huns had vanished alike from the Asiatic Steppe, and from within China. The nomadic confederacy of the Xianbei had filled the territory vacated by the Huns, and they soon bestrode Inner Asia. One of the largest clans within the confederacy of than Xianbei was the Tabgatch, whom Chinese writers called Tuoba. These nomads assimilated themselves and their allies to the customs and language of their sedentary neighbour, and the conquests of their chieftain Toba Gui extended his power throughout northern China. 210 With time Toba Gui gave himself the name of Wei, and this was the beginning of the dynasty of the same name which ruled northern China between the years 386 and 585. The new dynasty, known to posterity as the Northern Wei, was assailed by new barbarians. The contempt of Chinese annalists called the new steppe power ‘wriggling insects’, or Rouran in their native tongue. 211 They had emerged from within the old Xianbei confederacy, or perhaps their ancient homeland had been deeper within the Inner Asian steppe. It was among the Rouran that the titles of khan and khaghan emerged, and they were applied to the rulers of that confederacy. It is possible that the ruling clan of the Rouran was none other the Avars who

208

I am referring to the Liang Shu, and the relevant portion of it is quoted and translated in de la Vaissière, É., “Is there a Nationality of the Hephthalites?,” p. 125. 209 Kim, J., The Huns, p. 59–60. 210 Holcombe, C., “The Xianbei Chinese History,” Early Medieval China 19, 2013, p. 15–22; Barfield, T. J., The Perilous Frontier, p. 118–127. 211 For a discussion of the Rouran state and society, see Kradin, N. N., “From Tribal Confederation to Empire: the Evolution of the Rouran Society,” Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae, vol. 58 (2), 2005, p. 149–169.

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were to be noticed in Roman sources of the sixth century, but the name which the Rouran called themselves is not known. 212 Over the course of the fifth century, the Northern Wei emperors conducted a series of successful campaigns in the west which saw the extension of Tuoba rule over other nomadic peoples to the embarrassment of the Rouran. The collapse of that confederacy was slow but inexorable. Though the Rouran had seized the northern possessions of the Hephthalites, they could not long resist the might of the Wei. Repeated assaults upon the Chinese frontier achieved little success throughout the fifth century, and such failures perhaps accelerated the collapse of the Rouran. This surely produced a state of anxiety and instability along the Hephthalites’ northern frontier in the early sixth century. 213 Fear of Inner Asian disorder, and the troubles that attended it, compelled the Hephthalites to strengthen their ties with the Northern Wei dynasty, to whom thirteen Hephthalite embassies were dispatched between the years 507 and 531. 214 Kavad must have profited from this period of fear and distraction also.

KAVAD’S FOREIGN POLICY In the time of peace which followed the Roman war, a policy of diplomatic engagement with other world powers took hold at the Persian court. The evidence is scant, but we can reconstruct two important initiatives: I. diplomatic contact with the court of the Northern Wei; and II. the establishment of a trading monopoly in the Indian Ocean. I. War with the Huns and strife within the Iranian nobility explain the interval between the years 476 and 507 during which no Iranian embassy was dispatched to the Northern Wei. But this changed suddenly, and the Iranian government renewed contact with China immediately after the Roman armistice. The renewal of embassies to China attests an Iranian interest the political life of Inner Asia; and it may suggest that Iran sought some advantage over the Hephthalites at the court of the Northern Wei. Chinese annals note the mere fact of Iranian embassies in the years 507, 517, 521, and 522. 215 But the notice of an embassy of the year 518 records sur212

Golden, P. B., “Some Notes on the Avars and Rouran” in Curta, F. / Bogdan-Petru, M. (eds), The Steppe Lands and the World Beyond Them: Studies in Honour of Victor Spinei on his 70th Birthday, 2013, p. 43–66; Golden, P. B., Central Asia in World History, 2011, p. 36. 213 Kim, H. J., The Huns, Rome, and the Birth of Europe, p. 39–41; Barfield, T. J., The Perilous Frontier, p. 120–127; Sinor, D., “The Establishment and Dissolution of the Türk Empire,” Sinor, D. (ed.), The Cambridge History of Early Inner Asia, 1990, p. 291–301. The name Rouran is sometimes transliterated Jou-jan, Jou-juan or Juan-juan. 214 Enoki, K., “The Nationality of the Ephthalites,” Memoirs of the Research Department of the Toyo Bunko (The Oriental Library), No. 18, 1959, p. 27. 215 Ecsedy, I., “Early Persian Envoys in Chinese Courts (5th-6th Centuries A. D.),” p. 229– 230.

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prising details. Iran sent presents, which were portrayed as tribute; and a letter from the Persian king addressed the Wei emperor in the most flattering language. The introduction to that document has survived: ‘May the Son of Heaven of the Most Magnificent Country in existence continue to reign when the sun comes out, as the Son of Heaven of the Central Han. The king of Persia, Kavad, makes ten thousand times his respectful obeisance.’ 216

How grateful we would be if the whole letter had been preserved! We shall never know the full import of that communication, and it is hard to discern why the embassy of the year 518 received special emphasis in the annals of China. Could it be that the epithet ‘very peaceful’ implies that a period of warfare with the Huns had come to an end? Alas, the slim notices which I have rehearsed point to no definite conclusions. II. The diplomacy of Kavad established a monopoly on Indian maritime trade. 217 An appendix to the strange text known as the Christian Topography is the evidence for this. 218 Its author was a merchant by the name of Cosmas who wrote in about the year 550, and he refers to the activities of his friend Sopatrus thirty-five years earlier. In about the year 515 Sopatrus was in Taprobane 219 where he participated in a negotiation between the king of that island, some Roman merchants, and an Iranian embassy – surely one of the many which the Sasanid court had dispatched to negotiate preferential trading agreements. When the monarch of Taprobane asked his guests about their countries and their respective rulers, the Iranian answer came first. ‘Our king,’ said Kavad’s ambassador, ‘is the more powerful, the greater, and the richer, and he is the king of kings; and if he wants a thing he can do it’. 220 When the king of Taprobane demanded a Roman response, Sopatrus produced the coins of the rival powers: the gold solidus of the Romans (as Sopatrus said) was better than the silver drachm of Iran. This response pleased the Taprobanian king, and annoyed the representative of Kavad, but the purpose of the Iranian embassy was achieved. 221 This maritime monopoly could not have succeeded without firm control over the Arabi216

Tashakori, A., Iran in Chinese Dynastic Histories, p. 44–45; Ecsedy, I., “Early Persian Envoys in Chinese Courts (5th–6th Centuries A. D.),” p. 235 with note 34. I have quoted the translation by Tashakori. 217 Howard-Johnston, J., “The India Trade in Late Antiquity,” in Sauer, E. (ed.), Sasanian Persia: Between Rome and the Steppes of Eurasia, 2017, p. 294–295; Howard-Johnston, J., “State and Society in Late Antique Iran,” p. 127. 218 Cosmas Indicopleustes, XI.13–19. 219 Now called Sri Lanka. 220 Ὁ ἡμέτερος, καὶ δυνατώτερος καὶ μειζότερος, καὶ πλουσιώτερος, καὶ βασιλεὺς βασιλέων ἐστίν. Καὶ εἴ τι θέλει, δύναται (Cosmas Indicopleustes, XI.12). 221 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xx.9–13. This evidence is examined in detail in the following chapter.

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an shore of the Persian Gulf. The Iranian alliance with the Lakhmid kingdom of Hira was essential to maintaining that control, and so Kavad must have been grateful for the foresight of his ancestor Shapur II. 222

THE ROMAN ERECTION OF A FORTRESS AT DARA AND THE IRANIAN REACTION While the armistice between Iran and Rome was negotiated, and while Kavad was engaged in warfare or diplomacy with the Huns, the Roman government began to refurbish the ruined fortresses which guarded the Iranian frontier. Fortifications were improved at Edessa, Batnae, Amida, and Theodosiopolis. 223 But the most important Roman project at that time was the construction of an imposing fortress about twelve miles 224 across the frontier from Nisibis. Dara, when it was finished, sat upon three hills, and the highest of these supported the citadel; and two walls, separated by an interval of fifty feet, enclosed the fortress and connected its towers. The inner wall contained every amenity necessary for resisting a siege including barracks, store houses, cisterns, and two public baths. 225 The establishment of this fortification signalled that the Roman government had relinquished its claim to Nisibis, and Dara strengthened the eastern frontier considerably. But, as even Procopius admitted, the treaty of 422 had forbidden either power from erecting new fortresses along their mutual frontier. 226 Amidst the distractions of distant warfare, Kavad might only protest at the construction of Dara, and Iranian efforts to destroy the foundation of that fortress failed. 227 The gentle diplomacy of the emperor Anastasius and a liberal gift of money were calculated to appease Iranian anger, but the construction proceeded, and Dara remained an irritating stimulus for war.

AN INTERVAL OF PEACE Many of the reforms attributed to Kavad and to his son Khusro must have been enacted, or resumed, after the defeat of the Huns. We may ascribe to this period the limestone casing added to the wall at Ghilghilchay and its new name of Abzud Kawad. 228 A project such as the refurbishment of a large defensive work bespeaks a 222

Morley, C., “The Arabian Frontier: A Keystone of the Sasanian Empire,” p. 272–273. Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, LXXXI; LXXXIX; XCI; Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.x.18–19. 224 ἀπέχει δὲ [Δάρας] πόλεως μὲν Νισίβιδος σταδίους ἑκατὸν δυοῖν δέχοντας (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.x.13). A stade is about one eighth of a mile. Ninety-eight stades should make a little more than twelve miles. 225 The early fortifications are described in Marcellinus Comes, a.c. 518, and the final form of Dara is delineated in Procopius, Aedificia, II.i–ii. 226 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.x.16. 227 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, XCII. 228 Gadjiev, M., “Apzut Kawad Wall,” in Encyclopaedia Iranica, 2017, online edition. The name of the wall is attested in the Geography of Ananias of Shirak, p. 57, and Moses Chorenatsi, 223

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stable central government. But, if the writer Procopius can be believed, factional strife amongst the nobility continued. The principle sign of this problem was Kavad’s apprehension of a noble plot to subvert the rule of his family. 229 The royal succession would not normally have passed to Kavad’s youngest son Khusro. Kawus, the eldest son of Kavad, was somehow displeasing to his father, and the accession of the middle son Jam was forbidden by law because he was blind in one eye. 230 We may infer that one noble faction favoured the appointment of Kawus and another supported Khusro. The noblemen whom Procopius calls Aspebed 231 was the uncle of young Khusro, whom Kavad had begotten by the sister of that aristocrat, 232 and here we may behold the lineaments of an alliance between the family of Sasan and another noble house. This faction reasoned that an adoption by the Roman emperor Justin 233 would strengthen the position of Khusro and assure his passage to the throne. The example of Yazdgard I, who became guardian to the young emperor Arcadius, may have inspired this proposal. 234 But the man whom Procopius calls Seoses objected to the adoption, frustrated the negotiation of it, and attempted to arouse discord between Justin and Kavad. If it is possible to identify Seoses with Zarmihr the younger, we may infer that the House of Karen led the opposition to Kavad’s adoption and was the principle object of Kavad’s fear. But, whoever Seoses was, he was accused and condemned for undermining the Iranian position when the adoption was on the point of approval. The emperor Justin was eager to perform the adoption of Khusro, despite the objections of a certain Proclus who argued speciously that the young Persian would stand to inherit the Roman empire. 235 The Roman government settled upon a form of adoption that would preclude such inheritance; 236 and, in the middle of the 520s, 237 an embassy was dispatched to the frontier to ratify an agreement with representatives of Kavad. XXVII.9. See also Aliev, A. A., et al., “The Ghilghilchay Defensive Long Wall: New Investigations,” p. 145. 229 He feared μὴ τι Πέρσαι νεωτερίσωσιν ἐς τὸν αὑτοῦ οἶκον (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xi.2). The ‘house’ of Kavad must refer to the Sasanid line itself, not to the immediate progeny of that king. 230 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xi.3–4. 231 Procopius seems to have mistaken a title for a name. Aspebed must be the rank of spahbad (Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 117 with note 126). 232 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xi.5. 233 The emperor Anastasius had lately died. 234 Christensen, L’Iran sous les Sassanides, p. 350. 235 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xi.11–19. Proclus was a quaestor, an official having charge over public revenue and expenditure. 236 Procopius calls it adoption not by virtue of a legal document but by arms and armour as befits a barbarian (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xi.22–23). 237 Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 137.

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The Iranian negotiators were Seoses and Mahbod. 238 Seoses, as it was later alleged, infuriated the Romans with accusations of improper meddling in the Caucasus, and Mahbod reported to his sovereign that Seoses had colluded with a Roman envoy by the name of Hypatius who likewise rejected the planned adoption. 239 Other opponents of Seoses brought other charges, and that aristocrat was arrested and put on trial. Seoses, as it was said, was an extraordinarily arrogant man whose selfimportance could be compared with that of no other person. He refused to abide by established custom, he worshiped strange gods, and he had buried the body of his dead wife in contravention of orthodox Zoroastrian practice. 240 The heretical beliefs of Seoses permit the inference that he was a Mazdakite, or at least that he was accused of belonging to that sect, and that he favoured the succession of Kawus. An interesting notice in the Chronography of Theophanes appears to support this inference. In a single day, says the chronographer, Kavad destroyed thousands of heretics, together with their preceptor, and all the Iranian grandees who espoused the same heresy. 241 The reason for this slaughter was that the sect aimed to enthrone one of Kavad’s sons who had promised to perpetuate their heresy. Theophanes calls the son by his royal title Padashkhwarshah, and from this we may infer that the Greek chronographer was referring to the eldest son Kawus. 242 Kavad pretended to support the position of the heretics, feigned acquiescence in the promotion of Kawus, summoned the heretics to a council, and commanded his soldiers to slaughter them all. 243 It is tempting to infer that Seoses was caught up in a purge of aristocrats who still clung to the Mazdakite creed and who had manipulated the eldest son of Kavad. But I am inclined to doubt that Mazdak himself was destroyed in that purge, as Theophanes seems to imply. But this must remain one of the great enigmas of Iranian history. The date of the purge, and the putative end of Mazdakite influence, is similarly mysterious. Procopius places the fall of Seoses at some point after the accession of the emperor Justin I and at an unspecified time after the failed adoption of Khusro. The incident described by Theophanes supposedly occurred two years 238

Procopius calls him Μεβόδης (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xi.25). Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xi.28–31. 240 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xi.33–35. 241 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 261–262. Theophanes calls these heretics ‘manichaeans’, and their ‘bishop’ he names Ἰνδάζαρος. Indazar must be the Persian word andarzgar or ‘teacher’ (Nöldeke, Die Geschichte der Perser, p. 462 with note 3). 242 Theophanes spells the title defectively as Φθασουαρσάν (Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 261). See for a learned discussion of what Theophanes meant, see Crone, P., “Kavad’s Heresy and Mazdak’s Revolt,” p. 41–42. Cf. Christensen, L’Iran sous les Sassanides, p. 354–355. 243 Καβάδης ἐκέλευσε κομβέντα γενέσθαι διὰ τὸ, φησίν, ποιῆσαι τὸν υἱὸν Φθασουαρσὰν βασιλέα…ὁ δὲ Καβάδης ἐπιτρέψας τῷ στρατεύματι εἰσελθεῖν πάντας κατέκοψεν ξίφεσι σὺν τῷ ἐπισκόπῶ αὐτῶν (Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 262). The hierarchs of the Magi and Christian prelates attended and observed the slaughter also. 239

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before the death of Kavad – a dating supported by the writer John Malalas who recorded the same information as Theophanes. 244 But the destruction of Seoses and his heretical beliefs was not the end of Kawus who laid claim to the throne, without success, at the moment of his father’s death. 245

KAVAD’S SECOND ROMAN WAR The seven-year armistice of the year 506 was never renewed, and the two powers lapsed into a state of war when it expired. The failed adoption of Khusro produced new tensions between Iran and Rome, and aggressive raids conducted by Iran’s Lakhmid clients spread destruction throughout Mesopotamia. 246 But a direct confrontation between the two powers was not immediate. The pretext for war was the Roman meddling in the Caucasus which Seoses had accused and condemned in the midst of negotiations with Rome. By the middle of the 520s, the respective kings of Lazica and Iberia had thrown off their allegiance to Iran, and they had demanded Roman protection. Iranian efforts to ensure the loyalty of Transcaucasia involved the forcible conversion of Christians to Zoroastrianism and a military intervention – policies which seemed intolerable to many inhabitants of that region. 247 A Roman force was also stationed in Lazica; and Tzath, the king of the Lazi, fled, and was welcomed at Constantinople where he was baptised, took a Roman wife, and received regalia befitting his rank. 248 The Iberian king Vakhtang 249 made a similar appeal to Rome, and Iranian forces expelled him and Roman troops from Iberia. The government of Iran greatly resented Roman encroachment into its proper sphere of influence, and Kavad responded by forming an alliance with a Hunnish or Sabir king who had formerly been loyal to the emperor Justin, and who menaced Lazica and Iberia from the northern Caucasus. But Zilgibis (that was the king’s name) continued to receive Roman money: Justin warned of the perfidy of Zilgibis, and Kavad destroyed that king together with his entire army. 250 But this failed to avoid further conflict in the region of the Caucasus, and fighting inflicted heavy losses upon both powers, and a Roman army penetrated and pillaged Iranian Armenia. 251 244

But these two others disagree on the date of Kavad’s death (Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 261–262; Malalas, p. 444). See Crone, P., “Kavad’s Heresy and Mazdak’s Revolt,” p. 42. 245 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xxi.20. 246 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xvii.40–45. 247 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xii.3–13. 248 John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 413–414; Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 139–147; Braund, D., Georgia in Antiquity, p. 276–277. 249 Procopius calls him Γουργένης, perhaps a misunderstanding of the name Vakhtang Gorgasali, and the identification is necessitated by chronology (Rapp, S. H., The Sasanian World through Georgian Eyes, p. 84). See also Braund, D., Georgia in Antiquity, p. 282–287. 250 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 254. 251 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xii.20.

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A sudden Roman invasion of Iranian territory in Mesopotamia occurred in the year 528. 252 The new emperor Justinian may have aimed to prevent further Iranian attempts to halt construction at Dara, 253 but the Roman force was defeated and their plan to build a new fortress at a place called Minduos failed. The chronicle of John Malalas indicates that the onset of a severe winter and domestic disturbances 254 prevented the renewal of warfare, and the two powers agreed to a short truce. 255 But Mundhir, chief of the Lakhmid Arabs, spread destruction throughout Syria and pillaged the vicinity of Antioch. 256 The Roman ambassador Hermogenes was dispatched to the Iranian court at Ctesiphon in the year 529. The accession of the emperor Justinian, which had occurred two years earlier, was formally announced to the Sasanid monarch, and Hermogenes received a letter prepared by the Iranian chancery addressed to the Roman emperor. John Malalas has recorded the words of Kavad: ‘Kavad, king of kings, of the rising sun, to Flavius Justinian Caesar, of the setting moon. We have found written in our ancient records that we are brothers of one another; and if one of us should need men or money, that the other should provide them. From that time to the present, we have remained constant in fulfilling that duty. When nations have risen against us, some we have been compelled to resist, and others we have induced to submit themselves to us with gifts of money, so that it is obvious that all that was in our treasuries has been exhausted. We had written of this to the emperors Anastasius and Justin and yet we achieved nothing. Wherefore we are compelled to prepare ourselves for war; and because we are neighbours of the Romans, we have been compelled to destroy those who dwell between us, although they are blameless, because of Roman disobedience. 257 But as Christian and pious men, spare lives and bodies, and give us some of your gold. If you do not do this, ready yourselves for war. You have a whole year for this, lest we be thought to have stolen the victory and to have won the war by guile.’ 258

But the demand for money went unanswered. Roman and Iranian troops massed at the frontier, and the two powers prepared for the outbreak of war. Iranian policy 252

Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xii.23. Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 149. 254 The Roman empire was afflicted by earthquakes, a revolt of the Samaritans, and Sacaren raids, and (according to Malalas) Kavad undertook the purge of heretics whom we may identify as Mazdakites (John, Malalas, p. 442; Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 160). 255 John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 442. 256 John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 445. 257 There is some ambiguity to the phrase τῆς ἐκείνων ἀπεθείας (John Malalas, p. 450). But ἐκείνων should resume τῶν Ῥωμαϊκῶν above. Contra the translation in Jeffrey, E. and M. / Scott, R., The Chronicle of John Malalas: A Translation, 1986, p. 263–264. 258 John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 449–450 (my translation). 253

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procured the defection of fifty-thousand Samaritans, and Kavad’s spies (as it seems) had enflamed discontent amongst that people into an obnoxious uprising. 259 Kavad had hoped at least to force Justinian to return to negotiation, and he succeeded despite some signal defeats. Kavad reopened the war on two fronts: one in Mesopotamia and one in Armenia. To the south, the Iranian force was divided into three armies of fiftythousand men commanded by the generals whom Procopius calls Peroz Mihran, Pityaxes, and Baresman, but the latter two of these names are really titles. 260 A memorable battle at Dara, which Procopius witnessed and described at some length, ended in a victory for the Romans and the famous general Belisarius. The armies of Iran failed to take that fortress, were routed, and they fled across the border. 261 Similar misfortune afflicted Kavad’s forces in the north. The Iranian general Mihr-Meroe aimed, as it seems, to secure Iranian influence in Iberia; but the motley army of local allies, which he led, was thrown into confusion near Satala in Roman Armenia. 262 Mihr-Meroe’s standard was captured, and the Iranian army retreated. Three Iranian brothers defected to Rome and contrived to cede to that power the two Iranian fortresses of Bolum and Pharangium. 263 The latter of these was an especially grievous loss as it was the centre of an important gold-mining operation, and it proved to be a great irritant in later negotiations. 264 Despite two Roman victories, the ambassador Rufinus blamed Iran for the outbreak of war, and attempted to sue for peace. 265 In an audience in August of the year 530, Kavad reiterated his claim that the war had been provoked by Roman refusal to pay for the maintenance of the Caucasian defences, despite an earlier obligation; he accused the illegal construction of the castle at Dara, and explained that so threatening a fortress had obliged him to maintain two armies. One force was to repel invasions from the steppe, and the other as a defence against the Romans. 266 ‘Never,’ said Kavad, ‘never shall the Persians put down their arms, until the Romans either help us to guard the Caucasian gates, as is just and right, or destroy the city of 259

John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 455–456; Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 191–192. Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xiii.16–21; Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 176 with note 22. The titles are bidakhsh and marzban which signify respectively governor of a province, and margrave. 261 Procopius, I.xiii.10–55. A thorough, modern analysis of the battle of Dara, and the tactics deployed there, is found in Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 169–185. 262 Again the best modern treatment of this battle is Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 185–190. 263 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xv.17–19; 26–33. 264 John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 455–456. 265 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xvi.1–3. 266 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xvi.4–8. It is interesting to speculate whether, or how, this claim is related to the quadripartition of the Iranian army. 260

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Dara!’ 267 The ambassador was dismissed, and war was renewed in the following spring.

THE BATTLES OF CALLINICUM AND MARTYROPOLIS In the work of Procopius, the Battle of Callinicum is distinguished by the quarrels and insubordination that afflicted the Roman army. An ignominious flight from the scene of battle is attributed to the general Belisarius, and the eye-witness account of Procopius is deformed by the writer’s attempt to retrieve the honour of his master. The events of the battle are therefore a matter of some doubt. 268 Procopius has also mistaken the title of hazaraft, or Commander of One Thousand Men, for the name of the Iranian general who led the invasion, 269 but that writer understood and recorded the Iranian war aims. A division of Hunnish, or more probably Sabir, auxiliaries, who fought on the Roman side, captured some Iranian horsemen who revealed that Kavad’s strategy was to penetrate Syria and plunder the city of Antioch. Lakhmid clients, under the leadership of Mundhir, were to guide Iranian forces northward along the Euphrates from Callinicum to Barbalissus, thence to Gabbula near Chalcis, and thence to Antioch. But Roman forces repulsed the Iranian host from Gabbula to Callinicum where, despite reciprocal damage, the Romans were defeated in a pitched battle. The Roman government was prepared to come to terms with Iran. But the Persian king wished to achieve further strategic advantage over Rome before reopening negotiations, and military operations moved northward. Every method was employed to capture Martyropolis, but without success. The use of mines, a mound, scaling ladders, and a siege tower failed to subdue that city, and the Roman commander Dorotheus outflanked his antagonists and captured some important fortresses in Iranian Armenia. 270 The war could no longer be continued without exhausting the belligerents, and the end of Kavad’s life was near. Despite the victory at Callinicum, Iranian forces had captured neither Antioch, nor Martyropolis, nor any other Roman fortress, and the hazaraft (according to the vague opinion of Procopius) was rebuked and dishonoured. 271

267

Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xvi.8. The best modern analysis is Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 193–207. 269 Procopius calls him Ἀζαρέθης (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xvii.1). 270 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xxi.7–8; John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 469; Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 207–212. 271 ὠνείδιζέ τε τῷ Ἀζαρέθῃ ὁ βασιλεὺς τὴν νίκην καὶ ἐν τοῖς ἀτιμοτάτοις τὸ λοιπὸν εἶχε (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xviii.56). 268

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THE SUDDEN DEATH OF KAVAD On the eighth day of September of the year 531, Kavad suffered a paralysis of the right side of his body and died five days later. 272 The monarchy of Kavad’s favourite son was assured by a written declaration entrusted to the nobleman Mahbod who read the text aloud before the assembled grandees of Iran, 273 and the legal challenge raised by Kavus, and perhaps an armed uprising, failed. 274 Upon the accession of Khusro, the anxiety of war was relaxed, and the two powers began to negotiate a treaty of peace.

272

John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 471. Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xxi.17–23. 274 Procopius says vaguely that Kavus ‘usurped the honour’ (ἐπεβάτευε τῆς τιμῆς), but this could conceal a rebellion of some sort (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xxi.20). 273

VI. THE IRANIAN RECOVERY THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE REIGN OF KHUSRO I AND ITS SOURCES To understand the reign of Khusro I is to comprehend many of the most important moments in the history of the world. 1 The Roman recovery of Italy and the provinces of the west, the great reform of the Roman legal system, the construction of the Church of the Holy Wisdom at Constantinople, and the Justinianic plague – these memorable events of European history all coincide with the reign of Khusro I. The rise of the Turks and their inexorable progress towards mastery of Eurasia began when Khusro sat upon the Iranian throne, and their annihilation of the Hephthalite empire received the assistance of the Sasanid government. The birth of Muhammad, the founder of the religion of Islam, occurred in the final years of Khusro’s reign; and the successors of that Arabian prophet, who ruled over the lands of the defunct Sasanian monarchy, adopted the system of taxation perfected by Khusro I. Long after his empire had perished, and long after the triumph of Islam upon the ruins of the Zoroastrian religion, the name of Khusro of the Immoral Soul, or Anusharwan, never ceased to be celebrated in Persian poetry and philosophy. Khusro is remembered as the restorer of Iranian power after the grim reverses of the fifth century. The Persian royal tradition commemorates him as a friend to science and learning, and the epithet ‘the Just’ is always attached to his name. 2 The notices of the Persian royal tradition swell to a gigantic size for the reign of Khusro I, and the historian is tempted to believe that much of the great bulk of the Shahnameh reposes upon a chronicle composed at the instigation of Khusro himself. There may be some truth to that belief, for Khusro is the only Sasanian king whose purported autobiography has survived, or rather large fragments of it. Ibn Miskawayh, 3 who served within the chancery of the Buyid state in the tenth century, composed a universal history called The Experience of Nations, and this interesting text 1

Jackson Bonner, M. R., Three Neglected Sources, p. 18. Jackson Bonner, M. R., “Sasanian Propaganda in the Reign of Husraw Anushirvan” in Jullien, C. (ed.), Husraw Ier reconstructions d’un règne: sources et documents, 2015, p. 258. 3 For more on this man, consult Bosworth, E. C., “Meskawayh, Abu ‘Ali Ahmad,” Encyclopædia Iranica, online edition, 2002. 2

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claims to transcribe, in Arabic translation, a portion of the narrative of Khusro’s life which that king himself composed. 4 An historian may struggle to believe that those paragraphs of Ibn Miskawayh are really direct translations excerpted from the full autobiography of a Sasanid monarch; but it is equally difficult to dismiss them as forgeries. 5 Nevertheless, the huge mass of indigenous anecdotes concerning the son of Kavad announces rather the fanciful or mendacious embellishment of the reign of an important king than a prodigious series of historical facts. 6 But external sources, which had reduced the history of the late fifth century to an inchoate series of notices, give way to the elegant and harmonious narratives of Procopius and Agathias, to the surviving fragments of a diplomatic history composed by Menander the Guardsman, and to the rough and demotic works of Theophanes and John Malalas. Without relaxing his scepticism or yielding to credulity, a modern historian may be grateful for the abundance of such material.

THE PEACE TREATY OF 532 At the death of Kavad, his son and successor Khusro exerted himself to terminate the war which he had inherited. The need for peace in the west was great. It is improbable that the Iranian state could have sustained the war effort long beyond the thirty years of intermittent fighting which had already elapsed, and the position of Khusro was insecure. Domestic strife and the threat of civil war oppressed the early reign of the new king, and amidst those calamities the Iranian government requested a truce and began the negotiation of an indefinite treaty of peace. 7 According to the writer John Malalas, the first act of Khusro was to invite Roman ambassadors into Iran. But those dignitaries refused to obey the request of the Sasanid king without an order from the emperor Justinian. A personal letter, composed at the behest of Khusro, was addressed to his Roman counterpart, but this document failed to induce the emperor to empower his diplomats to negotiate. Justinian was undoubtedly aware that the rule of his Persian rival was insecure, and the emperor refused at first even to recognise the legitimacy of Khusro’s monarchy. Malalas describes the domestic strife which disrupted the reign of Khusro. Sectaries, whom he calls Manichaeans, had requested and received the tolerance of the new monarch; but Zoroastrian hierophants could not abide the liberal spirit of the 4

Ibn Miskawayh, Tajarib al-Umam, v. 1, p. 132–139. On the merits of the biography of Khusro I as an historical source, see Jackson Bonner, M. R., Three Neglected Sources, 2011, p. 41–46 and Grignaschi, M. “Quelques spécimens de la littérature sassanide conserves dans les bibliothéques d’Istanbul,” Journal Asiatique, vol. 254, 1966, p. 19–21. 6 For a long treatment of the supposed splendours of Khusro I’s reign to the neglect of politics and military affairs, see Christensen, L’Iran sous les Sassanides, p. 419–435. 7 The best study of this treaty is Williams, M., Roman-Sasanian Relations (532 to 545 CE), Unpublished MPhil Thesis, Oxford, 2010, p. 5–23. 5

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son of Kavad, and a noble and hieratic plot was formed to depose Khusro and to install one of his brothers upon the throne. 8 The chronicler omits the name of the rebel, but Procopius’ reference to the challenge raised by Khusro’s brother Kawus appears to allude to the same events related by Malalas. 9 The involvement of heretics recalls the uprising and massacre described in the Chronography of Theophanes and in an earlier portion of Malalas’ own work. 10 Those events are dated to the final years of the reign of Kavad amidst the supposed turmoil of Mazdakism – an indication, as it seems, of two revolts led by Kawus and his heretical supporters. The notices of Malalas, Procopius, and Theophanes, may all repose upon different misinterpretations of Roman intelligence concerning an irregular and disorderly royal succession and the effects of a foreign heresy which was but dimly comprehended. But it is highly improbable that strife erupted at the Persian court because Khusro agreed to tolerate an obnoxious heresy. Although Theophanes and Malalas describe considerable slaughter after the first insurrection of Khusro’s brother, it may be that the rebel himself was granted an amnesty only to lead a second revolt which issued in his death. Justinian’s refusal to recognise the legitimacy of Khusro may suggest that the Roman government favoured the rule of a different son of Kavad, or at least that Roman interests were best served by an Iranian court paralysed by an irregular succession and a contest for the throne. But the Persian king either destroyed the conspirators who assailed the beginning of his reign, or at least very considerably reduced their power; and when his rule was secure, Khusro again asked for a truce of three months in which to perform the negotiation of an indefinite peace. But diplomatic contact was not immediate. Roman suspicions were aroused by the sudden penetration of the Sabirs through the Caspian Gates and the devastation which they wrought throughout Roman Mesopotamia, and their predations reached as far as Antioch. 11 The chronicle of Zachariah the Rhetor states plainly what Procopius merely insinuates: the incursion of those nomads was prompted by the Sasanian government. 12 The force of Procopius’ words is that the Sabir and Iranian armies were to coordinate an attack upon their mutual enemy, but the nomads per8

John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 472. Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xviii.56. 10 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 261–262; John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 444. 11 Malalas claims that Roman Armenia, Euphratesia, Cilicia Secunda, and Cyrrhestica were overrun and pillaged (John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 472). Zachariah the Rhetor mentions the raids reached Antioch (Zachariah, Historia Ecclesiastica, IX.vi, p. 98). 12 Zachariah, Historia Ecclesiastica, IX.vi, p. 98: 9

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Οἵ τε Οὖννοι οὐ πολλῷ ὕστερον ἐσβαλλόντες εἰς γῆν τὴν Ῥωμαίων, ἐπεὶ τὸν Περσῶν στρατὸν ἐνταῦθα οὐχ εὗρον, δι’ ὀλίγου τὴν ἐπιδρομὴν ποιησάμενοι ἐπ’ οἴκου ἀπεκομίσθησαν ἅπαντες (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xxi.28).

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formed their raids alone. The influence of Iran upon the Sabirs must have suggested revenge for the Roman failure to recognise the legitimacy of Khusro, and may have been a tactic to impel Roman diplomats to the negotiating table. Rufinus, a Roman ambassador, was sent to investigate the origin of the invasion, and Roman anxieties were countered by Iranian denial. Malalas draws a veil over the demonstration of Iranian innocence, and the duplicitous ambassador received and transmitted the disavowal of the Sasanid government without examination or criticism. 13 The diplomatic conferences and exchanges which followed are described by the writer Procopius. A Roman embassy met Khusro and his ministers somewhere upon the river Tigris. Eleven thousand pounds of gold was the price of peace with Iran, and Khusro also demanded the removal of the Roman general from Dara and the return of the Armenian fortresses at Pharangium and Bolum. 14 Granting the cession of those places was beyond the power of the Roman ambassadors who dispatched one of their number to Constantinople where he consulted the emperor. Justinian at first agreed to Iranian terms, but Khusro’s refusal to cede Iranian fortresses in Lazica compelled the Roman government to reject the proposed settlement, and negotiations failed. 15 The principal Iranian diplomat was a nobleman by the name of Zabergan, 16 about whom very little is known. The most influential figure on the Roman side was the ambassador Rufinus. It was that Roman patrician who had at first convinced the emperor Justinian to accept the terms offered by Khusro. He had persuaded the emperor to give up the forts in Lazica, and he had transmitted the false intelligence which had exonerated the Iranian government of instigating the Sabir invasion. We may behold in Rufinus the character of a diplomat whom the court of Khusro had induced to favour the interests of Iran. But Justinian sought to gain the advantage by exploiting Khusro’s relationship with Rufinus also; and when Rufinus had returned to Constantinople, the Roman government immediately diffused the false report that Rufinus had been executed. 17 Khusro, who was greatly troubled by the apparent death of the ambassador, is said to have begun an invasion of Roman terri13

John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 472–473. When his perfunctory investigation was complete, Rufinus instructed Dorotheus, the Roman general in Armenia, to take up arms against the Sabir Huns and to expel them from Roman lands. Hearing of this, the Huns retreated through the Caspian Gates, and Dorotheus recovered the booty that they had seized. For very brief discussion of these events from the Roman perspective, see Greatrex, G. / Lieu, S. N. C., The Roman Eastern Frontier and the Persian Wars, p. 96. 14 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xxii.1–2. 15 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xxii.6–11. 16 This is known from two small notices in The History of Grigor, p. 360 and Procopius, Anecdota, II.xxxiii. 17 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xxii.9. Greatrex believes that the origin of this rumour was a belief that Rufinus had been slain in a purge connected with the aftermath of the so-called Nika Riot (Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 214), but this is doubtful.

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tory. But Rufinus, who had returned to Iran bearing the large payment of gold which Khusro had demanded, entreated the Sasanian king to abandon his project of warfare and to return the money. A cloud of suspicion hung over the Roman ambassador: his fellow envoys regarded him with extreme distrust, and they denounced him to the emperor, insinuating, as it seems, that Rufinus was a creature of the Persian king. 18 Nevertheless, a new embassy, led by Rufinus and his colleagues, suggested an amended treaty which was approved and ratified by both powers. 19 Five terms of that treaty may be reconstructed with certainty on the warrant of notices in works of Procopius and John Malalas. 20 First, all lands and persons captured in the course of the last war were to be returned to the power from which they were taken. The Armenian fortresses of Pharangium and Bolum were accordingly retroceded to Iran, and that power returned to Rome the Lazian castles of Sarapanis and Scanda. Second, the country of Iberia was left free to decide its allegiance to either great power. Third, the headquarters of the Roman general of the east was to be removed from the fortress of Dara. Fourth, the Roman empire agreed to pay to Iran eleven thousand pounds of gold for the defence of the Caspian Gates. Fifth, the rulers of the two sedentary empires saluted one another as ‘brother’, and they promised to send money or men whenever they were needed. All but two of those terms aimed to restore the condition of the two powers before the war. 21 The construction of the castle at Dara had violated the peace treaty of the year 422, 22 and the late king Kavad had been justly enraged by it. But the government of Khusro agreed to tolerate its presence on condition that it pose no serious military threat, and the office of the Roman general of the east was therefore removed to the city of Constantina. Earlier treaties had stipulated an annual payment of money, which the Iranian government portrayed as a tribute, but the Treaty of 532 foresaw no similar, regular payment. Eleven thousand pounds of gold was the largest sum ever disbursed by the Roman Empire to a foreign power, 23 but it was a single, not an annual, payment. The Persian royal tradition presents only one paltry notice of the treaty until warfare again erupted between the two great powers in the year 540. 24 The attitude 18

Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xxii.10–15. Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xxii.16; John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 477. 20 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xxii.16–18; John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 477. For modern authorities see Williams, M., Roman-Sasanian Relations, p. 5–23, and Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 215–218. 21 Jones, A. H. M., The Later Roman Empire 284–602: A Social, Economic, and Administrative Survey, v. I, 1964, p. 272. 22 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.x.16. 23 Iluk, J., “The export of gold from the Roman Empire to barbarian countries from the 4th to the 6th centuries,” Münstersche Beiträge zur antiken Handelsgeschichte 4, 1985, p. 91. 24 Tabari, v. 2, p. 148–149: 19

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of the Iranian government to the treaty which terminated thirty years of fighting is accordingly obscure. Roman opinion held that the peace was to last indefinitely. 25 The words of Procopius may imply that it was meant to be an endless or an eternal peace, as it is sometimes translated by modern writers, but indefinite is perhaps a better construal. 26 The more modest opinion of the chronicler John Malalas was that the treaty was to hold for the duration of the two rulers’ lives. 27 But it was a mere eight years before the peace was violated and war was resumed.

THE INTERVAL OF PEACE BETWEEN 532 AND 540 The peace of the year 532 left the Roman emperor free to begin the reconquest of Italy and North Africa, and to reform the system of Roman law which had fallen into disorder. Roman building projects filled the 530s, the Church of the Holy Wisdom was completed in the year 537, and the administration of Roman Armenia was thoroughly reorganised. 28 The preoccupations of Khusro were similarly ambitious. The reformation of Iranian fiscal and military policy, which the late king Kavad had begun, were completed before the renewal of warfare in the year 540, and the fragments of Sasanian legal opinions which have survived attest Khusro’s interest in the codification of Iranian law. The appearance of a complementary pair of great men may be more than a conceit which satisfies the historian’s desire for symmetry and balance. 29 The image of the two rulers was always before the eye of Procopius, and he accuses Khusro and Justinian alike of loving innovation, fickleness, mendacity, dissimulation, perfidy, false piety, and avarice, 30 and so we may discern that the era of mutual reform was alike a period of mutual influence, imitation, and rivalry. In the year 528, which coincides with the early reign of Justinian and the twilight days of Kavad, Roman military policy established an Armenian field command 25

For a modern discussion of this, see Williams, M., Roman-Sasanian Relations, p. 16–17. Procopius calls it both τὴν εἰρήνην πέρας οὐκ ἔχουσαν and τὴν ἀπέραντον καλουμένην εἰρήνην (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xxii.3; I.xxii.17). For the meaning of those phrases, see Higgins, M. J., “International relations at the close of the 6th century,” The Catholic Historical Review 27.3, 1941, p. 286 with note 22. But it must be admitted that the Codex Justinianus notes that the emperor confirmed pacem cum Persis in aeternum (Codex Justinianus, I.xxvii.2). 27 πάκτα εἰρήνης τῶν δύο πολιτεῶν Ρωμαίων τε καὶ Περσῶν…μέχρι τῆς τῶν ἀμφοτέρων ζωῆς (John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 477). 28 Pazdernik, C., “Justinianic Ideology and the Power of the Past” in Mass, M. (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Justinian, Cambridge, 2005, p. 198–202; Evans, J. A. S., The Age of Justinian: The Circumstances of Imperial Power, 1996, p. 126–150; and Moorhead, J. Justinian, 1994, p. 35; 52–60; 92–93. 29 Clark, K., Civilisation, 1969, p. 229. 30 Kaldellis, A., Procopius of Caesarea: Tyranny, History, and Philosophy at the End of Antiquity, University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004, p. 199–128. For representative passages see Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xxiii.1; II.ix.8; Anecdota, VI.38; VIII.22; 13.10; 22.31–32; 29.1; 29.12. 26

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independent of the general of the east and his administration. 31 It is difficult to determine whether the quadripartition of the Iranian army inspired or imitated that important development, 32 but it is highly improbable that the military innovations of both powers were unconnected. Some modern writers have beheld in the tax policy of Kavad and Khusro the influence of the Roman empire, and a superficial comparison may be made to the fiscal reforms introduced by Diocletian. 33 Justinian’s codification of Roman law may perhaps be compared to the Iranian literary and intellectual revival patronised by Khusro, for this may have included both the writing of the Avesta and an official dynastic history which informed later Persian and Arabic writers. 34 It was a version of this chronicle which inspired the Christian informant of the Greek historian Agathias who composed a strange excursus on Sasanian dynastic history in the late sixth century. 35 Justinian’s attempt to extirpate the pagan religion led to the closure of the neo-Platonist School of Athens in the year 529. 36 But Khusro interested himself in Greek philosophy, and seven Greek philosophers migrated to the Sasanid court in order to escape the bigotry of Justinian. 37 Some relics of Sasanian legal texts attest Khusro’s double zeal for reform of the state and the purity of Iranian religion. The so-called Book of A Thousand Judgements attests that Khusro limited the numbers of judges and scribes in the province of Adashir-Khwarra, perhaps in order to halt the growth of the administrative state; and it was commanded that documents arising from interrogations and trials be sealed by eyewitnesses, so as to bring order, we may assume, to a disorganised 31

John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 429–430. Cf. Howard-Johnston, J., “The Late Sasanian Army,” p. 116. 33 Altheim, F. / Stiehl, R., Finanzgeschichte der Spätantike, 1957, p. 41. But the ingenious comparison of Altheim and Stiehl has not attracted many followers (Howard-Johnston, J., “The Two Great Powers,” p. 215 with note 127). 34 Howard-Johnston, J., “The Late Sasanian Army,” p. 116; Christensen, L’Iran sous les Sassanides, p. 415–429. 35 On the writing of the Avesta, see Boyce, M., Zoroastrians: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices, p. 135; and Corcoran, S., “Observations on the Sasanian Law-Book in the light of Roman legal writing,” in Rio, A. (ed)., Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages: Proceedings of the 2008 Byzantine Colloquium, 2011, p. 95. For the Persian royal annals, see Jackson Bonner, M. R., “Sasanian Propaganda in the Reign of Husraw Anushirvan,” p. 261; and Agathias, Historiae, II.27; and IV.30. 36 Agathias, Historiae, II.31. 37 Agathias alleges that these seven philosophers were mentioned by name in the treaty of 532, and that Khusro allowed them to live in Iran without fear of persecution. The Persian king refused to ratify the treaty without such stipulations (Agathias, Historiae, II.31.4). I am inclined to doubt that the philosophers were really mentioned in the treaty, but Nechaeva argues that they were (Nachaeva, E., “Seven Hellenes and One Christian in the Endless Peace Treaty of 532, Studies in Late Antiquity, Vol.1, Number 4, 2017, p. 359–380). 32

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method of filing and storage. 38 The government of Khusro likewise enjoined upon judges the use of administrative seals issued by a central authority. 39 The legal judgements which survive the reign of Khusro pertain to trusteeship of a fire temple, 40 the inheritance of land, 41 the rights and duties of knights, 42 and the seizure of property belonging to sorcerers and heretics. 43 These announce an emphasis upon property and inheritance, and it is noteworthy that many important posts in the civil administration seem to have been held by Zoroastrian clerics. These small glimpses exhaust our knowledge of the legal reforms of Khusro I, but they must have formed part of a larger project which could, without great exaggeration, be compared to the legal work of Justinian. 44 But no Roman parallel may be found for the augmentation of the Iranian irrigation system in the eastern hinterland of Ctesiphon. This project improved hydraulic infrastructure originally installed in the age of the Arsacids, and was surely begun in the interval of peace before the year 540. 45 A large canal, known to posterity as the Cut of Khusro, proceeded from the eastern bank of the river Tigris, near the site of Samarra, and joined the river Diyala below the village of Baʿquba. Twenty miles downstream, a branch canal was drawn from the Cut of Khusro down to the right bank of the Tigris. The stream of the great canal continued south-east, past Ctesiphon, and rejoined the Tigris near the site of Nahr Sabus. This the lower part of the Cut of Khusro passed through a village called Nahrawan, and came to be known as the Nahrawan Canal. 46 Many settlements flanked its sides, and many a bridge and weir connected the two banks. A highway departed from Ctesiphon, traversed this canal over a pontoon bridge at the village of Nahrawan, and proceeded to the royal residence at Dastgard and the further settlements of Jalula and Hulwan to the northeast, and onward through Media towards Rey and then eastwards through Gurgan towards Nishapur. Innumerable smaller canals diverged from the main channel and 38

The Book of A Thousand Judgements, 72.2–11. The Book of A Thousand Judgements, 93.6. See also Corcoran, S., “Observations on the Sasanian Law-Book in the light of Roman legal writing,” in Rio, A. (ed)., Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages: Proceedings of the 2008 Byzantine Colloquium, Centre for Hellenic Studies Occasional Publications, 2011, p. 99. 40 The Book of A Thousand Judgements, A37.1–15. 41 The Book of A Thousand Judgements, A37.16–38. 42 The Book of A Thousand Judgements, A16.11–A17.1; A19.2–6. See also Corcoran, S., “Observations on the Sasanian Law-Book,” p. 87. 43 The Book of A Thousand Judgements, A38.12–16. 44 Cf. Daryaee, T., Sasanian Persia, p. 30. But Daryaee is surely wrong to insist that The Book of A Thousand Judgements was originally commissioned and redacted under the leadership of Khusro I (Macuch, M., “Madayan i Hazar Dadestan,” Encyclopædia Iranica, online edition, 2017). 45 Howard-Johnston, J., “The Late Sasanian Army,” p. 106. 46 Adams, R. McC., The Land Behind Baghdad, p. 76–79. 39

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watered the lands east of Ctesiphon – a great boon to Iranian agriculture and human settlement. But this irrigation system was also a formidable barrier to any invader bold or foolish enough to approach Ctesiphon from the north, and we may credit the government of Khusro with an extraordinary feat of engineering which remained in operation until its neglect and deterioration under new masters in the twelfth century. 47 The mood of competition and emulation between the great powers suggests a period of mutual suspicion and envy. But the peace was respected, and the two empires almost revived the spirit of cooperation inaugurated by Yazdgard I. The life of a monophysite bishop and martyr, composed in Syriac, attests alike the tranquillity of the times and the willingness of both powers to cooperate. The bishop John of Tella, who was a vehement opponent of the Chalcedonian synod and its doctrines, had fled Roman territory into the bosom of Iran. Ephraem, the bishop of Antioch, eagerly sought the arrest and destruction of his monophysite antagonist, and he demanded and received the help of the governor of Nisibis, who apprehended John of Tella in the winter of the year 537. An interrogation ensued at Nisibis, and the fugitive bishop was asked to explain his three illegal crossings of the border. ‘Today there is such profound peace’, he answered, ‘that I knew not one state from the other’. 48 To that surprising explanation the bishop added that ‘the two kings are brothers in love’ – an interesting appeal to the propaganda of the time. Only twice was the peace threatened before the year 540. A severe winter of the year 535 gave way to a summer of extraordinary warmth, and a vehement drought expelled from the desert a host of fifteen-thousand Saracens. Mundhir, the Lakhmid king subject to the Sasanid monarch, denied them pasturage within the empire of Iran, and those fugitives penetrated the Roman territory of Euphratesia, perhaps in the region of Zenobia and Sergiopolis. But Batzas, the Roman general in Mesopotamia, pacified the invaders without the use of arms, and conflict was averted. 49 In the year 537, the Roman field army at Dara rose in revolt. 50 The principle grievances may have been despondency occasioned by the immense diversion of soldiers from the East to serve in Justinian’s Italian and African wars, as well as infrequent payments to soldiers along the Iranian frontier. 51 A certain John Cottistis 52 led an abortive rebellion which involved even the bodyguard to the commandant at 47 Morony, M., “al-Nahrawān”, Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2012, online edition; see also the vivid description of the Nahrawan canal and its environs, as well as a short survey of its history, in Le Strange, G., The Lands of the Eastern Caliphate, 1966, p. 57–62. 48 The whole incident is found in the biography of John of Tella in Vitae Virorum apud Monophysitas celeberrimorum, p. 65–73. 49 Marcellinus Comes, a.c. 536. For modern authorities, see Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 219, and Shahid, I., Byzantium and the Arabs in the Sixth Century, 1995, p. 194–195. 50 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xxvi.5–12. 51 Greatrex, G., Rome and Persia at War, p. 219–220. 52 Marcellinus Comes, a.c. 537.

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Dara, but the inhabitants of that city resisted and defeated the uprising. ‘Had the Persians not kept the peace, incurable evils would have befallen the Romans; but the treaty, which I have already mentioned, prevented this’. 53 From that remark by Procopius we may judge both the Roman apprehension of danger and the Iranian respect for the peace.

THE CONCLUSION OF THE REFORMS OF KAVAD AND KHUSRO The principal aim of the reforms, which Khusro completed, was to increase the resources available to the state and to enlarge the power of the army. A regular and predictable income would be the result of a fixed rate of taxation – an innovation which began with the cadastral survey of Kavad. But change may be feared and rejected even if it be for the better, and those reforms failed to please all subjects. The writer Tabari alludes to the criticism which emerged from the Iranian administrative state. According to a somewhat fanciful narrative, Khusro presided over a conference of Iranian officials whose task was to implement the new tax policy. The king’s demand to know the opinions of his officials touching the reform, and the bold reply of a secretary, adumbrate a serious defect which must have been perceived by many a courtier and bureaucrat. ‘O king’, said the secretary, ‘is it your will to establish this land tax upon shifting foundations? A vine may die, land sown with corn may wither, a water channel may dry up, and the water source of a spring or canal may be cut off!’ 54 Whatever the yield of a harvest (as the secretary implies), the farmer would be liable for the same annual fixed sum. In a time of plenty, competition amongst farmers would compel them to sell their harvests at a loss, and economic necessity might drive them to the bank or to the moneylender. 55 But the Sasanid government proceeded with the new policy, despite the astute criticism of the secretary; and, if we may believe the account of Tabari, Khusro commanded that his refractory bureaucrat be bludgeoned to death with inkwells. 56 Discontent with Khusro’s reforms is suggested by the writer Procopius also. ‘Khusro…was a man of disorderly mentality and with a perverse love of innovation, wherefore he was full of confusion and clamours and he became the cause of such things in everyone else’. 57 We cannot know what strange circumstances lie behind 912F

53

Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xxvi.7. This is a paraphrase of Tabari, v. 2, p. 150. 55 Cf. Scott, J. C., The Moral Economy of the Peasant, 1976, which is the foundation of the argument in Crone, P., “Kavad’s Heresy and Mazdak’s Revolt,” p. 33–334; See also Løkkegaard, F., Islamic Taxation in the Classic Period, with Special Reference to Circumstances in Iraq, 1950, p. 110, 117, 119, and Dennett, D. C., Conversion and the Poll Tax in Early Islam, 1950, p. 14–15. 56 Tabari, v. 2, p. 151: 54

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Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xxiii.1.

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these emphatic words, but Procopius assures us that the monarchy of Khusro was assailed by men who were greatly annoyed at the new ruler’s policies. A party of nobles remained loyal to Kavad’s son Jam, whose succession was forbidden by reason of his blindness in one eye. This faction vowed to install upon the Sasanid throne the son of Jam, who bore the same name as his royal grandfather. The younger Kavad, who was yet a boy, was to become king of Iran, and his father Jam was to administer the affairs of state. The substance of this noble plot was discovered to Khusro who slew Jam together with all his other brothers and their male progeny and every man who had participated in the conspiracy. Amongst the dead was Khusro’s maternal uncle, whom Procopius calls Aspebed. But the young prince Kavad escaped death. Adurgundbad, upon whom the elder Kavad had bestowed the rank of Margrave of the Eastern Marches, 58 had adopted the son of Jam whom he raised as his own child. The royal command to slay the child Kavad was ignored, the Margrave merely pretended to have carried out the murder, and the young boy was concealed within the house of Adurgundbad. The secret was known only to the adoptive parents, to young Kavad’s nurse, and to Bahram the son of the Margrave. When the younger Kavad came of age, he fled to Constantinople where he was received by the emperor Justinian – a fact which Bahram is said to have revealed to Khusro nine years later. 59 If Procopius may be trusted, Khusro and Bahram then plotted to kill Adurgundbad, and the son received the title and office of his slain father. A similar fate awaited others at the court of Khusro. Procopius reports that a high-ranking Persian by the name of Mebodes came into conflict with Zabergan, who had performed the negotiation of the peace of the year 532. 60 Khusro is said to have ordered Zabergan to summon Mebodes to the Persian court. Finding Mebodes marshalling his army, Zabergan returned to Khusro to report that his antagonist was unwilling to present himself before the king. A fear of civil war or rebellion was aroused, and Khusro commanded the execution of Mebodes. The poet Ferdowsi has transformed this story into the strange tale of Mahbod and Zarvan, who were respectively minister and door-keeper to the Sasanian king. 61 A Jew imparted to Zarvan the magic to turn milk into poison merely by gazing upon it; and when that drink was set upon the royal table, the sons of Mahbod who drank of it perished. Mahbod was blamed and executed, and Zarvan was exalted and honoured by Khusro. But rumours of witchery came to the king, who repented of his wrath with Mahbod. Zarvan revealed what he had done, and he and the Jew were put to death. 58

Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.vi.18; Christensen, L’Iran sous les Sassanides, p. 508. Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xxiii.10–28. Procopius entertains the possibility that the Kavad who appeared in Constantinople may have been an imposter, and he draws a veil over his fate. 60 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xxiii.25–29. 61 Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 1573–1716. 59

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Whatever noble strife may be concealed behind the curtain of fable, it was sufficiently interesting and important to be remembered in the lore of Iran, but its connection with the reformation of the Iranian state is obscure. It is possible that Mebodes, and a faction which supported him, had sought to terminate the peace between Iran and Rome and thereby disrupt the project of reform – but this may be wild speculation. But discontent was not universal, for some social classes attained new privileges by reason of Khusro’s reforms. The ancient landed gentry, or dihqans as they are called in Persian, rose to prominence in the reign of Khusro I, when management of small estates and the taxation of peasants became their hereditary duties. 62 The estates of the dihqans were surely smaller, and their wealth more modest, than the vast domains and the copious riches of the ancient aristocracy; but the power and influence of the dihqans proved to be greater. The Iranian nobility and the House of Sasan were buried in a common grave, and the dihqans survived the ruin of the Iranian empire. 63 In the centuries that followed the Arab conquest of Iran, they preserved and transmitted the relics of Iranian lore upon which reposes the Persian royal tradition. Ferdowsi, the writer of the Shahnameh, claimed descent from that class of gentry, and the epic that he composed often invokes the authority of the dihqans and the traditions which they recited.

THE COLLAPSE OF THE PEACE TREATY OF 532 AND THE OUTBREAK OF WAR In the year 539 two embassies appeared at the Sasanian court. A deputation of Ligurian priests represented Vittigis, king of the Goths who had overrun the Roman west; and a party of Armenian aristocrats brought the interests of their nation before the Persian king. 64 The words of those ambassadors, reported only by Procopius, describe the Roman government as their oppressors. Both nations disclose what Procopius attempts to conceal: the ambitions of the emperor Justinian to impose his authority everywhere. The speeches reported by Procopius are a mixture of invective and hyperbole; but, although the Roman historian probably invented them, they must represent real grievances. The complaints of the Armenians are the most realistic and informative. They demonstrate that the Roman government had intruded into the Iranian sphere of influence, and had begun to encroach upon every sensitive part of the mutual frontier of the two powers. The peace treaty of 532 is accused and blamed as a source of 62

Kennedy, H., “Survival of Iranianness,” in Curtis, V. / Stewart, S., The Rise of Islam: The Idea of Iran, v. IV, I. B. Tauris, London, 2009, p. 17–21; Tafazzoli, A., “Dehqan,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, Vol. VII, Fasc. 2, p. 223–224; Christensen, L’Iran sous les Sassanides, p. 107; Nöldeke, Die Geschicher der Perser, p. 440. 63 Christensen, L’Iran sous les Sassanides, p. 411; 508. 64 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.ii.1; II.iii.31.

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‘common destruction’ 65 which was connected with a fundamental reorganisation of Roman Armenia and its administration, and the invidious imposition of Roman law. 66 A new and oppressive tax was levied upon Armenia; the Tzani, once an autonomous people, were now slaves to the Romans; a Roman magistrate now lorded himself over the neighbouring Lazi; and Roman generals had been sent to Bosporus in order to detach that region from the nomads who held it, and thereby outflank Iran in the Caucasus. 67 Even Iranian supremacy in the area of the Red Sea was challenged, and those Armenian noblemen denounced the alliances between the Roman state and the kingdoms of Ethiopia and Himyar. 68 The emperor Justinian was further accused of a double treachery: he had attempted to bribe Mundhir, king of the Lakhmid Arabs and vassal to Khusro, and thereby to terminate his loyalty to Iran; and he had tried to induce the Sabirs to assail the empire of Khusro. 69 Such, at least, was the opinion of Procopius. We may corroborate only one element of that opinion. The Persian royal tradition clearly blamed the Roman emperor for the outbreak of war, and the histories of Dinawari and Tabari, and the Shahnameh claim that the Ghassanid Saracens, who were loyal to Rome, had attacked Khusro’s Lakhmid vassal without provocation. 70 But it is a surprising fact that the account of Procopius also presents the opposite claim. The opinion of the Roman government was that Mundhir, the Lakhmid king, had been instructed to invent a pretext for war, and a conflict over boundary lines between the Lakhm and Ghassan was the result. 71 Although it was surely a diplomatic irritant between the two powers, even if Khusro had instigated it, the conflict between Saracens was hardly a reason for warfare; and that feeble justification for Roman hostility could not counterbalance the unfriendly encroachment of Justinian. ‘They break the peace,’ the Armenian envoys averred, ‘not they who first put on armour, but they who are caught plotting against their neighbours when a treaty is in force’. 72 The Persian king and his ministers considered the arguments which they had heard, and resolved upon a preemptive strike. 73 65

κοινόν τινα ὄλεθρον (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.iii.36). Williams, M., Roman-Sasanian Relations, p. 36–43. 67 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.iii.39–40. 68 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.iii.41. 69 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.iii.47. 70 Dinawari, p. 70; Tabari, v. 2, p. 149; Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 436–440. Khusro’s purported autobiography makes no mention of Saracen affairs, but ascribes the outbreak of war to the perfidy of Justinian (Ibn Miskawayh, Tajarib al-Umam, v. 1, p. 133; Grignaschi, M. “Quelques spécimens,” p. 189), and we may well construe that as an implication that the Armenian and Gothic embassies had spoken the truth. 71 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.i.1–3. 72 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.iii.50. 73 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.iii.55–56. 66

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The aim of the Iranian government was to assert control over the Transcaucasus, and to hold the kingdoms of Iberia, Suania, and Lazica. The last of these was the most important, for possession of Lazica would, in theory, give Iran a port on the Euxine from which to menace Constantinople by sea. 74 But the war opened with a sudden invasion further south: Khusro extracted tribute from the Roman cities which he besieged, and his most memorable achievements were the storming of Antioch, the capture of its population, and their resettlement in the vicinity of Ctesiphon. But those activities were designed to abase Roman prestige and to divide the Roman military power, which was already dangerously preoccupied in the West. 75 Although operations proceeded with astonishing success to the great frustration of the emperor Justinian, the Iranian victory in Lazica was brief. Problems of supply led to the failure of this northern campaign, that country was abandoned when an enemy more dangerous than the Romans appeared in the East, and all memory of warfare in the region of the Caucasus was wiped from the page of indigenous Persian history. The fate of Khusro’s Levantine campaign was different. The Persian royal tradition commemorated, embellished, and exaggerated the assaults upon Sura, Hierapolis, Callinicum, and Antioch, to such a degree that it would be impossible to believe that the war had even occurred without the testimony of Procopius. 76

THE BEGINNING OF THE WAR The poet Ferdowsi provides a surprising description of the beginning of Khusro’s invasion. Lavish rites were performed within the great temple of Adur-Gushnasp at Ganzak in Azarbaijan. Khusro recited prayers for victory, Zoroastrian hierophants chanted the words of the Avesta, priests tore their shirts, noblemen muttered divine praises as they cast jewels into the air, and others wallowed in the dust upon the floor. 77 This pious beginning to the war must have its origin within Khusro’s own propaganda; for it advertised the right belief of the Sasanid government, and emphasised that the war was just. The first assault came in the spring of the year 540. Avoiding the fortress of Circesium, Khusro and a division of the Iranian army had advanced up the river Euphrates, and fell upon the city of Sura. 78 A vigorous defence of a single day saw the death of the garrison commander. A disingenuous negotiation between the local 74

Braund, D., Georgia in Antiquity, p. 273–274. Sarris, P., Empires of Faith: The Fall of Rome to the Rise of Islam, 500–700, 2011, p. 155; Howard-Johnston, J., “The Destruction of the Late Antique World Order’ in Kennet, D. & Luft, P. (eds), Recent Research in Sasanian Archaeology, Art and History, 2008, p. 80. 76 Jackson Bonner, M. R., “Sasanian Propaganda in the Reign of Husraw Anushirvan,” p. 276. 77 Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 528–530. It is noteworthy that Ferdowsi refers to a written Avesta. 78 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.v.8. 75

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bishop and the Iranian king was interrupted by an effort to force open the gate of the city, and Sura was put to fire and sword. 79 That bishop, whose see was the city of Sergiopolis had purchased the freedom of the Surene captives by means of a promissory note. The unhappy city of Sura was emptied of all its treasures, and its people were killed or enslaved. Justinian had dispatched Megas, the bishop of Beroea, to pay Khusro one thousand pounds of gold and to entreat him to withdraw across the Euphrates. The Persian king agreed to accept the money, but refused to depart; and, proceeding to Hierapolis, Khusro extracted two thousand pounds of silver in return for stopping an assault upon that city. The Iranian army then proceeded to Beroea from which Khusro demanded double the sum which had been extorted from Hierapolis. The treasury of Beroea failed to satisfy the demand in full, and Khusro reduced that city to ashes – but not before a large portion of the disaffected and unpaid garrison defected to Iran. 80

THE FALL OF ANTIOCH The city of Antioch was the next object of Khusro’s wrath. The circuit wall of that city was weak, and six thousand troops sent by the generals of Palmyra and Damascus augmented by a small measure the meagre defences of Antioch. A fearful population was heartened to behold those reinforcements, but some of the inhabitants fled with as much money as they could carry. The Iranian host encamped before the river Orontes, and an emissary by the name of Paulus was dispatched to demand one thousand pounds of gold. Night passed, and the immediate threat of total destruction failed to persuade the Antiochenes to purchase the departure of Khusro; and, from the safety of the battlements of their city, they taunted the Persian king and assailed his emissary with arrows. 81 On the morrow, Khusro’s forces attacked the wall at a vulnerable spot where the Roman defenders had attempted to widen the area between two towers by means of large timbers. The collapse of this structure left that weak position undefended, and the application of ladders carried the Iranian host over the wall. The battlements of Antioch, and its circuit wall covered a rocky height above the city, and below those steep rocks was an expanse of uninhabited land which the Iranian host was obliged to cross before reaching the houses of the city. In that interval, much of the Roman forces fled in anticipation of its despoliation and ruin. Only the rival factions of the hippodrome, who were accustomed to fighting, remained, and they resisted the entry of Khusro’s soldiers. 82 79

Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.v.13–15. Promises were also made, but without fulfilment, to ransom the persons whom Khusro had captured. 80 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.vii. The soldiers’ payment had been in arrears for a long time (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.vii.37). 81 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.viii.1–7. 82 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.viii.8–31.

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If Procopius can be believed, Khusro summoned his advisers, and appeared to contemplate a settlement with the citizens of Antioch. Such was the interpretation of Zabergan, who protested vehemently against any show of mercy or humanity. Procopius draws a veil over the origin of his knowledge of that grim conference, and it is probable that the capacities of the rhetor have overpowered those of the historian. But the plan upon which Khusro resolved was one of extraordinary violence and rapacity. A numerous band of the best Iranian troops was sent into Antioch. The slaughter which ensued was savage, and Antioch was plundered and burned; gold, silver, and great slabs of marble were removed from the city and transported to Iran, and the surviving population of Antioch was carried off into captivity. Those unhappy persons were settled in a new city in the vicinity of Ctesiphon which bore the name Khusro’s Better Antioch. 83 But this was not the end of Khusro’s activities in the Levant.

NEGOTIATIONS WITH ROME AND THE AFTERMATH OF THE SACKING OF ANTIOCH A Roman embassy appeared before Khusro offering a settlement. Five thousand pounds of gold were paid immediately, and those emissaries promised a yearly subsidy of five hundred pounds of gold also. That annual payment was a renewal of the support which Rome had promised for the defence of the Caucasian passes. 84 Procopius has recorded an interesting description of that diplomatic exchange. The Roman embassy vituperated the king of Iran for his claim that Justinian had violated the peace treaty of 532. The reply of Khusro was to accuse his Roman antagonist of inciting Arabs and Sabirs to attack Iran, and the Roman ambassadors mounted the preposterous defence that it was not the emperor Justinian but his advisers who had attempted to induce those peoples to annoy the empire of Khusro. The Caucasian defences, and the annual subsidy, were mentioned by Khusro himself in order to illustrate the importance of restraining the barbarians of the north, and to counterbalance the insulting presence of the Roman fortress at Dara. A Roman ambassador uttered the anxious protest that Khusro wished to make the Romans tributary to the empire of Iran. ‘No’, said Khusro, ‘but the Romans shall have the Persians as their own soldiers for the future, paying them a fixed amount for their service; for you give an annual payment of gold to some of the Huns and to the Saracens, not because you are their subjects, but in order that they may guard your land unplundered for all time’. 85 When the negotiation had concluded, Khusro visited Seleucia, the port of Antioch, where he bathed in the sea, and, in the opinion of Procopius, he performed a 83

Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.ix.17–24; II.xiv.1–8. The name of the city is attested in Sebeos, p. 69 as Վեհ Անջատոք Խոսրով. 84 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.x.10–23. 85 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.x.23.

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sacrifice to the sun and the other gods. 86 The town of Daphne, a suburb of Antioch, was the next object of Khusro’s interest. He performed a sacrifice before an impressive grove and some water fountains there, and set fire to the church dedicated to Michael the Archangel – revenge, as Procopius says, for the death of a noble Persian who had been killed nearby. The city of Apamea was forced to pay one thousand pounds of silver, and was then emptied of all its treasures save a fragment of the wood on which Christ had been crucified. 87 It was said that a priest by the name of Thomas had entreated the Persian king to spare that precious relic, and Khusro obliged. In the hippodrome of that unhappy city, the Persian king officiated at a chariot race in mockery of the Roman emperor. Because his rival Justinian was an avowed supporter of the blue, Khusro declared himself in favour of the green, team; and Procopius claims that the green party was victorious only because Khusro had demanded that their blue antagonists be artificially restrained. Khusro’s final act in the vicinity of Apamea was to punish an Iranian soldier for violating the daughter of a Roman citizen, and the Iranian army began to withdraw from Roman territory. But Khusro’s extortion of money continued. Two hundred pounds of gold were extracted from the city of Chalcis, and the Iranian force proceeded westward across the Euphrates to Edessa. 88 That city might have resisted an obstinate siege, and Khusro, who had fallen ill, made no attempt upon it. But the citizens of Edessa paid two hundred pounds of gold also, and eagerly attempted to ransom many captives taken by Khusro, but without success. 89 Gold was refused from the pagans of Carrhae on the ground that Khusro would accept money only from Christians, but payment was offered and accepted from Constantina. 90 An attempt was then made upon the fortress of Dara, which resisted vigorously. Neither an immense torrent of Iranian missiles, nor the digging of a tunnel below the wall succeeded. The Roman response to the tunnel of Khusro was a trench, dug crosswise, which intercepted and halted the Iranian stratagem.

KHUSRO’S ATTEMPTS TO DESTROY THE FORTRESS OF DARA While Khusro was at Edessa, word had reached him from the emperor Justinian that the Roman government had ratified the truce negotiated after the fall of Antioch. But Khusro’s attack upon Dara was interpreted as a violation of that agreement, and the government of Justinian immediately annulled the treaty. 91 The Roman counterattack came in the spring of the year 541. Belisarius, the famous general, had been recalled from Italy together with his officers and a contingent of 86

Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xi.1–3. Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xi.24–31. 88 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xii.1–20. 89 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xiii.1–5. 90 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xiii.13–20. 91 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xiii.26. 87

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Gothic mercenaries and was dispatched to Mesopotamia. Another general, Valerian, was instructed to invade Iranian Armenia. It was at this moment that Khusro began his penetration of Lazica – the primary aim of this war.

THE ROMAN RESPONSE But the Roman response of the year 541 did nothing to counterbalance the achievements of Khusro. The febrile campaign of Belisarius in Mesopotamia was disgraced by insubordination and impaired by a distrustful emperor. An abortive siege of Nisibis gave way to a small skirmish, 92 the Iranian fortress of Sisauranon fell to the arms of Belisarius, and Harith, his Saracen ally, plundered the countryside. 93 That perfidious Arab failed to return to the Roman camp, and his scouts spread the false intelligence that a large Iranian army had crossed the Euphrates to intercept the host of Belisarius. A hasty retreat to Roman Mesopotamia was recommended, and the Roman host was filled with alarm. Here we may discern the influence of Iranian disinformation, and we may infer that Khusro’s Lakhmid vassals had perverted the loyalty of Harith. Greater distresses came upon Belisarius when his soldiers fell ill in the burning heat of the Mesopotamian summer, and the Roman host was compelled to retire.

BELISARIUS RETURNS TO THE FRONT In the following year, Khusro returned to Roman Mesopotamia. His purpose, so Procopius believed, was to penetrate as far as Palestine and to pillage the riches of Jerusalem – an ambition unrealised until the memorable reign of the second Khusro. 94 Instead, a siege of Sergiopolis came to nothing, but the unhappy bishop of that city, who failed to pay the ransom which he had promised two years before, was carried off into captivity and tortured. 95 Belisarius was again dispatched to the theatre of war, and he made camp at Dura Europus.

KHUSRO WITHDRAWS FROM MESOPOTAMIA The account of Procopius alleges that Khusro was dissuaded from giving battle by virtue of a preposterous charade. A Persian envoy by the name of Abandan was sent to the Roman camp in order to take the measure of Belisarius and to reopen the negotiation of a peace treaty. 96 Six thousand of the largest and most handsome of the Roman soldiers set out to hunt far from the camp, and one thousand Roman horsemen crossed the Euphrates and appeared to bar a withdrawal of the Iranian 92

Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xviii. Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xix. 94 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xx.18. 95 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xx.1–16. Procopius claims that Khusro demanded double the promised sum – but without success. 96 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxi.1–2. 93

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host. A pavilion of cloth concealed the general Belisarius, and the mercenaries of Thrace, Illyria, those of Gothic race, Heruls, Vandals, and Moors flanked that structure. Clad only in linen tunics, trousers, and girdles, that heterogeneous mob appeared to walk about carelessly, ignoring the approach of the Iranian emissary. 97 An interview followed this bizarre stunt. ‘Khusro the king is enraged that what had previously been agreed upon was not kept, insofar as Caesar had sent no ambassadors; and because of this Khusro is compelled to come into the land of the Romans in arms’. 98 Those words of Abandan excited the scorn of the Roman general, who dismissed the behaviour of Khusro as unnatural. What follows is wholly inexplicable unless we assume that Procopius was at pains to conceal a problem of some kind. Abandan, as it is said, returned to Khusro, and advised him to vacate the land of the Romans with all possible haste. But the reason for the recommended departure was that the Iranian envoy had judged Belisarius to surpass all other men in sagacity and manliness, and the appearance of the Roman warriors had aroused in Abandan a great feeling of admiration. 99 Khusro, according to the mendacious exaggerations of Procopius, was convinced that his triumph over a general would achieve little, but the victory of Belisarius over the Sasanian king would be a signal disgrace. A bridge was thrown over the Euphrates, and the host of Khusro appeared to withdraw. A momentary truce held until the Iranian army attacked and destroyed the city of Callinicum. 100 The theatre of war south of Lazica was now confined to Armenia. A Roman force of thirty thousand troops was defeated by the guile of the Armenian general in the service of Iran. 101 Nabed (that is what Procopius calls the general) commanded a small force of only four thousand men, but at the village of Anglon, about fifteen miles southwest of Dvin, his forces lured the Roman host into an ambush. Efforts to block access to the town involved the excavation of a trench and the use of stones and carts to obstruct the roads; and infantrymen were concealed within old cabins. The Roman host drew near in a disorderly formation, and a feigned retreat of some Iranian soldiers forced their antagonists to pursue a flying enemy into the narrow streets of Anglon. A torrent of missiles descended upon them from the citadel of that village, Iranian soldiers emerged from the cabins in which they had concealed themselves, and they slew or made captive a great portion of the Roman army.

97

Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxi.3–8 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxi.8. 99 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxi.9–14. 100 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxi.21–32. 101 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxv. 98

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KHUSRO’S RETURN TO MESOPOTAMIA AND HIS ABORTIVE SIEGE OF EDESSA A year passed until Khusro continued his war in Mesopotamia with an assault upon the city of Edessa. It was the solemn promise of Khusro to enslave everyone within that city, to transport them to Iran, and to transform Edessa into a pasture for sheep. 102 But a brief skirmish between Khusro’s Huns and the Edessenes convinced the Sasanid king to offer his withdrawal to the inhabitants of that city in exchange for money. Paulus, the interpreter and emissary of Khusro, demanded a parley, and some notables of Edessa confronted the aristocrat Zabergan in a private conference. The advice of Zabergan was to think only of the safety of Edessa and to pay a great sum of money; at a later meeting between those notables and Khusro himself, the same demand was reiterated together with a dire warning lest Edessa suffer a more terrible fate than Antioch. These discussions gave way successively to a siege, to renewed negotiations, and to repeated demands for money. 103 An artificial hill arose steadily before Edessa, and the fearful citizens attempted to erect another structure to overtop it, but without success. As negotiations proceeded, and the Iranian mound grew, Edessene diggers prepared a tunnel below the walls of the city in order to undermine the artificial hill by setting its wooden supports on fire. Five days later, Khusro was forced to abandon the mound, and on the sixth day scaling ladders were applied to the wall of Edessa, and a furious assault began. But Khusro failed to take the city and he received only five hundred pounds of gold from the citizens of Edessa. 104

THE ARMISTICE OF 545 That was the last engagement of Khusro’s war in Mesopotamia, and a truce of five years was negotiated in the year 545. The royal palace at Ctesiphon was the scene of the conference, and the Roman ambassadors Sergius and Constantius opened negotiations with the demand that Khusro abandon his war in Lazica, which yet proceeded, and that he return that country to the Romans. 105 Such, in the opinion of the Roman envoys, would be the only secure foundation of a durable peace. But Khusro and his ministers agreed only to an armistice, for in the opinion of the Iranian government the many differences between itself and Rome could not be resolved easily. Khusro demanded and received a payment of two thousand pounds of gold, as well as the assistance of the Roman physician Tribunus, who had apparently cured him before and whom he greatly missed. 106 The emperor Justinian dispatched both the money and the physician immediately. 102

Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxvi.4. Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxvi.5–46. 104 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxvii. 105 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxvii.1–6. 106 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxvii.7–10. 103

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OUTBREAK OF THE PESTILENCE Soon we must rejoin the Iranian host amidst the crags and ravines of Lazica where war continued for nearly twenty years. But first, we must return to the strange account of Khusro’s withdrawal from Mesopotamia in the summer of the year 541. The testimony of Procopius, designed to inflate his master Belisarius, conceals the outbreak of the first great pandemic disease in recorded history. 107 That outbreak was the reason why the campaign in Mesopotamia came to an abrupt end. The spread of the pestilence throughout Mesopotamia would not have respected the artificial frontier between the two powers, and word of it may well have reached the Khusro’s government before its penetration of the Iranian empire. But the Persian royal tradition includes no description of the outbreak and spread of the plague. The pestilence, which in the opinion of Procopius nearly destroyed all mankind, 108 was noticed first at the port of Pelusium at the eastern extremity of the Nile Delta. 109 But this fact gives us little insight into the origin of the disease, and we cannot infer from it, as one writer has done, that the pestilence must have begun further south in Africa. 110 The science of genetics has traced the origin of the pestilential bacterium to the region of the Tian Shan mountains in Inner Asia; and it was from there that the bacterium evolved and spread. 111 Literary sources suggest a progress eastward from Egypt into Iran; and so, if we trust them, we might infer that the disease moved southward from Central Asia into India, and that the flourishing trade routes of the Indian Ocean and the Red Sea slowly bore the pestilence to the port of Clysma, the modern Suez, whence it proceeded northward over land to Pelusium. 112 Its westward progress was then swift and inexorable across the coast of North Africa; Alexandria, Sicily, Rome, southern 107

Williamson, E. D. / Oyston, P. C. F., “The Natural History and Incidence of Yersinia Pestis, and Prospects for Vaccination,” Journal of Medical Microbiology, 61, 2012, p. 911–918. 108 Λοιμὸς…ἐξ οὗ δὴ ἅπαντα ὀλίγου ἐδέησε τὰ ἀνθρώπεια ἐξίτηλα εἶναι (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxii.1). 109 Procopius, II.xxii.6. 110 Contra Horden, P., “Mediterranean Plague in the Age of Justinian” in Mass, M. (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Justinian, 2005, p. 135. Cf. Sussman, a writer with some medical knowledge, as it seems, who argues spuriously in favour of an Indian origin (Sussman, G., “Scientists Doing History: Central Africa and the Origins of the First Plague Pandemic” in Journal of World History, v. 26, n. 2, 2015, p. 325–354). 111 Keller, et al., “Ancient Yersinia pestis genomes from across Western Europe reveal early diversification during the First Pandemic (541–750),” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2019 116 (25), p. 12363–12372; Sariyeva, G., et al., “Marmots and Yersinia pestis Strains in Two Plague Endemic Areas of Tien Shan Mountains,” Frontiers in Veterinary Science, 2019; Monica H. Green, “Putting Africa on the Black Death Map: Narratives from Genetics and History,” Afriques 9, 2018, p. 12–14. I owe these references to Monica Green. 112 Harper, K., The Fate of Rome: Climate, Disease, and the End of an Empire, 2017, p. 215–219.

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Gaul, and Spain were afflicted by the year 543, and soon that divine punishment was visited upon the peoples of Ireland and Wales. In the east, the pestilence was diffused along shipping lanes, roads, and caravan routes: from Gaza and the coast of Palestine, it spread to Antioch and its environs, and its progress into Syria and Mesopotamia was noticed by John of Ephesus, and other ecclesiastical writers following him, who recorded a description of its effect upon the Roman east and its advance through Iran into China by the early seventh century. 113 The descent of the pestilence upon a town or city was swift, but it would not advance until it had run its course in a single place; and so rumour of the disease prevented its arrival. Many persons infected by the pestilence would collapse on a sudden and die, but those who were not struck down instantly were afflicted by painful swellings on the groin, the thigh, the armpit, or the neck. Fluid might fill those swellings so that they burst asunder, revealing festering abscesses which discharged blood, pus, and water, but in such cases the victim would survive. Beasts of many kinds, including the cattle, dogs, and mice of Syria and Mesopotamia, exhibited the same signs of infection, and they perished in large numbers. If we can believe the testimony of John of Ephesus, most of the population of Egypt died, the death toll in Palestine was yet greater, and entire villages were annihilated in Mesopotamia. 114 What caused the outbreak of the plague? It may be that the apparent spread of the disease is an illusion created by our literary sources, and that the plague bacterium had left the Tian Shan long before the sixth century of our era. The great expanse of the steppe which connects all of Eurasia would have offered no impediment to the transmission of a disease which originated there. If we consider Iran’s openness to the steppe, we may wonder whether the pestilence had rather penetrated Khusro’s empire from the east, or down through the Caucasus, than from Mesopotamia. 115 If the peoples of India had indeed been infected, the disease may well have been brought to them over the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean by Iranian merchants. But, however we may opine on such matters, a sudden change in climate, noticed by Procopius in the year 536, provoked by a huge volcanic explosion near

113

The account of John of Ephesus was found in the second part of his Ecclesiastical History which is now lost, but was recycled by several later writers, such as the work attributed to Dionysius of Tel-Mahre, the Chronicle of Michael the Syrian, and the Chronicle of Seert (Morony, M. G., “For whom does the writer write?: the first bubonic plague pandemic according to Syriac sources” in Little, L. K., Plague and the End of Antiquity: The Pandemic of 541– 750, 2007, p. 59–64). 114 Anecdota Syriaca, tom. I., p. 307 (the whole description of the plague is in p. 304–325); and Pseudo-Dionysius of Tel-Mahre, p. 77. For analysis, see Morony, M. G., “For whom does the writer write?,” p. 70–74. 115 I am grateful to Monica Green who inspired this idea in a personal communication.

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the equator, led to cooler temperatures for several decades, and would have favoured either the outbreak or the spread of the Justinianic plague. 116 The pestilence had two important effects upon the Roman state: a vast inflation of wages and a great reduction in government revenue. A law of the emperor Justinian, issued in the year 543, declared that the chastisement of God, which had taken such a heavy toll upon Constantinople, was at an end. Wages, which had doubled or trebled, were to return to their values before the plague had created a shortage of workers. 117 According to Roman custom, taxes upon farmland, whose owners had perished, were levied upon neighbouring landowners; and after the ravages of the pestilence this practice became especially burdensome. 118 The population diminished, fewer taxes were collected, public salaries were curtailed, 119 and the construction of buildings at the expense of the state gave way to the erection of churches and monasteries with the money of private persons. 120 The evidence of archaeology is consistent with this melancholy scene. 121 In the grim opinion of modern medical writers, various strains of the pestilence have afflicted Iran for centuries, no part of that country has been free of infection, and rural outbreaks have lasted as long as forty years. 122 To take a single example, in the year 1830, the plague spread through the region of the Persian Gulf, and thence towards Tabriz which, at that time, was the capital of Iran. Thirty-thousand persons died there, and the government was transposed to Ardabil as the disease proceeded into northern Iran. Thousands perished in Gilan and Mazandaran in the year 1831, and the population of Rasht was reduced by more than half. It is most unlikely that the disease which struck in the nineteenth century was the same as that which afflicted Iran in the reign of Khusro I. But the vehemence of the later plague may give us a sense of the damage wrought by a deadly bacterium before the age of antiobiotic drugs. Procopius, Bellum Vandalicum, IV.xiv.5–6; Harper, K., The Fate of Rome, p. 249–271; Haldon, J., et al., “History meets palaeoscience: Consilience and collaboration in studying past societal responses to environmental change”, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 115(13), 2018, p. 3210–3218; Larsen, L. B., et al., “New ice core evidence for a volcanic cause of the A.D. 536 dust veil,” Geophysical Research Letters, vol. 35, issue 4, 2008. 117 Novellae, CXXII. 118 Procopius, Anecdota, XXII.15–22. 119 Procopius, Anecdota, XXIV.30–33. 120 Kennedy, H. / Liebeschutz, J. H. W. G., “Antioch and the Villages of Northern Syria in the Fifth and Sixth Centuries A.D.: Trends and Problems” in Nottingham Mediaeval Studies, 32, 1988, p. 67–71. 121 Kennedy, H., “Justinianic Plague in Syria and the Archaeological Evidence” in Little, L. K., Plague and the End of Antiquity: The Pandemic of 541–750, 2007, p. 87–95. 122 Shahraki, A. H. / Carniel, E. / Mostafavi, E., “Plague in Iran: its History and Current Status,” Epidemiology and Health, v. 38, 2016, p. 1–12. 116

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But it is difficult to reconstruct the effect of the Justinianic plague upon the empire of Khusro. On the strength of the Roman example, we may reasonably assume that a decline in population would have produced an inflation of wages and would have depressed revenues to the state. The Persian royal tradition has recorded only two exiguous notices which are necessarily connected with epidemic disease. I. In the year 542, in the midst of warfare with Rome, Khusro himself was infected, and he retreated to the highlands of Azarbaijan to recover his health. 123 II. When the archbishop Joseph sat upon the patriarchal throne of Seleucia-Ctesiphon in the 550s, he exerted himself to bury the dead whose bodies lay upon the ground and littered the streets 124 – an indication that the pestilence was a problem which the Iranian state was obliged to manage long after Khusro’s recovery. If the sufferings of Ctesiphon resembled those of Constantinople, work of every kind would have ceased as the disease ran its course, and the Iranian capital may have lost nearly half its population. 125 Within the interval between the monarch’s illness and the efforts of the patriarch, we may only guess at the course of events, for the activities of the Iranian government are obscure. But it may be possible to connect some stray notices of the Persian royal tradition with the aftermath of a large mortality. The history of Tabari adumbrates military action undertaken to pacify the frontiers of Iran and to recruit foreigners within the army. We might infer that Khusro sought to augment the strength of his armed forces whose numbers had been reduced by the pestilence. 126 Tabari asserts that a people called Bariz, who dwelt upon that frontier, were subdued, displaced, and resettled throughout the empire of Iran where they became soldiers. All but eighty warriors of a people known as Sul were slaughtered, and those fighters were brought into the ranks of the Iranian army, and were made to 123

Dinawari, p. 71. The fact of the infection is corroborated by the account of Procopius (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxiv.1), although Dinawari claims that Khusro recuperated at Homs (which is also called Aleppo). The emperor Justinian was infected also, but he remained within the walls of his palace at Constantinople (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxiii.20). 124 Chronicle of Seert II(1), p. 186: ...‫يوسف ا��لقب با��اثليق ��ف ��ته ا�ى دفن ا��و�ى ا��طرو��ن �ي ا��رض والطرقات‬

This same chronicle purports to describe an anecdote relating the effect of the disease upon Beth Aramaye in Iranian Mesopotamia, but this anecdote (which appears to be a lesson on the dangers of attachment to worldly goods) is also attested elsewhere and said to have taken place in Egypt (Chronicle of Seert II(1), p. 184 with note 1). 125 See Procopius’ description of the pestilence in Constantinople (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxiii). Sixteen thousand persons may have perished in a single day, and when the death toll reached two hundred and thirty thousand, officials ceased counting (Evans, J. A. S., The Age of Justinian, p. 163; Moorhead, J. Justinian, p. 99). The population of Constantinople at the time was perhaps about five hundred thousand persons. 126 See my argument in Jackson Bonner, M. R., Three Neglected Sources, p. 85–87.

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dwell in the city of Shahram-Peroz. A similar fate awaited the nomads known as Abkhaz, the Alans, and two other peoples of doubtful name; 127 and the poet Ferdowsi describes the subjugation and resettlement of Alans, as well as the people of Daylam and Gilan. 128 A more daring inference concerns the population of widows and orphans who respectively were given in marriage or adopted by the Persian king. 129 The writer Tabari appears to relate those measures with the doubtful consequences of Mazdakism. But the deaths of husbands and parents may perhaps more plausibly be connected with the desolation wrought by the pestilence; and Khusro’s legislation pertaining to inheritance may have aimed to prevent the ruin of noble families whose patriarchs had died.

THE REVOLT OF ANUSH-ZAD The gravest consequence of the pestilence, of which we may be certain, was an insurrection which purposed to overthrow the rule of Khusro and which might have subverted the established religion of the House of Sasan. The insurrection of Anush-Zad is variously attested in the works of Procopius and the relics of the Persian royal tradition diffused among the history of Dinawari, the Shahnameh, and the Chronicle of Seert. 130 The account of the revolt which was preserved by Dinawari is the earliest and fullest that has survived amongst the prose histories of ancient Iran. But it is incomplete, and the poetry of Ferdowsi narrates the longest and most elaborate account of the insurrection of Anush-Zad within the Persian royal tradition. The anonymous Chronicle of Seert records a surprisingly different narrative of the same story, and it is difficult to reconcile it with the consensus of Dinawari and Ferdowsi. But let us begin with the account of Procopius. The revolt against Khusro I, led by his son Anush-Zad, began in the year 542 in the midst of the war with Rome. The pestilence afflicted the entire Mediterranean world, it had begun its penetration of the Iranian army, and a rumour declared that Khusro, who had contracted the disease, had perished. 131 Anush-Zad had been exiled by his father for many transgressions, chief amongst which was philandering with the wives of his father. Believing that the king was dead, Anush-Zad emerged from exile and raised up a revolt, which was crushed by the general Fariburz. 132 Anush-Zad was taken captive 127

Tabari, v. 2, p. 100. Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 345–440. 129 Tabari, v. 2, p. 102. 130 See my analysis of the rebellion in Jackson Bonner, M. R., “The Rebellion of Anosh Azad,” Historia i Swiat, no. 5, 2016, p. 159–165. Kaldellis’ preposterous idea that the revolt of Anush-Zad is unattested outside the works of Procopius must be dismissed (Kaldellis, A., The Wars of Justinian, 2014, p. 125, n. 258). 131 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxiv.8; Bellum Gothicum, VIII.x.17–22. 132 Procopius calls this man Φαβρίζος. 128

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and, in order to disqualify him from mounting the Sasanid throne, his eyelids were disfigured. Indigenous Iranian tradition recorded a somewhat different story. 133 Khusro’s son Anush-Zad was born to a Christian mother, who had refused to become a Zoroastrian. Dinawari says at first that Anush-Zad differed from his father in religion and later implies that he was a Christian, but Ferdowsi clearly declares that the young rebel was a follower of Christ. That Christian prince was immured within the prison at Gondeshapur, but when news of the king’s illness reached him, Anush-Zad escaped, recruited an army of Christians, threw his father’s deputies out of Khuzestan, and that host of Christians prepared to march on Ctesiphon. Apart from mentioning the capture of Anush-Zad and the restoration of Khusro’s dominions, the stream of Dinawari’s narrative runs dry without exposition of the end of the revolt – details provided only by the Shahnameh. In the distichs of Ferdowsi, Anush-Zad’s insurrection begins when that Christian prince frees some madmen imprisoned at Gondeshapur, and all Christians (even prelates and a portion of the nobility, apparently) gathered under his banner. A couplet, which a modern editor cites as a variant reading, makes the mother of Anush-Zad the financier of the rebellion. 134 News of the insurrection reached Khusro, who declared, in a formal letter to a military officer called Ram-Barzin, his low opinion of Christians. The battle between the armies of Anush-Zad and Ram-Barzin issued in the destruction of Khusro’s son, and Ferdowsi describes the death of a Christian martyr. The mother of the rebel led the Christians of Iran in mourning, and she prepared the burial shroud and grave of Anush-Zad. The Chronicle of Seert presents an account of Anush-Zad’s rebellion which is almost unrecognisable. 135 We read only that one of Khusro’s unnamed sons revolted and took over Gondeshapur; and the patriarch of Iran was accused of having prompted the insurrection. The Sasanian king then demanded that the archbishop terminate the revolt, and that prelate complied by threatening the dissidents with excommunication. That was the end of the rebellion, and Khusro left his Christian subjects unmolested. Procopius assures us that Justinian and the Constantinopolitan court received the intelligence of the revolt of Anush-Zad. 136 Though the pestilence assailed the imperial capital with especial vehemence in the year 542, Procopius claims that the emperor immediately ordered an invasion of Iran. The Roman defeat at the Armenian village of Anglon was the result, and no further attempt was made to exploit the uprising of Khusro’s son. Such an embarrassment may be the reason for Proco133 134 135

Dinawari, p. 71–72; Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 743–980. This line appears among Khaleghi-Motlagh’s notes (Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, p. 149: n. 7):

Chronicle of Seert, II(1), p. 162–163. 136 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxiv.6–10.

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pius’ seeming confusion about the year in which the revolt of Anush-Zad occurred. That writer’s account of the Persian War clearly places the rebellion of Khusro’s son in the year 542. But the eighth book of Procopius’ history, commonly called the Gothic War, appears to situate the revolt amongst events of the year 550, the final year of the truce which the two powers had ratified five years earlier. The two principal signs that the latter dating is wrong are: I. the strength of the consensus of Procopius’ earlier notice with indigenous Iranian tradition; and II. that Greek writer’s failure to indicate that there were, in his opinion, two revolts of Anush-Zad. 137 Procopius published the eighth book of the Gothic War in the 550s, – at least a decade after the revolt of Anush-Zad. 138 Carelessness or a lapse of memory occasioned by the passage of so many years may account for the apparent inconsistency of chronology. But it may be that Procopius transposed the narrative of Anush-Zad’s revolt for a more serious reason. In the great contest that had arisen between the two powers, the Roman emperor who had sought every advantage over his rival at every sensitive part of their mutual frontier should not have failed to exploit the insurrection of a Christian rebel of the Sasanid line. Though the subtleties of theological speculation divided the churches of Iran and Rome, the embarrassment of schism would have yielded to a spirit of rivalry and to the requirements of politics. 139 The terrible year when Totila’s Goths had just taken Rome and overrun Italy again, and when warfare was fierce in Lazica, might have excused the failure of Justinian, and Procopius may have concealed the religion of Anush-Zad in order to avoid embarrassing the Christian emperor who failed to take advantage of the rebellion of Khusro’s son. Was Anush-Zad really a Christian? There is enough circumstantial evidence to permit the inference that Anush-Zad was a votary of Christ and that his insurrection was of great interest to his coreligionists. According to Procopius, two sources diffused the report of Anush-Zad’s insurrection. That Roman historian asserted that he heard the tale from the Armenian general Valerian by way of a secret envoy who had transmitted intelligence which had originated from the brother of the Bishop of 137

Surely that is what Procopius would have done if he had believed that there had been two revolts of Anush-Zad (Contra Börm, H., Prokop und die Perser: Untersuchungen zu den römischsasanidischen Kontaktenin der ausgehenden Spätantike, 2007, p. 127. See my arguments in Jackson Bonner, Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Ahbar al-Tiwal, p. 105–106). 138 The chronology of Procopius’ works is subject to much controversy. Evans believes that the Gothic War appeared in the year 557 (Evans, J. A. S., “The Dates of Procopius’ Works: A Recapitulation of the Evidence,” Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies, 37, 1996, p. 301–313). But Greatrex has more recently dated it to about the year 552 (Greatrex, G., “Recent Work and the composition of Wars VIII,” Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies 27, 2003, p. 45–67). 139 Contra Jullien, C., “La révolte des chrétiens au Hūzestān (551): modèles narratifs d’une historiographie,” Bulletin of the Asia Institute, 25, 2015, p. 109.

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Dvin; 140 and Tribunus (Khusro’s Christian physician) was the other source. 141 It is highly probable that the account of the rebellion presented by Ferdowsi originated in a Christian hagiography. 142 The narrative of the Shahnameh is full of Christian imagery, and the tone of the story is generally sympathetic to Anush-Zad as a martyr of royal birth. References to Syrian ecclesiastical vocabulary may surprise a Muslim reader, and the only partisan of Anush-Zad who has a name is called Shammas: the normal Syriac word for ‘deacon’, which an uninformed translator could easily have mistaken for a personal name. 143 But the emphasis on Christian burial is perhaps the most convincing proof that Ferdowsi’s source was an account of a martyrdom. At the moment of his death, the son of Khusro rejects the practice of excarnation and the trappings of a Zoroastrian funeral, he demands a burial befitting a Christian, and his mother obliges. Such a story could not have been composed by a Zoroastrian, especially not one close to the Sasanian court. 144 In the superficial account of the Chronicle of Seert, our attention is drawn to a fanciful description of the intervention by Mar Aba, patriarch of the Iranian church, who is accused and credited respectively with inspiring and halting the insurrection. We may infer that the source of this account represents an effort on the part of the leadership of the Iranian church to disclaim involvement in the revolt and to share in the credit for having stopped it. 145 140

Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxiv.8. Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.x.8. 142 I originated this idea first in Jackson Bonner, M. R., Three Neglected Sources, p. 59–70, and developed it further in Jackson Bonner, Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 68–71. My theory has lately been endorsed in Jullien, C., “La révolte des chrétiens au Hūzestān (551): modèles narratifs d’une historiographie,” p. 107–120. 143 Shammas appears in Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 895. Other Syrian ecclesiastical terms include ‘catholicos’, ‘patriarch’, and ‘bishop’ (Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 895; 957; 963). 144 Ferdowsi must have versified his source as he found it, and there is no reason to suspect that he invented the conclusion of the story (Contra Nöldeke, T., Geschichte der Perser, p. 473). Nöldeke merely asserts without proof what I deny without fear of contradiction. The narrative of Dinawari must also go back to this source also, I believe. On the subject of Christian hagiography in the Sasanian period, there is further circumstantial evidence to support my inference. Familial strife between mixed Zoroastrian and Christian families is a well-attested theme in Syriac hagiography. And there was, as Walker has recently observed, a fair amount of Syriac hagiography dealing with Persian martyrs, some of which dealt with royal and aristocratic Christians, and which reflected the tropes and motifs of the Iranian epic tradition: The History of the Heroic Deeds of Mar Qardagh is a case in point (Walker, J. T., The Legend of Mar Qardagh: Narrative and Christian Heroism in Late Antique Iran, 2006, p. 19–26). So the putative hagiography of Anush-Zad would fit into a well-established genre. 145 If Mar Aba had intervened to stop the revolt, we should expect to find mention of this in his biography. But the Life of Mar Aba includes no such thing. The only notice that comes close refers to a disturbance in Khuzestan in about 550, probably related to the same schismatic communities in that region which Mar Aba had dealt with earlier in his career (Life of Mar Aba, p. 264; 225–226; Jackson Bonner, M. R., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 141

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But the end of the revolt and the death of Anush-Zad aroused the expectation of Iranian Christians that a follower of Christ should one day sit upon the Sasanian throne, and this hope was not abandoned until the fall of the House of Sasan.

THE LAZIC WAR OF 541–562 Now we must return to the Iranian war effort in Lazica. According to the writer Procopius, in about the year 540, Lazian envoys had appeared before Khuso. 146 They complained bitterly of Roman intervention in the Transcaucasus, and that the imposition of the Christian religion in that region had infuriated the votaries of Zoroaster. The presence of the Roman army after the departure of king Vakhtang was intolerable, and Procopius also accuses two unpopular generals, Peter and John Tzibus, whose appalling conduct had eroded Lazian loyalty to Rome. The Lazian ambassadors invited Khusro to enter and to occupy their country; military plans were made in secret and disclosed to only a few within the narrow circle of power which surrounded the king, and it was advertised that Khusro intended to pacify a tribe of Huns, or more probably Sabirs, which had assailed Iberia. 147 In the year 541, Khusro and the Iranian army forced their way through the thick forests and narrow ravines of Lazica, and received the submission of its king Goubaz. 148 The Roman castle at Petra, at the mouth of the river Phasis, had been fortified at the command the emperor Justinian, and its walls resisted the battering ram of Khusro. Aniabed was the Iranian general whose operations Khusro, like Xerxes at the Battle of Salamis, observed from a throne upon a lofty hill above the fighting. A rapid sally from the fortress of Petra scattered the Iranian host and embarrassed the general Aniabed whom Khusro, in a transport of rage, impaled upon a wooden stake. 149 An effort to storm the wall failed, and the Iranian king resolved to besiege Petra. Volleys of arrows were discharged from either side, a stray missile ended the life of the Roman commander, and disheartened the defenders, of Petra. 106–107) In fact, the outbreak of the disturbance is attributed to Satanic influences which would more fairly describe a doctrinal dispute than a Christian insurrection against a Zoroastrian king led by that king’s own son. Pigulevskaja, the Soviet scholar from Leningrad, assumed that that disturbance in Khuzestan in about 550 was the revolt of Anush-Zad, and many scholars have followed her. But the evidence for this is very flimsy. It is easy to get the impression that Pigulevskaja went out of her way to portray the revolt of Anush-Zad as a form of communist revolution. She confounds Anush Zad’s rebellion with the Mazdakite uprising (Pigulevskaya, N., Les villes de l’état Iranien, p. 288). Pigulevskaja based this argument on a notice of Ibn Athir’s to the effect that Anush-Zad was a zindiq, or ‘heretic’ (Pigulevskaya, N., Les villes de l’état Iranien, p. 225), and argues on the warrant of no evidence that this hybrid rebel movement was a response to a process of feudalisation. 146 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xv.1–30. Braund, D., Georgia in Antiquity, 1994, p. 292–293. 147 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xv.35. 148 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xvii.1–2. 149 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xvii.10–11.

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Burrowing underground, the Iranian host then loosened and removed the stones of a gigantic tower which guarded the fortress; the resultant cavity was filled with wood and set on fire, and the violent collapse of that structure delivered Petra to Khusro, and Lazica became a protectorate of Iran. 150 Meanwhile warfare proceeded to the south. The empire of Iran held the fortress of Petra, and Khusro exerted his authority over the Lazi, for eight years. But in the interval between the years 541 and 549, the natives of Lazica found the rule of Iran increasingly intolerable. In the opinion of Procopius, the extreme rigidity of Iranian manners and the severity of their laws were a great burden to a Christian people, the disappearance of Roman trade was a grievous blow the economy of Lazica, and the men of that country looked for an opportunity to return to the bosom of Rome. 151 Roman opinion held that, in the year 549, Lazica was on the point of rebellion, and that Khusro had commanded the murder of king Goubaz, the expulsion of the native population of Lazica, and the establishment of a colony of Iranians and other peoples loyal to the Sasanian king. But Roman fears of ethnic cleansing 152 were exaggerated, or perhaps imaginary; and Khusro never launched a naval attack upon Constantinople. 153 A feint, calculated to distract the Roman government, was employed as the Iranian effort to hold Lazica came under strain. The Iranian occupation of that country took a heavy toll upon the reputation of Khusro; the grumbling of Iranian courtiers abused the Sasanian king as the destroyer of the Iranian people, 154 and another noble plot was formed to murder him. 155 If Procopius may be trusted, the reaction of Khusro was to win prestige by an attempt to seize the fortress of Dara by stealth. 156 A diplomatic mission was dispatched to Constantinople, and its leader Yazdgushnasp took with him his mother, his two daughters, and five hundred of the bravest Iranian soldiers. 157 The ambassador and his retinue were to cross the border and pass the night at Dara; and, once admitted to the city, the military entourage intended to fire the houses and to open the gates to reinforcements from Nisibis. But, as Procopius claims, the plot was disclosed to a Roman deserter who commu150

Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xvii.18–28. Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxviii.25–28. 152 That is what Evans calls this policy (Evans, J. A. S., The Age of Justinian, p. 166). 153 Braund, D., Georgia in Antiquity, 1994, p. 296–298. 154 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.vii.2. …ἐς ἤθη ἐπανιόντες τὰ πάτρια Χοσρόῃ ὡς λαθραιότατα ἐλοιδοροῦντο καὶ διαφθορέα τοῦ Περσῶν γένους αὐτὸν ἀπεκάλουν (Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.vii.3). 155 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.vii.4. 156 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.vii.5. Although Stein dates this event to the year 447 (Stein, L’Histoire du bas empire v. 2, 1949, p. 510), it is obvious from the context that Procopius considered that it had immediately preceded the outbreak of war in Lazica in 549. 157 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxviii.31–44. 151

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nicated it to a colleague of the author. 158 Accordingly, Yazdgushnasp was admitted to Dara with a mere twenty followers, and they proceeded to Constantinople, where (in the opinion of Procopius) a diplomatic exchange of no importance occurred and where the ambassador wasted ten months. 159 In later years, Iranian ambassadors were received at Dara with much greater caution and with more attention to security than before, 160 and so we may infer that the Roman government had apprehended a very serious danger at the appearance of Yazdgushnasp. But the feint did little to distract Roman attention from Lazica. 161 Though Iranian policy had settled upon the murder of Lazian king, Goubaz had been warned, and the failure of the plot gave way to a general insurrection, and the flight of that monarch to the Roman emperor. Justinian welcomed Goubaz into his protection, and this was the reason for the outbreak of war in the year 549. Dagisthaeus was the Roman commander dispatched to recover Lazica, and he instantly formed the siege of Petra with the forces of Goubaz, one thousand men of the neighbouring tribe of the Tzani, and seven thousand Roman soldiers. The assaults of Daghisthaeus upon the fortress of Petra filled the space of four months. 162 Despite the obstinate resistance of the Iranian garrison, Khusro sent his general Mihr-Meroe with thirty thousand troops to assail the besiegers and to augment the defence of Petra. The advice of Goubaz recommended that the Roman force block the pass below the river Phasis and to impede the entry of Mihr-Meroe; and the Lazian king and his allies sealed off the passes at the frontier between Lazica and Iberia. But Dagisthaeus had installed a mere one hundred men at the defile below the Phasis – far too few to resist the Iranian reinforcements, who added three thousand troops to the garrison of Petra. 163 Five thousand Iranian soldiers held the passes of the Lazian frontier to maintain the supply route, and the balance of Mihr-Meroe’s forces, whose numbers strained the army’s capacity to supply them, retired to Iranian Armenia. In the following spring, a counterattack destroyed the Iranian camp upon the Iberian border, and the Romans seized their provisions, and cut off the supply line. The ensuing engagements were of varied fortune. It was the policy of Khusro to re-establish, and that of Justinian to disrupt and destroy, the Iranian supply line to Petra. The general, whom Procopius calls Chorian, led into Lazica a large force of 158

George was the name of that colleague who had served with Procopius on the staff of Belisarius. 159 Ὁ βάρβαρος οὗτος ὡς πρεσβεύων ἐς Βυζάντιον ἦλθε…τῷ τε βασιλεῖ ἐς ὄψιν ἥκων ἀμφὶ μὲν τῶν σπουδαίων τινὶ οὐ μέγα οὐ μικρὸν ἴσχυσεν εἰπεῖν, καίπερ οὐχ ἧσσον ἢ μῆνας δέκα κατατρίψας ἐν Ῥωμαίων τῇ γῇ (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxviii.38). 160 Constantine Porphyrogenitus, De Caeremoniis, I.89–90. 161 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxviii. For modern authorities see Evans, J. A. S., The Age of Justinian, p. 166–167 and Braund, D., Georgia in Late Antiquity, 1994, p. 298–300. 162 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxix–xxx. 163 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxx.1–18.

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Iranians and Alans, but that army was destroyed together with its commander. 164 Later skirmishes were indecisive. 165 Procopius insinuates that the blandishments of Iranian spies had perverted the loyalty of Dagisthaeus, 166 whom the Lazi accused of treason and negligence whereby Khusro consolidated his position in their country. The Roman veteran general Bessas was dispatched to replace that perfidious commander, and Dagisthaeus was cast into prison at Constantinople. 167 In the year 550, Iranian policy had attempted to detach from Roman obedience the neighbouring tribes of the Abasgi and Apsili. A revolt of the former people was crushed by Bessas, his subordinates were mostly successful in pacifying the Lazian hinterland, and the treachery of a Lazic nobleman delivered an important Apsilian fortress to Rome. 168 But more serious fighting was reserved for the following year. A Roman attempt to undermine the wall of Petra succeeded only in lowering a portion of it which rested upon a weak foundation; and the operations of three battering rams, employed on the advice of the Sabirs, 169 were resisted by the defenders’ projection of flaming jars of sulphur, bitumen, and naphtha upon those engines. 170 Bessas applied scaling ladders to the walls of Petra, his men ascended, a violent struggle ensued upon the rampart, and the general himself was hurled to the ground. 171 A torrent of missiles was aimed at the procumbent Roman general as his men struggled to cover him, and the Iranian garrison were perhaps amused to behold the Roman bodyguard dragging the aged and corpulent frame of their commander to safety by his foot. 172 After a disorderly retreat, the assault was reiterated with new vehemence, and the Iranian force, fearing that their capacity to resist would soon be exhausted, offered to relinquish the fortress. Bessas suspected a trap, and offered a parley without a promise to suspend hostilities. 173 But on a sudden, a portion of the circuit wall of Petra collapsed, and an Armenian youth of the Roman army forced his way through the breach, and his fellow soldiers followed. A great mass of fiery projectiles was flung down upon the Romans, but a vehement wind arose and blew the flames upon the Iranian garrison, and the wooden platform 164

Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.i.3–6. Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.viii.1–20. 166 Or such is the claim of Procopius, (Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.ix.1–3). 167 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xi.11–14. 168 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.ix–x; Braund, D., Georgia in Antiquity, p. 300–301. 169 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xi.21–26. Procopius describes the novel manner in which the Sabir Huns constructed and used the rams (Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xi.27–34). 170 The Iranian garrison hurled ἀγγεῖα...θείου τε καὶ ἀσφάλτου…καὶ φαρμάκου ὅπερ Μῆδοι μὲν νάφθαν καλοῦσιν, Ἕλληνες δὲ Μηδείας ἔλαιον (Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xi.36. Braund, D., Georgia in Antiquity, p. 301–302. 171 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xi.44. 172 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xi.45–51. Bessas was ἀνὴρ εὔσαρκος τε καί, ὅπερ ἐρρήθη, ἐσχατογέρων (Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xi.48). 173 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xi.52–58 165

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which supported them caught fire, and the valour of the defenders was broken. 174 The Roman army rushed into the fortress, occupied it, burned alive all the men who yet resisted within the citadel, 175 and Bessas commanded the complete destruction of Petra’s walls. 176

A TRUCE IS NEGOTIATED As that violent contest proceeded in Lazica, the negotiation of a peace settlement began at the same moment. The truce of five years, which began in the year 545, was at an end, and a Roman envoy appeared at the court of Khusro to open the negotiation, and later the Iranian ambassador appeared at Constantinople to arrange the niceties of the treaty. 177 Yazdgushnasp was a supercilious and unspeakably pretentious man, whose affectation and self-conceit were unbearable to Roman sensibilities, 178 and the officials at the court of Justinian were perhaps embarrassed to behold the huge crowd of retainers surrounding the ambassador, along with his wife, his brothers, his daughters, and ‘two of the most famous Persians’ whose offensive custom was to adorn their heads with golden diadems. 179 But the emperor Justinian felt neither the disgust, nor the contempt, described by Procopius, and Yazdgushnasp was received with unusual friendliness and magnificence. Roman suspicions were aroused as the ambassador lingered at the Roman capital, and as negotiations proceeded, into the year 551, the twenty-fifth of Justinian’s reign. The writer Procopius derides this period as an enormous waste of time. 180 The diplomacy of Khusro aimed to protract the negotiation. The court at Ctesiphon reasonably expected that the Iranian position in Lazica would be strengthened during that interval; and the retinue of Yazdgushnasp, who circulated freely and unobserved throughout Constantinople, would have had ample time to gather secrets. 181 Procopius draws our attention to the vast sums of money which Yazdgushnasp possessed and distributed, and it possible that suspicion of bribery lurks behind the words of the historian. 174

Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xi.59–60. Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xi.61–64; VIII.xii.1–16. 176 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xii.28–29. 177 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xv.1–2. 178 Ἰσδιγούσναν τε αὖθις οὐ πολλῷ ὕστερον ἔπεμψεν, ὀφρυάζοντά τε καὶ ἀλαζονείᾳ τινὶ ἀμυθήτῳ ἐχόμενον, οὗ δὴ ὅ τε τῦφος καὶ τὸ φύσημα φορητὸν εἶναι Ῥωμαίων οὐδενὶ ἔδοξεν (Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xi.4). But the usual interpreter, Braducius (cf. Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xxviii.41), did not participate, apparently because he had fallen under suspicion (Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xi.8–10). 179 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xi.5–6. 180 πολύ τι χρόνου κατέτριψε μῆκος (Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xv.1). 181 This is the force of Procopius’ complaints about the embassy (Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xv.20–21). 175

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As the Iranian ambassador alleged, Justinian had violated the truce of the year 545. Several accusations were presented to the Constantinopolitan court, but Procopius notices only that Roman policy had encouraged Harith and his Saracens to attack Mundhir and the Lakhmid kingdom of Hira. 182 Two thousand six hundred pounds of gold was the price of negotiating a peace which was to exclude the lands of the Saracens and the country of Lazica. 183 ‘Men are accustomed’, wrote Procopius, ‘generally to feel shame at disgraceful appearances, not facts’, 184 and so the Roman court refused to discharge the gold in repeated annual payments so as to avoid the ignominious name of tribute. But Yazdgushnasp had achieved a settlement which Roman opinion held to be greatly to the advantage of Iran: the armies of Khusro, as it was believed, would inevitably extend their control over Lazica, whence it would be impossible to dislodge them. 185

FIGHTING CONTINUES IN LAZICA The Iranian general Mihr-Meroe had intended to relieve the fortress of Petra which the Roman army had lately invested. But word reached him that Petra had fallen, and Mihr-Meroe abandoned that plan. Seizing the fortresses of Sarapanis and Scanda upon the Iberian border, the Iranian army reestablished their supply route, and instantly resolved to attack the city of Archaeopolis with a large body of Iranian cavalry, a contingent of four thousand Sabirs, and eight elephants which boldly traversed the steep gorges and thick forests of Lazica. 186 But the army of Mihr-Meroes suffered as much from want of supplies as from Roman resistance; and, despite the use of Sabir battering rams and the valour of Daylamite mercenaries, confusion overcame the Iranian host and a disorderly retreat ensued. Procopius blames a wounded, or perhaps crazed, elephant which reared up, threw his riders backward, and disrupted the Iranian line. 187 Four thousand Iranians were destroyed in that confused rout, the standards of Mihr-Meroe were captured and taken to Constantinople, and twenty thousand horses had perished not (as it was said) because of the fighting but by reason of exhaustion and starvation. 188 The retreat of Mihr-Meroe ended at the fertile region of Mocherisis, a day’s journey from Archaeopolis. The Iranian army gathered fodder there, rebuilt the fortresses of Cotaeum which the Lazi had earlier destroyed lest it be occupied by an 182

Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xi.10. For a modern opinion on this conflict, see Shahid, I., Byzantium and the Arabs in the Sixth Century, 1995, p. 239–240. 183 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xv.3–7. 184 τὰ γὰρ αἰσχρὰ ὀνόματα, οὐ τὰ πράγματα, εἰώθασιν ἄνθρωποι ἐκ τοῦ ἐπὶ πλεῖστον αἰσχύνεσθαι (Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xv.7). 185 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xv.14–19. 186 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xiii.1–30. Braund, D., Georgia in Antiquity, p. 302–305. 187 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xiii.33. 188 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xiv.41–44.

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enemy, and Mihr-Meroe blockaded the castle of Uthimereos. 189 The voluntary betrayal of that fortress to Iran represents the growing disaffection of the Lazi with their Roman occupiers. Theophobius (that was the name of the nobleman who had yielded the fortress of Uthimereos) assisted the Iranian government with a propaganda campaign: the Iranian seizure of Lazica was inevitable, an immense host had utterly defeated the armies of Rome, and the cause of Goubaz was lost. Khusro himself, as Theophobius falsely maintained, had appeared at the head of an enormous army, which was impossible to resist. The Sasanian monarch was said to have offered pledges of safety on condition that the guardians of Uthimereos surrender that fortress, they complied, and the regions of Scymnia and Suania were similarly united to the Iranian dominion of Lazica. 190 Over the course of the winter which proceeded into the year 552, Mihr-Meroe consolidated his hold upon that country, he dispersed a Roman force from the mouth of the river Phasis, and drove Goubaz into hiding atop the snowy crags of Lazica. 191 But an embassy from Mihr-Meroe to Goubaz failed to persuade the Lazian king to relinquish his alliance with Rome. 192 The money which the ambassador Yazdgushnasp had brought to Khusro purchased an alliance with the Sabirs. Those nomads, together with a large number of elephants, accompanied Mihr-Meroe upon a new campaign in Lazica, and attempted to capture some important fortresses – but without success. 193 The absence of military activity in the year 553 suggests that Khusro had abandoned efforts to expand, and had turned to consolidating, the Iranian position in Lazica. 194 At this moment the narrative of Procopius exhausts itself, and we must turn to the writer Agathias for the conclusion of the Lazic war. Fighting was resumed in the year 554. Three Roman generals (Bessas, Martin, and Buz) arrived with a large force to strengthen Justinian’s hold upon Lazica, and the Iranian general Mihr-Meroe resolved, as it seemed, to drive the enemy from that country. 195 The rumour was diffused that the Iranian general had died, the vigilance of the Roman garrison at Telephis was relaxed, and that fortress was betrayed to Iran. 196 Although the Roman commander Martin and his troops had vacated Telephis and retreated to a fortified island at the confluence of the rivers Doconus and Phasis, Mihr-Meroe failed to pursue them. It was impossible to convey supplies to so large an army in the midst of enemy territory. 197 The Iranian fortress at On189

Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xiv.50–54. Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xvi.1–15. 191 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xvi.16–21. 192 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xvi.22–33. 193 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xvii.11–19. 194 Greatrex, G. / Lieu, S. N. C., The Roman Eastern Frontier and the Persian Wars, p. 120. 195 Agathias, Historiae, II.18.6–8. Braund, D., Georgia in Antiquity, p. 306–308. 196 Agathias, Historiae, II.19–20. 197 Agathias, Historiae, II.22.2. 190

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oguris was reinforced, and Mihr-Meroe returned to Mocherisis where his health began to deteriorate. That general, whom Agathias acknowledges as a brilliant strategist and superb fighter, died in Iberia in the following summer; and, in accordance with ancestral Iranian custom, the corpse of Mihr-Meroe was exposed without the city of Mtskheta to be devoured by dogs and carrion birds. 198 Khusro and his ministers were distressed by the death of Mihr-Meroe, and his vacant post was filled by an unnamed nobleman who bore the title Nakhwaragan, but it was some time before he arrived in Lazica. 199 Three Roman generals had failed to expel the Iranian army, Gubaz accused his western allies of incompetence, and his loyalty to Rome appeared to waver. Bessas was punished by an ignominious exile, but Martin retained his post. He and a colleague by the name of Rusticus accused the Lazian king of treason, and they presented the charge to the emperor Justinian who summoned his vassal to Constantinople. But, before his departure, the Roman commanders murdered the Lazian king toward the end of the year 555. 200 The death of Gubaz exhausted the willingness of the Lazi to cooperate with Rome, and the commander Martin and his forces prosecuted the war without indigenous assistance. The Roman siege of the Iranian fortress an Onoguris ended in an embarrassing retreat, and Iranian soldiers from Mocheresis pursued their flying enemy to the walls of Archaeopolis. 201 The noblemen of Lazica hesitated to revive their allegiance to Iran, and instead complained loudly to Justinian of the murder of their king. 202 The Roman emperor promised to investigate the death of Gubaz, and Athanasius, an elderly senator, arrived in Lazica for that purpose. Tzath, the brother of the late king, was awarded the insignia of rule by the emperor Justinian, and he was escorted into Lazica by the Roman general Soterichus. At this moment, the Nakhwaragan advanced down the Phasis with an army of sixty thousand men. 203 But he achieved no important victory, and his abortive siege of the castle of Phasis ended in such a severe rout that the Nakhwaragan retreated to Iberia. 204 In the brief interval of calm which followed, Rusticus and other conspirators were arrested, tried, and beheaded in an effort to restore Lazican confidence in Roman dominion. 205

198

Agathias, Historiae, II.22.1–6. Agathias, Historiae, III.2.1–2. 200 Agathias, Historiae, III.3–11. Braund suggests that there was some truth to the charge of treason (Braund, D., Georgia in Antiquity, p. 308). 201 Agathias, Historiae, III.5.6–8.1 202 Agathias, Historiae, III.14. 203 Agathias, Historiae, III.17.4. 204 Agathias, Historiae, III.17–28. 205 Agathias, Historiae, IV.1–4; Braund, D., Georgia in Antiquity, p. 308–309. 199

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THE END OF THE LAZIC WAR The purpose of the Roman general Soterichus was to distribute a large amount of gold to neighbouring peoples whose loyalty had been disrupted by the murder of Gubaz. But the tribe of the Misimians, who were subject to the Lazi, conceived of an implacable hatred of Rome, they embraced the Iranian cause, and they slew Soterichus. 206 Accordingly, the final campaign of the Lazic war involved efforts of either side to restore or to exploit the loyalty of the Misimians. 207 As the winter of the year 556 drew on, the Iranian cause in Lazica was utterly thwarted because the Nakhwaragan and his forces withdrew from the region of Misimia, and a Roman army invaded and occupied it. 208 This shameful defeat ended the career and life of the Iranian general. In a transport of rage, Khusro summoned that unfortunate man before him and inflicted a savage punishment. The skin of the Nakhwaragan was torn downwards from his neck and removed from his body, turned inside-out, inflated as though it were a wineskin, and suspended from a pole – a sight which Agathias calls both pitiful and disgusting. 209 With that grim image, Agathias terminates his account of the Lazic war.

THE PEACE TREATY OF 562 In the year 557, the ambassador Yazdgushnasp returned to Constantinople. Many a lengthy conference with the Roman emperor and his advisers yielded to the agreement of an armistice, during which embassies were to be exchanged between the two powers, and the niceties of a treaty of peace were determined. 210 The account of the martyrdom of Shirin, a young Iranian saint, preserves a small allusion to the departure of the Roman ambassador from Ctesiphon, and the return of the Iranian envoy from Constantinople. 211 But the diplomatic history of Menander the Guardsman, which survives only in large fragments, has recorded a detailed description of that treaty and the negotiation which produced it. The government of Iran desired a limitless 212 peace together with a large annual payment of gold. The immediate disbursal of thirty or forty years’ worth of such payments was the opening demand which instigated a long dispute. 213 Peter the Pa206

Agathias, Historiae, III.15.6–17.2. Braund, D., Georgia in Antiquity, p. 310–311. Agathias, Historiae, IV.13. 208 Agathias, Historiae, IV.15–20. 209 Agathias, Historiae, IV.23.2–3. 210 Agathias, Historiae, IV.30.7–10. Agathias refers to Yazdgushnasp by his family name of Zikh. 211 See the translation of the martyrdom in Devos, P., “La jeune martyre perse saint Shirin († 559),” Analecta Bollandiana, 112, 1994, p. 26. 212 Πέρσαι μὲν διηνεκεῖς ἠξίουν ἔσεσθαι τὰς σπονδάς, etc. (Menander Protector, frag. 6.1.134). 213 This long dispute was already preceded by a good deal of puffery from both sides (Menander Protector, frag. 6.1.1–154). 207

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trician (that was the name of the Roman ambassador) preferred a short treaty without expenditure, but a compromise was achieved. Fifty years was to be the duration of the peace; the country of Lazica was to return to Roman obedience; and five hundred pounds of gold, denominated in thirty thousand nomismata, was the annual price of peace. The Romans promised to provide the payment of ten years in one large sum, seven years of which were to be paid immediately, and the remaining three years’ worth were to be disbursed after the lapse of seven years. Thereafter payments would be made annually. But the bulk of the treaty was intended to ensure that the peace would be respected, and so past irritants and causes of tension were addressed minutely in thirteen clauses. 214 I. Iran undertook to prevent Huns, Alans, and other foreigners from passing through their Caucasian fortifications into Roman territory; and the government of Rome promised to refrain from sending an army into Transcaucasia or through any part of their frontier. II. The treaty would bind the Arab clients of both great powers. III. Commerce of every kind was to be conducted only at specified customs posts in accordance with establish practice. IV. Ambassadors were to be given the respect which they deserved, and were to be permitted to exchange whatever goods they may have brought with them without hindrance, but they were to depart without delay at the end of their diplomatic work. V. Smuggling was rigorously condemned and was to be punished severely. Saracen and foreign merchants were forbidden from using secret roads, and were accordingly bound to cross the border only at Nisibis and Dara. VI. Defectors in wartime were to be free to return to their native countries; but migrants or renegades in a period of peace were to be forcibly removed to the empire from which they had fled. VII. If the accused failed to satisfy the plaintiff, disputes between the subjects of Iran and Rome were to be settled upon the border of the two empires in the presence of both an Iranian and a Roman governor. VIII. The government of Iran promised to vacate its grievance about the fortification of Dara, and both states agreed to abandon the construction of fortresses along their mutual frontier. IX. Neither great power would attack any tribe or people subject to the other. X. The Roman general of the east would not be stationed at Dara, and the garrison of that city was thenceforth to be small. XI. Questions of treachery which might threaten the peace were to be investigated by judges along the frontier, and appeals could be made first to the master of the soldiers in the east and second to the respective sovereign of the injured person. XII. The blessings of God were invoked upon all who abide by the peace, and curses were called down upon those who might alter the treaty. XIII. The peace was to last for fifty years. The envoys of Khusro attached to those provisions a letter addressed from the Iranian monarch to his Roman counterpart. Menander the Guardsman claims to 214

Menander Protector, frag. 6.1.314–397.

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preserve a literal Greek translation of the original document composed in Middle Persian, and the unusual syntax of the letter suggests that the claim is true: ‘Divine, good, progenitor of peace, ancient, Khusro, king of kings, fortunate, pious, beneficent, unto whom the gods have given great fortune and great empire, giant of giants, who is formed of the gods, to Justinian Caesar, our brother. We give thanks to the brotherliness of Caesar for the peaceful intercourse that is between the two states. We have commanded Yazdgushnasp the divine chamberlain and we have given him power; and to Peter, master of the Romans, the brotherliness of Caesar has commanded and given power, to speak and to negotiate. Zikh 215 and the aforementioned master amongst the Romans and Eusebius have spoken together concerning the peace, and they have negotiated the peace of fifty years, and all have affixed their seals. We therefore consider the provisions which Zikh, the master of the Romans, and Eusebius have settled as a secure peace, and we abide by them’. 216

With those words, Khusro gave his sanction to the treaty which terminated the war in the Lazica, and which appeared to usher in a new spirit of cooperation between the two powers. The position of Iranian Christians was the matter which the ambassadors next discussed. Votaries of Christ within the empire of Iran were to be free to build churches, to worship without fear, and to sing their hymns of praise without hindrance. No one might compel them to participate in Zoroastrian worship, nor would Christians make converts of Zoroastrians, and the Iranian government promised to allow the rites of Christian burial and the use of graves. 217 This was the conclusion of the negotiations, and the treaty was ratified despite a seeming omission. The two parties had failed to agree upon the fate of the territory of Suania. Both powers claimed that land as a vassal state, and its ambiguous position ensured that discussion would continue for some time. 218 But the treaty of the year 562 held, despite the doubtful fate of Suania, and the negotiations concerning it.

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE ROMAN TRIBUTE The Roman wars of Kavad and Khusro, and the negotiations which interrupted or terminated them, are distinguished by a mysterious, but important, feature. The demand for gold, extracted by plunder or requested as a subsidy, was so frequently reiterated that we might be tempted to infer gross fiscal mismanagement or the fail215

This is the family name of Yazdgushnasp (Greatrex, G. / Lieu, S. N. C., The Roman Eastern Frontier and the Persian Wars, p. 130). 216 Menander Protector, frag. 6.1.187–198. 217 Menander Protector, frag. 6.1.398–407 218 Menander Protector, frag. 6.1.435–603; frag. 6.2–3. Braund, D., Georgia in Antiquity, p. 311– 314.

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ure of the state to collect taxes. But the purity of the Sasanian silver drachm hardly wavered throughout the reign of that dynasty, and gold coinage was produced rarely and only for ceremonial purposes in quantities so small that it could not have circulated as currency; 219 and so we must attempt some other explanation for the seemingly insatiable demand for that metal from Rome. In Antiquity, the merchants of the Indian subcontinent and the island of Taprobane attained a legendary capacity to attract gold. 220 The Natural History of Pliny the Elder remarked that half the Roman expenditure on luxury goods was to the benefit of India, 221 and the strain of that trade upon the Roman state was noticed by Tacitus in a speech which he imputes to the emperor Tiberius. 222 The opulence of the Roman commerce in the east was romanticised by the poets and historians of Taprobane, for whom Roman gold was a conspicuous feature of business. Erukkadur Thayankannanar, a Tamil poet, described the bustling port of Muchiri in Kerala, ‘where the beautiful large ships of the Greeks, bringing gold, come splashing upon the white foam on the waters of the river Periyar…and return laden with pepper’ 223 and Paranar, the first Tamil historian, noted that ‘sacks of pepper are brought from the houses to the market; the gold received from ships, in exchange for articles sold, is brought to shore in barges, at Muchiri, where the music of the surging sea never ceases…’. 224

219

Schindel, N., “Sasanian Coinage,” Encyclopædia Iranica, online edition, 2016. See also the arguments in Howard-Johnston, J., “The Sasanian State,” p. 144–181. Those arguments are based on: Alram, M. / Gyselen, R., Sylloge Nummorum Sasanidarum, Band I, p. 76–77; 81–84; 162–167; 268–271; Alram, M. / Gyselen, R., Sylloge Nummorum Sasanidarum, Band II, p. 88– 92; 98–102; Schindel, N., Sylloge Nummorum Sasanidarum, Band III/1, p. 17; 55–58; 103–11; 197–209; and Blet-Lemarquand, M. (with Gyselen, R. and Gordus, A. A.), “La question récurrente de la raison d’être de ’pd sur le monnayage de Khusrō II (590–628): Étude préliminaire,” p. 41–58. 220 Mayhew, N. J., “How Far Can Coins Provide Evidence of Bullion Flows? A Review of the European Evidence from c. 1000 A.D. with Methodological and Historical Implications for India,” in Gupta, P. L. / Jha, A. K. (eds.), Numismatics and Archaeology, 1987, p. 20–26; Chaudhuri, K.N., Trade and Civilisation in the Indian Ocean: An Economic History from the Rise of Islam to 1750, 1985, p. 184–185. 221 Pliny, Historia Natura, VI.xxvi.101; XII.xl.84. 222 Tacitus, Annals, III.liii. 223 Erukkadur Thayankannanar, Akam, 148 quoted in Kanakasabhai, V., The Tamils Eighteen Hundred Years Ago, 1904, p. 16. I have modified the translation only slightly. 224 Paranar, Puram, 343 quoted in in Kanakasabhai, V., The Tamils Eighteen Hundred Years Ago, p. 16. I found this reference and the previous one in Vickers, M., “Nabataea, India, Gaul, and Carthage: Reflections on Hellenistic and Roman Gold Vessels and Red-Gloss Pottery,” American Journal of Archaeology, vol. 98, no. 2, 1994, p. 231–248.

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We can reasonably infer that Indian traders sought to extract gold as well from their Iranian, as from their Roman, clients. 225 Here we have perhaps the strongest indication of the purpose of the gold which the Sasanian government demanded from her western antagonist. The exports of the Iranian state were considerably smaller in value than its imports, and it is probable that most of the gold extracted from the Roman empire was destined to offset that imbalance of trade. 226 The successive governments of Kavad and Khusro established and maintained a monopoly upon the maritime commerce which conducted the silk, spices, wood, and precious stones of India through the Persian Gulf and into Mesopotamia and the province of Persia. But carpets, cloth, glass, nuts, and dried fruit were the domestic products exported by Iran, and the worth of these commodities was far lower than the exorbitant wares of India. So we may suppose that the use of gold allowed the merchants of Iran to purchase those expensive imports, and thereby to correct the trade deficit. Such an inference suggests the potent influence of those merchants upon Iranian policy and the willingness of the government to support trade. Though the Romans might bristle at the idea of tribute, the Constantinopolitan court was prepared to endure the payment of subsidies. But the Iranian monopoly upon the Indian maritime trade, established by Kavad, was intolerable to the Roman government and Justinian resolved to dismantle it. In the year 528, Roman policy persuaded the Christian king of Ethiopia to launch an attack upon the Jewish kingdom of Himyar in the Yemen. 227 His purpose was to restore Christian rule upon both shores of the Red Sea. Later, in the year 531, the emperor Justinian dispatched an embassy to the Ethiopian capital of Aksum, where he sought and obtained an alliance against Iran. Ethiopian merchants, acting on Rome’s behalf, were to force their way into the silk trade across the Indian Ocean and break the Iranian monopoly. A similar embassy, which arrived in Himyar, purposed to incite the Arabs of Yemen to attack Iran upon her Mesopotamian flank. But the plans of Justinian came to nothing: no such attack ever occurred, and the government of Justinian was much aggrieved that Iranian importers of raw silk habitually met Indian maritime traders at their first port of call, purchased all available merchandise, and excluded their Roman rivals from that profitable trade. 228 But this was not the end of the trade war between Iran and Rome. Superior organisation and the support of a strong central government assured the triumph of Iranian merchants in the Indian Ocean. According to Procopius, Khusro’s invasion of Syria in the year 540 had placed a heavy strain upon the silk 225

Cf. the argument about Sasanian gold in Frye, N., “Commerce iii. In the Parthian and Sasanian Periods,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. VI., fasc. 1, 1992, p. 61–64. 226 Howard-Johnston, J., “The India Trade in Late Antiquity,” p. 292–293. 227 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xx.1; John Malalas, Chronographia, p. 458–459; Tabari, v. 2, p. 124–125. 228 Procopius, Bellum Persicum, I.xx.9–13.

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industry at Berytus and Tyre. 229 Roman manufacturers were now entirely at the mercy of Iranian merchants who threatened to raise the price of silk exorbitantly; but the state intervened to prevent this, and purchased all the available silk and sold to private businesses all that was not required by public factories and the demands of the palace. 230 The mandate of Justinian was that a pound of silk be bought for no more than fifteen pieces of gold – a price which many Iranian merchants refused to accept. The result was a great diminishment of raw silk available to factories and an enormous rise in the price of the finished product. The instincts of a despot instructed Justinian to reduce the price of a pound of raw silk to eight gold pieces; and when the garment industry of Syria was all but destroyed, the manufacture of silk became a monopoly of the Roman state. But the officials who administered the Roman silk industry continued to derive the raw material from the merchants of Iran. Two monks suggested to the emperor Justinian the famous scheme whereby the eggs of a silkworm were encased in dung, concealed within a wooden cane, and smuggled out of China. 231 The court of Justinian surely marvelled at such wonderful animals, but their appearance in Constantinople, in about the year 552, could not have established a domestic silk industry large enough to satisfy the needs of the Roman empire, nor could it have broken the Iranian monopoly upon the silk trade. 232 In the reign of Justin II, who had succeeded the emperor Justinian, the Roman state had relinquished all hope of disrupting the commerce of the Indian Ocean. But the peculiar object of the foreign policy of the second Justin was to dominate the terrestrial silk trade; and he formed an association with the merchants of Sogdiana and the new masters of Central Asia – an alliance which was to have dire consequences for Iran.

THE RISE OF THE TURKS At the beginning of Khusro’s reign, the Confederacy of the Rouran held sway over all Asia between the dying empire of the Hephthalites and the borders of China. But the power of that confederacy had grown weak, and internal strife began to sap the strength of the ruling house until it was overthrown by one of its subject peoples. 233 It was said that, in the early sixth century, the khaghan Chounu had been murdered by his own mother who installed her younger son Anagui as ruler. Civil war forced Anagui to seek refuge in China at the court of the Northern Wei whose intervention he requested and received. But the rule of Anagui was challenged by a man with the 229

Procopius, Anecdota, XXV.13. Codex Justinianus, IV.40.2 231 Procopius, Bellum Gothicum, VIII.xvii.1–10. 232 Howard-Johnston, J., “The India Trade in Late Antiquity,” p. 296. 233 I am following Kim, H. J., The Huns, Rome, and the Birth of Europe, p. 39–41; Sinor, D., “The Establishment and Dissolution of the Türk Empire,” p. 291–301; and Barfield, T. J., The Perilous Frontier, p. 125–127; 131–133. 230

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strange name of Brahman, who himself had sought the aid of the Wei emperor. Chinese policy was to assist both rival khaghans, and the court of the Northern Wei installed Anagui as ruler of the region between Turfan and Karashahr, and to Brahman they gave the region of Kokonor. The obvious purpose of this policy was to keep the Rouran divided, and to increase the likelihood of warfare between the two khaghans. In the early 520s, Brahman attempted to form an alliance with the Hephthalite Huns. Three royal daughters of the Hunnish king were taken in marriage, and Brahman hoped, perhaps, that this union would assure him military support against the Northern Wei and Anagui alike. 234 But the reaction of the Chinese court was to arrest and detain Brahman at Luoyang until his death in the year 524. This left Anagui sole ruler of the Rouran and the peoples subject to them. Anagui involved himself in the politics of two rival Chinese courts. Marriage alliances of the Rouran royal house with both the Eastern and the Western Wei made Anagui a person of great influence amongst those Chinese antagonists, but the political troubles emerging from Inner Asia were less interesting to him. In the year 546, a hostile confederation of nomads, known as the Töles, 235 had planned to overthrow the Rouran state; but a man by the name of Bumin, who ruled over one of the peoples subject to the Rouran khaghan, launched a pre-emptive attack and destroyed the Töles. Bumin demanded a reward for his loyalty and asked for the hand of Anagui’s daughter. The people over whom Bumin ruled derived their name, as it was said, from the shape of a mountain near which they dwelt. The form of the mountain resembled a helmet, and in their language the word for that piece of armour was türk. The working of iron was an important industry amongst the Turks, and that mountain was the site of their mining operations, together with their furnaces and smithies. The khaghan conducted an annual pilgrimage to the ancient mines in which his ancestors had been born, and a ritual feat of iron-working was a conspicuous feature of his investiture. In the opinion of Anagui, no ‘blacksmith slave’ could be worthy of his daughter, and he refused the request of Bumin. 236 That Turkish king instantly raised the standard of revolt, and in the year 552 his people had triumphed upon the

234

Cf. Kuwayama, S., “The Hephthalites in Tokharistan and Gandhara,” in Kuwayama, S. (ed.), Across the Hindukush of the First Millennium: a Collection of the Papers by S. Kuwayama, 2002, p. 127. 235 This people is variously known as Tölöš, Tiele, ‘Red Di’, Chile, Gaoche, and Dingling. For more on them, see Yildirim, K., “The Twelve Families of the Töles,” Central Asiatic Journal, 60 1/2, 2017, p. 265–272. 236 For more on this memorable exchange, and the meaning of the word ‘slave’, see Moses, L., “T’ang Tribute Relations with the Inner Asian Barbarian,” in Perry, J. C. / Smith, B. L. (eds.), Essays on T’ang Society, 1976, p. 65.

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ruins of the Rouran Confederacy – a great slaughter which was noticed in the annals of China. 237 Khusro and the Iranian court would have observed with careful attention every political and military development upon the Asiatic steppe. The disintegration of the Rouran Confederacy and the rise of the Turks would have been perceived with alarm, as that new Asiatic power advanced westward toward the region of Sogdiana, the shore of the Aral Sea, and the frontier of Iran. 238 Competition arose amongst the rival courts of China for a marriage alliance with the khaghan of the Turks; and this contest, in which the Northern Qi were victorious, 239 signifies China’s acknowledgement of Turkish supremacy in the world of the nomad. From this we may sense the importance of an Iranian diplomatic mission to the Northern Wei which arrived in the year 555. 240 The Chinese sources which mention that embassy provide neither elaboration nor detail, but we might infer that ambassadors attempted to gather intelligence and to seek advice concerning the new masters of Inner Asia. Such were the circumstances in which the Iranian government terminated the war in Lazica and began negotiations with Rome in the year 557. 241 The menace of Turkish power must have been the reason that the ambassador Yazdgushnasp opened negotiations with the request for an indefinite peace, and it was surely at this moment that diplomatic contact between Iran and the Turkish empire began.

THE ANNIHILATION OF THE HEPHTHALITE EMPIRE The Hephthalite Huns, who had retreated from the page of history in the early sixth century, were soon to be humiliated. In the midst of negotiations with Rome in the year 557, Yazdgushnasp claimed that the Sasanian monarch had ‘overturned the might of the Hephthalites’. 242 The real meaning of that remark must have been connected with the termination of the Iranian tribute paid to those Huns, and this was advertised as a great success of Khusro’s foreign policy. It was perhaps easy to foresee the proximate collapse of the moribund empire of the Hephthalites and the absorption of their lands into the expanding Turkish empire; but the announcement of Yazdgushnasp, if understood literally, was premature. 237

Chinese Annals, p. 7; Barfield, T. J., The Perilous Frontier, p. 132. Sarris, P., Empires of Faith, p. 157; de la Vaissière, É., Histoire des Marchands Sogdiens, 2002, p. 197–198; Graff, D. A., Medieval Chinese Warfare, p. 142; Barfield, T. J., The Perilous Frontier, p. 131–132. 239 Chinese Annals, p. 11. 240 Ecsedy, I., “Early Persian Envoys in Chinese Courts (5th-6th Centuries A. D.),” p. 232. 241 Howard-Johnston, J. “The Sasanians’ Strategic Dilemma,” in Börm, H. / Wiesehöfer, J. (eds.), Commutatio et Contentio: Studies in the Late Roman, Sasanian, and Early Islamic Near East in Memory of Zeev Rubin, 2010, p. 46–47. 242 He boasted that Khusro τὴν τῶν Ἐφθαλιτῶν κατεστρέψατο δύναμιν (Menander Protector, frag. 6.1.7–8). 238

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The vast size of the Turkish empire meant that it could not be governed by a single person forever. At the death of Bumin, the dominion of the Turks was divided between a son and a brother. The Turkish heartland in what is now Mongolia passed to Muqan son of Bumin together with the title of supreme khaghan; and Istemi, the younger brother of Bumin, inherited the princely title of yabghu, and the region now called Jungaria, together with the country surrounding the rivers Irtysh, Imil, Yulduz, Ili, Chu, and Talas. Hereafter we may observe a permanent division of the two empires of the eastern and the western Turks, ruled respectively by Muqan and Istemi. 243 By the middle of the sixth century, the western empire of the yabghu khaghan was the dominant power of the steppe, and Istemi appears in Roman sources as a formidable military and political leader. The Roman historian Menander the Guardsman has mistaken his title for the strange name Silzabul, and the Persian royal tradition has produced a similar corruption in the form of Sinjibu. But this small error hardly detracts from the clear portrait of a barbarian leader in the character of Attila and a worthy forerunner to Genghis Khan. It was Istemi’s solemn task to hunt down and to destroy the relics of the Rouran Confederacy which his ancestor had overthrown and superseded. The pursuit of those nomadic fugitives, whom Roman sources identify as the Avars, brought Istemi and the western Turks to the steppes of what is now southern Russia and into the view of the two sedentary powers. It is to the late 550s that we should ascribe the strange fragment of Menander the Guardsman which purports to record a speech of the Turkish yabghu khaghan Istemi in which he vows to destroy the Hephthalite state: ‘When Silzabul, leader of the Turks, had heard of the flight of the Avars, and that they had departed and devastated Turkish lands…he spoke boldly: “they are by nature neither birds, so that they may escape by wing upon the air from the swords of the Turks, nor indeed fish, so that going under water they might disappear into the uttermost depths of the billowy sea; but they must stalk the earth above. When my war upon the Hephthalites is thoroughly terminated, I shall attack the Avars and they shall not escape my powers.” Thus it is said that Silzabul boasted, and he continued his assault upon the Hephthalites’. 244

That bombastic utterance, encumbered by recondite vocabulary and stiff phraseology, is obviously the declamation of a Byzantine rhetorician, and it is impossible to imagine that the Turkish yabghu really pronounced what Menander wrote. But there 243

Barfield, T. J., The Perilous Frontier, p. 132–143; Grousset, R., The Empire of the Steppes, p. 82. The extent of their territory is indicated on the map under the name Göktürks (‘celestial Turks’) which is the indigenous appellation of the people of the first Turkish empire. 244 Menander Protector, frag. 4.2.1–11. My translation imitates the qualities of Menander’s diction and syntax.

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must be some truth to it: the passage was extracted from Menander’s full account of the collapse of the Hephthalite state, and it reveals that the Turkish war upon those Huns had already begun by the time of the armistice between Iran and Rome in the year 557. The Chinese biography of Jinagupta appears to describe the conditions that we would associate with warfare, for that Hindu monk passed through the country of the Hephthalites in the year 555. His biography notices extensive but empty fields and a sparse population which failed to produce food and drink. It was only with supernatural aid, as it is said, that Jinagupta and his companions escaped unharmed by the violence about them. 245 In the year 558, the fate of the Huns was sealed. The last Hephthalite embassy appeared at the court of the Northern Zhou in that year, 246 and this must indicate either that their empire had fallen or that it was irretrievably weakened toward the end of the 550s. We cannot be certain of the moment at which the Hephthalite state was finally subjugated by the Turks, but we may establish the date by which that empire was certainly extinguished. An embassy of the yabghu khaghan Istemi appeared before the Roman emperor Justin II in the year 568, and announced that Turkish power had already humiliated the Hephthalite Huns and that they now paid tribute to the empire of the Turks. 247 Iranian participation in the Turkish war upon the Hephthalites is very doubtful. 248 The diplomatic contact between Iran and the Turks seems to have yielded an agreement that the empire of Khusro would give political support to the Turkish annexation of Hephthalite lands, and that the Sasanian king would connive at the inevitable war. But there is no convincing evidence of any further involvement. An important fragment of the History of Menander the Guardsman reports the boasting of both an Iranian and a Turkish embassy before the Roman Emperor, and the envoys announced that their respective nations had crushed the Hephthalites. 249 The testimony of Menander is that the emperor Justin interrogated the Turkish ambassador, as though he were testing the Iranian claim, which the emperor and his advisers plainly disbelieved. The strength of the Turkish evidence persuaded the Con245

Chavannes, É., “Jinagupta (528–605 après J.-C.),” in T’oung Pao, Second Series, Vol. 6, No. 3, 1905, p. 340–341. I am following Kuwayama’s interpretation of this passage (Kuwayama, S., “The Hephthalites in Tokharistan and Gandhara,” p. 130). 246 Specht, M. E., “Études sur l’Asie centrale, d’après les historiens chinois,” Journal Asiatique, octobre-novembre-décembre, 1883, p. 345. Kuwayama, S., “The Hephthalites in Tokharistan and Gandhara,” p. 128 –130. 247 Menander Protector, frag. 10.1.68–74. 248 Contra Grenet, F., “Regional Interaction in Central Asia and Northwest India in the Kidarite and Hephthalite Periods,” Proceedings of the British Academy, 116, 2002, p. 213–214; Kuwayama, S., “The Hephthalites in Tokharistan and Gandhara,” p. 130. 249 Menander Protector, frag. 10.1.68–95. See Blockley’s note on this passage in Blockley, R. C. (ed.), The History of Menander the Guardsman, p. 263, n. 121.

VI. THE IRANIAN RECOVERY

217

stantinopolitan court to form an alliance with that people to the great annoyance of Iran. This was in the year 568. The mysterious Avars, whom Istemi had sought to destroy, successfully passed into Europe toward the end of the reign of Justinian. 250 They extended their power from the banks of the Volga to the those of the Danube. To the north of that river dwelt the Slavs, whom the Avars attacked and subjugated; and the westward expansion of those nomads was halted and reversed by Sigebert, the grandson of Clovis, in a memorable battle in Thuringia of the year 562. Not long thereafter the Avars formed an alliance with the Lombards, who had settled in Pannonia, and together they subdued the Gepids and occupied their dominions upon the Hungarian plain. There the political heartland of the Avar khaghanate remained until Charlemagne and his son Pepin destroyed them at the end of the eighth century. 251 But let us return to the beginning of Turkish and Iranian relations in the 550s. The chief aim of Sasanian foreign policy must have been to ensure that Turkish mastery of Inner Asia halted at the Iranian frontier. This implies that diplomatic contact had yielded Turkish promises to respect the Sasanid state, but the promises of Khusro are obscure. It is tempting to infer that Khusro had offered military assistance to the Turkish khaghan. But the sources which have come down to us, and which are not obviously mendacious or imaginary, suggest a military contribution that was either so small as to permit the Turks to disclaim all Iranian participation, or so large as to justify the claim of Yazdgushnasp that Khusro alone had destroyed the empire of the Huns. This strange paradox takes shape in a great mass of improbable and antithetical narratives within the Persian royal tradition, most of which announce Khusro as conqueror of the Huns. 252 The historian Dinawari is the earliest to have transmitted this tradition, and his mendacious testimony asserts that an Iranian attack upon the Hephthalites recovered the lands of Tukharistan, Zabulistan, Kabulistan, and Chaghanian. 253 At the same moment the khaghan of the Turks invaded Sogdiana, and he annexed the territories of Chach, Firghana, Samarqand, Kash, Nasaf, and Bukhara; and the response of Khusro was to dispatch his son Hurmazd with a large army which drove the Turks from the border, and induced the khaghan to relinquish what he lately con250

Golden, P. B., “The Peoples of the south Russian steppes,” in Sinor, D., The Cambridge History of Inner Asia, 1990, p. 260–261. 251 Schutz, H., The Carolingians in Central Europe, Their History, Arts, and Architecture: A Cultural History of Central Europe, 750–900, 2004, p. 60–62. 252 Widengren compared the accounts of Ibn Athir, Thaʿalibi, Eutychius, Balʿami, Masʿudi, the anonymous Nihayat al-Irab, Mirkhond, Majmal al-Tawarikh, and the Farsnama (Widengren, G., “Xosrav Anôšurvân, les Hephthalites et les peuples turcs (Études préliminaires des sources)” in Orientalia Suecana, I, 1952, p. 66–94). For my own position on the same evidence, see M. R. Jackson Bonner, Three Neglected Sources, p. 89–101. 253 Dinawari, p. 69.

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quered. 254 One of the narratives presented by Tabari resembles these fables. Khusro intended, says Tabari, to punish the Hephthalites for the death of Peroz and the Turks were invited to participate. The Sasanid monarch personally slew the Hephthalite king, he penetrated as far as the hinterland of Balkh, he quartered his troops in Firghana, and returned to Iran through the region of Khurasan. 255 Another passage, also recorded by Tabari, presents a different account of the demise of the Huns which the historian failed to reconcile with his other claims. 256 Here we read a greatly abbreviated narrative which deprives Khusro of all involvement in the collapse of the Hunnish state, and there is no mention of cooperation between Khusro and the khaghan. Tabari, however, adds the interesting claim that, amidst the Turkish war, a body of Turks attempted to cross the Iranian frontier, but the impressive fortifications upon the plain of Gurgan prompted them to abandon their invasion. This account is superficially credible, and bears some resemblance to the longer and more trustworthy testimony of Ferdowsi. The Shahnameh gives Khusro and his court no direct involvement in the Turkish and Hephthalite war, and the force of Ferdowsi’s narrative is that the leaders of the Hephthalite state feared an alliance between the Turks and Iran, and those men resolved to arrest and murder the Turkish ambassador as he passed through their territory into Iran. 257 War was the predictable consequence of that insult, and the Sogdian city of Bukhara was the place of the battle which destroyed Hephthalite power. 258 The source of this consensus of Tabari and Ferdowsi is mysterious. But it plainly reposes upon a tradition distinct from the propaganda informing the fabulous narratives which exaggerate the involvement of Khusro in the collapse of the Hephthalite state. 259 It is corroborated, moreover, by the testimony of Menander the Guardsman and the annals of the Northern Zhou which ascribe the humiliation of the Huns to the Turks alone. 260 254

Dinawari, p. 70. Tabari, v. 2, p. 103. 256 Tabari, v. 2, p. 10–102. 257 Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 1780–1782: 255

258

‫��ازد و از دل كنند آفر�ن‬ ‫���ن روى و��ان شود ��ر ما‬ ...‫جهان از فرستاده ��دا��ن‬

‫ا�� شاه ا��ان و �اقان ��ن‬ ‫هراس ست از�ن دوس�ى ��ر ما‬ ‫ببا�� ي�� تا��ن سا��ن‬

Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 1800–1829. Grignaschi, M., “La Chute de l’empire hephthalite dans les sources byzantines et perses et le problème des Avars,” in Harmatta, J. (ed.), From Hecataeus to Al-Ḫuwārizmī: Bactrian, Pahlavi, Sogdian, Persian, Sanskrit, Syriac, Arabic, Chinese, Greek and Latin sources for the history of pre-Islamic Central Asia, 1985, p. 235. 260 Menander Protector, frag. 10.1.68–95. See Blockley’s note on this passage in Blockley, R. C. (ed.), The History of Menander the Guardsman, p. 263, n. 121. For the annals of the Northern Zhou, see Specht, M. E., “Études sur l’Asie centrale, d’après les historiens chinois,” p. 344– 345. 259

VI. THE IRANIAN RECOVERY

219

THE CONSEQUENCES OF THE FALL OF THE HEPHTHALITES The appearance of the game of chess in Iran, 261 and tale of the arrival and translation of the fables of Bidpai 262 attest the penetration of Indian culture into Iran after the fall of the Hephthalite monarchy. These romantic notices of the Persian royal tradition are connected with a mysterious vizier Buzurg-Mihr, whose preternatural intelligence, and whose very existence, may be imaginary. 263 But these amusing stories represent neither the most serious, nor the most interesting, consequences of the collapse of Hunnish power in the east. The city states of Sogdiana, which the Turks now possessed, were the great prize of the war. Theophanes of Byzantium, an historian of the sixth century whose work survives only in a summary prepared by the patriarch Photius, described the history of the silk markets of Central Asia. The Turks, says Theophanes, now exerted control over the silk emporia which they had wrested from the Hephthalite state, which itself had acquired them from the Sasanian monarchy after the defeat and death of Peroz. 264 The Turkish empire now controlled the nexus of nearly all international overland trade, and the merchants of Sogdiana now wielded greater influence than ever before upon the affairs of China. In the second half of the sixth century, the leader of their expatriate community rose to prominence in the city of Luoyang and with time the profitable trade in the export of horses from the Ordos region became a monopoly of Sogdian merchants. 265 The influence of the Sogdian people was exploited by their nomadic masters; and with the aid of those sedentary ambassadors, the Turks began to prosecute a foreign policy more potent than that of any former nomadic power. 266 But Khusro, as far as we are able to discern, reasserted no claim over the markets and waystations of the terrestrial silk trade, he demanded no share of any rents derived from them, and Iran assisted the establishment of a Turkish monopoly on all overland trade between China and Rome. Here we may behold the most signifi261

Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 2663–2767. Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 2387–2425. These tales are commonly called Kalila and Dimna. 263 Khaleghi Motlagh, Dj., “Bozorgmehr-e Boktagan,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, Vol. IV, Fasc. 4, p. 427–429. 264 Οἱ γὰρ Τοῦρκοι τότε τά τε Σηρῶν ἐμπορία καὶ τοὺς λίμενας κατεῖχον. Ταῦτα δὲ πρὶν μὲν Πέρσαι κατεῖχον, Ἐφθαλάνου δὲ τοῦ Ἐφθαλιτῶν βασιλέως…Περόζην καὶ Πέρσας νικήσαντος ἀφῃρέθησαν μὲν τούτων οἱ Πέρσαι δεσπόται δὲ κατέστησαν Ἐφθαλῖται. Οὓς μικρῷ ὕστερον μαχῇ νικήσαντες Τοῦρκοι ἀφεῖλον ἐξ αὐτῶν καὶ ταῦτα (Theophanes of Byzantium). 265 Howard-Johnston, J. “The Sasanians’ Strategic Dilemma,” in Börm, H. / Wiesehöfer, J. (eds.), Commutatio et Contentio: Studies in the Late Roman, Sasanian, and Early Islamic Near East in Memory of Zeev Rubin, 2010, p. 48; De la Vaissière, É., Histoire des Marchands Sogdiens, p. 208– 212. 266 De la Vaissière, É., Histoire des Marchands Sogdiens, p. 102–153; 197–212. 262

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THE LAST EMPIRE OF IRAN

cant concession which Khusro made to the Turks. The Turkish khaghan had surely promised not to violate the border of Iran; but had he offered anything else? We may be fairly certain that, in the reign of Khusro I, the empire of Iran reasserted control over most of the region of Bactria, for the striking of Sasanid coins resumed at the mints of Marv, Herat, Sakastan, Chach, Samarqand, and Balkh. 267 Possession of those territories may be confirmed by the evidence of sealings, dated to the reign of Khusro I, found as far as Zabulistan and Kadagistan, a region to the east of Rob in Bactria. 268 This evidence, which is more trustworthy than the Persian royal tradition, suggests that Khusro and the khaghan had agreed to divide Hephthalite lands between them, but the Turkish portion was by far the larger. The relics of the Hephthalite state were now confined north of the river Oxus and south of the Pamir mountains in Bactria, where mints continued to produce coins in the old style. 269 That debased Hunnish remnant may have extended into the region of Badakhshan. But the old king Ghatfar was dead. Faghanish, his successor, wherever he pretended to rule, was nothing more than an Iranian client, 270 and that moribund monarchy hobbled on until it vanished altogether in the eighth century. Some high-ranking Huns attempted to serve the new masters of Central Asia in the same duties which they had performed under their late king. One of these, perhaps the most prominent of them, was a mysterious Hephthalite nobleman. In the fragments of Menander’s history, we first encounter the figure of Catulph as an adviser to the Hephathalite king. Only a single piece of that minister’s advice to his monarch has survived: it was a proverb to the effect that a dog in his home ground is stronger than ten foreigners, and by this he meant that the king should advance no further. 271 The circumstances of this utterance are obscure, but we may fairly assume that the fragment was lifted from Menander’s description of the war be-

267

Vondrovec, K., Coinage of the Iranian Huns and Their Successors from Bactria to Gandhara (4th to 8 century CE), p. 561–562. The mint at Balkh ceased to produce Iranian coins in the twelfth regnal year of Hurmazd IV, the year 591, when that region fell to the Turks. 268 See Gyselen, R., “La reconquête de l’est iranien par l’empire sassanide au IVe siècle d’après les sources ‘iraninnes’,” Arts asiatiques 58, 2013, p. 162–167 and Gyselen, R., Nouveaux matériaux sigillographiques pour la géographie administrative de l’empire sassanide, 2002, p. 152. 269 Examples of these can be seen in Vondrovec, K., Coinage of the Iranian Huns and Their Successors from Bactria to Gandhara (4th to 8th century CE), p. 415–416. 270 Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 1826–1829: th

‫��ر ��د با�� به ا��ان زم�ن‬ ‫ببندد به فرمان ��رى ��ر‬ ‫فرامش كند ��ز و گوپال را‬ ‫��ين�� جنگ آورى ��فراز‬

‫��ار�� ما تاب �اقان ��ن‬ ‫�� ا��ونک فرمان ��د �اتفر‬ ‫سپارد ��و ��ر هيتال را‬ ‫و��نه از ���ه ى خشنواز‬

This speech was pronounced by one of the noblemen of the Hepthalites. 271 Menander Protector, frag. 4.3.

VI. THE IRANIAN RECOVERY

221

tween the Hephthalites and the Turks. 272 But Catulph’s concern for the survival of the Hephthalite state gave way to hostility when relations between Catulph and his king deteriorated. ‘The man’, says Menander, ‘who has been wronged by the ruler feels great anger against the state’, and the testimony of that historian was that the Hunnish king had violated the wife of Catulph, and his revenge was to betray his kingdom to the Turks. 273 But, amidst mysterious circumstances, Catulph was soon to forsake the court of the khaghan and to reappear as an adviser to Khusro. 274

RELATIONS BETWEEN THE TWO POWERS AFTER THE PEACE TREATY OF 562 It is impossible to say with precision or certainty how Khusro and his court were preoccupied in the 560s after the collapse of the Hephthalite state. But the mood was surely grim. Repeated efforts to overturn the monarchy of Khusro and the ravages of the pestilence would have promoted a spirit of heaviness at Ctesiphon. The great push towards the Black Sea and the fitful war in Lazica had ended in failure and retreat. A residue of that conflict remained in the form of diplomatic wrangling over the small region of Suania, the fate of which had not been decided in the treaty of the year 562. Debate on this subject preoccupied Iran and Rome throughout the 560s and, we may assume, promoted a feeling of tension between them. A small infringement of the peace treaty of 562 is noticed in the Chronography of Theophanes. Harith, the Saracen king loyal to Rome, appeared in Constantinople in the year 563. He complained of an aggressive raid performed by the Lakhmid king ʿAmr son of Mundhir. 275 This, as far as we can tell, was not interpreted as an act of war on the part of Iran; the emperor Justinian appears to have pacified his vassal by means of a generous subsidy, but tensions among the Saracens lingered. Two years later Justinian was dead. The poet Ferdowsi claims that, at the death of the emperor Justinian in the year 565, Khusro composed a letter and sent it to the Constantinopolitan court, and the force of this communication was to mourn the departure of his most formidable rival, to open relations with the new emperor Justin II, and to relieve the strain upon the two powers: ‘… May you receive many rewards from the late Caesar, and may Christ befriend your soul. I have heard that you sit upon his renowned throne, and that you have

272

Felföldi, S., “A Prominent Hephthalite: Katulph and the Fall of the Hephthalite Empire,” Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae, Volume 54 (2–3), 2001, p. 193. 273 Menander Protector, frag. 4.1; frag. 10.1.16–18. 274 Menander Protector, frag. 4.1; frag. 10.1.19–20. 275 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 240.

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THE LAST EMPIRE OF IRAN re-established its glory. Ask of us whatever you require, whether horses, armour, treasure, or armies’. 276

The Shahnameh appears to preserve the indigenous Iranian attitude to the new emperor. Justin II (who is wrongly described as the foolish and inexperienced son of Justinian) received Khusro’s envoy with great disrespect, and ignored the letter. 277 The emperor’s advisers prepared a haughty and disdainful speech which the boy Justin pronounced before the Iranian envoy, who returned to Ctesiphon and communicated to Khusro the offensive bluster which he had heard at Constantinople. Khusro’s reaction was a vow to punish the empire of Rome. 278 Such, according to Ferdowsi, was the scene in which relations between the two great powers deteriorated into a state of war in the year 572. Although the account of the Shahnameh is not entirely mendacious, the real cause of the war was altogether different.

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CHINESE SILK To understand the failure of the peace of 562, we must return to the Asiatic steppe and to the empire of the Turks. From the year 557 onward, the rival dynasties of Zhou and Qi had vied for control of northern China, and each believed that the intervention of the Turks would decide the contest. One hundred thousand rolls of silk was the price by which each Chinese antagonist purchased first the neutrality, and at length the assistance, of the Turks. 279 That income accumulated over the course of a decade and by the end of the 560s it would have amounted to somewhat more than two million rolls of silk. A Chinese peasant might have exchanged one roll of plain silk for one hundred and thirty-two pounds of rice, and the value of a roll of patterned silk, preferred by the nobility, surpassed two hundred and twenty pounds of that grain. 280 But we may form a better idea of the value of the Turkish surplus of silk with reference to Roman figures, since the price of that fabric had been fixed by the emperor Justinian. 276

Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 6160–6163:

Mine is a loose translation. 277 Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 6169: 278

279 280

‫مسی�ا روان تو را یار باد‬ ‫��س�ی بیاراس�ی ��ت اوی‬ ‫ز اسب و سلیح و ز گنج و سپاه‬

Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. 6180–6183:

����‫��ان نامه پادشا نن‬

‫��انگ��م آ�� ز آباد بوم‬ ‫به آذر گشسب و ���ت و ک��ه‬ ‫ز گنج �هن ��کند گ�و پوست‬ ‫���ل جهان باد �� من ��ام‬

The evidence for this is in the Zhou shu (Chinese Annals, p. 13). Vainker, S. J., Chinese Silk: A Cultural History, 2004, p. 47–48.

‫ز قی�� تو را ��د ��یار باد‬ ‫شنیدم �� �� نامور ��ت اوی‬ ‫ز ما هرچ با�� ز ن��و ��واه‬ ��‫ی�� �ای دورش فرود آور‬

‫ک�� ز�ن سپس روم را نام شوم‬ ‫به ��دان پاک و ��ورشید و ماه‬ ‫�� �� هرچ در پادشا�ی اوست‬ ‫��ا�� ��تیغ ما رانیام‬

VI. THE IRANIAN RECOVERY

223

If we assume that a roll of silk weighed about three and a half Roman pounds, and that the price of a pound of that material remained at eight pieces of gold, then the value of two million rolls of silk would have been about fifty-six million gold pieces. 281 Accordingly, the traders of Sogdiana advised their Turkish masters to seek a new market for that expensive commodity, and they began with an embassy to the court of Khusro in the year 568. In the minds of the Turk’s Sogdian colleagues, that extraordinary quantity of silk and its exorbitant value took on the form of a potent economic and diplomatic weapon which they aimed at the heart of the Iranian economy and their Indian competitors. 282 The scale of the threat may perhaps be judged by the reaction of Khusro, who denied the Sogdians entry into his domestic markets. The commercial policy of Iran was evidently to preserve at all cost the monopoly upon maritime trade with India, and after much deliberation Khusro announced his rejection of Turkish silk with a provocative and insulting gesture. The Sasanid king, says Menander, followed the counsel of that mysterious Hephthalite refugee Catulph, who advised that all the silk which the Sogdians had offered be purchased at a fair price and then incinerated before the eyes of the merchants who had sold it. Maniach (the chief Sogdian envoy) and his fellow ambassadors returned to their country greatly displeased by those events at the court of Khusro. 283 A later embassy, which involved only Turks, came to a worse end: all but three or four of their envoys were poisoned on the advice of Catulph, but official propaganda blamed their deaths upon the stifling aridity of Ctesiphon. 284 That narrative of Menander the Guardsman is surely founded upon the Turkish account of events at the Iranian court. Khusro’s ostentatious rejection of two embassies was the foundation of the commercial and military union of the Turkish and the Roman empires. The lurid details of Khusro’s refusal were communicated to the emperor Justin II in the circumstances of the embassy of the year 568, and a part of Menander’s history was founded upon the official record of that meeting. But the counsel of Catulph has received undue significance. We can scarcely believe that the advice of that Hephthalite renegade prompted the collapse of peaceful relations between Iran and the Turks. We may with greater probability infer that it was the policy of the Sogdians and Turks to antagonise Iran, to form an alliance with Rome, and to set the two great sedentary powers at war. 285 Two important bodies of evidence corroborate this inference. 281

One gold piece was one seventy-second of a pound, we can compute the price at just under eight hundred thousand pounds of gold. 282 de la Vaissière, É., Histoire des Marchands Sogdiens, p. 205–207. 283 Menander Protector, frag. 10.1.1–26. 284 Menander Protector, frag. 10.1.27–47. 285 Howard-Johnston, J. “The Sasanians’ Strategic Dilemma,” p. 49.

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I. It was surely obvious that Sogdian entry to the Iranian silk trade would have been refused. Iranian treaties with Rome had always specified, or had attempted to specify, the places where trade was to occur, for the threat of espionage under the guise of commerce was keenly felt by both great powers. The same reasoning would have applied, but with greater force, to the alliance of the Sogdian merchants and the Turkish khaghan. 286 II. The embassy of Maniach the Sogdian appeared in Constantinople late in the year 568 with the express purpose of forming an alliance against a mutual enemy. Justin II received from the embassy the gift of silk, and Maniach presented a letter which described the political order of the Turkish empire and its division into four principalities, and which introduced Istemi, the junior colleague of the supreme khaghan Muqan. This embassy, as we have already noticed, boasted of the Turkish defeat of the Hephthalite empire, and declared their eagerness to form a commercial and military alliance with Rome. 287 ‘We are most ready’, the ambassadors added, ‘to war down the enemies of the Roman state who mass upon their territory’. 288 In the following year, the Roman general Zemarchus and Maniach departed for the court of Istemi, where the Turkish and Roman powers formed an offensive alliance against the empire of Iran. 289 Lavish feasting cemented that new relationship. Turkish diplomacy aimed to display the power and opulence of their khaghan, who himself reclined ostentatiously upon a couch of gold. An Iranian ambassador who was present at the last of the banquets attempted to rebut in uncouth language the vehement abuse which Istemi heaped upon his nation. 290 The Iranian embassy departed, and (we may assume) communicated to Khusro what they had heard: Istemi had begun to meditate an attack upon the empire of Iran. Khusro and his ministers resolved to forestall this assault, and to exclude Roman participation from it, by intercepting Zemarchus and his colleagues on their journey to Constantinople. The Kuma river flows northeast from the Caucasus into the Caspian Sea, and in a wooded place near a part of that river, four thousand Iranian troops lay in wait for the Roman embassy. But with the aid of the Ugur tribe, who were vassals of Istemi, Zemarchus avoided the Iranian ambush, and proceeded through many lesser dangers to Constantinople. 291 The emperor Justin 286

Howard-Johnston, J., “The India Trade in Late Antiquity,” p. 297–298; de la Vaissière, É., Histoire des Marchands Sogdiens, p. 225–228. 287 Menander Protector, frag. 10.1.58–95. 288 Προστίθεσαν δὲ ὡς καὶ ἑτοιμότατα ἔχουσι καταπολεμῆσαι τῆς Ῥωμαίων ἐπικρατείας τὸ δυναμενές, ὁπόσον ἐς τὴν κατ᾽ αὐτοὺς ἀγελάζονται ἤπειρον (Menander Protector, frag. 10.1.86–88). The strange verb ἀγελάζεσθαι must mean literally ‘to herd together’. 289 Menander Protector, frag. 10.2–3. 290 Menander Protector, frag. 10.3.74–89. 291 Menander Protector, frag. 10.4–5.

VI. THE IRANIAN RECOVERY

225

was delighted by the formation of the Turkish alliance, and he began to suppose that the power of Iran would easily be destroyed. 292

TROUBLE IN ARMENIA The Roman orient once trembled at the name of Khusro, but the destroyer of Antioch and the monarch who had survived the pestilence had bowed before the demands of the merchants of the Indian Ocean. Now the Persian king and his court seriously contemplated the ruin of Iran. The alliance of their great sedentary and nomadic foes assumed an aspect more menacing than that of any former antagonist, and the first signal of Roman aggression was an uprising in Armenia. Votaries of Christ among the nobles of Iranian Armenia would perhaps always claim to be aggrieved at the rule of the servants of the Sasanian king, and to be oppressed by the real or apparent imposition of Zoroastrianism. But in the year 571 the behaviour of the Iranian governor, whom Khusro had installed there, was especially grievous and offensive. According to the Armenian history of Stephen of Taron, the Iranian governor Chihor-Vshnasp of the House of Suren, showed no respect to the noblemen of Armenia, and he was accused of philandering with their wives. 293 Three Roman authors also attest an effort to erect a temple of fire, and this project was interpreted as a plan to enforce Zoroastrian worship upon a Christian people. 294 Enraged at such offenses, Vardan Mamikonean slew Chihor-Vshnasp, fled to Constantinople where he formed an alliance with the emperor Justin. The testimony of the ecclesiastical historian Evagrius reverses the order of those events, but confirms the Roman assistance to Vardan and his fellow dissidents, 295 and the writer Theophylact Simocatta implies that the Armenian uprising was prompted by Roman interference. 296 The court of Khusro would have justly complained that the foreign policy of Justin was illegal. Detaching the allies of either great power was repugnant to the spirit of the treaty of 562 which rigorously prohibited defections and emigration in time of peace. The treaty of 363, moreover, had forbidden the king of Armenia from making common cause with Rome against an Iranian opponent; and the force of that agreement was to confine both powers to their respective spheres of influence. But the astonishing answer of the Roman emperor was to announce the premature expiry of the treaty of 562 and a return to a state of war. He added that it would have been impossible for the Romans to reject the defection of fellow Chris292

Menander Protector, frag. 13.5. Stephen of Taron, 84.23–86.7. This text mistakenly places the rebellion in the reign of Justinian, but the emperor Justin II is meant. 294 John of Ephesus, Historia Ecclesiastica, II.20.81–84; Michael the Syrian, X.i; Theophanes of Byzantium. 295 Evagrius, Historia Ecclesiastica, V.7. 296 Theophylact Simocatta, III.ix.9. 293

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tians 297 – an indication that the government of Justin was determined to renew the war even on a specious pretext. A Roman attack was nevertheless not immediate. Evagrius claims that Justin made no preparation for war apparently because he was addicted to luxurious and dainty living. But the truth is that the Romans had hoped to use an Iranian military crackdown in Armenia as a pretext for invasion. In this atmosphere of religious tension, it cannot be a mere coincidence that Khusro directed a Christian ambassador to dissuade the Roman emperor from attacking Iran. Sebokhth (that was the name of the envoy) was instructed to feign ignorance of the Armenian revolt, and to demand the payment of gold stipulated by the treaty of 562 after the passage of ten years. 298 As the Iranian ambassador prostrated himself before the emperor, the cap which he wore upon his head fell to the ground, and the emperor and his ministers were buoyed up by that apparent omen of victory. 299 Justin probed the Iranian ambassador for a sign that Khusro had begun a military intervention in Armenia. Although Sebokhth admitted that he had heard of a small disturbance there, he begged the emperor not to disrupt the present disposition of that country. 300 A common religion espoused alike by Rome and Armenia was a weak pretext for war, and Sebokhth warned that an invasion of his country would reveal that the religion of Christ was a matter of general belief in Iran. 301 Should the Romans prevail in a war (the ambassador argued), killing fellow Christians would compass their own ruin. 302 But the emperor Justin was determined to strike at Iran with overwhelming force. ‘If the king of the Persians attempts to move one finger, I shall move my arm’, he said; and with this strange threat, the emperor looked forward to installing a new king upon the Iranian throne. 303

THE OUTBREAK OF WAR IN 572 The events of the war may be reconstructed from intermittent notices in the histories of Theophylact Simocatta, John of Ephesus, and Menander the Guardsman. 304 These sources describe the Armenian uprising and the events which unfolded along the border between the empires of Iran and Rome, but Turkish campaigns in the 297

Ἐπεγκαλοῦντα τοίνυν περὶ τούτων Χοσρόην Ἰουστῖνος ἀπεπέμπετο, λέγων πεπεράσθαι τὰ τῆς εἰρήνης, καὶ μὴ οἷόν τε εἶναι Χριστιανοὺς ἀπορίψαι ἐν καιρῷ πολέμου Χριστιανοῖς προσρύεντας (Evagrius, Historia Ecclesiastica, V.7). 298 Menander Protector, frag. 16.1.1–9. 299 Menander Protector, frag. 16.1.17–24. 300 Menander Protector, frag. 16.1.31–42. 301 In fact, Menander’s assertion is that the Christian religion was believed in by everyone (Menander Protector, frag 16.1.47). 302 Menander Protector, frag. 16.1.43–49. 303 Menander Protector, frag. 16.1.51–57. Howard-Johnston, J. “The Sasanians’ Strategic Dilemma,”, p. 50–51. 304 Cf. Howard-Johnston, J. “The Sasanians’ Strategic Dilemma,” p. 52–53.

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east are wholly obscure. Some important details may be extracted from the Persian royal tradition, which alleges that Saracens massed upon the southern border of Iran and launched raids into lower Mesopotamia. 305 Iranian strategists were forced to contend with attacks on all fronts. Their counsel was to confront the Roman army directly in northern Mesopotamia, and then to throw the full weight of Iranian arms against the Turks in the north-east. 306 But the first priorities were to secure Armenia and the Arabian frontier. I. Iranian foreign policy in Armenia in the 570s is obscure. But we may trust the words of the ambassador Sebokhth when he implied that recent disturbances were likely to be resolved. By the end of the year 572, we read of no further troubles, nor is there evidence of a general insurrection of Christian peoples throughout the Transcaucasus as there had been in the fifth century. II. Sasanian diplomacy was exerted to suborn the Ghassanid allies of Rome. At that time, they were commanded by Mundhir, who had lately carried war deep into the territory of the rival Lakhm. At the behest of the Iranian government, the Lakhmid king Qabus retaliated and inflicted a severe defeat upon Justin’s vassal. 307 Thereafter Mundhir and his armies refused to fight for Rome, and the empire of Iran ceased to fear the Ghassan. John of Ephesus, who is the source of these events, has reversed cause and effect so as to obscure the treason of Mundhir, a fellow monophysite Christian. An imperial order for the execution of that Arab is said to have prompted Mundhir’s inaction, 308 but it was surely the just response of a government enraged at his submission to Iranian influence. Mundhir is said to have asked the Roman emperor for gold with which to hire more troops; and when this request was denied, an Iranian bribe may have persuaded him to allow the safe passage of the armies of Khusro. 309 This was in the year 573. III. Suborning the Ghassan was but one part of a larger plan of securing the Arabian Peninsula which had begun earlier. The Iranian annexation of the Yemen should be understood as the most important part of this policy. The circumstances of that conquest were fortuitous. The ruler of Himyar, Sayf bin Dhu Yazan, had complained to the Roman emperor Justin II of the Ethiopian occupation of his country, but an embassy to Constantinople was rebuffed. 310 Diplomatic contact was immedi305

Tabari, v. 2, p. 174 with the analysis of Howard-Johnston, J. “The Sasanians’ Strategic Dilemma,” p. 52. 306 My analysis of this war follows Howard-Johnston, J. “The Sasanians’ Strategic Dilemma,” p. 53–57. 307 John of Ephesus, Historia Ecclesiastica, VI.3. 308 John of Ephesus, Historia Ecclesiastica, VI.4. 309 Cf. Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and His Historian: Theophylact Simocatta on Persian and Balkan Warfare, 1988, p. 257–258. 310 Tabari, v. 2, p. 139.

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ately opened with the Lakhmid court at Hira and at length Khusro’s vassal Nuʿman brought the plea of Sayf before the court at Ctesiphon. According the legendary account in the history of Tabari, eight hundred men were released from prison and entrusted to the command of one Wahrez. 311 Two hundred men perished on the voyage, but those who remained fought and defeated the Ethiopian army of king Masruq, that monarch was slain, his people were expelled from southern Arabia, and the banner of the Sasanid monarch was raised above the city of Sanʿa. Sayf was made viceroy of the Yemen, and he was charged with collecting the poll and land taxes which were to be paid to Khusro annually. 312 On the evidence of Theophanes of Byzantium, we may situate the conquest of the Yemen in the year 570. 313 IV. The threat posed by the outer world of the nomad was felt keenly within Iran, and for a moment it was Khusro’s greatest care to ensure that the defences of the empire could withstand a Turkish attack. 314 Presents and the gift of rings affirmed the loyalty of Khusro’s Caucasian vassals, a large military display announced the monarch’s resolve to defend them, and the fortifications of the Caucasus were strengthened. The result of this, according to a fragment preserved by Ibn Miskawayh, was the defection of a Turkish chieftain, some of his generals, and two thousand companions. It was their solemn duty to garrison and defend the fortresses of the Caucasus, and in return the Iranian state granted them provisions and, we may assume, allowances. V. Khusro’s attraction of Turkish defectors was surely an attempt to weaken, or to destroy the alliance between Rome and the Turks, and the biography of Khusro announces the success of that venture. Another fragment preserved by Ibn Miskawayh situates what is perhaps Khusro’s greatest diplomatic triumph in the thirty-seventh year of his reign, or the year 568. 315 Four Turkish tribes are said to have submitted themselves to the Iranian monarch, begging his forgiveness for a past transgression – a possible reference to previous predatory raids into Iran at the behest of Rome. 316 Fifty-thousand Turks, including men of fighting age, their wives, 311

Tabari, v. 2, p. 140–141. Tabari, v. 2, p. 141–142. 313 Theophanes of Byzantium; de la Vaissière, É., Histoire des Marchands Sogdiens, p. 224; Shahid, I., Byzantium and the Arabs in the Sixth Century, p. 364–366. 314 The Turks are here invoked, anachronistically, under the name of Khazar (Ibn Miskawayh, Tajarib al-Umam, v. 1, p. 134; Grignaschi, M. “Quelques spécimens de la littérature sassanide, p. 19). For a discussion of the erroneous use of ‘khazar’, see Zuckerman, C. “The Khazars and Byzantium – the First Encounter,” in Golden, P. B. / Ben-Shammai, H. / Róna-Tas, A. (eds), The World of the Khazars: New Perspectives. Selected Papers from the Jerusalem 1999 International Khazar Colloquium, 2007, p. 402–403. 315 Jackson Bonner, M., Three Neglected Sources, p. 85; 106. 316 Ibn Miskawayh, Tajarib al-Umam, v. 1, p. 136–137; Grignaschi, M. “Quelques spécimens de la littérature sassanide, p. 23–24). 312

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their children, and their slaves, passed through the defences at Darband, and were settled within Iran. Estates, high ranks, wages, and provisions were bestowed upon those Turks, who were apportioned amongst the cities and fortresses of Iran, amongst which special mention is made of the garrison city of Marv, the region of the Alans, and Azarbaijan. Later, in about the year 570, a high-ranking Turkish chieftain, whom Ibn Miskawayh fails to name, dispatched to the Sasanid king a letter which asked forgiveness for a previous act of treason and which pledged future loyalty to the empire of Iran. 317 The response of Khusro was to upbraid that Turkish chieftain on the ground that Roman coercion could not excuse his behaviour. It seems, however, that a peaceful relationship was re-established between the Turks and the empire of Iran, and Khusro endured no further aggression from Central Asia. There is later evidence of tribute paid to the Turks in the form of money 318 and two thousand virgins taken as prisoners of war, 319 but the text preserved by Ibn Miskawayh draws a veil over the diplomatic contact and the negotiations which surely preceded the disintegration of the Turkish and Roman alliance.

THE WAR IN MESOPOTAMIA When the war began, the Iranian state must have entrusted the defence of the east to the garrisons of Marv and Nishapur and their huge detachments of cavalry. The enormous rampart and towers of the wall at Gurgan would have seemed impregnable, and there may be some truth to the legend, reported by Tabari, that the mere sight of the wall filled the Turks with dread. It is also possible that tribute money paid to the Turks softened the inevitable attack. 320 But Khusro’s highest objective was to carry war into the west, and to intercept Roman forces which had already appeared in Mesopotamia. A small raid into Arzanane was the only Roman accomplishment of the year 572, and the general Marcian was preoccupied with matters of recruitment and supply. 321 No invasion on a large scale would be possible until the following year, and this interval gave the Iranian government sufficient time to form their plans for war. Early in the new year, the Roman army advanced toward Nisibis, which they attempted to besiege. An Iranian force was defeated at Sargathon, eight miles to the west of that city; but the fortress of Trebothon, thirty miles to the south-east, resisted a Roman siege, and the army of Marcian retreated after ten days. 317

Ibn Miskawayh, Tajarib al-Umam, v. 1, p. 137–138; Grignaschi, M. “Quelques spécimens de la littérature sassanide, p. 24–25. 318 Theophylact, III.6.10–11. 319 John of Ephesus, Historia Ecclesiastica, VI.7. The virgins, however, never arrived because they threw themselves into a river. 320 Theophylact Simocatta, III.6.10–11. 321 Evagrius, Historia Ecclesiastica, V.8.

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The Roman government and military command were soon to be taken utterly by surprise. They had been deprived of reliable intelligence after the defection of their Ghassanid ally, and Iranian disinformation had persuaded the Roman court to believe either that Khusro was dead, or that he should soon expire. 322 But, crossing the frontier at Circesium, Khusro advanced up the Euphrates with astonishing speed. A small detachment of troops was entrusted to the Iranian general Adurmahan, who began to ravage the undefended countryside of Syria. The Roman army trembled to behold the sudden appearance of the Persian king and his army before the walls of Nisibis. 323 The Roman host was overwhelmed by fear, and Khusro pursued them to Mardin. The arms of Adurmahan put the city of Apamea to fire and sword, and he is said to have carried off two-hundred and ninety-two thousand persons into captivity. 324 Meanwhile, Khusro began the siege of Dara. Roman engines, captured from the vicinity of Nisibis, were turned against that fortress, and after nearly six months Dara had fallen. 325

TRUCE IN MESOPOTAMIA Khusro had inflicted a humiliating defeat upon his Roman enemy. The loss of Dara to a monarch who was lately believed to be dead was received with such alarm that the emperor Justin fell into a madness from which he never recovered. 326 His wife, the empress Sophia was made regent together with general Tiberius. Khusro opened the negotiation of a truce. In the opinion of Menander the Guardsman, Roman humiliation ensured that they should be willing to end the fighting on almost any terms; but the government of Justin, which had begun the war, would not beg for peace. An envoy of the Roman government agreed to an armistice of one year purchased with the sum of forty-five thousand pieces of gold. 327 Khusro and his ministers had wanted a longer truce; and in the following year, the Roman state agreed to a peace of three years and to annual payments of thirty-thousand pieces of gold. 328 Amidst the negotiation, the Iranian ambassador Mahbod instructed the general Tamkhusro to ravage Roman territory: he penetrated as far as Constantina, but 322

Rumour had reached the emperor Justin to the effect that Χοσρόην ἢ τεθνάναι ἢ πρὸς αὐτὰς τὰς τελευταίας ἀναπνοὰς εἶναι (Evagrius, Historia Ecclesiastica, V.9). 323 Theophylact, III.10.6–7; Evagrius, Historia Ecclesiastica, V.9. For analysis, see Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and His Historian, p. 257–258. 324 This was the occasion for the abduction of the two thousand virgins selected by Khusro as a personal gift to the Turkish khaghan (John of Ephesus, Historia Ecclesiastica, VI.7). 325 Theophylact Simocatta, III.10–11.2; John of Ephesus, Historia Ecclesiastica, VI.5–6; Evagrius, Historia Ecclesiastica, V.9–10. 326 Theophylact Simocatta, III.11.3. 327 Menander Protector, frag. 18.1–2. 328 Menander Protector, 18.3–4; 23.1; Theophylact Simocatta, III.12.3–4. For analysis, see Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and His Historian, p. 259–260.

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withdrew at the advance of the Roman general Justinian and his mercenary host. 329 As those two armies glowered at one another across the Euphrates, and even as small skirmishing continued, the negotiations at Ctesiphon were concluded, but Mahbod refused to receive the Roman tribute at the frontier and he compelled the emperor Justin’s ambassadors to bring the money to Nisibis as a symbol of Roman humiliation. 330 But the truce applied only to Mesopotamia and so fighting continued in Armenia. This was in the year 575. 331

KHUSRO’S ARMENIAN CAMPAIGNS The purpose of Khusro’s invasion of Armenia was to re-establish Iranian authority in that country, and he aimed to destroy cities and towns whose allegiance lay with his Roman antagonist. 332 The invasion began in the spring of the year 576. 333 The city of Theodosiopolis was the first object of Khusro’s wrath, but his failure to capture it diverted him westward to Caesarea of Cappadocia. But Khusro lingered, having dismissed Theodore, the Roman ambassador who had accompanied him, and he demanded that the regent Tiberius send a new envoy. Thirty days elapsed and no ambassador appeared. A Roman host, commanded by the general Justinian, thwarted Khusro’s attack upon Caesarea; and the Iranian army turned northward to the city of Sebaste which was instantly exposed to every misery and horror of war, and left a smouldering ruin. But that exemplary act of aggression and terror gave way to an ignominious retreat. The rugged crags of the Armenian mountains allowed Khusro little room to manoeuvre, Roman forces promptly surrounded the Iranian host, and the soldiers of the general Justinian captured the royal baggage train and acquired an immense haul of booty. Khusro descended to the plain of Melitene and that city was put to fire and sword. Some doubtful skirmishes ensued together with an exchange of letters between Khusro and the Roman general. On a sudden, Khusro resolved to withdraw, but the proximity of the Roman forces induced a disorderly retreat across the Euphrates in which half the Iranian army drowned. 334 Khusro and the survivors

329

John of Ephesus, Historia Ecclesiastica, VI.13. Menander Protector, frag. 23.1. 331 I am following the chronology in Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and His Historian, p. 260–262. 332 Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and His Historian, p. 264. 333 Menander Protector, frag. 18.6.66; Theophylact, III.14. 334 John of Ephesus, Historia Ecclesiastica, VI.8; Theophylact Simocatta, III.12.11–14.11; John of Ephesus is perhaps the more reliable witness, and Theophylact has conflated several events which were really separate (Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and His Historian, p. 265– 266). 330

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escaped through Arzanene and the Hakkari mountains. 335 That grim reverse was followed by Roman penetration as far as the Caspian Sea and within the vicinity of one of the royal residences in Azarbaijan.

THE RENEWAL OF DIPLOMACY AND THE DEATH OF KHUSRO Khusro reopened negotiations with the Romans. 336 The Iranian mission involved two high-ranking Persians, one of whom Menander calls Nadoes, and the other was Mahbod who bore the title of Sar-nakhwaragan. The Roman government was represented by the patricians John and Peter, by the former ambassador Theodore, and by a physician called Zacharias. A fragment of the history of Menander the Guardsman records that the discussion touched on the return of Dara, the matter of the Roman tribute, Iranian Armenia, and Iberia. Conferences proceeded for more than a year, despite an interruption when the Iranian general Tamkhusro triumphed over a Roman army in Armenia where one hundred and twenty thousand men were killed and thirty thousand were taken into captivity. 337 Nevertheless, it was the policy of Khusro’s government to prolong negotiations in order to delay any retaliation from their western antagonist. 338 In the winter of the year 578, the Roman general Justinian was dead. His successor Maurice, the future emperor of that name, gathered an army at the fortress of Citharizon in Roman Armenia. But forty days before the expiry of the Mesopotamian truce, the Iranian general Mahbod penetrated the regions of Constantina and Theodosiopolis and captured the fortress of Thanurium in Mesopotamia. 339 Maurice and his forces instantly departed the vicinity of Citharizon in pursuit of Mahbod. At this moment Tamkhusro and his army rushed through Armenia and ravaged the 335

John of Ephesus, Historia Ecclesiastica, VI.9; Theophylact Simocatta, III.14.11. Roman historians seem to think that Khusro passed a law which restricted the Persian king from campaigning, but this is doubtful (Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and His Historian, p. 266– 267). 336 Menander Protector, frag. 20.1.19–29. 337 John of Ephesus, Historia Ecclesiastica, VI.10. Theophylact is at pains to downplay the severity of this defeat (Theophylact Simocatta, III.15). 338 Menander Protector, frag. 20.1–2; John of Ephesus, Historia Ecclesiastia, VI.12. It is possible that the Turks had again begun to threaten Iran at this moment. Throughout those diplomatic wranglings, a Roman prisoner held by Iran attempted to warn the Roman government of the present weakness of the Iranian empire (Menander Protector, frag. 20.1). Asterius (that was the prisoner’s name) may have transmitted information concerning Iran’s north-eastern border and the operations of the Turks which threatened it (Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and His Historian, p. 269). But this is speculative. 339 Menander Protector, frag. 23.1.5; Theophylact Simocatta, III.15.11. There was some question as to the precise date of its termination (Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and His Historian, p. 269 with note 35).

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environs of Amida. 340 The purpose of this raid was surely to disrupt the Roman supply lines from their main fortresses in Upper Mesopotamia, and thereby to delay or forestall an invasion of Iran. But the swift reaction of Maurice was to ravage Arzanene, where he captured ten thousand Syrian 341 Christians, along with several important castles, chief amongst which was the fortress of Aphumon. Roman propaganda held that the destruction of the countryside of Arzanene was so great that it was visible from the windows of Khusro’s summer palace in Carduchia, and the sight of that devastation, as it was said, hastened the death of the Persian king. 342 Early the next year, in February or March, Khusro was dead. 343 The final months of his life had been grim. Though the general Maurice failed to take the fortress of Chlomaron, and the bishop of that city negotiated the Roman withdrawal, the region of Nisibis was devastated by Roman raids, and the Iranian fortress of Singara was lost before the onset of winter. 344 Khusro’s garrisons at Chlomaron, Dara, and Nisibis were too weak to confront the forces of Maurice directly – a sign, perhaps, that Turkish aggression in the north-east had distracted Iranian arms to that distant frontier.

THE REIGN OF KHUSRO I AND THE CHRISTIANS OF IRAN A pious historian, reflecting on the life of Khusro I, composed a surprising eulogy for the Sasanian king. ‘He was a prudent and wise man, and all his lifetime he assiduously devoted himself to the perusal of philosophical works. As it was said, he took the trouble to collect the religious texts of all creeds, and he read and studied them…He praised the books of the Christians above all others, and he said “these are true and wise above those of any other religion”.’ 345

Those are the words of John of Ephesus. The myth of a Christ-loving king of the Sasanid line is also found upon the pages of the most important Armenian writer of the sixth century. Sebeos describes Khusro’s profession of faith, his baptism by the catholicus of Iran, his participation in the mystery of the eucharist before his death,

340 Menander Protector, frag. 23.6; John of Ephesus, Historia Ecclesiastica, VI.14; Theophylact Simocatta, III.15.12–13. 341 The text calls them Nestorian. 342 Menander Protector, frag. 23.7; John of Ephesus, Historia Ecclesiastica, VI.15; Evagrius, Historia Ecclesiastica, V.19; Theophylact Simocatta, III.15.13–15. 343 Theophylact composed a strange disquisition comparing Khusro and Justin who died within about a year of one another (Theophylact Simocatta, III.16.4–13). 344 Theophylact Simocatta, III.16.1–2. 345 John of Ephesus, Historia Ecclesiastica, VI.20.

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and the rites of Christian burial which attended Khusro’s sepulture within the royal tombs. 346 The autobiography of Khusro advertises the erudition of a Sasanid monarch who studied alike the customs of his forefathers and those of Rome and India. 347 Not only did Khusro adopt such foreign customs as might ‘adorn his power’, 348 but he also informed the Romans and Indians which of their practices displeased him. Despite his adherence to the law of Zoroaster, 349 Khusro vaunted his tolerance of all religions, and announced that ‘to know and to follow science and the truth are the greatest ornaments of kings’. 350 This portrait may be corroborated by the description of Khusro recorded by Agathias who claims that that monarch had interested himself in Platonic philosophy, and had welcomed the sages who fled Justinian’s closure of the School of Athens. 351 The claims that Khusro had become a Christian are surely fabulous, but they can only have been invented, believed, and transmitted because Khusro was a friend to the Christians of Iran, and they had become a numerous and important population. The appointment of the urbane and learned Mar Aba as patriarch of SeleuciaCtesiphon was the action of a respectful and indulgent monarch. 352 That churchman had been educated at Nisibis, Edessa, Alexandria, and Athens where he had immersed himself in the philosophy and rhetoric of the Greeks. 353 In his youth he had been a Zoroastrian, and he was as adept in the lore and jurisprudence of the Avesta as he was in the scripture and theology of the Christians. Mar Aba subordinated his vast assemblage of worldly and hieratic learning to the rigours of monasticism, which had inspired him at the School of Nisibis. But his purpose was not to separate the Iranian church and the world of politics, but to unite them; and his vision of an orderly and homogeneous Iranian church compelled him to purge that body of all dissent and all lingering variation. But in Mar Aba’s attitude to the eccentricities of Iranian Christianity, the inflexible ascetic triumphed over the pragmatic bishop. The legal innovations of Mar Aba divided an already heterogeneous mass of custom, practice, and organisation. He outlawed the practice of close-kin marriages which were a Zoroastrian custom imitated by some Christians, he re-established 1205F

1206F

346

Sebeos, p. 69–70. Ibn Miskawayh, Tajarib al-Umam, v. 1, p. 139. 348 Ibn Miskawayh, Tajarib al-Umam, v. 1, p. 139: 347

349

Ibn Miskawayh, Tajarib al-Umam, v. 1, p. 138. 350 Ibn Miskawayh, Tajarib al-Umam, v. 1, p. 139: 351

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Agathias, II.28–83. But Agathias rebukes those who too greatly praised the learning of Khusro. 352 I follow Payne, R. E., A State of Mixture, p. 93–126, although I reject the author’s opinion concerning Mar Aba and the revolt Anush-Zad. 353 Barhebraeus was greatly impressed by the learning of Mar Aba (Barhebraeus, III, p. 89).

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clerical celibacy, and he forbade the participation in feasting. Such efforts of Mar Aba had the effect of extracting Christians from the social life of their country. The establishment of an ecclesiastical monarchy gave the bishop of Seleucia-Ctesiphon universal jurisdiction but failed to win general acceptance and respect. Mar Aba was arrested and put on trial in the year 542. A brief period of confinement within his own abode gave way to a formal exile to Azarbaijan from which he returned in year 551, the year before his death. Mar Aba remains an influential figure and a saint of both the Assyrian Church of the East and the Chaldaean Catholic Church, and there can be no question that Khusro chose a great man as patriarch. But Mar Aba, as it seems, had less political sense than the Iranian government had hoped, and Khusro’s next appointment was Joseph – a patriarch well connected to the Iranian court, and former physician to Khusro, but he achieved little and pleased no one. 354

354

Chronicle of Seert, II(1), p. 176–188; Barhebraeus, III, p. 95–97.

VII. TRIUMPH AND TRIBULATION DEFECTS AND BIASES OF THE SOURCES OF HURMAZD’S REIGN In the reign of Hurmazd IV, the empire of Iran became the dominant power of the Near East. The Armenian insurgency, which had begun in the reign of Khusro I, was pacified, the armies of Rome suffered several humiliations, and a victorious campaign against the Turks drove that enemy from the Iranian frontier and recovered all lands upon the western shore of the Oxus river together with the city of Balkh. 1 The monarch Hurmazd might have been remembered as a worthy son of Khusro, and he might have been commemorated for presiding over an astonishing victory on two fronts against the hostile powers which had assailed Iran from the days of his father. But the Persian royal tradition has covered Hurmazd in opprobrium, and the principal features of his reign have been deformed. The son of Khusro is depicted as the model of an indolent prince, whose moments of leisure were undisturbed by the calamities that assailed his empire. 2 He abused, imprisoned, and murdered a great portion of his nobility, 3 and the ire of the Zoroastrian priesthood was aroused by his refusal to torment the Christians of Iran, some of whom had risen to high station at the Sasanian court. ‘As our royal throne,’ said the son of Khusro, ‘cannot stand upon its two front legs without the two back legs, likewise our kingdom cannot stand or endure firmly if we arouse the hostility of the Christians and votaries of other religions, whose beliefs differ from our own’, and the king rejected his clerics’ desire to persecute his Christian subjects. 4 The laudatory view of Hurmazd, which we find in the Christian Chronicle of Seert, must repose upon the opinions of grateful churchmen who escaped torment, and the high 1

Howard-Johnston, J., “The Sasanians’ Strategic Dilemma,” 2010, p. 56–57. Dinawari, p. 81. 3 Dinawari, p. 80–81; Tabari (v. 2, p. 172) asserts that Hurmazd murdered thirteen thousand six hundred aristocrats and clergymen. Cf. Sebeos (p. 72) who mentions some of the king’s noble victims by name. 4 This is a paraphrase of Tabari, v. 2, p. 173. The Chronicle of Seert confirms the benevolence of Hurmazd towards the Christians of Iran, and the same argument is made, in nearly the same words, in Chronicle of Seert, II(1), p. 196. For a brief, modern analysis, see Payne, R., A State of Mixture, p. 164–168. 2

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honour of the patriarch Ezechiel, and his successor Ishoʿyahb, confirms perhaps the sincerity of a tolerant prince. 5 But such indulgence was a great irritant to the Zoroastrian nobility and priesthood. Only one complaint against Hurmazd appears to be attested in both the Persian royal tradition and the work of a Roman historian. The substance of the grievance was that Hurmazd mistreated a portion of the Iranian military. Although the payment of foot soldiers was apparently ample under the rule of Hurmazd, the writer Tabari claims that that Persian prince deprived the officer class of resources and aroused their profound resentment and hatred. 6 This testimony may be corroborated by the history of Theophylact which asserts that Hurmazd reduced the army’s pay by one tenth. 7 The resultant discontent within the Iranian army, and amongst its commanders, gave way to a rebellion which nearly overturned the rule of Hurmazd in the year 590. To the stinginess of Hurmazd we may add the doubtful claim that he was descended on his mother’s side from the yabghu khaghan of the Turks. 8 In the Persian royal tradition, the invocation of the king’s Turkish ethnicity became a rallying cry of the rebels who overthrew him, and their insult reposed upon an alleged marriage alliance between Khusro I and a daughter of the khaghan. According to the elaborate account of Ferdowsi, an Iranian minister, by the name of Mihran-Sitad, completed the perilous journey to the court of the khaghan, where the marriage alliance was ratified, and the grateful khaghan evacuated Sogdiana, Samarqand, and Chach, and ceded those lands to Khusro. 9 Close examination demonstrates, however, that this narrative cannot be trusted. I. It is inconceivable that a marriage alliance, by virtue of which the khaghan gave up his daughter to the Iranian king, could have persuaded the Turks to cede to Iran a large portion of the territories lately wrested from the Hephthalite Huns. The ruin of the Hephthalite empire gave way to Turkish supremacy throughout Central Asia and along the north-eastern flank of Iran. Why would the khaghan have then transformed himself into an Iranian vassal? II. The silence of contemporary, or nearly contemporary sources, is a convincing reason to reject claims of any sort of Persian and Turkish marriage alliance. The autobiography of Khusro I, persevered by Ibn Miskawayh, suggests an association between the Sasanid king and fifty thousand Turks who had been settled within Iran. Those Turks were supposedly divided into seven groups, and Khusro gave estates and wages to all their chieftains. But no marriage union is mentioned or sug5

Chronicle of Seert, II(1), p. 195–196. Labourt, J., Le christianisme, p. 197–207. Tabari, v. 2., p. 173. 7 Theophylact, III.16.13. 8 Dinawari, p. 76; Tabari, v.2, p. 173. 9 Ferdowsi, Nushin-Ravan, l. l. 2062–2065; 2152–2252; 2282–2284. 6

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gested, and the Turks who came to Iran in 568 lacked a single leader. 10 Nor is a marriage union mentioned by Menander, or at least not in the fragments of his work that have survived, nor is it included in Chinese annals, which are otherwise interested in Turkish marriage alliances, even when external powers are involved. 11 Most astonishing of all, it is not even mentioned in the History of the Caucasian Albanians, 12 where we would have expected to find it. In this text Khusro II addresses himself to the king of the Turks, alleging close, familial ties between his house and them, but the Persian king fails to mention that he was the grandson of a Turkish khaghan. III. Finally, the historian Dinawari mentions that Khusro I dispatched his son Hurmazd at the head of a great army against the Turkish khaghan, and the Turkish advance into Iran was thereby halted. 13 If Hurmazd had been the product of a Persian and Turkish marriage alliance, he cannot have been born before that alliance was contracted. This error is also found in the history of Tabari, and it appears that that author recognised this problem and supplied the impossible claim that Hurmazd had been born to Khusro and the khaghan’s daughter long before the Hephthalite war, and before the appearance of the Turks. 14 The origin of Hurmazd’s Turkish ancestry is perhaps a misunderstanding of the marriage between Khusro I and a daughter of the Hephthalite king. The writer Sebeos makes Hurmazd the offspring of such a union, 15 and the claim is far from implausible, for a Hephthalite princess was the wife of Khusro’s father Kavad, and the Hephthalite thraldom of Iran lasted until the mid 560s when the Turks overthrew them. It is possible to imagine that some of the defects, which I have rehearsed, are not mendacious distortions, but rather exaggerations, of the truth. The reign of Hurmazd terminated in insurrection and civil war, and the Persian throne was shaken first by the rebellion of a general who was not of the Sasanid line and then by the son and brothers-in-law of Hurmazd. The propaganda of two rival factions has therefore left a deep impression upon indigenous Iranian history. If that propaganda 10

Ibn Miskawayh, Tajarib al-Umam, v. 1, p. 136–137. Between 554 and 556, for instance, the Turkish chief, whom the Chinese called Sikin, is said to have promised his daughter to Emperor Taizu of the northern Zhou; upon the untimely death of Taizu, another of Sikin’s daughters was promised to his successor Emperor Gaozu, but this alliance was prevented by the Emperor of the northern Qi, who contracted a marriage alliance with Sikin (Chinese Annals, p. 11). Sikin, whom Liu calls ‘Sse-kin’ should be identified with Muqan khaghan. 12 Moses Daskhurantsi, II.12, p. 88. 13 Dinawari, p. 69–70. 14 Tabari, v. 2, p. 103. 15 Sebeos, p. 72–73. Contra Shahbazi who claims that there may have been a misunderstanding of a union between Khusro I and a Khazar princess (Shahbazi, S., “Hormozd IV,” in Encyclopaedia Iranica, XII, 5, 2004, p. 466–467). 11

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was recorded, it must have been believed; if it was believed, its roots must have been grounded in fact. But the historian must be on guard against reporting the biases of the enemies of Hurmazd without the corroboration of foreign sources. So we may be grateful that the opening of Hurmazd’s reign is covered in the surviving fragments of Menander the Guardsman and the Ecclesiastical History of John of Ephesus – sources which I have already introduced. The histories of Theophylact Simocatta and Sebeos, which cover the remainder of that reign, and those of Hurmazd’s successors, are the principle texts which corroborate or correct the Persian royal tradition. Theophylact was the third and last continuator of the writer Procopius. He was an Egyptian lawyer who held high office in the reign of the emperor Heraclius. Documentary evidence, which abounds in the work of Theophylact, came through intermediary texts: two of these were laudatory biographies of senior generals whose dispatches had served as primary sources. 16 Other texts exploited by Theophylact for the Iranian part of his history were of a more literary cast, but are nevertheless trustworthy. His chief sources in this connexion were the lost history of John of Epiphaneia who covered the approach to war and its beginning in the year 603, and very probably a version of Sasanian dynastic history. 17 An oral source, whom Theophylact calls ‘a recorder of royal memoranda’ 18 within the Iranian chancery, may have been an ambassador to Constantinople in the reign of the emperor Heraclius. The style of Theophylact reveals a man whose greatest care was to involve even the simplest of meanings within the most elaborate swathings of ornate declamation and sententious bombast. Modern criticism has pronounced Theophylact the most affected and stilted of all Byzantine writers, 19 but the churchman Photius put it best: ‘…the excessive use of figurative expressions and allegorical ideas is frigid and shows a childish lack of taste; furthermore his frequently unseasonable moralisin reveals a fondness for excessive and superfluous conceit’. 20 Yet the work of Theophylact is the fullest and most circumstantial source for the reign of Hurmazd. 16

The objects of these putative encomia were the homonymous father of the emperor Heraclius who had served in the east in the 580s, and Priscus who had become a chief senatorial ally of the partisans of the emperor Heraclius towards the end of reign of the usurper Phocas. 17 Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and His Historian, p. xxi–xxv. 18 ἱερομνήμων is Theophylact’s expression (Theophylact, III.6.1), which the Whitbys construe as as ‘sacred official’ (See note 87 in Whitby, M. / Whitby, M., The History of Theophylact Simocatta: An English Translation with Introduction and Notes, Oxford, 1986, p. 101). Precisely what Theophylact means is obscure, and I have employed Frendo’s translation (Frendo, D., “Theophylact Simocatta on the Revolt of Bahram Chobin and the Early Career of Khusrau II,” Bulletin of the Asia Institute, New Series, vol. 3, 1989, p. 77–78. 19 Wilson, N. G., Scholars of Byzantium, 1983, p. 105. 20 The judgement of the patriarch should be quoted in full: Ἡ μέντοι φράσις αὐτῷ ἔχει μέν τι χάριτος, πλήν γε δὴ ἡ τῶν τροπικῶν λέξεων καὶ τῆς ἀλληγορικῆς ἐννοίας κατακορὴς

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The history attributed to Sebeos is perhaps equally veracious and its style less pretentious. The Armenian history of Lazar Parpetsi, which terminates in about the year 484, had given way to the strange silence of Armenian historiography throughout the sixth century, 21 but that silence was broken by Sebeos. The author was a churchman with access to the archives of the Patriarchate at Dvin, and his work runs from about the year 570 down to the time of writing in the 650s, and an interesting supplement was added in the year 661. There is a solid documentary foundation to this history, as well as a clear chronological framework. According to Sebeos, Khusro II is the maleficent figure responsible for the destruction of the old world order, and the collapse of the Sasanid state. The great war of the year 603 was the primary theme of Sebeos’ history, and the author describes it in startling, apocalyptic tones; but a long introduction surveys the most important events of the recent past, including the Armenian opposition to Iranian rule, the death of Khusro I, the insurrection of Bahram Chobin, and the events which followed after the coronation of Khusro II. 22

THE BEGINNING OF HURMAZD’S REIGN As the life and reign of Khusro I drew to an end, the two powers grew weary of war and again sought peace. A spirit of clemency compelled the Roman emperor Tiberius to release as a gift to Khusro the Iranian prisoners of war held in Roman captivity. Amongst them was a physician by the name of Zacharias whom the imperial government dispatched as an envoy to the Iranian court. A former member of the imperial bodyguard who bore the name Theodore was raised to the rank of general and together he and Zacharias received full ambassadorial powers and were instructed to make peace on any possible terms. 23 Menander has preserved the substance of a letter addressed to Khusro by Tiberius who announced his natural friendship towards his Iranian counterpart. That epistle announced the Roman government’s readiness to cede to Iran all Iranian Armenia and Iberia (save only such Persarmenians and Iberians as wished to remain subject to the emperor), together

χρῆσις εἰς ψυχρολογίαν τινὰ καὶ νεανικὴν ἀπειροκαλίαν ἀποτελευτᾷ. Οὐ μὴν ἀλλὰ καὶ ἡ τῆς γνωμολογίας οὐκ ἐν καιρῷ παρενθήκη φιλοτιμίας ἐστὶ περιέργου καὶ περιττῆς (Photius, Bibliotheca, cod. 65). 21 Andrews, T. L., “Identity, Philosophy, and the Problem of Armenian History in the Sixth Century,” in Wood, P., History and Identity in the Late Antique Near East, 2013, p. 29–41. 22 Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses to a World Crisis: Historians and Histories of the Middle East in the Seventh Century, 2010, p. 70–102; Thomson, R. W. / Howard-Johnston, J. / Greenwood, T., The Armenian History Attributed to Sebeos, vol. 1, 1999, p. xxxiii–xxxix. 23 Τιβέριος ὁ αὐτοκράτωρ…ἐφῆκε Ζαχαρίᾳ τε καὶ Θεοδώρῳ καὶ μεγίστων πρέσβεων ἔχειν ἰσχὺν καὶ τὴν εἰρήνην ὡς ἄν οἷοί τε ἔσοιντο διατιθέναι (Menander Protector, frag. 23.8.21– 24).

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with the fortress of Aphumon and the land of Arzanene. There was but a single condition: that the castle of Dara be returned to Rome. 24 The court of Khusro had submitted a reciprocal provision, but the government at Ctesiphon might well have acceded to that one demand and happily received those territories without it. The Iranian envoy Farrokhdad 25 arrived at Constantinople in the winter of the year 579 bearing a letter from the Sasanid monarch, and Menander purports to quote the text of it. ‘If you wished to do what is just, O emperor of the Romans, you would do well to render to us the leaders who plotted the uprising of Iranian Armenia and make them suffer penalties as they are strung up in the borderlands of the Persian and Roman realms. You would also pay to the Persians damages for what occurred there. But if you are opposed to these things, at least do what befits friends: let officials of both states meet at the border and arrange, as far as they are able, a treaty of peace; and so that these matters may move forward, let there be a truce’. 26

That correspondence between Ctesiphon and Constantinople shows that the two powers were prepared to grant significant concessions in exchange for peace. The oft-repeated demand for annual payments of gold was notably omitted, Farrokhdad and the emperor Tiberius agreed upon terms substantially similar to the original Roman proposal, and a truce of two or three months was granted for the ratification of that agreement. 27 But the death of Khusro intervened. ‘The Romans and the Persians would have confirmed the treaty of peace’, says Menander, ‘had Khusro not departed from among men, and his son Hurmazd (a truly evil man) taken up the diadem’. 28 Upon the accession of Hurmazd, the Roman government reiterated the same terms of peace which Khusro had arranged, and a lengthy negotiation ensued. The testimony of Theophylact compresses the interval between the opening of negotiation and the resumption of warfare, and thereby creates the appearance that the failure of diplomacy was almost immediate. 29 But Menander the Guardsman presents the more reliable and detailed portrait of conferences deliberately protracted over the course of several months – a delay which allowed the countryside to recover from Roman depredation, while the Iranian army refurnished with supplies the castles and fortresses of Mesopotamia. 30 Zacharias and 24

Menander Protector, frag. 23.8.15–21. Menander called him Φερογδάθης (Menander Protector, frag. 23.8.49). 26 Menander Protector, frag. 23.8.32–41. 27 Menander Protector, frag. 23.8.42–57. 28 Menander Protector, frag. 23.9.1–3. 29 Theophylact, III.17.3. 30 Menander Protector, frag. 23.8–9. My analysis of this period follows Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and His Historian, p. 271–275. 25

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Theodore endured a procession of irksome delays contrived by the Iranian court; and a confinement of three months within a dark and ill-ventilated room at Ctesiphon amidst the burning heat of summer degraded the envoys of Rome. 31 Small skirmishing continued in Armenia, 32 and the two powers fortified their positions along the river Batman, 33 but the diplomatic stratagems executed at the Persian capital delayed all important military action until the year 580. The Sasanid monarch announced his rejection of the Roman terms at a formal audience with the ambassadors of the emperor Tiberius. Dara would never be retroceded to Rome, nor would any other city which Iran had wrested from her western antagonist. Khusro, as Hurmazd explained, might have been content to return a city which he had acquired, but the new king refused to abandon what he had inherited from his father. The nobleman Mahbod spoke on behalf of Hurmazd and arraigned the arrogance of the Romans, who foolishly expected to receive Dara without a military victory; and he reasserted the Iranian demand for annual subsidies. ‘Let the Romans know’, he declared, ‘that I shall never consent to the peace treaty, unless they are willing to restore the annual payments which we received from the emperor Justinian!’ 34 That reply was followed by the abrupt dismissal of the Roman embassy. According to the testimony of Menander, Zacharias and Theodore were provisioned by their Iranian hosts with an inadequate supply of food, their escorts compelled them to make long delays, and they were led by a disorientating and circuitous route out of Iran. 35 When news of the failed embassy reached Constantinople, preparations began for war.

THE RESUMPTION OF WAR The Roman plan was to carry war deep into Media while Romanophil Saracens harassed and defeated their Iranian counterparts. But no sieges are recorded, and the writer Theophylact describes only violent ravaging throughout the year 580. 36 In the spring of the following year, Roman forces, their Arab allies, and a small navy of supply boats proceeded boldly down the Euphrates with the intention of laying siege to the Iranian capital. 37 Not every error of the disastrous expedition of the emperor Julian was repeated, but the bulk of the Roman army had been drawn into the plain of Babylon and the cities to the north were defenceless against every calamity of war. Roman forces halted in the vicinity of Ctesiphon where the Iranian army had 31

Menander Protector, frag. 23.9.102–117; John of Ephesus, VI.22. Sebeos, p. 71. 33 Menander Protector, frag. 23.9.18–23; John of Ephesus, VI.35. 34 Menander Protector, frag. 23.9.99–101. 35 Menander Protector, frag. 23.9.109–117. 36 Theophylact, III.17.3–4. 37 The most reliable account is that of Theophylact, III.17.5–6. Other sources are John of Ephesus, VI.16–18 and Evagrius, V.20. 32

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severed the bridge across the river Tigris. At this moment the Iranian general Adurmahan appeared in Upper Mesopotamia at the head of a numerous army, which destroyed and burnt everything as far as Edessa and thence southward to Callinicum. The Roman host was compelled to withdraw instantly, and the general Adurmahan vacated his enemies’ line of retreat. 38 Though the writer Theophylact alleges a Roman triumph over Iranian forces, John of Ephesus more plausibly describes an Iranian withdrawal and a contemptuous letter sent from Adurmahan to his Roman antagonist. ‘Although I have heard that you shall fall upon me’, said the Iranian commander, ‘do not trouble yourselves to come, for you are worn out with the weariness of marching. But rest, and I shall come to you’. 39 The text of the letter may be genuine, or it may be an invention calculated to excuse the behaviour of Mundhir whom the Roman government blamed for the failure of the entire expedition. 40 But the real cause of that reverse was Roman indiscipline and the foolish plan to deprive Upper Mesopotamia of troops. 41 The Iranian success of the year 581 compelled Rome to sue for peace a second time in the early reign of Hurmazd. 42 When negotiations collapsed in the year 582, the Iranian general Tamkhusro led an army across the frontier and battle was joined in the vicinity of Constantina. A common soldier whose name is unknown, or perhaps a Christian enthusiast by the name of Constantine, slew Tamkhusro and the dispirited Iranian host withdrew to the Wadi Dara where they remained for three months. 43 Leaving his troops at Constantina, the Roman field commander Maurice returned to Constantinople and was proclaimed emperor on the fifth day of August. Conflict in the Near East mutated into a torpid war of attrition and continued for six years. Reciprocal devastation and sieges afflicted both sides of the Tigris, while the Roman army attempted to rid Arzanene of Iranian influence and control. The position of Iran should have been secured by possession of Dara and the collapse of Rome’s alliance with the Ghassanid Arabs, but the soldiers of Hurmazd failed to achieve anything beyond the defence of their own position. 44 Late in the year 582 the forces of the Iranian general, whom Theophylact calls by his title Kardarigan, defeated a Roman army at the confluence of the rivers Nymphius and Tigris, and that Roman historian blames this failure on exhaustion 38

John of Ephesus, VI.17. John of Ephesus, VI.17. 40 John of Ephesus, III.40–41. Mundhir had achieved, however, some important success against the Lakhmid Arabs, whose capital he attacked and burnt (John of Ephesus, VI.18). 41 Menander describes the lack of Roman discipline (Menander Protector, frag. 23.11.8–12). 42 Menander Protector, frag. 26.1.1–15. 43 Menander Protector (frag. 26.5) blames an anonymous soldier, and John of Ephesus (VI.26) credits the enthusiast Constantine. 44 My analysis of this period follows Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and His Historian, p. 276–286. 39

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and indiscipline. 45 The fortress of Aphumon, lately captured by Rome, was the object of the Iranian war effort in the year 583. But the Roman army instantly formed the siege of an Iranian castle nearby at Aqba, and the soldiers who assaulted Aphumon were drawn away from their objective for the defence of that fortress which Rome at length captured and destroyed. 46

DIPLOMATIC DELAYS The events of the following year can be reconstructed only in vague outline. Chapter headings which have survived the loss of a portion of John of Ephesus’ Ecclesiastical History declare that the government of Hurmazd sued for peace after the fall of Aqba. An Iranian ambassador arrived at Constantinople in the year 584, and the court of the emperor Maurice dispatched an envoy to Ctesiphon in return. But negotiations failed, despite the arrival of a second Iranian embassy to the Roman capital. 47 At this moment, conflict among the Ghassanid Arabs, who were loyal to Rome, shattered that federation into fifteen rival factions, and a portion of them defected to Iran. 48 Here we may perhaps behold the influence Iranian espionage, and the diplomatic exchange with the court at Constantinople was a tactic to delay and distract the Roman state. Meanwhile, the Roman encampment at Monocarton, in the vicinity of Constantina was strengthened as a forward base from which to menace Iran. 49 An Iranian thrust led by the general Kardarigan into the region of Tur ʿAbdin came to nothing when Roman forces penetrated as far as Nisibis and ravaged its environs. That Iranian general retreated eastward in order to expel his antagonists, but the Romans withdrew and avoided battle. 50 In the year 585, Iranian military command formed a bold plan to destroy the Roman base at Monocarton. The general Kardarigan mounted a vigorous, but unsuccessful, siege of that encampment, and then proceeded northwards to the vicinity of Martyropolis where he destroyed the church of John the Baptist and withdrew – most probably to Iranian Armenia. 51 The court of Hurmazd again reopened negotiations for peace in the spring of the following year. Mahbod was dispatched as an ambassador to meet the Roman general Philippicus at the city of Amida, where Iranian terms were disclosed at a military conference. The speech which the writer Theophylact attributes to the envoy Mahbod seems rather an aggressive harangue 45

Theophylact, I.8.4–11. Theophylact, I.12.1–7; John of Ephesus, VI.36. 47 John of Ephesus, VI.37–39. 48 Michael the Syrian, X.xix; John of Ephesus, VI.41–42. 49 Theophylact, I.14.6. 50 Theophylact, I.13.1–12. 51 Theophylact, I.14.1–10. See note 78 in Whitby, M. / Whitby, M., The History of Theophylact Simocatta, p. 41. 46

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than the address of an ambassador, and it is plainly the composition of a Byzantine rhetor. 52 But it is surely grounded in truth. Though the precise figure stipulated by Mahbod is not mentioned, the Iranian demand for gold as the price of peace must be genuine. This demand was communicated to the Roman government, it was refused, and Roman forces again prepared to invade Iran.

THE IRANIAN REVERSE AT SOLACHON The general Kardarigan advanced to meet his western foe. The Roman position at the plain of Solachon required the Iranian host to traverse a waterless desert, and Roman strategists expected the crossing to weaken the soldiers and cavalry of Iran. 53 But a prophecy of the Magi predicted victory and fortified the resolve of the Kardarigan: a train of camels was laden with water-skins, and the Iranian host advanced upon Monocarton. Some Iranian spies were captured, and torture revealed the plans of the general Kardarigan who intended to attack his Christian foe on Sunday. When battle was joined, the Iranian host was thrown into confusion, the Kardarigan fled to a hill top, and the ruins of his army were refused entry at the fortress of Dara whither they had fled. 54 This Roman victory was followed by an incursion into Arzanene, where the Kardarigan and the remnants of his army resisted the Roman siege of Chlomaron. Philippicus, the Roman general, withdrew to Aphumon and thence to Amida; and his efforts to fortify Roman positions in the Tur ʿAbdin plain gave way to an illness which required him to yield command to the general Heraclius. 55 Roman operations of the year 586 concluded with devastating raids into Corduene and Beth Arabaye, 56 and in the following year similar attacks achieved the capture of three Iranian fortresses in the vicinity of Dara. 57

THE ROMAN MUTINY AND THE SUPREMACY OF IRAN This contest in the most heavily fortified portion of the Iranian and Roman frontier might have been protracted to the utter exhaustion of the belligerents. But tension grew within the Roman army, and transformed itself into mutiny at the publication 52

Ἄνδρες πολέμιοι…ὁπλίσατε τὴν εἰρήνην ἀποχειροτονοῦντες τὸν πόλεμον, δόρυ καὶ ξίφος ὡς γεγηρακότα χαιρέτωσαν, καὶ στρατεύσατε σύριγγα πρᾷον ὁμου καὶ ποιμενικὸν περιλαλοῦσαν τερέτισμα, etc. is the preposterous beginning to the speech (Theophylact, I.15.3–10). The Roman listeners are said to have hissed and shouted throughout the ambassador’s speech, to which they might have objected, had it really been pronounced, entirely on aesthetic grounds. 53 Theophylact, II.1.1–7. 54 Theophylact, II.3.1 to 4.14. 55 This is the father of the future emperor of the same name. 56 Theophylact, II.5.1 to II.10.5. 57 Theophylact, II.10.6 to II. 18.1–26.

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of an imperial edict reducing military pay by one quarter. 58 All operations were undertaken with extreme and deliberate slowness or halted altogether between the eighteenth day of April of the year 588 and the ninth day of the same month in the following year. 59 The government of Hurmazd made some important efforts to take advantage of Roman paralysis, and despite a reversal at Martyropolis in the year 588, that city fell by the subterfuge and defection of a Roman officer in the following year. 60 Roman victories in autumn of the year 589, and their seizure of the fortress at Aqba, could not offset Iran’s strategic advantage along her western frontier.

WARFARE IN THE EAST The court at Ctesiphon now turned its attention to the great power which dominated Asia and Europe, and which had menaced Iran since the fall of the Hephthalite Huns. In the decade of the 570s, the advance of the Turks upon the Iranian border had merely been deterred, but the moment to confront them directly was come. 61 Muqan, supreme khaghan of the Turks, had been succeed by his brother Topo; but at the death of Topo in the year 581 a sanguinary contest of succession erupted. The late khaghan had left the throne to his nephew Daluobian – a disruption of the customary succession from eldest to youngest brother and eldest to youngest son. As a result of this apparent abuse, a conclave of Turkish grandees appointed Ishbara, grandson of Bumin who had thrown off the Rouran yoke, and a civil war ensued. The Sui dynasty of China had lately repelled and punished an attack upon its northern border by the forces of Ishbara, but that sedentary power intervened in the Turkish civil war on the side of Ishbara against his cousin and rival Daluobian. In the year 588, Dulan (the son of Ishbara) had inherited the cause of his father against three other rivals, but in the year 595 the final victory went to Tardu son of Istemi. 62 Iranian intervention began in the year 588 when the Turkish throne was disputed by four pretenders.

THE RISE OF THE GENERAL BAHRAM CHOBIN The sources which narrate the period from the accession of Hurmazd to the confrontation between Iran and the Turks are distinguished by the strange retreat of the Sasanid monarch into almost total obscurity. The domineering presence of Khusro I 58

Theophylact, III.1.1. Theophylact, III.1–4. My analysis follows Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and His Historian, p. 286–289. 60 Theophylact, III.5.11–13. 61 I am following the analysis of Howard-Johnston, J., “The Sasanians’ Strategic Dilemma,” 2010, p. 56–57. 62 Graff, D. A., Medieval Chinese Warfare, p. 142–143; Barfield, T. J., The Perilous Frontier, p. 133–138; Wright, A. F., The Sui Dynasty, 1978, p. 188. I owe the first two references to Mr James Howard-Johnston. 59

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has given way to the tenebrous figure of Hurmazd whose throne was to be assailed by an illustrious general of the ancient family of Mihran. Bahram Mihrewandak, 63 or Bahram Chobin 64 as he is called in the Persian royal tradition, had distinguished himself in the armies of Khusro I and had commanded a brigade of cavalry at the siege and capture of Dara in the year 572. 65 His hereditary estates surrounded the city of Rey, and his lineage originated, as it was believed, among the Arsacid kings of Iran. 66 It was Bahram who led the victorious intervention against the Turks in Central Asia – a military exploit which, for a fleeting moment, made the empire of Iran the foremost power of the Near East and which was long remembered in Persian lore. Ibn Nadim, the bibliophile who flourished in the tenth century of our era, prepared a catalogue of books which mentions a work called The Book of Bahram Chobin. 67 The same text is mentioned by the writer Masʿudi whose historical work, known as The Meadows of Gold, includes a narrative of the exploits of Bahram; and all other texts of the Persian royal tradition recount the same tale. 68 The strength of those connections allows us to reconstruct the contents of the lost Book of Bahram Chobin, and it is highly probable that the accounts of Dinawari, Tabari, and Ferdowsi repose upon that vanished text. 69 Nothing whatever is known about the life of Jabala Ibn Salim who is said to have translated the Book of Bahram Chobin from Middle Persian into Arabic. 70 Nor is it possible to explain how or why Jabala’s translation supplanted all indigenous accounts of the reign of Hurmazd; but it is obvious that the tale of Bahram Chobin was profoundly entertaining, for it elevated the conquests and rebellion of Bahram to the level of the legendary conflict between Iran and Turan, and it is infused with aristocratic and chivalrous sentiment. 71 But a great mist of fable and romance sur63

Sebeos, p. 73. Shahbazi provides an interesting discussion of the origin of that name here (Shahbazi, S., “Bahrām VI Čōbīn,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, III/5, 1988 p. 514–522). 65 Theophylact, III.18.10. 66 Theophylact, III.18.6–10. 67 Fihrist, p. 364: 64

.��‫ ����ة جب�� �ن سا‬،‫��اب ��رام شوس‬

As Nöldeke pointed out, ‫ شوس‬is an easy graphical corruption of ‫( شوب�ن‬Nöldeke, T., Die Geschichte der Perser, p. 474). 68 Masʿudi, Muruj al-Dhahab, v. 2, p. 223: 69

.��‫ ا‬،‫للف ُرس ��اب م ُفرد �ي اخبار ��رام جوب�ن وما ك�ن من مك���ه بب��د ال��ك ��ن سار ال��ا‬

See my arguments in Jackson Bonner, M., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 62–63. 70 Fihrist, p. 305: 71

.‫ وك�ن ناق�� ً ا�ى العر�ى من الفرس‬،‫ وقد م�� ذ��ه‬.‫ ك�تب هشام‬،��‫جب�� �ن سا‬

Perhaps the most striking epic feature is the account of the death of the Turkish king. In this connexion, Dinawari’s treatment is spare and we can see the result of his editing (Dinawari, p. 92). Tabari reports that Bahram slew the khaghan with a single arrow. This shot, says

VII. TRIUMPH AND TRIBULATION

249

rounds the edifice of historical truth, 72 and we may be certain only of a few details which are corroborated by the works of Sebeos and Theophylact. It is nevertheless possible to reconstruct the following narrative. The bold expedition of Bahram delivered Iran from the Turkish menace and won him great renown. 73 Before the battle, says Dinawari, representatives of the two antagonists met to parley. The Turkish khaghan, who was confident of an imminent victory over Iran, promised to overturn the throne of Hormazd and to bestow the monarchy upon Bahram. 74 But that general refused the offer on the surprising ground that he was not of the Sasanid line. Warfare ensued, a single arrow discharged from the bow of Bahram slew the khaghan, and the Turkish army was defeated. The son of the khaghan, whom Dinawari calls Yaltikin, succeeded his dead father, and sued for peace with Iran. What followed is yet more doubtful. According to Dinawari, the armies of Bahram and Yaltikin met on either side of the river Balkh near Tirmiz, where the Turks finally surrendered. But the writers Tabari and Ferdowsi declare that the khaghan’s son and successor fled to a distant castle where Bahram besieged

Tabari went down in Iranian lore together with the splendid bowmanship of other famous archers: Arash, the mighty bowman mentioned in Zoroastrian scripture (Yasht 8.IV.6), and Sukhra, who supposedly took revenge on the Hephthalites in the wake of Peroz’ defeat (Tabari, v. 2, p. 174–175). But there were other such features which Dinawari and Tabari left out of their histories. By comparison with Ferdowsi’s Shahnameh, we can see what those prose writers omitted from the original tale. Dinawari makes no mention of Mihran Sitad’s prophecy, uttered whilst on the point of death, that a certain Bahram Chobin would come for the overthrow of the Turks (Ferdowsi, Hurmazd, l. 370–383). There is no mention that Hurmazd gives Bahram the dragon-emblazoned banner of the ancient hero Rustam (Ferdowsi, Hurmazd, l. 512–514). Likewise absent is Bahram’s discouraging nightmare, sent by a malevolent Turkish sorcerer (Ferdowsi, Hurmazd, l. 791–800). Dinawari and Tabari omit the Turkish king Sava’s wizards’ casting terrible spells which fill the air with fire and trouble the Iranians in battle (Ferdowsi, Hurmazd, l. 838), nor do we find in Dinawari anything resembling Firdawsi’s fanciful description of the many arrows shot in the battle between Bahram and the Turks (Ferdowsi, Hurmazd, l. 873). There is nothing about the astrologer who tells Bahram to rest on Wednesday (Ferdowsi, Hurmazd, l. 1050–1052). Nor does Dinawari narrate Bahram’s garden party, held on Wednesday instead of fighting, which the Turks promptly surrounded (Ferdowsi, Hurmazd, l. 1052–1069). Ferdowsi makes Bahram go hunting with Izad Gushasp and Yal Sina, and the three meet a mysterious girl who prophesies that Bahram shall be king of Iran (Ferdowsi, Hurmazd, l. 1415–1471). The passionate speech by Gurdiya, Bahram’s sister and probable wife, who likens Bahram to many heroes of old, is likewise omitted (Ferdowsi, Hurmazd, l. 1560–1606). 72 Cf. the effusive description of the Bahram romance in Altheim, F., “The First Romance of Chivalry,” East and West, vol. 9, no. 3, 1958, p. 129–144. 73 Dinawari, p. 83–84. 74 Dinawari, p. 83:

.‫اخص الناس �ي‬ ّ �‫� ا�يّ ح�ى امل ّكك ��� ا��ان ��ر واجعل‬ ّ �‫ف��ا التقوا ارسل ا�ى ��رام ان ان‬

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THE LAST EMPIRE OF IRAN

him and received his capitulation. 75 Yaltikin and his grandees were then escorted to Ctesiphon, where the monarch Hurmazd welcomed his submission and allowed him to return to his own lands beyond the river Oxus. The testimony of Sebeos and Theophylact confirm Bahram’s victory over the Turks and the conquest of the city of Balkh, but that is all. 76 An immense haul of booty was captured from the Turks. The pompous declaration of Theophylact is that the army of Bahram carried off ‘couches, tables, and thrones of gold, equestrian accoutrements, jars, and everything else that is set forth for the honour of a tyrant’. 77 Dinawari similarly attests to the capture and dispatch of the golden throne of the khaghan and three hundred camel loads of treasure, 78 and Sebeos has compressed those details down to mere invocations of treasure, plunder, and booty. 79 But here our sources begin to diverge. Texts of the Persian royal tradition draw our attention to this great mass of treasure, and connect it with the outbreak of revolt. The catalyst, says Sebeos, was the envy of Hurmazd, who declared, or who had been led to believe, that Bahram had retained most of the booty for himself. 80 Sebeos adds the plausible detail that the plunder had been distributed throughout Bahram’s army, and the attempt of Hurmazd’s forces to retrieve it issued in a brutal massacre. 81 This was the beginning of a rebellion which aimed, in the words of Sebeos, to annihilate the House of Sasan and to place Bahram upon the Iranian throne. The testimony of Dinawari is similar. The mistrustful and suspicious vizier, whom Dinawari calls Yazdan Jushnas, provoked the king’s wrath against his victorious general, and the court of Hurmazd dispatched to Bahram a letter and an ostentatiously insulting gift of a spindle and the belt and necklace of a woman. ‘Prove to me’, wrote the Sasanid monarch, ‘that you have not sent me only a small measure of booty from a great mass of it, or else I shall conclude that it was a mistake for me to promote you. I am sending you a necklace to put upon your neck, and the belt of a woman. Gird yourself with it. As for the spindle, hold it in

75

Tabari, v. 2, p. 175; Ferdowsi, Hurmazd, l. 1108–1314. Sebeos, p. 73; Theophylact III.6.12–14; III.18.12. 77 λαφυραγωγοῦνται γὰρ κλῖναι καὶ τράπεζαι καὶ θρόνοι χρυσοῖ κόσμος τε ἱππικὸς ἀμφορεῖς τε καὶ πάντα τὰ ἐς τυράννων συντεταγμένα τιμήν (Theophylact, III.6.14). 78 Dinawari, p. 84: 76

.��‫وو�َّه اليه ��ل� ال���� ا��هب فبلغ ما و َّ�ه اليه وِقر ثلثمائة بع‬

79

Sebeos, p. 73–74. 80 According to Sebeos, Hurmazd remarks to himself: Ընթրիքն առաւլ մեծագոյն, եւ զնշանն ի պատռոյս ճանաչեմ. բայց յայնչափ սաստիկ գանձուցն ոչ էր արժան այնչափ հասանել յարքունիս (Sebeos, p. 74). In the history of Dinawari, the same sentiment is put into the mouth of a slandering vizier (Dinawari, p. 85): 81

Sebeos, p. 74.

.‫ا��ا ا��ل� ما ك�ن اعظم ا��ا��ة ال�ى م��ا هذه اللقمة‬

VII. TRIUMPH AND TRIBULATION

251

your hand; for perfidy and ungratefulness are the attributes of women.’ 82 Adorned by those offensive presents, Bahram addressed his companions, and a counsel of war resolved instantly upon rebellion. But the History of Theophylact and the Georgian text known as the History of King Vakhtang Gorgasali claim that the rebellion of Bahram began after his return from the east. An Iberian army and its allies had embarked upon an invasion of Albania in the year 588, and the forces of Bahram, who had lately humiliated the Turks, were diverted from Central Asia to confront that new threat. 83 The noblemen of Iberia then asked the Roman state to give them a king, the emperor Maurice complied, and a certain Guaram was installed upon the Georgian throne at Mtskheta. In the following year, a Roman and Iberian alliance undertook a devastating raid into Azarbaijan, and the Iranian host commanded by Bahram responded with a plundering expedition into Suania, where they defeated a Roman army. But the Romans were subsequently victorious, and unspecified female attire was Bahram’s reward for an ignominious defeat upon the shore of the river Araxes. 84 In response, Bahram’s dispatches began to refer to Hurmazd as the daughter, rather than the son, of Khusro I, and civil war began. The consensus of Theophylact and The History of King Vakhtang Gorgasali may appear more plausible than the narrative presented in the Persian royal tradition. The Book of Bahram Chobin, upon which that tradition reposes, would surely have concealed the real reason for the humiliation of its hero, and would have drawn a veil over his defeat in the Transcaucasus. Sasanian legitimist propaganda, however, would have had the opposite tendency, and it may be that all sources are true, but that the history of Theophylact has overstated the significance of Bahram’s operations in Transcaucasia, and mistaken a small reverse for a grievous defeat. 85

THE REBELLION OF BAHRAM CHOBIN The son and heir to Hormazd was yet a boy. Khusro, who had been named for his illustrious grandfather, was nominal ruler of Ran and Movakan, two districts of Iberia near Albania. 86 At the outbreak of Bahram’s revolt, a party of aristocrats at Ctesiphon decided that they could tolerate the rule of Hurmazd no longer, but that they might more readily support the rule of a Sasanian boy than that of an Arsacid man; and so they instantly resolved to depose the king whom they loathed, to set his son upon the throne of Iran, and to invite the emperor of the Romans to intervene upon the side of Khusro and to destroy the rebel Bahram. 82

I am paraphrasing Dinawari, p. 85. Ferdowsi reports woman’s robe, a distaff, some cotton, and woman’s shirt (Ferdowsi, Hurmazd, l. 1378–1381). 83 Theophylact, III.6.1 to III.7.7–19.; The History of King Vakhtang Gorgasali, p. 229–230. 84 Theophylact, III.8.1–3. 85 Cf. Howard-Johnston, J., “The Sasanians’ Strategic Dilemma,” 2010, p. 58. 86 The History of Vakhtang Gorgasali, p. 228.

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THE LAST EMPIRE OF IRAN

Political and religious tensions filled this grim period. The monarch Hurmazd and his court had sustained a war effort on two fronts for more than a decade, and the armies of Iran had cooperated with military policy. But weariness of fighting and a reduction in payment 87 disposed the forces of Bahram to believe that the Sasanid monarch was enraged at the military and that he had threatened to execute the soldiers involved in Bahram’s defeat in the Transcaucasus; and a forged edict announced the curtailment of the customary donative from the treasury to the armed forces. 88 A spirit of mutiny filled the loyalists of Bahram who aspired to overthrow a monarch who was universally hated, and the prospect of the extinction of the Sasanian dynasty forced some to contemplate the end of the world. The partisans of Bahram and the legitimist Sasanian party alike circulated religious propaganda possessing the force of apocalyptic prophecy. 89 The end of the Sasanid line, brought about by the hands of a pretender with ancient royal lineage, was the force of Bahram’s messaging. An apocalyptic passage of the Bundahishn, a Zoroastrian holy book, alludes to a year-long period of Roman rule over Iran, after which ‘a man shall come from the frontiers of Kavulistan, with whom there will be glory, also of the royal family, whom they will name Kay Bahram; and all men will return with him, and he will rule even over India, Rome, and Turkistan, over all the frontiers’. 90 A curious passage of the Shahnameh seems to suggest that Bahram had declared himself to be the living embodiment of the Fire of the Exalted Mithra, and he promised to renew the religion and customs of the ancient Arsacids, from whom he claimed to be descended. 91 To these strange claims the Sasanian legitimists responded with their own apocalyptic prophecies, some of which are preserved in the Middle Persian Zamasp Namak. In this text an unnamed, low-born pretender arises from the east: he seizes power, is ousted by foreigners, and disappears mysterious87

Payment had been reduced by one tenth at the beginning of Hurmazd’s reign (Theophylact, III.16.13). 88 Theophylact, III.18.13–14. 89 Jackson Bonner, M., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 63–64; Czeglédy, K., “Bahrām Chūbīn and the Persian Apocalyptic Literature” in Acta Orientalia Hungarica 8, 1958, p. 21–43. But Czeglédy is surely wrong about the Bahman Yasht, III.14, for that prophecy better fits the circumstances of the Arab rule of Iran. 90 Bundahishn, XXXIII.27. 91 Ferdowsi, Khusraw-i Parvez, l. 344–347: !‫��ا�� ���ن �� بود نام �ى‬ !‫ك�� تازه اي�ن مي��د را‬ !‫چو جنگ آورم آ�� ��كش‬ !��‫��ان آ�� ت�� ��ز�ن م‬

!‫��ر�ى من از پارس آرم به رى‬ !‫��افرازم ا��ر جهان داد را‬ !��‫من از ���ه ى نامور آر‬ !��‫نب��ه جهان جوى ��گ�ن م‬

For some analysis of these lines, see Pourshariati, P., Decline and Fall of the Sasanian Empire, p. 402. The Fire of Exalted Mithra is my construal of the phrase adur burzen-mihr, on which see M. Boyce, “Adur Burzen-Mihr,” Encyclopædia Iranica, I/5, 1983, p. 472–473.

VII. TRIUMPH AND TRIBULATION

253

ly. 92 The unpopular Hurmazd IV, who had been deposed, is called a ‘deaf and blind king’, 93 and the figure who vanquishes the rebel appears under the name Aparvez Khwatay, 94 or Victorious Lord – an obvious reference to the epithet Aparvez, ‘victorious’, which posterity has attached to the name of Khusro II. Political propaganda was diffused by both antagonists also. Hurmazd was half Turk, he was a foreign tyrant, whose rule was unlawful; and his loyal vizier Yazdan Gushnasp was likewise illegitimate. ‘Hurmazd is not king, neither is Yazdan Gushnasp vizier!’ and ‘put your minds at ease from the son of the Turkish woman!’ were rallying cries of the rebels. 95 The king’s heavy-handed and aggressive treatment of his nobility and clergy was transformed into the claim that he had murdered thirteen-thousand six-hundred of them, and cast many others into prison, over the course of his reign. 96 The response of the Sasanian party was to affirm that Bahram was a person of no station, a base-born fool, and an illegitimate upstart. 97

BAHRAM’S ADVANCE UPON CTESIPHON Bahram had taken and held the city of Rey, had advanced to Nisibis where the garrison had defected to him, and had begun to march toward Ctesiphon. 98 It was at Nisibis, says Theophylact, that Bahram’s revolt claimed its first victim. The person whom Theophylact calls Chubriadanes 99 held a high rank within what we might call Hurmazd’s ministry of war; and when the partisans of Bahram encountered him at Nisibis, they cut off his limbs and severed his head and sent them to the court at Ctesiphon as tokens of irreconcilable revolt. 100 The response of Hurmazd was to dispatch an embassy to Nisibis with the instruction to mollify Bahram, 101 and preparations were made to gather the royal treasure, sever the bridge across the Tigris, and take refuge among the Lakhmid Arabs at their capital of Hira. 102 The rebel sta92

‘Then will arise in the land of Khorasan an insignificant and obscure man who will go forth in great power, and with him many men and horses, and sharp lances, and the land will be made his own by violence and dominion. He himself in the midst of his dominion will fail and pass out of sight’ (Zamasp Namak, §58–59). 93 Zamasp Namak, §90; Czeglédy, K., “Bahrām Chūbīn and the Persian Apocalyptic Literature,” p. 34. 94 Zamasp Namak, §64. 95 Dinawari, p. 85. 96 Tabari, v. 2, p. 172; Cf. Dinawari, p. 87. 97 Dinawari, p. 83. An old woman refers to Bahram as (Dinawari, p. 98–99): 98

.���‫�اهل ا��ق ��ّ�ى ا��ل� وليس من اهل بيت ا��مل‬

My analysis follows Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and His Historian, p. 292–293. 99 It is not at all clear to me what Iranian name this may represent. 100 Theophylact, IV.1.4. 101 Theophylact, IV.1. 102 Sebeos, p. 74.

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THE LAST EMPIRE OF IRAN

tioned himself at the crossing of the Greater Zab river along the road running from Mosul to Arbela, and there he received the emissaries of Hurmazd. 103 The general Farrukhan had been instructed to confront the usurper and his faction, but before his departure he made a strange request of the Sasanid monarch. The release of a noble prisoner by the name of Zadspram was considered essential to the success of Farrukhan’s mission, and Hurmazd accordingly permitted it. 104 The writer Theophylact draws our attention to this interesting detail, but fails to explain that Zadspram must have had some important connexion with Bahram. Perhaps Zadspram, by reason of some friendly association with the usurper, could be expected to play an important role in negotiations with him, or it may be that Farrukhan wanted Zadspram to feign defection to an old friend, and to act as a spy. 105 But the influence of Zadspram, whoever he was, failed to dissuade Bahram from his bold enterprise, and contact with that usurper convinced him to abandon Farrukhan and to join the rebellion. 106 A subsequent parley between the forces of Bahram and the soldiers of Farrukhan convinced a portion of loyalist troops to murder their commander and submit themselves to Bahram, and the assassins were members of Farrukhan’s own bodyguard. 107 Let us pause here and note a strange feature of the Persian royal tradition. Neither Dinawari, nor Ferdowsi, mentions a person answering to the name of Zadspram, but they have alike transmitted a curious variation of the narrative of Theophylact. Dinawari reports that at the height of Bahram’s rebellion Hurmazd dispatched his vizier Yazdan Gushnasp to mollify Bahram, and the vizier took with him an unnamed cousin. Tensions between the two men led the vizier to suspect that his cousin was an assassin, and he wrote a letter to this effect addressed to Hurmazd. Discovering and reading that epistle, the cousin instantly slew Yazdan Gushnasp, but when the head of Yazdan was presented before Bahram, the enraged usurper slew the vizier’s murderer, and resolved to place upon the Sasanid throne Khusro, the young son of Hurmazd. 108 Ferdowsi, who had drawn upon the same account, includes the same information, but renames the vizier Ayin Gushasp, and adds the detail that the anonymous man, whom he calls ‘the fellow citizen’, and who accompanied the vizier, had been released from prison for that purpose. 109 The Book of Bahram Chobin, upon which the accounts of Dinawari and Ferdowsi repose, has

103

Theophylact, IV.1.6–8. ὁ μὲν ὀυν Φεροχάνης ἠξίου τὸν βασιλέα Ζαδέσπραν, ὃν ἐν εἱρκτῇ δεδεμένον Ὁρμίσδας ἀπέθετο, τῶν δεσμῶν ἀφαιρεθῆναι καὶ συστρατεύειν ἀυτῷ (Theophylact, IV.2.3–4). 105 Jackson Bonner, M., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 122–123. 106 Theophylact, IV.2.5–7. This, of course, may have been his intention from the beginning. 107 Theophylact, IV.2.8–11; IV.3.1–3. Their names were Zoarab and Shahram. 108 Dinawari, p. 86–87. 109 Ferdowsi, Hurmazd, l. 1791–1857. 104

VII. TRIUMPH AND TRIBULATION

255

distorted the truth so as to salvage the reputation of Bahram. 110 After the defection of Zadspram, as Theophylact says, Bahram may have suspected that man of treachery and killed him. To justify the murder of a friend or relative of the usurper, the story that we find in the Persian royal tradition was invented by partisans of Bahram. The anonymous prisoner betrayed and killed Hurmazd’s vizier, and in revenge Bahram slew him. This, more honourable, cover-up story was then blended with the killing of Farrukhan by his bodyguard – which itself was most probably a counteroperation by Bahram. But what of the remark that Bahram had intended to make young Khusro king? The indigenous historical tradition of Iran avers that Bahram’s original intention was to replace Hurmazd with his son Khusro, and that it was only after the deposition of the father that Bahram resolved to murder the son and to restore Hurmazd to his throne. 111 The testimony of Dinawari and Ferdowsi include the mendacious detail that Bahram began to mint coins bearing the likeness of young Khusro, and that these were distributed throughout the Iranian capital. 112 These claims, which surely repose upon the fables of the Book of Bahram Chobin, were perhaps invented to explain the early specimens of Khusro’s coins which depict a rather simple crown without adornment. 113 The coins of Khusro II were struck because the faction that supported him took power at Ctesiphon before the arrival of Bahram. But the youth of Khurso ensured that the serious business of government would be entrusted to others. Accordingly, it was the uncles of Khusro who exerted every effort to place the son of Hurmazd upon the throne and to rule through him. Binduya and Bistam were descended from the ancient noble family with the name or title of Ispahbuda, and their sister had married Hurmazd. That monarch had imprisoned Binduya, along with other noblemen, for real or imaginary crimes which our sources have omitted. Bistam and his sister achieved the release of his brother and other aristocratic prisoners, and their first task was to depose Hurmazd and to prevent his escape from Ctesiphon. 114 A portion of the late Farrukhan’s troops had fled in confusion; and, reaching the royal capital, they declared all that had transpired in the vicinity of Nisibis, announced the imminent arrival of the usurper, and instantly joined the movement to place Khusro upon the throne of his father. 115

110

Jackson Bonner, M., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 123 Dinawari, p. 89. I am following Jackson Bonner, M., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar alTiwal, p. 117–118. 112 Dinawari, p. 86; Ferdowsi, Hurmazd, l. 1713. 113 Tyler-Smith, S., “Calendars and Coronations: The Literary and Numismatic Evidence for the Accession of Khusrau II” in Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies 28, 2004, p. 43–44. 114 Sebeos, p. 75; Theophylact, IV.3.5. 115 Theophylact, IV.3.6. 111

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THE LAST EMPIRE OF IRAN

THE DEPOSITION OF HURMAZD AND THE ACCESSION OF KHUSRO II If the writer Theophylact may be believed, Hurmazd had bedecked himself in all the trappings of monarchy and seated himself upon the royal throne. Binduya and an escort of soldiers burst in upon the melancholy king, who attempted to address himself to his antagonists. 116 Theophylact fails to record the words uttered by Hurmazd, and, with equal vagueness, Binduya is said to have upbraided the king in aggressive and uncouth language. The attendant soldiers jeered at the Sasanid monarch, and Binduya grasped him by the hand, pulled him from the throne, removed the diadem from his head, and entrusted him to the soldiers for immediate imprisonment. 117 On the following day, Hurmazd declared his intention to address an assembly of the most senior ranks of government. The speech, which Theophylact pretends to record, is plainly the turgid production of a Byzantine lawyer; but it is perhaps plausible that Hurmazd defended his achievements in war against the Turks and against Rome, and promised to abdicate and enthrone one of his sons. 118 The response of Binduya is an imaginary refutation of the remarks of Hurmazd; and at his order, an anonymous son of the king and his mother were slain before the Persian monarch who was forcibly blinded and cast into prison. 119 Such was the grim prelude to the coronation of Khusro II. Theophylact makes the doubtful claim that fear of his own murder had compelled Khusro to flee to Azarbaijan as soon as Hurmazd had been deposed, and that only a binding guarantee of good faith recalled Khusro to the capital for his coronation. 120 Royal homage and acclamations filled the hall of the palace even as Bahram advanced upon Ctesiphon. 121 But here the writer Theophylact takes leave of the truth and implicates Khusro in the death of his father. For a brief moment, says Theophylact, the captive Hurmazd was treated with kindness and Khusro regularly sent his father a share of the royal table. The former king, however, rejected the generosity of his son, employing boorish insults against his servants, and was accordingly beaten to death with clubs. 122 The Persian royal tradition is perhaps more trustworthy and corrects two important errors of Theophylact. 123 I. Dinawari’s text, following The Book of Bahram Chobin, exculpates Khusro II from his father’s murder. The invaluable testimony of Sebeos (who took every opportuni116

Theophylact, IV.3.8. Theophylact, IV.3.11. 118 Theophylact, IV.4.1–18; Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and His Historian, p. 294. The speech prepared by Theophylact seems to be a reminiscence of Herodotus III.80–82. 119 Theophylact, IV.6.1–5. 120 Theophylact, IV.3.13. 121 Theophylact, IV.7.1. 122 Theophylact, IV.7.3–4. 123 Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and His Historian, p. 294–295. 117

VII. TRIUMPH AND TRIBULATION

257

ty to blacken Khusro’s character) makes no accusation of patricide, 124 and so we must suspect the account of Theophylact. The murderers of Hurmazd, says Dinawari, were Binduya and Bistam, who strangled the king with his own turban. 125 The propaganda of Bahram, however, blamed Khusro for the murder of his father. 126 II. According to Dinawari, the royal accoutrements, which had been removed from Hurmazd, were sent to Khusro who had already fled to Azarbaijan at the outbreak of Bahram’s revolt. 127 Khusro is then made to arrive at Ctesiphon almost immediately after Hurmazd’s destitution. Though it is superficially plausible, Theophylact’s account presents a strange chronological problem. If Khusro had fled when Hurmazd was deposed and returned a mere nine days later, as Theophylact implies, Khusro could not have reached Azarbaijan and returned to Ctesiphon in the allotted time. 128 Dinawari’s earlier placement of Khusro’s flight is more credible. Khusro’s absence from the capital would have served three purposes: it would have kept him out of danger; it would have allowed him to deny all involvement in the deposition and murder of his father; and it would have set the stage for a triumphant return to the capital – a spectacle intended to overshadow the chaos and confusion that had gone before.

THE TRIUMPH OF BAHRAM VI The contest between the partisans of Khusro II and Bahram Chobin, which issued in the coronation of a usurper and the flight of the Sasanid monarch, is narrated in great detail upon the pages of Theophylact. 129 Fanciful notices within the Persian royal tradition and those derived from the Book of Bahram Chobin may supplement that minute account, but without external corroboration. The coronation of Khusro II had occurred immediately after the deposition of his father Hurmazd, and the passage of only a few days brought the usurper Bahram to the vicinity of Ctesiphon. On the left bank of the river Tigris, at the crossing of the Nahrawan canal, the rebel army halted and began preparations for an obstinate siege of the royal city. 130 Costly gifts and a royal epistle composed by the partisans of Khusro were dispatched to Bahram, and the double force of the letter was to demand a peaceable end to the present insurrection and to promise the rebel the 124

Dinawari, p. 91; Sebeos, p. 75. Dinawari p. 91. 126 Dinawari, p. 94. 127 Dinawari, p. 86. Hurmazd suspected the involvement of Binduya and Bistam, and commanded their imprisonment. 128 Whitby, M. / Whitby, M., The History of Theophylact Simocatta, p. 106–107 with notes 13 and 14. 129 Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and his Historian, p. 292. 130 Dinawari specifically mentions the digging of a trench and construction of a bridge (Dinawari, p. 89). 125

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second rank in the Empire of Iran. 131 An epistolary exchange ensued, and Theophylact claims to transcribe the haughty reply of Bahram who disdained the offer of the Sasanid, whom he derided as an ignorant patricide; Bahram refused to abandon his claim to the throne, and upbraided the son of Hurmazd for releasing his uncles from prison, but he promised to make the young man a regional governor, provided that he lay aside the crown and vacate the royal palace. It was perhaps the aim of Khusro’s partisans to delay the advance of Bahram, and to postpone a military confrontation; and so the reply of that party expressed a mood of conciliation and flattery: ‘Khusro, king of kings, master of dynasts, lord of nations, ruler of peace, saviour of men, noble and immortal man among the gods and a most manifest god among men, very glorious, victorious, rising with the sun and bestowing eyes upon the night, of distinguished ancestry, a king who hates war, generous, who praises the Bounteous Immortals, 132 and who protects the empire of the Persians, to Bahram general of the Persians and our friend. We have received a reminder of your much talked of bravery; and we rejoiced, knowing that you are well. 133 In your letter you set forth certain expressions which did not come from your heart, but perhaps the secretary (drunk on much wine and encompassed by unmeasured sleep) composed frivolous and monstrous dreams. Yet, since the trees at this time have put off their apparel, and dreams have no power, we are therefore not troubled. We received the royal throne properly, nor have we subverted Persian customs. Those who have been rescued from confinement, we shall not return them thither; 134 for it is not right that a king’s gift be bereft of power. We have taken courage to such a degree that we shall not put off the diadem, so that, if there are other worlds, we expect to rule over them also. We shall approach you who are very like a king, either persuading with words or subduing with arms. If you wish to prosper, give thought to what is needful. Be well, for you shall be our finest ally’. 135

As Bahram pondered this strange letter, forces loyal to the House of Sasan were assembled from the wreckage of Farrukhan’s army and the soldiers whom Khusro had collected on his flight to Azarbaijan. Shahram, Zamerd, and Binduya were en131

Theophylact, IV.7.4–6. The text says ὁ τοὺς Ἄσωνας μισθούμενος (Theophylact, IV.4.5) which is most obscure, or perhaps unintelligible. The two Whitbys could not make sense of this phrase (Whitby, M. / Whitby, M., The History of Theophylact Simocatta, p. 114 with note 28), and I am only guessing. 133 ὑγιαίνετε, which is plural, is grammatically impossible in Greek, but perfectly acceptable in Persian… 134 The text is defective, but the sense is clear (cf. Whitby, M. / Whitby, M., The History of Theophylact Simocatta, p. 114 with note 29. 135 Theophylact, IV.8.5–8. 132

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trusted with the command of that motley army which defended a position behind the Nahrawan canal, and the forces of the usurper were arrayed upon the other side. Skirmishes and sallies followed, as messages were transmitted between the two antagonists. 136 We cannot be surprised that the Persian royal tradition ascribes to Khusro an important role in the fighting, but we can scarcely believe the claim that an arrow discharged from the young king’s bow was refracted by the hauberk of Bahram, and that a second missile laid low the rebel’s horse. 137

KHUSRO RESOLVES TO FLEE The ragged crew of soldiers, which Khusro had assembled in haste, could not have held Ctesiphon against the onslaught a veteran army buoyed up by the confidence of recent victories, and the morale of the loyalist force began to fail. Khusro and his partisans 138 contemplated the ruin of their enterprise and meditated flight. Theophylact’s Iranian informant was perhaps at pains to excuse the behaviour of his countrymen, for he claimed that Bahram refused to induce defections, neither did he employ any form of deceit; but he resolved upon a surprise attack by night, even as Khusro was attempting escape from Ctesiphon. An indiscriminate massacre of the baggage animals and the soldiers of Khusro compelled the survivors to relinquish their obedience to the Sasanid monarch, and to join the rebel. It was at this moment, says Theophylact, that Khusro and his advisers resolved to flee across the Euphrates into the bosom of Rome. 139 But the testimony of Dinawari is different. That writer alleges that Bahram had invited the partisans and soldiers of Khusro to defect to him, on the ground that he would restore the rule of Hurmazd. 140 The deposed monarch yet languished in prison, and it was the inexorable advance of Bahram that compelled Binduya and Bistam to murder him – but only after young Khusro had taken his father’s counsel to seek asylum with the Roman emperor. We may fairly assume that this was the sequence of events presented in the Book of Bahram Chobin, and it must repose upon an official, but mendacious, account disseminated by the court of Khusro II. An entertaining chase takes shape upon the pages of the Persian royal tradition: the young king and his retinue flee to a monastery at Hit upon the Euphrates as a thousand men commanded by a certain Bahram son of Siyavushan pursued them; and Binduya, clad in the garments of the young king, posed as a decoy upon the battlement of the 136

Theophylact, IV.9.1–5. Dinawari, p. 90. 138 Dinawari names the principal loyalists: Binduya and Bistam, Hurmazd Jurabzin, the Nakhoragan, Shapur son of Abarkan, Yazdak, scribe of the army, Bad son of Peroz, Sharvin son of Kamgar, and Gurdi son of Bahram Gushnasp (Dinawari, p. 90). 139 Theophylact, IV.9.6. I am following the excellent analyses of Frendo, D., “Theophylact Simocatta,” p. 84–85, and Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and his Historian, p. 292–297. 140 Dinawari, p. 90. 137

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monastery while Khusro and small band of followers escaped unnoticed. 141 The strange conclusion of this account is that Binduya was arrested, taken back to Ctesiphon, and cast into prison along with his captor Bahram son of Siyavushan who had failed to apprehend the fugitive Khusro. A more veracious account of Khusro’s flight can be reconstructed on the authority of Theophylact and the testimony of two Syriac texts. The first of these is the lost Ecclesiastical History of Dionysius of Tel-Mahre recycled in an anonymous Syriac chronicle composed in the twelfth century; 142 the second is the anonymous Chronicle of Khuzestan, 143 which credibly traces Khusro’s route from Ctesiphon to Peroz-Shapur, and thence to Anat, Hit, and Circesium. 144 The future necessity of flight had perhaps been contemplated for some time, for overtures had been made to an Arab general loyal to Rome by the name of Nuʿman, who was (in the opinion of Dionysius of Tel-Mahre) a zealous votary of Christ. 145 Though it is most unlikely that Nuʿman personally conveyed a letter from Khusro to the emperor Maurice, it is probable that the Arab general facilitated the young king’s passage between Hit and the Roman fortress of Circesium. 146 Khusro and his thirty companions made camp ten miles from Circesium, where Roman authorities were surely prepared for the king’s arrival. A messenger brought word to the commandant of that fortress that the king of Iran sought asylum. Probus (that was the commandant’s name) welcomed an embassy from the Persian king, and invited him and his retinue into the fortress. After the passage of two days, Khusro and his staff composed a message to his Roman imperial colleague, and the commandant arranged its delivery to the court at Constantinople and a copy was dispatched to Comentiolus, the Roman general stationed at Hierapolis. Theophylact purports to transcribe the letter precisely. In the negotiations which framed the Treaty of Nisibis, the Iranian ambassador Afarban had described the two great sedentary powers as two lamps or eyes. In the fifth century, the ambassadors of Iran had invoked the common danger of the northern barbarian, and in his present distress the Persian king employed the same imagery and similar arguments. God had ordained that the whole world should be illumined by the two great powers, whose solemn task was to guide and regulate the 141

Dinawari, p. 91–93. Chronicle to 1234, p. 215. For a brief discussion of this Syriac source see Howard-Johnston, J., Witness to World Crisis, p. 194–195. 143 Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 15–39. On this source see Howard-Johnston, J., Witness to World Crisis, 2010, p. 128–134. 144 Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 15. Contra Sebeos, who claims that Khusro arrived in Antioch (Sebeos, p. 75), Dinawari, who terminates the journey at Yarmuk (Dinawari, p. 95), and the Chronicle to 1234, which places Khusro in Edessa (Chronicle to 1234, p. 215, l. 5–6). 145 Chronicle to 1234, p. 215: l. 24–26. 146 Theophylact, IV.10.4. 142

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affairs of civilised men by controlling their nomadic antagonists. But the empire of Iran had lately been assailed by demons who had subverted the natural relationship between master and slave. The rule of a usurper would entail the destruction of the established order of the two sedentary states, for the ferocious and malevolent nations dwelling beyond the confines of the civilised world would overrun the empires of Iran and Rome. ‘It is then right for your peaceable providence to offer a saving hand to an empire weighed down and overpowered by tyrants; to uphold a state that is on the edge of destruction; to establish within the Roman empire the cause of salvation, as though it were a universal trophy; and to proclaim yourselves founders, saviours, and physicians of the empire of Iran’. The young king then proclaimed himself the suppliant and the son of Maurice, and he invoked the protection of God’s holy angels over the emperor and his dominions. 147 The letter was dispatched, and the emperor and his advisers contemplated the plight of the young Persian king who had placed the fortunes of his House into the hands of his ancestors’ most formidable opponent. From this moment onward, each great power was to become permanently involved in the affairs of the other, and the arbitrary distinction between the history of Rome, and that of Iran, ceases to have further utility. 148

THE PROBLEM OF CHRONOLOGY The narrative, which I have rehearsed, may seem disorderly and confused, for we can establish only with great difficulty the sequence of those momentous events. Only one event may be dated with certainty. 149 The testimony of Theophylact and numismatic evidence allow us to fix the date of Khusro’s accession upon the twenty-seventh day of the month of June in the year 590. The end of the melancholy life and reign of Hurmazd must have occurred a matter of days before that, and the coronation of Bahram was coincident with the festival of Maidhyoi-zaremaya in early August of the same year. 150 The confrontation at the Nahrawan canal can have lasted only a few days, and the flight of Khusro must have begun soon before the coronation of Bahram. But beyond these conclusions, which have the appearance of certainty, the sequence of events is quite speculative. Tabari enrols among the followers of Bahram three relatives of the Turkish khaghan 151 – a claim which suggests 147

Theophylact, IV.10.1–11. Howard-Johnston, J., “The Sasanians’ Strategic Dilemma,” 2010, p. 59; Frendo, D., “Theophylact Simocatta,” p. 77–88. 149 Jackson Bonner, M., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 118; Howard-Johnston, J. “Kosrow II,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, 2010 online edition. 150 Theophylact, IV.12.6; Tyler-Smith, S., “Calendars and Coronations,” p. 33–65. The chronology presented in Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and His Historian, p. 294–295 has been shown to be false. 151 Tabari, v. 2, p. 175–176; 178; 179. I owe these references to Mr James Howard-Johnston. 148

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that the usurper had endeavoured over the course of the year 589 to secure the eastern borders of Iran before he made his bid for the throne. But the public declaration of rebellion was reserved for the following year in which Hurmazd’s humiliating presents constituted merely the occasion, and not the cause, of the insurrection which seated an Arsacid upon the Sasanian throne.

THE REIGN OF BAHRAM CHOBIN The ephemeral reign of Bahram Chobin began at about the same moment as Khusro’s supplication to the emperor Maurice. Loyalty to the House of Sasan, ensured that every effort was exerted by the lingering partisans of Khusro to overturn the unsteady throne of the usurper. Presents and favours had failed to win the loyalty of Iranian noblemen, who refused to acknowledge the legitimacy of the new Arsacid ruler, and when neither aristocrats nor clergy could be found to perform the coronation, Bahram seized the accoutrements of monarchy and placed the diadem upon his own head. 152 The rule of Bahram was justified upon a surprising pretext. Ardashir, the upstart son of the shepherd Sasan, had wrested the sceptre from the last Arsacid by fraud; and the highest purpose of Bahram was to re-establish the House of Arshak. Hieratic speculation had computed a mere five hundred years between the appearance of the prophet Zoroaster and the reign of Ardashir, and the rule of the Sasanid House was to fill another five centuries until the millennium of Zoroaster would descend into anarchy and warfare. But the appearance of a saviour would deliver the empire of Iran from those troubles and inaugurate a new millennium under the orderly rule of a new dynasty. 153 The usurper and his partisans advertised a divine sanction to their rebellion, they announced that Bahram was the saviour foretold by ancient prophecy, and the apocalyptic tensions, which had begun at the outbreak of civil war, attained new vehemence. Such at least is the portrayal of Bahram’s rebellion which we find in Ferdowsi’s Shahnameh. But Bahram ruled with too heavy a hand, and failed to conciliate the party of loyalists which yet remained at Ctesiphon. At the command of the usurper, all who maintained their allegiance to Khusro were instructed to depart from the capital within ten days. The writer Dinawari notes the abrupt departure of Mushel Mamikonean, the Christian governor of Armenia, at the head of a numerous host; and Azarbaijan, a loyalist stronghold, was the destination of that army and its commander. 154 The Persian royal tradition notices a strange and fanciful attempt to end the reign of the usurper. Bahram Siyawushan who had failed to apprehend young 152

Theophylact, IV.12.1–7. These ideas are expounded in a florid dialogue between young Khusro and Bahram (Ferdowsi, Khusraw-i Parviz, l. 273–430). 154 Dinawari, p. 94. Dinawari computes the number of men at twenty thousand. 153

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Khusro watched over the prisoner Binduya, 155 who persuaded his jailer to participate in a plot to murder the rebel. Bahram son of Siyawushan let Binduya out of confinement, gave him a horse and some weapons, and agreed to assassinate the tyrant Bahram Chobin. For this grim purpose, he concealed a sword beneath the shirt; but, as he was dressing, he was seen by his wife, who happened to be the daughter of Bahram Chobin’s sister. The wife then warned the usurper, whose men were commanded to strike the assassin with polo mallets as he approached the royal presence. This bizarre episode revealed the hidden sword and secret guilt of the son of Siyawushan who was killed instantly. The uncle of Khusro wrongly assumed that his royal antagonist had been slain; and, when he discovered the truth, he disguised himself and fled to Azarbaijan where he joined the forces commanded by Mushel. 156 So runs Dinawari’s account of the brief reign of Bahram Chobin, and it is our only glimpse of the rebel’s failure to secure his hold upon Ctesiphon. Without detail or elaboration the writer Theophylact has also noticed an attempt to end the life and reign of Bahram. The conspiracy was discovered, Bahram’s assailants were defeated in a nocturnal battle, and the usurper maintained his authority by dismembering the conspirators whose dying bodies were crushed by elephants. 157

THE SASANIAN RESTORATION Hope in an Arsacid saviour had never been widely felt, nor would it ever be fulfilled. The young Sasanian king was soon to return to Iran at the head of a large army comprising forty thousand Roman troops under the generals John the Patrician and Narses, who had replaced Comentiolus at the behest of Khusro. This large host was accompanied by twelve thousand Armenians led by Mushel Mamikonean, and eight thousand Iranians commanded by the uncles of Khusro. The son of Hurmazd could never have returned to the Sasanid throne without the aid of Rome, and the concessions to the emperor Maurice were generous. The strategic advances achieved in the reigns of Khusro’s father and grandfather were reversed in an instant. 158 Martyropolis and Dara were given up, and the balance of power in the Transcaucasus was swung towards Rome to which nearly all Armenia and Iberia were ceded. In those troublesome countries, Khusro would retain only the provincial capitals of Dvin and Tiflis – possessions intended to offset the acknowledgement of political subordination to Rome, and to avoid the appearance of humiliation. 159 155

Theophylact confirms that Binduya had been imprisoned, but that is all (Theophylact, IV.12.2). 156 Dinawari, p. 94–95. See my analysis of this episode in Jackson Bonner, M., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 120. 157 Theophylact, IV.14.10–14. 158 Theophylact, IV.13.24. 159 Sebeos, p. 75. See Howard-Johnston, J., The Armenian History Attributed to Sebeos: Part II, p. 171.

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The writer Theophylact suggests that Bahram tried and failed to match the terms which Khusro had offered. The rebel promised to yield the city of Nisibis and all lands as far as the river Tigris on condition that the Roman emperor offer no assistance to the young Sasanid and his uncles. 160 If Bahram had known of Khusro’s terms, as Theophylact says, he cannot have expected his offer to succeed; and we may perhaps infer that the Arsacid usurper had approached the Roman emperor first. Be this as it may, the history of Sebeos offers a small glimpse into the Roman deliberations on the fate of Khusro, and we find no mention of the terms offered by Bahram. The unanimous voice of the Roman Senate had urged the emperor Maurice to refuse aid to the young Sasanid. ‘It is not right to agree, for the Persians are a lawless people and utterly deceitful. They make promises in distress, but in calmer times renege. Great evil has come upon us from them. Let them slaughter themselves, and we shall have relief’. 161 The eye of Sebeos cannot have penetrated the secret deliberations of the Roman government, but it is unsurprising that a cautious Senate might have recommended neutrality before the prospect of an Iranian civil war. But the emperor surely beheld danger in the instability and possible collapse of the empire of Iran, and the threat of Turkish power instructed him to maintain the parity of the two great sedentary states. Maurice rejected the advice of the Senate, and the numerous forces of John the Patrician and the general Narses were dispatched. News of Khusro’s alliance with Rome persuaded the garrisons at Nisibis and Martyropolis to shift their allegiance to the young king, 162 and at the beginning of spring in the year 591 loyalist troops were massing on both sides of the Taurus mountains in Armenia under the supervision of John Mystacon, the Roman regional commander. The strategic aims of the Sasanid party were to draw Bahram out of the Iranian capital, to occupy it, and to defeat the rebel with overwhelming force. For these purposes, loyalist soldiers were separated into three divisions commanded respectively by Narses, a supporter of Khusro by the name of Mahbod, and John Mystacon and Binduya. 163 In a slow progress toward the river Tigris, Narses took and held Mardin and Dara; after a momentary pause, the forces of Narses crossed the great 160

Theophylact, IV.14.8. Sebeos, p. 76. 162 Theophylact, IV.1–17; Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and his Historian, p. 298–300. Sittas, who had betrayed Martyopolis to Iran in the reign of Hurmazd was duly executed. The restoration of Martyropolis to Roman control was commemorated in an inscription, which survived in mutilated form down to the nineteenth century. It refers to Khusro as ‘the god, king of kings’ (Mango, C., “Deux Études sur Byzance et la Perse sassanide,” Travaux et mémoires, 9, 1985, p. 91–104). 163 I am following, and compressing, Theophylact V.1–6, as well as the learned analysis of Howard-Johnston, J., “Kosrow II,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, online edition, and HowardJohnston, J., “The Sasanians’ Strategic Dilemma,” p. 59–60. 161

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river and advanced toward the Lesser Zab where a contingent of rebel forces were defeated. 164 The manoeuvres of Narses were intended to distract the rebel Bahram and to confine his forces to Mesopotamia, while the large army commanded by John Mystacon and Binduya moved north-east into Armenia. As the usurper’s forces advanced to meet that imposing army in the north, Mahbod and a small force departed swiftly from the fortress of Singara, advanced down the Euphrates, entered the metropolitan region of Ctesiphon, and occupied the Iranian capital. 165 Rebel forces and those commanded by John Mystacon and Binduya narrowly avoided combat near Lake Urmia, and the loyalist force pursued their flying opponent deep into Azarbaijan. 166 The rebel Bahram recognised that his plight was desperate. A letter composed by the usurper was addressed and dispatched to Mushel Mamikonean and the entire Armenian nobility. The force of the epistle was to warn of the treachery of the House of Sasan, which the rebel called a ‘universal calamity’ 167 which the people of Armenia had always resisted. The rebel besought their loyalty and assistance against a mutual foe; and in a solemn invocation of Ahura Mazda, the sun, the moon, fire, and water, and an oath by Mithra and all the gods, he promised to restore the ancient kingdom of Armenia to its original independence and to its original size. 168 This letter received no reply, and a second epistle, of a more menacing character, was dispatched to Mushel. Bahram was astonished that his promise had failed to please Mushel, and the usurper mingled a tone of regret with the most threatening language. ‘Tomorrow morning’, wrote Bahram, ‘I shall show you armoured elephants, and upon them shall be a host of armed warriors who shall rain down upon you iron arrows, lances of tempered steel, together with darts, from their powerful bows, strong young men fully armed to repel you, swift Arabian horses, axes and swords of tempered steel, and as many blows as may be necessary for you and for Khusro’. 169 That letter elicited a response from Mushel, who dismissed the threats of his antagonist. Battle was joined in the vicinity of Ganjak in Azarbaijan. The conflict described upon the pages of Theophylact is a mixture of a few interesting, but doubtful, tactical details and much bombast. 170 We may, however, trust that victory seemed to incline now to one side and then to another, and that the battle was violent and sanguinary. So vehement was the fighting that, in the opinion of Sebeos, blood flowed copiously and irrigated all the surrounding countryside, and the shattered host of 164

Theophylact, V.5.1–6. Theophyact, V.6.1–9. 166 Sebeos, p. 77. 167 զտիեզերական պատուհասն, զտունն Սասանակայ (Sebeos, p. 77). 168 Sebeos, p. 77–78. 169 Sebeos, p. 78. 170 Theophylact, V.9.5–15.1 165

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Bahram barely escaped a promiscuous massacre. Corpses were strewn over fields and roads, many a warrior, and many an elephant, were presented before Khusro who commanded that his enemy captives be trampled beneath the feet of those animals. 171 But after four days of fighting, the outcome was more probably decided by an embassy of Binduya which induced the defection of all but four thousand of Bahram’s troops, 172 and the fugitive usurper fled to the city of Balkh, 173 where he sought and received the protection of the Turks. Khusro II would now be king of Iran.

171

Sebeos, p. 79–80. The Book of Bahram Chobin seems also to have described a sanguinary and ridiculous battle in which the usurper cut a Roman soldier in half with a single blow of his sword, and he summoned Khusro to single combat (Dinawari, p. 97). 172 Dinawari, p. 98. See Jackson Bonner, M., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 122. 173 Sebeos, p. 80; Dinawari, p. 98–104.

VIII. THE LAST WAR OF ANTIQUITY THE REIGN OF KHUSRO II The writer who described the collapse of the Iranian empire, and its conquest by the victorious Arabs, accused and blamed Khusro for the ruin of the old order. Sebeos wrote of the ‘Sasanian brigand, Aparwez Khusro, who consumed with fire the whole inner land…and brought destruction upon the entire world’. With the pen of a churchman and the words of a prophet, Sebeos recounted a calamitous tale of ‘wrath evoked from on high and the anger flaming up below, torrents of fire and blood, deadly attacks, the cry of demons, and the roar of dragons’, for the destructive, ruinous, and accursed Sasanid monarch had fulfilled the commandment of the Lord’s wrath against the whole world. 1 Though its beginning was perhaps inauspicious, the reign of the second Khusro was the last period of Sasanian greatness; and his military conquests reclaimed the patrimony of Cambyses and Darius and nearly achieved the total humiliation of Roman power. But it was only a brief moment of supremacy. The king who had ascended the throne amidst a noble plot, and the murder of his own father, was to perish in the same manner; and, only a short while after his death, the empire of Iran was shaken to its foundation and buried in the dust, but no one forgot the name of Khusro II, whose arrogance and pride were blamed for the collapse of the House of Sasan. 2 When Khusro returned to the throne, a cloud of suspicion and doubt hung over him. The patriarch of Seleucia-Ctesiphon had refused to accompany the Sasanid king into Roman territory, 3 and Khusro grew to hate him. Ishoʿyahb (that was the patriarch’s name) had offered public prayers for the health and life of the rebel Bahram, and he had refused to meet Khusro upon his return to Ctesiphon. 4 These reports surely conceal divided loyalties and great tensions at the Sasanid court, 1

I am paraphrasing Sebeos, p. 72. See, for example, Tabari’s introduction to the reign of Khusro II (Tabari, v. 2, p. 174), and Daryaee, T., Sasanian Persia, p. 32–24 and Christensen, A., L’Iran sous les sassanides, p. 440– 490. 3 Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 15: 2

4

‫ܦܫ ܡܪܝ ܝܫܘܥܝܗܒ ܩܬܘܠܝܩܐ ܡܢ ܗܝ ܖܢܚܙܘܡ ܥܡܗ‬

Chronicle of Seert, II(2), p. 440–441. See also Payne, R., A State of Mixture, p. 173.

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which Bahram had attempted to exploit, for many among the nobles and clergy must have looked upon Khusro as a weakling beholden alike to his powerful uncles and to the emperor of Rome. But the worst charge against the young king was that he was complicit in the death of his father Hurmazd. The flight and death of Bahram Chobin had deprived Khusro I of a rival, and a dissident army of a leader. But the party which had opposed the House of Sasan had returned to Iran, and might have fought under the banner of any prince strong enough to command their allegiance. When Khusro resolved to assert his independence and to execute the men who had murdered his father and achieved his return to the throne, he created a new cause for aristocratic and military resentment; and it was his uncle Bistam who raised the standard of revolt.

THE DESTRUCTION OF BAHRAM CHOBIN AND THE REVOLT OF BISTAM At the beginning of Khusro’s restoration, Bahram the usurper yet lived and had taken shelter at the court of the Turkish khaghan. It was perhaps Khusro’s first goal to destroy that rebel, and for this purpose an Iranian embassy appeared before the khaghan. 5 Every argument designed to persuade the ruler to slay the Iranian fugitive was deployed, but the khaghan was unmoved. Dinawari, who narrates this strange episode in detail, draws a veil over a private conference between the ambassador and the khaghan’s wife, who agreed to dispatch a slave to the abode of Bahram, and a concealed dagger was plunged into the breast of the rebel. As he expired, the last breath of Bahram pronounced his brother Mardan Sina his successor. The khaghan grieved the death of his friend, and in a transport of rage he meditated the death of the Turkish queen. To the partisans of Bahram the khaghan granted leave to depart the land of the Turks, and they withdrew to the region of Tabaristan. A Turkish escort accompanied them as far as the river Oxus; and Gurdiya, the sister of Bahram, who was the most beautiful woman, of the most perfect character, and the greatest equestrian of her age, sat upon Bahram’s horse and led his men into Iran. 6 Meanwhile, Khusro began to strengthen his position, and he surely looked for and rewarded allies. The history of Sebeos draws our attention to the career of Smbat Bagratuni, and the honour in which he was held is surely but one example of Khusro’s generosity and political manoeuvring. Gifts of gold, silver, and costly garments were lavished upon Smbat, together with the very belt and sword which had belonged to Hurmazd IV. Successive titles were attached to the name of that Armenian prince, and in time he became a junior minister of finance and governor of the 5

Dinawari calls the ambassador Hurmazd Jurabzin. Tabari omits his surname (Tabari, v. 2, p. 181). 6 Dinawari, p. 103–105. Tabari adds the interesting detail that Bahram’s brother Gurdi had interceded with Khusro on behalf of Gurdiya, and secured safe passage for her (Tabari, v. 2, p. 181).

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province of Gurgan in the year 595. 7 But all who participated in, or could be associated with, the insurrection of Bahram and the murder of Hurmazd were put to death. The writer Theophylact credibly suggests that Khusro resolved instantly upon the murder of his uncles, but we may doubt that a Zoroastrian king polluted the element of water by casting Binduya into the depths of the river Tigris. 8 The independent testimonies of Sebeos and Dinawari confirm that Khusro sought to eliminate Bistam and Binduya immediately after his restoration, but Khusro’s early attempt to kill his uncles succeeded only in removing Binduya, and in transforming Bistam into an implacable rebel whose insurrection lasted ten years. A narrative of that revolt can be reconstructed on the warrant of the Chronicle of Khuzestan, the testimonies of Sebeos and Dinawari, and numismatic evidence. The testimony of Dinawari, which reposes upon the lost Book of Bahram Chobin, is that Binduya had been instructed to pay four thousand drachms to a certain Shirzad son of Bahbudan on account of his splendid performance on the field of polo. But the instruction of Khusro was ignored and Binduya declared that the royal treasure had not been established for such an extravagant waste. This was Khusro’s scarcely credible justification for destroying his uncle – a pretext which may nevertheless conceal an accusation of financial impropriety on the part of Binduya. But the most serious charge against Khusro’s uncles was surely that they had killed his father Hurmazd. A severe punishment was meted out to Binduya, whose limbs were removed from his body, and his expiring trunk was abandoned within a square at Hulwan. But as he perished, Binduya loudly cursed the House of Sasan and the perfidy of Khusro II, who then commanded that his uncle be pelted with stones until dead. 9 A similar death had perhaps been prepared for Bistam, whom Khusro attempted to lure to court. 10 A letter was dispatched to his uncle announcing his immediate dismissal from his command as general of the east, and Bistam instantly resolved to confront his young nephew. But another nobleman, by the name of Mardan Bih Qahraman, informed Bistam of the fate that awaited him, and the uncle fled the vengeance of his nephew and escaped to the land of Gilan and thence to Daylam. The approach of Bistam heartened the partisans of Bahram Chobin who yet lingered in that mountainous region, and the rebel’s successor, Mardan Sina, urged Bistam to take command of Bahram’s troops and overturn the throne of Khusro. 11 7

Sebeos, p. 96; Garsoian, N., “Smbat Bagratuni” in Encyclopaedia Iranica, 2005. Theophylact, V.15.1. 9 Dinawari, p. 105–106. Cf. Sebeos, p. 94–95 who is aware of the execution of Binduya on some pretext or other, and the attempt to lure Bistam to court; and the Chronicle of Khuzestan rather states that Binduya was crucified (Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 16). 10 Sebeos, p. 95; Dinawari, p. 106. 11 Dinawari, p. 107. 8

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The sister of Bahram was given in marriage to Bistam, and the large rebel army declared its allegiance to a new leader. Bistam established a forward base at Dastaba in the vicinity of Rey and began to pillage the country of Media. 12 An epistolary exchange between Khusro and Bistam preceded a military confrontation. Bistam announced his superior claim to the throne and repeated an ancient insult to the House of Sasan. ‘Know’, wrote Bistam, ‘know that you are not more worthy of this power than I, but rather I am more worthy of it than you, for I am the son of Dara son of Dara, who fought Alexander, but you (O son of Sasan) took what was rightfully ours by force and craft. Your father Sasan was only a shepherd, and if his father had known better he would not have kept the kingdom from him and given it to his daughter Khumana’. 13 From this strange paragraph of Dinawari’s history we may judge the force of Bistam’s own propaganda which appears to have portrayed him as the avenger of Darius III and the true heir to the Achaemenid monarchy. 14 The battle that followed induced Bistam first to retreat to the mountains of Gilan and then to flee to the northeast. The writer Sebeos asserts that Bistam’s purpose was to fortify himself in the land of his Parthian ancestors, 15 to bring under his control the troops of that region, and to return to Iran at the head of a vast host. A garrison of Armenian troops in the city of Isfahan threw off their allegiance to the House of Sasan and joined the army of Bistam, and a series of uprisings throughout northern Iran may perhaps be connected with the revolt of Bistam also. 16 Shawg and Pariovk, two kings of Hunnish extraction, supplicated themselves to the power of Bistam, and in the year 595 a large and heterogeneous host began the long march upon the metropolitan region of Ctesiphon. 17 The army of Bistam confronted the forces of Khusro at Hamadan, and in the opinion of Dinawari the slaughter was immense but without decisive outcome. 18 12

Sebeos, p. 95. Dinawari, p. 108. 14 Jackson Bonner, M. R., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 125. 15 Երթայր ի կողմանս Պարթեւաց (Sebeos, p. 95). This means the region surrounding the city of Balkh. 16 Sebeos, p. 96. Principalities in Amal, Royean, Zrechan, Tabaristan, and Gurgan all rose in revolt and were pacified by Smbat Bagratuni. For further interpretation, see Jackson Bonner, M. R., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 126. 17 Եւ գումարալ զամենայն գաւրսն կողմանց Արեւելից դիմեաց գնաց յԱսորեստան զաւրու մեծաւ եւ հզաւր յոյժ, զի սպանցէ զԽոսրով եւ առցէ յինքն զթագաւորութիւն նորա (Sebeos, p. 97). Sebeos appears to claim that the attack upon Ctesiphon really occurred, but this cannot be right, and he seems to have misinterpreted mere planning for action (Jackson Bonner, M. R., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 127–128). 18 Dinawari, p. 108. 13

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After the passage of five years, Bistam could no longer retain the loyalty of his allies and his subordinate forces. It was perhaps at the instigation of Khusro that the Hunnish king Pariovk planned an ambush, and sought a private conference with Bistam. An insincere display of obeisance gave way to slaughter; Pariovk seized the treasures, the baggage train, and the wife, of Bistam, and retired to Central Asia. 19 The bonds which had united the troops of Bistam were dissolved, and each man threw down his arms and began to withdraw to his own land. The dying flames of rebellion were finally extinguished by Smbat Bagratuni who, in the valleys of Tabaristan, destroyed the Armenian forces who had supported the rebel. So runs Sebeos’ account of the end of Bistam’s rebellion. A strange tradition, which Dinawari found in the Book of Bahram Chobin, records a different end to the rebellion of Bistam. Gurdiya, sister to Bahram and wife to Bistam, had received a secret message from Khusro II, who persuaded her to make Bistam drunk and to murder him in his sleep 20 – a sign, as it seems, that Khusro himself had brought about the death of his uncle. This was in the year 600, the seventh and final year of the issues of Bistam’s coins, 21 and the tenth regnal year of Khusro II. 22 At Ctesiphon the court of Khusro marked the end of the rebellions of Bahram and Bistam with a grim display of royal supremacy. The lifeless head of Bistam was suspended from the neck of Bahram Chobin’s son Shapur; and seated upon a camel, the son was exposed to the ridicule which the father had merited, while that animal circumambulated the palace of Khusro. 23

KHUSRO, THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION, AND PEACE WITH ROME The return of the rightful Sasanid monarch was commemorated in Khusro’s second regnal year by an issue of coins bearing the image of the young king wearing a crown surmounted by two great wings – the symbol of Verethragna, the hypostasis of victory. 24 The young Sasanid was a zealous exponent of the Zoroastrian religion, and he caused himself to be portrayed in a relief at Taq-i Bostan flanked by the gods Ahura Mazda and Anahita. But religion was an important tool as well of foreign as of domestic policy, and Khusro allowed himself to be portrayed as a Christian pros19

Sebeos, p. 97–98. The Chronicle of Khuzestan preserves a vague reminiscence that Bistam was slain by a ‘Turk’ (Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 16). 20 Dinawari, p. 109–110. 21 Göbl, R., Sasanian Numismatics, pl. XV and p. 53; contra Paruck, F. D. J., Sasanian Coins, 1976, p. 112–113; Christensen, A., L’Iran sous les sassanides, p. 446, who extends the coins of Bistam over ten years. I followed this error in Jackson Bonner, M., Al-Dinawari’s Kitab alAkhbar al-Tiwal, p. 127–128. 22 Dinawari, p. 105. 23 Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 16. 24 Tyler-Smith, S., “Calendars and Coronations,” p. 45.

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elyte and perhaps as a convert. 25 The leadership of the Iranian church had assisted, and probably prepared, Khusro’s escape and asylum amongst the Romans, and his interest in Christianity was a plausible pretext for such support. The writer Theophylact includes a rumour of conversion under a heavy cloak of bombast, 26 and prayer and the offering of a jewel-encrusted cross of gold are said to have persuaded St Sergius to grant Khusro victory over the usurper Bahram. 27 The hope of the emperor Maurice, and that of the Roman government, was that the Sasanid king would be regenerated in the waters of baptism at the hand of Domitianus, the metropolitan bishop of Melitene. 28 But the king refused, and a contemporary writer of high renown commiserated with his ecclesiastical colleague. ‘Although,’ wrote Pope Gregory the Great, ‘although I lament that the emperor of the Persians has not been converted, I rejoice that you nevertheless made every effort to introduce him to the Christian faith’. 29 But so fascinating was the rumour of Khusro’s embrace of the Christian religion that a chronicler of the seventh century in the distant kingdom of Francia recorded his conversion. 30 Though he remained a Zoroastrian, Khusro advertised his respect for Christianity. He granted permission to build churches, and he permitted anyone but Zoroastrians to embrace the faith of Christ 31 – unambiguous signs that the government of Iran wished to remain at peace with Rome in the last decade of the sixth century. The young king’s renewed patronage of the shrine of St Sergius honoured that saint with a large gold paten at the moment of his Christian wife’s pregnancy. 32 That lady, whose Persian name was Shirin, was a Christian of Khuzestan, and she was repre-

25

Payne, R. E., A State of Mixture, p. 164–165. Theophylact IV.10.1. 27 Theophylact V.13.4–5; Payne, R., A State of Mixture, p. 172–173; Flusin, B., Saint Anastase le Perse et l’histoire de la Palestine au début du VIIe siècle, tom. II, Commentaire, 1992, p. 99–100. 28 The emperor Maurice had dispatched the bishop to Khusro at Hierapolis (Theophylact, IV.14.1–6; Evagrius, Historia Ecclesiastica, VI.18). 29 Imperatorem vero Persarum etsi non fuisse conversum doleo, vos tamen ei Christianam fidem praedicasse omnimodo exulto (Gregorii I Papae, Registrum Epistolarum, tom. I., III.62). 30 …Mauricius imperator infinitissimum adparatum Anciocam fieri fieri iussit, ubi imperator Persarum cum sexaginta milia Persus baptizatus est (Chronicle of Fredegar, §9). The writer’s language is ‘irretrievably barbaric’ (Wallace-Hadrill, J. M., The Fourth Book of the Chronicle of Fredegar, 1960, p. xxviii). The story reached the chronicler in a rather garbled form. The Persian king is called Anaulf and the name of Shirin has been corrupted into Caesara. But we can be certain that Khusro II and Shirin are meant because the chronicler makes them contemporaries of the emperor Maurice. A foolish note by the editor (Wallace-Hadrill, J. M., The Chronicle of Fredegar, p. 7, n. 3) alleges that the king in question is Khusro I, but this is wrong. 31 Tabari, v. 2, p. 180. 32 Theophylact, V.xiv.1–12. 26

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sented as the most influential of Khusro’s wives. 33 At her behest royal favour flowed to the Christians of Mesopotamia, and churches and convents arose even in the vicinity of the royal palace at Ctesiphon. 34 Christian officials of high rank participated in the political and social life of the royal court. 35 The ruling house of the Lakhmid Arabs, who had long adhered to their ancestral paganism, embraced the religion of Christ, and the dyophysite, so-called Nestorian creed, without opposition from the government of Khusro. 36 Monophysite Christians of Armenia alike found protection and patronage under the Sasanid monarchy and the patriarch at Dvin, and a Roman bishop who adhered to the formula of Chalcedon was allowed to reside at Theodosiopolis – a sign of Khusro’s benign indifference to Christian theological division. 37 All the powers of a Zoroastrian and a Christian heaven looked with equal approval upon the reign of Khusro, or so it was publicly advertised. Divine and mystical interventions, which appealed to votaries of either faith, had assisted Khusro’s victory over Bahram at a moment when defeat seemed imminent. It was said that the holy man Sabrishoʿ had appeared beside Khusro in a vision; he grasped the bridle of the king’s horse, and directed it forcibly into battle; and the intercession of the saint assured the triumph of the Sasanid army. 38 But a Zoroastrian nobility re33

Khusro II may have made many Christians wives, of course. Shirin is first mentioned by Theophylact (Theophylact, V.xiv.3–4). But ‘Mary the Roman’, who appears in some oriental sources, could not have been a daughter of the emperor Maurice as Dinawari, Tabari, and the Chronicle of Khuzestan claim (Flusin, B., Saint Anastase le Perse, II, p. 102–103). The romance between Khusro and his wife Shirin was an object of fascination to the Christians of Iran. It may be that the poetry which we associate with courtly love, and which is such a conspicuous feature of the High Middle Ages, found some of its inspiration in that tale. Ferdowsi used it, amongst other whimsical anecdotes, to fill the void left by his omission of the last was of Antiquity; and Nizami, the great poet of the twelfth century, found a Georgian rendition of that tale and versified the great love story in New Persian (Orsatti, P., “Kosrow o Shirin,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, 2006, online edition). 34 Sebeos, p. 85; Chronicle of Seert, II(2), p. 466–467; Flusin, B., Saint Anastase le Perse, II, p. 100–103. 35 The Chronicle of Seert includes a list of the high-ranking Christian officials who surrounded Khusro (Chronicle of Seert, II(2), p. 551). The physician Mar Aba of Kashkar, John Sendori and Gabriel of Singara, Yazdin who is called ‘the generous’, John of Kashkar, are some of the most important names. In the haughty opinion of the chronicler, ‘Khusro employed many more Christians within his service, in order to advertise his disdain for the envious Magi: may God curse them and be merciful to Khusro!’ (Chronicle of Seert, II(2), p. 525). 36 Chronicle of Seert, II(2), p. 468–469; 478–481. 37 Sebeos describes this as a division of the catholicosate (Sebeos, p. 91). On Khusro’s clemency to monophysites in general, see Flusin, B., Saint Anastase le Perse, II, p. 106–118. 38 Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 16; Chronicle of Seert, II(2), p. 481. But the Chronicle of Seert mistakenly claims that the circumstance of the apparition was the conflict with Bistam. This vision

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quired a different explanation for Khusro’s victory. Sorush, one of the Bounteous Immortals, appeared before the king, clad in a green mantle and astride a white horse. The divine messenger grasped Khusro by the hand and brought him to safety in the midst of a furious mellay. ‘My name is Sorush’, he said, ‘make no cry, for you are safe; hereafter you shall be ruler of the world…’ 39 Scepticism, or embarrassment, compelled the writer Tabari to reduce this strange story to the mere mention of Khusro’s deliverance when ‘a thing which cannot be comprehended’ took him up into a mountain. 40 The real or imaginary assistance of Sabrishoʿ was the pretext for his elevation to the patriarchate of Seleucia-Ctesiphon. There is perhaps no greater sign of Khusro’s royal favour to the Christian religion than the magnificent ceremonies which attended the installation of Sabrishoʿ. 41 A synod was convened upon the third Friday of Lent in the year 596, and despite some resistance, the Persian king enforced his will upon the assembled bishops. Sabrishoʿ was chosen and made patriarch. The Magi beheld with astonishment the vast crowd which gathered to observe the installation of the new patriarch. Sabrishoʿ struggled to emerge from the church, and a band of foot soldiers was dispatched with the king’s own horse to carry the new bishop out of the vicinity of the church and away from the immesnse throng. The saint refused so obvious a symbol of aristocratic status and royal favour, proffering the excuse that he was a poor horseman, but the obedient soldiers ignored his protests, seated him upon the animal by force, and began to direct it by pulling on the bridle. 42 But the words of the saint forbade the advance of Khusro’s horse, and so the soldiers drove away the huge crowd of spectators by means of cudgels, and they escorted Sabrishoʿ into the royal court, where he was met by servants from the household of Shirin, bearing lighted tapers and vaporous thuribles. The anonymous writer of the Chronicle of Khuzestan noted the high honour in which Sabrishoʿ was was the pretext on which Khusro promoted Sabr-Isho’ to the patriarchal throne, apparently. See also Payne, R., A State of Mixture, p. 173. 39 The poet is somewhat more verbose (Ferdowsi, Khusraw-i Parviz, l. 1902–1908):

40 41

Tabari, v. 2, p. 180:

‫���� آمد از راه فرخ ��وش‬ ��‫ز د��ار او گشت خ��و دل‬ ‫ز ��دان پاک ا�ن نباشد شگفت‬ ‫به آسا�ی آورد و ب��اشتش‬ ‫��یگفت چندی و چندی ����ت‬ ‫چو ا��ن شدی دور باش از ��وش‬ ‫نبا�� �� با�� �� از پارسا‬

‫هم آن�� چو از کوه ��شد ��وش‬ ��‫��ه �امهاش س�� و خن�� به ز‬ ‫چو ��دیک شد دست خ��و ��فت‬ ‫چواز پیش ��خواه ��داشتش‬ ‫��و گفت خ��و �� نام تو �یست‬ ‫فرشته ��و گفت نامم ��وش‬ ‫���ن �� شوی �� جهان پادشا‬ .‫رفعه ا�ى ا��بل ��ء �� يوقف �ليه‬

Chronicle of Seert, II(2), p. 484–491; Wood, P., The Chronicle of Seert, 2013, p. 194–196; Flusin, B., Saint Anastase le Perse, II, p. 104–105. 42 For some analysis of this incident, which may be mostly imaginary, see Payne, R., A State of Mixture, p. 2–5.

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held throughout his life, and that of the Chronicle of Seert imputes to the Persian king a startling speech which was addressed to the ecclesiastical favourite: ‘your predecessors were the slaves of my forefathers; but I am your son and this lady is your daughter’. 43 If the Chronicle of Seert may be believed, the Roman government looked with approval upon the elevation of Sabrishoʿ and Khusro’s patronage of the Christian religion. Maurice dispatched a painter to execute a portrait of Khusro, and gladly received the bones of certain Iranian saints together with the cap of the new bishop. A small fragment of the True Cross was sent to Sabrishoʿ and bestowed, at Khusro’s behest, upon his wife Shirin – a strange portent of future events. 44 A new age of cooperation between Christian and Zoroastrian had begun, and the two religions appeared, or were made to appear, closer than ever before. Contemporary churchmen rejoiced that Christ had worked through the person of Khusro and had pacified the two great empires. 45 The bishops of either power put aside their ancient hostility. In the year 596 Probus, the bishop of Chalcedon, arrived in Ctesiphon where he attended the Divine Liturgy in the presence of the Persian king, and in return Khusro dispatched to Constantinople Milas, bishop of Senna. 46 The patriarch of Seleucia-Ctesiphon began a diplomatic correspondence with the emperor Maurice which issued in a mutual exchange of captives who had been held since the days of Hurmazd IV. 47 Toward the end of the sixth century, an outbreak of the pestilence afflicted the region of Kashkar in southern Mesopotamia, and an assembly of Zoroastrian priests gathered before the walls of the theological school to solicit the intercession of a holy man within, and the disease was dispersed by the force of his prayers. 48 The visitation of the Magi, who had adored the infant Son of God, was an obvious pretext for assimilating the religion of Christ to that of Zoroaster, and the court of Khusro promoted a practice of identifying figures of the Christian with those of the Zoroastrian religion. The heroes of the deep past were integrated within the heritage of Christianity, and the patriarchs, prophets, and kings of Israel were written into the lore of Iran. This tendency, which surely developed from popular superstition, outlived the Sasanid state. In the opinion of Dinawari, the loremasters of Iran identified the Iranian culture hero Jamshid with Arphaxad, son of Shem and grandson of Noah, 49 but some said that he was the biblical king Solomon; 50 and 43

Chronicle of Seert, II(2), p. 491. Chronicle of Seert, II(2), p. 492–493. 45 Eustratius, Vita Martyris Golinduch, p. 23. 46 Theophylact, V.15.8–11; Chronicle of Seert, II(2), p. 493; Flusin, B., Saint Anastase le Perse, II, p. 106. 47 Chronicle of Seert, II(2), p. 493. 48 Chronicle of Seert, II(2), p. 508. 49 Dinawari, p. 1–8. 50 Dinawari, p. 9. 44

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Faredun, who slew the demon king Azdahag, was believed to be the same as Nimrod. 51 In the reign of Khusro II, it was said that the body of the prophet Daniel reposed in a bronze container within the royal treasury at Susa; but when the Roman government requested that it be given to them, Khusro refused on that ground that it was dear to his wife Shirin and her fellow Christians. But the writer Sebeos, who is the only source of this tale, notices the important detail that pious Zoroastrians considered the body within the bronze vessel to be that of Kay Khusro: the legendary ruler familiar from Zoroastrian scripture. 52 Perhaps the most astonishing piece of propaganda was the claim that the founder of the Sasanid dynasty himself had been a Christian. Avestan legend held that the conversion of king Gushtasp to the religion of Zoroaster was actuated by the prophet’s healing of the king’s horse, whose legs had been mysteriously absorbed into its belly. According to a strange legend, the apostle of Jesus who appeared at the court of Ardashir, studied and chanted the gospel at night; and when the king’s favourite horse was found dead, that holy man restored it to life. 53 He befriended the king’s vizier Abarsam, and his influence prompted the conversion and baptism of the first Sasanid monarch – an historical and chronological impossibility. But the triple force of this myth was that the Christian faith could be understood as a source of royal legitimacy and power, that the Christians of Iran could be loyal to the House of Sasan, and that the mythical history of Iranian Christianity could be made comprehensible to a Zoroastrian nobility. These are the strongest indications that the myth of Ardashir’s conversion originated in the reign of Khusro II. But the privileges of Iranian Christians may have exaggerated the severity of their disputes over doctrine and ecclesiology. Toward the end of the sixth century, the patriarch Sabrishoʿ endorsed Henana of Nisibis in a bid to replace the current occupant of that see. Gregory of Kashgar (that was the name of the incumbent) fled, the people of Nisibis rose in revolt in the year 599, and the Nakhwaragan was dispatched with a great army and elephants to put down the insurrection. The Iranian general swore to protect the inhabitants of the city; but when the gates of Nisibis were thrown open to him, he refused to abide by his oath. Nobles were seized and tortured, their houses were emptied of their treasures and burnt, and an indiscrimi-

51

Dinawari, p. 9. Notably, Moses Chorenatsi also associates Azhdahak and Faredun with the age of Nimrod (Moses, Chorenatsi, I.32). 52 Sebeos, 85–86; Skjærvø, P. O., “Kayanian vii. Kauui Haosrauuah, Kay Husrōy, Kay Ḵosrow” in Encyclopaedia Iranica, 2013, online edition. 53 Dinawari, p. 46–47; Nihaya, p. 185–186. For analysis see Jackson Bonner, Al-Dinawari’s Kitab Al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, p. 67–68, Payne, R., A State of Mixture, p. 164–165, and Schilling, A., “L’apôtre du Christ,” p. 89–112.

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nate slaughter ensued. 54 The Zoroastrian king of Iran respected the religion of Christ, but he would not tolerate the violence of his sectaries.

THE ROAD TO WAR Even amidst the calamities of civil war and the contest with Bistam the Roman government had respected the monarchy of Khusro. In the decade of the 590s, Roman arms were preoccupied in the Balkan peninsula where every effort was made to reassert the emperor’s authority over Slavic tribes who had migrated below the river Danube. 55 In the year 591 the emperor Maurice had appeared at the head of a large host and carried war deep into territories held by the Slavs and Avars. It was a hard campaign that was to end in mutiny; but that military distraction, and the revolt of Bistam, assured peaceable relations between the great powers in the last decade of the sixth century. 56 But when civil war afflicted the empire of Rome, and the emperor Maurice was slain, Khusro revived a policy of aggressive warfare in the west. In the month of November in the year 602, trouble began with the emperor’s instruction that the Balkan field army pass the winter north of the Danube, and the soldiers’ refusal gave way to an implacable mutiny. But the enraged soldiers had failed to convince their general Peter to disobey the command of the emperor, and the army appointed the centurion Phocas as their leader. This disgruntled force resolved instantly to march upon Constantinople with the intention of overthrowing Maurice. The emperor, his wife Constantina, and their nine children 57 escaped from Constantinople only a day before the rebel received the crown from the hand of the Patriarch in the church of St John the Baptist in a suburb of the city. 58 This was on Friday, the twenty-third day of November. Two days later, Phocas entered Constantinople without opposition. Maurice and his family were captured near Praenetus and taken to Chalcedon where all but the eldest son were slain on the twentyseventh day of November. 59 In the Camp of the Tribunal at Constantinople, the grim display of the lifeless heads of Maurice and his family announced the triumph of the usurper; but the citizens of Constantinople noted the absence of the head of Theodosius, who had escaped the slaughter and fled to the court of Khusro. 60 It was perhaps at the behest of Maurice that Theodosius sought refuge with his fa54

Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 18–19; Chronicle of Seert, II(2), p. 514. Whitby, M., The Emperor Maurice and his Historian, p. 24–27; 157–169. 56 Whittow, M., The Making of Orthodox Byzantium, p. 69. 57 They were six boys, Theodosius, Tiberius, Peter, Paul, Justin, and Justinian, and three girls, Anastasia, Theoctiste, and Cleopatra (Chronicon Paschale, p. 693). 58 Theophylact, VIII.vi.2–10; Chronicon Paschale, p. 693. 59 Chronicon Paschale, p. 694. 60 Theophylact, VIII.15.11; Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 20; Sebeos, p. 106; Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 290–291; Dinawari, p. 110. 55

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ther’s ally and his own brother by adoption, but Roman propaganda portrayed the fugitive as an upstart and impostor. Khusro, who himself had fled the rebellion of a usurper, was moved, or pretended to be moved, by the plight of the young Theodosius, and the successor to Augustus and Constantine was afforded an honourable reception by the heir of Cyrus and Ardashir. The patriarch Sabrishoʿ performed a coronation according to the Roman custom; and in the royal church at Ctesiphon, at the behest of the Persian king, the rightful Orthodox emperor of Rome received his title, and his crown, from the hand of a Nestorian priest. 61 Royal acclamations would scarcely have ceased to reverberate at the Iranian capital when preparations for an invasion began, but the open declaration of war coincided with the later reception of a Roman embassy.

THE DECLARATION OF WAR Five months after the coronation of Phocas, the ambassador Lilius had been dispatched to announce the new reign, but Khusro refused to acknowledge the man who had murdered his benefactor, and the Roman envoy was cast into prison. 62 The rebellion of Phocas had provoked a general disorder throughout the Roman world. Hostility between the factions of the circus afflicted every city of the empire. Narses, the Roman commander in the east, disdained the authority of the new emperor and he rose in revolt and occupied the city of Edessa. The son of the exarch of Carthage, who bore the name Heraclius, would soon lead a rebellion, and overthrow the usurper. But for the moment the eye of Phocas was turned to the east, and he instructed Germanus, the commandant at the fortress of Dara, to besiege Edessa and to dislodge its occupier. 63 Narses implored the aid of the Persian king, and Khusro resolved to exploit what he rightly saw as an incipient civil war, and (in the language of Theophylact) ‘he mobilised that world-destroying trumpet, for this tyranny of Phocas became the undoing of harmonious relations between Romans and Persians; for Khusro resolved to pretend to uphold the hallowed memory of the emperor Maurice, and thus the Persian war was allotted its origin’. 64 With that final volley of bombast, Theophylact terminates his history, and we leave behind the old world of classicising historiography, and we pass suddenly into a new and different age.

61

Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 20:

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The reception and coronation of Theodosius is repeated by Tabari, v. 2, p. 181: 62

Theophylact, VIII.15.2–7. 63 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 291–292. 64 Theophylact, VIII.15.7.

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THE MOOD OF THE TIME AND THE SOURCES FOR THE WAR We are now very remote from the confident, polished, and self-conscious prose of Ammianus, Procopius, Agathias, Menander, and Theophylact. Religious enthusiasm and supernatural speculation begin to take on ever greater significance in an age of eschatological fervour and self-doubt; prophecies of the imminent end of the world predominate, and we may yet sense the spirit of the time in three roughly contemporaneous sources. The first of these is the Armenian writer Sebeos, whose work is imbued with an apocalyptic urgency, and it affords a reliable narrative of the tumultuous seventh century. George of Pisidia, a prominent churchman connected with the court of the emperor Heraclius, is the second. George was a poet who commemorated the Persian wars of Heraclius, and his poetry (which the emperor himself commissioned) reposes upon official reports sent from the field to Constantinople. 65 We may detect in his poetry a melancholy loss of confidence in man’s power over the world in which he lives, as George contemplates the vanity of ambition and the brute reality of God’s infinite sway over all creation. 66 The arresting declamations of the prophet of a new religion are the third source. The earliest portions of the Quran, pronounced amidst the last great war of Antiquity, are vivid evocations of the end of the world and the imminent day of judgement, and the prophet exhorts all mankind to repentance in preparation for the Last Day. 67 The writing of Theophylact gives way to two Roman chronicles and one abridgement from which we may derive only a sparse outline of the Roman account of the last war of Antiquity. 68 I. The Pascal Chronicle purports to list all the important events of human history down to the compiler’s own day, and it terminates at the year 628: the final year of the war. Its last section, which covers the conquests of 65

Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses to a World Crisis, 2010, p. 16–35. For example, see these lines of George’s Hexaemeron (George of Pisidia, Hexaemeron, l. 369–378): Τίς τὸν μέγιστον οὐρανὸν τοῦτον βλέπων, Καὶ τὴν ἀεικίνητον, ἣν ἔχει βίαν, Τῶν ἀστέρων τε τοῦς συνεκτικωτάτους, Νῦν μὲν βορείας, νῦν δὲ κινήσεις νότου Ἐν ἐκδρομῇ ποιοῦντας, ἢ μεταστάσει· Ἢ τὴν ἄβυσσον τοῦ χυθέντος ἀέρος, Ψυχρουμένην νῦν καὶ πάλιν πυρουμένην, Καὶ προσβολὰς πάσχουσαν ἠναγκασμένας, Οὐ τὴν ἄτρεπτον ἐννοήσας οὐσίαν, Δούλην νομίζει τὴν ἀείτρεπτον κτίσιν; For other examples, see Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses to a World Crisis, 2010, p. 29; 35. 67 Quran 54:1; 81:1–6; 82:4; 99; Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses to a World Crisis, p. 355–358; 449. 68 On the principal sources of the period see Greatrex, G. / Lieu, S. N. C., The Roman Eastern Front and the Persian Wars, p. 182–183. 66

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Khusro and the counterattack of Heraclius, is not a narrative, but rather a rich fund of chronology and documentary evidence covering the Roman efforts to sue for peace with Iran, the siege of Constantinople, and a dispatch from the field announcing the victory of Heraclius and the fall of Khusro. 69 II. The Chronography of Theophanes is a compilation of a later date, for it terminates in the year 813. But a portion of this source reposes upon an official account of Heraclius’ campaigns, full of lucid and plausible detail, and probably composed by the poet George of Pisidia. 70 III. The Short History composed by the patriarch Nicephorus is a composition of the late eighth century, covering the period between the years 602 and 769. The writer of this text was not an eyewitness to the events which he describes, but his work reposes upon documentary sources of the seventh century which are now lost. 71 These three sources may be supplemented by important notices in Syrian chronicles, such as the Chronicle of Khuzestan, and the sources of the Persian royal tradition, of which the best examples are the works of Dinawari and Tabari, for the poet Ferdowsi has transmitted no account of the last war of Antiquity. 72

THE OUTBREAK OF WAR AND ITS FIRST PHASE 603–615 The invasion began in the spring of the year 603. 73 Iranian troops had gathered on the northern and southern flanks of the Taurus mountains, and Khusro himself took command of his southern forces and led them into Mesopotamia. 74 It was Khusro’s first aim to form the siege of Dara. He then divided his forces, and leaving an army outside the walls of that castle, Khusro and a smaller cohort proceeded to Edessa. A dawn assault threw the defenders of that city into a panic; many flung themselves into the Daisan river, 75 others fled ignominiously, and the gates of Edessa were thrown open to the Persian king. Theodosius, who had accompanied Khusro, was presented to the citizens of Edessa as the rightful emperor of Rome. Khusro then withdrew to Dara where the siege of that fortress continued for a year and a half. In the summer of the year 604, mines destroyed the walls of Dara, and 69

Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses to a World Crisis, p. 37–59. The author of the chronicle was perhaps Sergius, the Patriarch of Constantinople. 70 Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses to a World Crisis, 2010, p. 268–295, in which the author expounds the intricate argument in favour of the source composed by George of Pisidia. 71 Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses to a World Crisis, p. 237–256. 72 Howard-Johnston, J., “Al-Tabari on the Last Great War of Antiquity” in HowardJohnston, J. (ed.), East Rome, Sasanian Persia and the End of Antiquity: Historiographical and Historical Studies, 2006, p. 1–22. 73 My division of the war into four phases follows Kaegi, W. E., Heraclius Emperor of Byzantium, 2003, p. 58–191. 74 Sebeos, p. 107; Whittow, M., The Making of Orthodox Byzantium, p. 72–73. 75 This stream is a tributary of the Euphrates, which is surely what Sebeos means (Sebeos, p. 107 with note 364 in the second volume, p. 58).

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the Iranian host rushed into the city and put every inhabitant to the sword; and the writer Sebeos was impressed by the rich haul of booty extracted from that fortress and brought to Ctesiphon. 76 As those events unfolded, a Roman army had been dispatched to recover Edessa, and Narses took flight and was captured at Hierapolis. He was taken to Constantinople and burnt alive at the behest of the usurper Phocas. 77 In the year that followed the reduction of Dara, Iran’s northwestern border was gradually extended westward of the old frontier along the watershed of the Araxes and Euphrates rivers. Successive Iranian generals fought a series of hard campaigns and faced greater resistance than Khusro had encountered to the south. 78 An early failure near Elevard gave way to a victory upon the plain of Akanich in the district of Shirak and then a withdrawal to Azarbaijan. The Iranian general, whom Sebeos calls Senitam Khosrov, defeated Roman forces in the districts of Basean and Taron, but operations were halted in the year 606. Over the course of that year the Iranian army undertook a campaign of recruitment in order to ensure numerical superiority. 79 Khusro now retired to his capital, and commanded his general Khoream, who is better known by his title Shahr-Baraz, 80 to carry war deep into Roman Mesopotamia and Syria. The general whom Sebeos calls Ashtat Yeztayar was likewise dispatched to Armenia along with young Theodosius. ‘Receive those who submit in a spirit of friendship’, Khusro instructed, ‘and keep them in peace and prosperity; but those who resist put them to the sword, and make war!’ 81 The presentation of the rightful Roman emperor assured the capitulation of Theodosiopolis in about the year 608, and the victorious general pressed on into Roman Armenia and seized the forts at Citharizon, Satala, and Nicopolis. To the south, in the years which passed between 607 and 615, all Roman cities east of the river Euphrates were captured and held. Though the order is uncertain and the chronology doubtful, the cities of Amida, Carrhae, Resaina, Edessa, Hierapolis, Qenneshrin, and Callinicum fell successively to the arms of Iran; and, as the Roman defences gave way, there began a large migration of persons westward. 82 The inner defences along the river Euphrates were broken; and in the year 611 the Iranian host captured Caesarea of Cappadocia, the most important military base in Anatolia. Antioch fell in the following year, 83 and the whole of Asia Minor was now 76

Sebeos, p. 107; This is also noticed in Chronicle to 724, p. 145. Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 292–293. 78 Sebeos, p. 107–109. For analysis, see Kaegi, W. E., Heraclius, p. 67. 79 Sebeos, p. 110. 80 Sebeos, p. 110; 125 (See Thomson, R. W. / Howard-Johnston, J., The Armenian History Attributed to Sebeos, p. 62 with note 391). 81 Sebeos, p. 110. 82 Chronicle 724, p. 146. 83 Sebeos, p. 111. 77

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exposed to the predations of Khusro’s soldiers. The Roman emperor had attempted and failed to sue for peace, and a counterattack was planned. A Roman siege of Caesarea in the year 612 threatened to expose the Iranian garrison to the calamities of famine, but that army forced its way through the Roman blockade, shattered the host of Heraclius, and left the city in flames. Again in the year 613 an expeditionary force was dispatched to resist the advance of Iran, but the Roman host was cut in pieces; and in the following year the government of Khusro began to project power throughout Syria and Palestine. 84 In the opinion of the writer Theophanes, the ravages of the Iranian army were destructive and frightening, but the behaviour of the tyrant Phocas was worse. 85 There may be a hint of irony in the words of Theophanes, but the command which Khusro is said to have issued to his generals suggests a will to rule, but not to destroy the people of Rome; and, despite the bloody conquest of Dara, the image of the peaceable annexation of Roman cities starts to the historian’s mind. The balance of the archaeological evidence suggests a far less violent and destructive portrait than that which takes shape upon the pages of written sources. 86 Nevertheless, though the forces of Khusro may have threatened, but sought to avoid, destruction and bloodshed, the capture of Jerusalem in the year 614 was attended by astonishing violence and religious enthusiasm.

THE SIEGE AND CAPTURE OF JERUSALEM When the House of Sasan emerged victorious from its most severe trials in the sixth century, the empire of Iran had changed. The militant Zoroastrianism of the age of Shapur I and his high priest Kerdir, the tolerance of the first, and the religious conformity of the second Yazdgard, and the strange doctrines espoused by Kavad gave way to the reign of a king who appeared to acknowledge the equal truth, or equal utility, of every religion of his empire. The early reign of Khusro II compels the historian to contemplate the monarchy of Cyrus: the great Achaemenid king who conquered and ruled with the sanction of Ahura Mazda, the approval of all the gods of Sumer and Akkad, and Marduk, the supreme god of Babylon. 87 But the Iranian gov84

Whittow, M., The Making of Orthodox Byzantium, p. 75–76. Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 296. 86 Greatrex, G., “The Impact on Asia Minor of the Persian Invasions in the Early Seventh Century,” in Şimşek, C. / Kaçar, T., The Lykos Valley and Neighbourhood in Late Antiquity, 2018, p. 13–26; Foss, C., “The Persians in the Roman Near East,” p. 149–170. 87 ‘…the gods of the land of Sumer and Akkad which Nabonidus – to the fury of the lord of the gods – had brought into Shuana, at the command of Marduk, the great lord, I returned them unharmed to their cells, in the sanctuaries that made them happy. May all the gods that I returned to their sanctuaries, every day before Bel and Nabu, ask for long life for me, and mention my good deeds…’ (Cyrus Cylinder, p. 43); ‘Marduk the great lord rejoiced at [my good] deeds’ (Cyrus Cylinder, p. 43). 85

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ernment had also taught the stubborn monotheism of the Jews to look upon Cyrus as God’s Messiah: ‘Thus saith the LORD to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have holden, to subdue nations before him; and I will loose the loins of kings, to open before him the two leaved gates; and the gates shall not be shut; I will go before thee, and make the crooked places straight: I will break in pieces the gates of brass, and cut in sunder the bars of iron: and I will give thee the treasures of darkness, and hidden riches of secret places, that thou mayest know that I, the LORD, which call thee by thy name, am the God of Israel.’ 88

A special relationship between the Jews and the Achaemenid kings took root, and was commemorated in the Hebrew scriptures. Khusro and his advisers cannot have been unaware of the high repute in which the Jews held his Achaemenid forerunners who had, successively, been anointed by God, restored the Jews to the Land of Promise, and commanded the reconstruction of the Temple which had been destroyed by the king of Babylon in the late sixth century before our era. 89 When the armies of Khusro penetrated Palestine and captured Jerusalem, the invasion was welcomed and encouraged by Jews who expected the opening of a new age, and who believed that the empire of Rome, which had destroyed their second temple, was the last of the earthly powers described by the prophet Daniel. 90 It is perhaps unsurprising that the Jews who beheld the apparent collapse of Rome’s Christian empire would recall the words of a prophet, and meditate upon the arrival of the Messiah and the moment when worldly power would pass to them. 91 But, when we contemplate the events that followed, a startling inference suggests itself: that Khusro encouraged the Messianic and eschatological expectations of Roman Jews. 88

Isaiah, 45:1–3. For some interpretations of this passage, see Fried, L. S., “Cyrus the Messiah? The Historical Background to Isaiah 45:1” The Harvard Theological Review, vol. 95, no. 4, 2002, p. 373–393, and Westermann, C., Isaiah 40–66: A Commentary, 1969, p. 4–5; 154. 89 2 Chronicles 36:22–23; Ezra 2:1–2; 3:8; 6:15; Nehemiah 7:6–7; Heilo, O., Eastern Rome and the Rise of Islam: History and Prophecy, 2016, p. 20. 90 Daniel 7:23–27. Van Bekkum, W. J., “Jewish Messianic Expectations in the Age of Heraclius” in Reinink, G. J. / Stolte, B. H. (eds.), The Reign of Heraclius (610 – 641): Crisis and Confrontation, Groningen Studies in Cultural Change (Book 2), 2002, p. 95–112; Wheeler, B. M., “Imagining the Sasanian Capture of Jerusalem: The Prophecy and Dream of Zerubbabel and Antiochus Strategios’ Capture of Jerusalem,” Orientalia Christiana Periodica, 57, 1991, p. 69–85; Levi, I., “L’Apocalypse de Zorobabel et le roi de Perse Siroès,” Revue des études juives, 68, 1914, p. 129–160. On the prophecy of Daniel, see Heilo, O., Eastern Rome and the Rise of Islam, p. 2–4. 91 Cf. Shoemaker, S. J., The Apocalypse of Empire: Imperial Eschatology in Late Antiquity and Early Islam, 2018, p. 92–100.

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That inference would explain why the conquests of Khusro coincided with a Jewish insurrection throughout the Roman world. The Jews of Antioch revolted in the year 610, and according to the testimony of Theophanes, some of them castrated the patriarch Anastasius, threw the severed organs into his face, and dragged the expiring corpse through the streets of their city. Many other Christians were slain, and an army dispatched by the emperor Phocas failed to arrest that furious rebellion. 92 A band of Samaritans and Jews from Tiberias, the Galilean mountains, and Nazareth is said to have joined itself to the Iranian host on is progress to Jerusalem. 93 As the Iranian army advanced upon Acre, the Jews of that city are said to have risen in revolt. 94 The Jews of Caesarea had willingly submitted themselves to the general Shahin, after the departure of the city’s Christian population; 95 and the capitulation of Palestine was achieved by certain Jews who had allied themselves with the general Shahr-Baraz. When the war had concluded, in a personal interview with the emperor Heraclius, a Jew by the name of Benjamin justified the insurrection on the ground that the Christians of Rome were the enemies of his people. 96 Intense feelings of Messianic expectation inspired Jewish liturgical poetry and apocalyptic literature of the early seventh century, and the city of the Jerusalem was at the centre of those hopes. ‘Assyria shall go forth against Edom…and Assyria will destroy all her tents’, ‘the king of the west will wage a mortal war with the king of the east’, and ‘Gog and Magog will then mightily clash inspiring fear in the hearts of the nations, and Israel will be cleansed of her sins’. 97 Such are the apocalyptic allusions to the war which promised to inaugurate ‘the day when the Messiah son of David will come to a downtrodden people’, and the Jews shall no longer be ‘kept away from the house of prayer’. 98 And after a brief respite ‘Assyria shall allow them to found a temple of holiness; and they will build there an altar of holiness and they will sacrifice offerings of holiness’. 99 Here we have an unmistakable sign that the Jews expected the purification of Jerusalem and the revival of their ancient rites under the rule of the Persian king. One Jewish liturgical poem suggests that an altar had indeed been erected upon the Temple Mount, and that sacrifice had resumed, but 92

Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 296. For the general uprising, see Neusner, J., A History of the Jews in Babylonia, vol. 5, p. 122–124. 93 Annals of Eutychius, v. 2, p. 216: 94

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Doctrina Jacobi, 5:12; Sharf, A., Byzantine Jewry from Justinian to the Fourth Crusade, 1971, p. 49. 95 Sebeos, p. 112. 96 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 328. 97 Sivan, H., “From Byzantine to Persian Jerusalem: Jewish Perspectives and Jewish-Christian Polemics,” Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies 41, 2000, p. 295; 288–289. I have modified Sivan’s translations slightly, to suit my diction and sentence structure. I owe this reference to Mr Tom Holland. 98 Sivan, H., “From Byzantine to Persian Jerusalem,” p. 295; 288–289. 99 Sivan, H., “From Byzantine to Persian Jerusalem,” p. 289.

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the mysterious leader of these developments, who called himself Nehemiah ben Hushiel, was executed by Iranian authorities, and the hope of the Jews gave way to disillusionment and anger. 100 We may fairly suspect that this was the cause of unrest and violence. Amidst the tumult of a Jewish uprising and Christian retaliation, Iranian forces were asked to intervene and to pacify Jerusalem. The flames of enthusiasm abated, but after the passage of a few months some Christian youths arose and slew the officers of the Persian king, and strife erupted again between Jewish and Christian citizens. Those Jews who had escaped death at the hands of their Christian antagonists sent word to the Iranian army at Caesarea, Shahr-Baraz resolved to punish the Christian population of Jerusalem, and the Iranian army began a siege of nineteen days. Mines shattered a part of the walls of Jerusalem, and for three days that city was devoted to fire and sword. The patriarch Zachariah, and many of the clergy, were arrested and tortured, until they revealed the hiding place of Christendom’s holiest relic. The wood of the cross, to which Jesus had been nailed, had been placed in a reliquary and buried in a vegetable garden. 101 The Iranian host extracted that relic from the ground and dispatched it to Ctesiphon as a trophy of war and a gift for Khusro’s Christian wife Shirin. 102 All the gold and silver which had accumulated within the Holy City over the past three centuries was melted down and sent to Ctesiphon. Seventeen thousand persons had been slain, and thirty-five thousand were taken prisoner. The forces of Shahr-Baraz occupied Jerusalem for twenty-one days, and supposedly burnt it to the ground. 103

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE IRANIAN CONQUEST OF JERUSALEM Archaeological work has revealed seven mass graves around the circumference of the Old City of Jerusalem. These graves indicate indiscriminate slaughter and hasty burial, and we may confidently associate them with the calamity of the year 614. 104 100

Stemberger, G., Judaica Minora II: Geschichte und Literatur des rabbinischen Judentums, Mohr Siebeck, 2010, p. 169–170; Sivan, H., “From Byzantine to Persian Jerusalem,” p. 291–292; Malamat, A., A History of the Jewish People, 1976, p. 362; Levi, I., “L’Apocalypse de Zorobabel,” p. 151–153. The date of these important events cannot be inferred precisely from the texts which allude to them. I have preferred the opinion of Sivan who situates them very early in the Persian occupation of Jerusalem. The later dating (between 629 and 634) suggested by Stemberger founded on the older opinion of Fleischer (Fleischer, E., “Solving the Qilliri Riddle,” Tarbiz 54, 1984–1985, p. 383–427). 101 Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 25; Tabari, v. 2, p. 181. Curiously, Dinawari (p. 111) has wrongly transferred the seizure of the cross to the city of Alexandria, and the vegetable garden is transformed into a place where basil grows. 102 Antiochus Strategus, p. 507. 103 Sebeos, p. 116. 104 Avni, G., “The Persian Conquest of Jerusalem (614 c.e.) – An Archaeological Assessment,” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, No. 357, 2010, p. 35–48.

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The most instructive of these is a cave at the site of Mamilla near the Jaffa Gate. Hundreds of human bones, mostly those of women and children, are mingled with cruciform pendants, lamps, and coins issued in the reign of the emperor Phocas; and a Greek inscription of four lines adorns the entrance to the cave: ‘for the redemption and salvation of those whose names God knows’. 105 This evidence strengthens our confidence in the mysterious writer Antiochus Strategus who claims that the soldiers of Shahr-Baraz had massacred Christians at the site of Mamilla where the faithful had buried the corpses in a grotto. 106 But the account of Antiochus is otherwise doubtful. The incineration and demolition of all churches, the destruction of altars, crosses trodden under foot, icons spat upon, 107 the systematic violation of four hundred nuns, 108 and the burning of the Church of the Resurrection 109 cannot be corroborated by the evidence of archaeology; nor would they reflect the behaviour of a conqueror who intended to rule over a population of Christians. Evidence of extensive burning is attested only on the northern portion of the old wall. 110 We may fairly suspect that the damage of a popular uprising and the intervention of a military power has been exaggerated into a vast scene of destruction. At the conclusion of this massacre, it is said that the general Shahr-Baraz sent forth criers who urged the survivors to emerge from the places in which they had hidden: artisans and builders were carried off to Iran and the others were imprisoned within a cistern. Certain Jews are said to have offered to purchase the freedom of any captives who would deny Christ; and, when this plan failed, they ransomed prisoners for the singular, and unbelievable, purpose of murdering them. 111 But the Christians ‘rejoiced because they were being slain for Christ’s sake and shed their blood for his blood, and took on themselves death in return for his death,’ 112 and the number of the slain was more than sixty-six thousand. 113 The work of Antiochus may perhaps best be understood as propaganda, composed amidst the great war, so as to justify the Roman view of a contest between the religion of Jesus and that of Zoroaster. 114 105

Reich, R., “God Knows Their Names” – Mass Christian Grave Revealed in Jerusalem,” Biblical Archaeology Review 22/2. 1996, p. 29–33. 106 Antiochus Strategus, p. 508; 514. 107 Antiochus Strategus, p. 507. 108 Antiochus Strategus, p. 509. 109 Antiochus Strategus, p. 509–510; cf. the Chronicle of Khuzestan which includes an especially lurid account of the destruction of the Church of the Resurrection (Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 26–27). 110 Magness, J., “Archaeological Evidence for the Sasanian Persian Invasion of Jerusalem,” in Holum, K. / Laim, H. (eds.), 400–800 C.E., 2011, p. 85–89. 111 Antiochus Strategus, p. 507–508. 112 Antiochus Strategus, p. 508. 113 Antiochus Strategus, p. 516. 114 Cf. Wood, P., The Chronicle of Seert, p. 215; Kaegi, W. E., Heraclius, p. 79–80.

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But the real experience of the fall of Jerusalem was never forgotten, and its greatest force was upon the minds and feelings of men. The God in whose name the Roman emperor had claimed to rule had turned against his people, and ascetics of the Palestinian desert accused, and sought to purify, a sinful people who had angered the deity. 115 We may perhaps compare the annexation of Palestine and the capture of Jerusalem with the fall of Rome in the year 410, which had shocked the Roman world and which had given rise to the utopian visions of St Augustine’s City of God. 116 An obscure citizen of Mecca similarly consoled himself at the prospect of Roman humiliation: ‘Rome has been vanquished in a land nearby. But after their defeat, they shall be victorious again in a few years. God is master of the past and the future; and on that day the believers shall rejoice in his help. He helps whom he wishes: he is mighty and compassionate.’ 117

PREPARATIONS FOR CONQUEST The success of Khusro’s invasion of the Roman empire unfolded amidst the disorder of Roman political strife and civil war. The reign of Phocas was savage and incompetent; and though the Roman government called young Theodosius an impostor, he was received as the rightful emperor of Rome wherever he appeared. Sanguinary repression at Constantinople, the successive rebellions of Narses and Heraclius, and war in the Balkans forbade the massive military intervention which might have halted the advance of Iran. 118 Massive concessions of territory were surely demanded from, and granted by, Theodosius; and in the mind of Khusro there took shape the double prospect of revenge upon the killer of Maurice and the recovery of territory which had been ceded in the year 591. By the turn of the sixth century, the hostile outer world of the nomad had taken on a less menacing aspect, and Khusro could safely deploy a large military force in the west. In the year 601 it was the bold project of the khaghan Tardu to reunite the western and the eastern halves of the Turkish empire. His failure gave way to a war upon the northern Chinese dynasty of the Sui – an exercise in which he may have hoped to win honour and prestige. But problems of an impossibly long supply line afflicted that campaign in a distant country, and the Töles, a tribe subject to the Turks, rose in revolt. The Chinese war was terminated abruptly, Tardu himself per-

115

Booth, P., Crisis of Empire: Doctrine and Dissent at the End of Late Antiquity, 2014, 94–100. Heilo, O., Eastern Rome and the Rise of Islam, p. 21. 117 Quran 30:2–5. On the tradition which connects these lines with the Iranian conquest of Palestine, see Ali’s preamble to his translation of Surah 30 (Ali, A., The Meaning of the Noble Qur’an, 2002, p. 1006–1007), and Nöldeke, Sketches from Eastern History, p. 41. 118 Kaegi, W. E., Heraclius, p. 65; Whittow, M., The Making of Orthodox Byzantium, p. 73–75. 116

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ished in about the year 602, and in the following year the disintegrating Turkish khaghanate was engulfed by civil war. 119 Such conditions left the government of Iran free to continue the policy of warfare inaugurated by Ardashir and the two Shapurs, and revived by Kavad and Khusro I. But two important historical facts announce that the conquests of Shahin and Shahr-Baraz were to be permanent. I. When the issue of the war seemed certain, Khusro terminated the privileged position of his Lakhmid vassal. 120 Nearly four hundred years of cooperation between the kings of Hira and the House of Sasan came to a sudden end in a single moment in the first decade of the seventh century. Khusro’s vision of an enlarged Iranian empire could not have included a policy of managing the Bedouins of northern Arabia through a single client; and centuries of antagonism between the Arabs of the Lakhm and Ghassan forbade a prominent role for the former allies of Iran, and a multilateral system of alliances extending across the Arabian frontier was to be the new policy. The Chronicle of Seert notes that relations between Hira and Ctesiphon disintegrated and issued in the ignominious execution of the king Nuʿman III. 121 But these troubles were a consequence, and not the cause, of Iran’s new policy. Iya ibn Qabisa, a client king of the Banu ʿIjl arose in place of his Lakhmid predecessor, and the new dynasty was established at Hira. It is possible that this change of policy was implemented in the year 606 when the penetration of Roman territory had been halted. 122 The Arabian reaction was fierce. Ties of loyalty to the Lakhmid monarchy compelled an alliance of tribes to attack Hira and to attempt to dislodge its new ruler. 123 That effort failed, but a deeper incursion of that Bedouin force issued in the rout of a small contingent of the Iranian army at the site of Dhu Qar. This small skirmish was but a slight reverse for the empire of Iran, but an Arabian merchant acclaimed it as a great victory, and announced that it had come about through his intercession. 124 Evidence for the Iranian consolidation of the desert frontier at this moment is meagre, but instructive. The government of Iran seems to have patronised the Ghassanid Arabs also, and they were surely a second important client beside the Banu ʿIjl at Hira. 125 There were surely others rooted in different portions of the 119

Barfield, T., The Perilous Frontier, p. 136–138; Wright, A. F., The Sui Dynasty, p. 188. I am following the analysis of Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses to a World Crisis, p. 437–439. 121 Chronicle of Seert, II(2), p. 468–469; 478–481; 539–540; 546. 122 No more precise dating is possible (Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses to a World Crisis, p. 437). 123 Tabari, v. 2, p. 193–194; 214–215. 124 Tabari, v. 2, p. 193: 120

125

.‫هذا اوّل يوم انتصف العرب من العجم ؛ و�ي نُ��وا‬

The principal evidence for this is that the Ghassan are identified as the core of the Roman and allied force defeated at the Battle of Yarmuk in the year 636 (Baladhuri, p. 135–137.

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Arabian frontier. But, whatever the composition of this multilateral system of alliances, it successfully guarded the southern flank of the Iranian empire throughout the reign of Khusro II, for we hear of no trouble in this sensitive region after the skirmish at Dhu Qar. 126 II. In the year 605, Gregory of Prat succeeded to the patriarchate of SeleuciaCtesiphon, and he occupied that office for four years. 127 Sabrishoʿ, his predecessor, had endorsed a dyophysite, non-Chalcedonian Christology; but the sympathies of Gregory were with the monophysites. 128 This was the moment at which the Iranian government shifted its support from the so-called Nestorian to the monophysite party, in anticipation of annexing Roman territory where Christians of that opinion were especially numerous. 129 The Chalcedonian policies of the emperor Maurice were swiftly reversed, monophysite priests were returned to their former churches, and Syrian churchmen received these developments favourably. 130 This was an obvious, but effective, policy to attract Christians who hated the Roman government and to alienate the Orthodox party. At the death of Gregory, the patriarchal throne was left vacant for the duration of Khusro’s war – a sign, perhaps, that Khusro had planned to abandon the patriarchate of Seleucia-Ctesiphon, and all its Nestorian associations, forever.

THE SECOND PHASE OF THE WAR 615–622 When the new emperor Heraclius had overthrown the usurper Phocas in the year 610, he dispatched an embassy to the Persian court and offered terms of peace. These were refused, the Roman ambassadors were slain, and by the year 615 an Iranian army under the command of the general Shahin had advanced through Asia Minor and appeared upon the Asiatic shore of the Bosporus within sight of Constantinople. 131 At this moment a second embassy was dispatched with the purpose of suing for peace without conditions. The emperor Heraclius had opened negotiations in person with Shahin, 132 and two senior ministers and a representative of the 126

Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses to a World Crisis, 2010, p. 441. Chronicle of Seert, II(2), p. 521–522. It was said that the intrigues of Shirin had achieved the elevation of that churchman over his rival Gregory of Nisibis, whom Khusro had originally preferred. 128 Flusin, B., Saint Anastase le Perse, II, p. 107–109. 129 Wood, P., The Chronicle of Seert, p. 200–201. 130 Flusin, B., Saint Anastase le Perse, II, p. 114–118. 131 Sebeos, p. 112–116; Chronicon Paschale, p. 706; Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 296. But the writer Nicephorus claims that Shahin besieged Chalcedon for a long time (Nicephorus, Breviarium, 9). 132 Sebeos, p. 122; the patriarch Nicephorus has transmitted a much-embellished account of this embassy (Nicephorus, Breviarium, 6). For a somewhat credulous analysis, see Kaegi, W. E., Heraclius, p. 83–86. 127

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patriarch of Constantinople bore gifts and a letter to the court at Ctesiphon. 133 The force of their epistle was a grovelling request on the part of the senate that the empire of Iran appoint a Roman client king, and that the war be brought to an immediate end. 134 At this moment, Khusro might have halted and consolidated the conquests which he had lately won. He refused to acknowledge the authority of the emperor of Rome; the representatives of the Roman senate were abject suppliants to the king of Iran, and the people of Constantinople trembled to behold the watchfires of Shahin at Chalcedon. Khusro could have installed young Theodosius as emperor, and reclaimed the lands which had been ceded in the year 591 together with other, more impressive conquests. But the request of the embassy was refused, the ambassadors were cast into prison, and Khusro commanded his general to prepare a naval assault upon the Roman capital. 135 Khusro’s change of policy, which required the abandonment and probable murder of young Theodosius and the deployment of additional military resources, cannot have been taken without careful deliberations. Many of the king’s advisers must have opposed so bold and dangerous a plan, but we have no direct insight into the discussions which shaped Khusro’s thought. All the Roman Orient, save the land of Egypt, had been subdued: the measure of Khusro’s ambition was surely equal to the size of the conquest, and this may have been enough to impel the Sasanid monarch to annex the entire Roman empire. But the threat of the outer world of the nomad must have shaped Iranian policy. In the year 615, the Iranian government received an arresting reminder of the power of the riders of the north. At the instigation of some Hephthalite kings, a vast Turkish force, which Sebeos computes at three hundred thousand men, traversed the river Oxus, destroyed an Armenian army sent to oppose them, and penetrated as far as Rey and Isfahan. 136 That formidable host spread devastation as they plundered, and returned to Central Asia with an immense haul of booty. The Turkish khaghan may have looked for a propitious moment to attack the sedentary power to the south, and the distraction of warfare in the west furnished the opportunity that he had awaited. But the sudden retreat of the Turks is difficult to explain. The evidence of Chinese sources informs us that the death of the old, and the succession of a new, khaghan provoked a change of policy in the year 615; and the empire of the Turks directed all military strength against the crumbling Sui dynasty. A surprise 133

The ambassadors were Olympius (former consul, patrician, and pretorian prefect), Leontius (former consul, patrician, and city prefect), and Anastasius (presbyter and syncellus) (Chronicon Paschale, p. 707). 134 The letter has been reproduced in full in Chronicon Paschale, p. 706–709. 135 Sebeos, p. 122–123. 136 Sebeos, 101–102. Sebeos calls these kings ‘Kushans’ by which he must mean ‘Hephthalite’. For analysis see Thomson, R. W. / Howard-Johnston, J., The Armenian History Attributed to Sebeos, part 2: Historical Commentary, p. 186.

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attack upon the Sui emperor in the midst of an inspection of his army issued in an embarrassing rout and a siege of the city of Yanmen, a strategic chokepoint between the valleys of Shanxi and the steppe. 137 Though the emperor Yang survived and escaped, this humiliation precipitated the fall of the Sui and inaugurated many years of Turkish involvement in the affairs of China. But nothing could ensure the permanent quiescence of nomadic power, and the government of Iran surely expected further aggression from the steppe. The Roman state, however diminished or humiliated, would have afforded a constant distraction to the empire of Iran, and a potential ally to her Asiatic foes, and the government of Khusro must have determined that the political union of all sedentary peoples would be required to resist the might of the Turks. 138 We have already noted that the Shahnameh of Ferdowsi offers no mention of the last war of Antiquity. But that poem includes a surprising allusion to an appraisal of the finances of the Iranian empire in that king’s twenty-sixth regnal year, or the year 615. 139 The distichs in question form part of a long speech put into the mouth of Khusro II amidst his self-justification and defence after his eventual destitution and arrest. Although we cannot expect Ferdowsi’s brief description to allow us a perfect idea of the contents of Khusro’s treasury, the financial assessment, to which he refers, may be grounded in fact. The resolution to prolong the war surely entailed financial deliberations also, and such a reckoning well fits the circumstances of the year 615 when the decision to annex the Roman empire was taken. 140

THE FALL OF ALEXANDRIA AND THE REDUCTION OF EGYPT While the Armenian general Smbat Bagratuni pacified the Iranian frontier in Bactria, the full occupation of Palestine was achieved in the year 616. 141 Razzias into Anatolia filled the following year, and were perhaps intended to distract Roman attention from the main target of the war. Under the command of the general Shahr-Baraz, Iranian troops massed in southern Palestine over the course of the year 618, and

137

Xiong, V. C., Emperor Yang of the Sui Dynasty: His Life, Times, and Legacy, 2006, p. 63–66; Wright, A. F., The Sui Dynasty, p. 195. 138 Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses to a World Crisis, p. 440 139 Ferdowsi, Khusraw-i Parviz, l. 234–238: ‫ز هر گوهرى گنج ما ما�� گشت‬ ��‫سوى شادى و فر ّ�ى تاخت‬ ‫چو صد بار دينار �ُ� صد هزار‬ ��‫مه ��م پنداو�� پار‬ !‫� ُ� آگنده دينار �ُ� شاهوار‬ The word spelt ��‫ پنداو‬should perhaps be ��‫پيداو‬. 140 141

Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses to a World Crisis, p. 352. Flusin, B., Saint Anastase le Perse II, p. 177–180.

‫چو د���� ما بيست و شش سا�� گشت‬ ��‫درم را ي�� ميخ نو ساخت‬ ‫��ان سال چون بازجس�� �مار‬ ��‫� ُ� آگنده افگنده پنداو‬ ‫به هر ��ره يى در ده دو هزار‬

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every preparation was made for an overwhelming attack upon the richest province of the Roman Orient. 142 In the year 619, Alexandria fell after an obstinate siege. A Christian Arab of the Arabian shore of the Persian Gulf 143 had been at Alexandria to study philosophy, and his sympathies with the empire of Iran compelled him to betray the Egyptian capital. On the advice of Peter (that was the Arab’s name), a band of Iranian soldiers seized a small navy of fishing boats; and, in the darkness of the early morning, they entered the city upon its western side opposite the sea. The guards of the western side were slain, the gates were thrown open, the city was invested, and the triumph of Khusro was proclaimed upon the battlements of Alexandria. The treasures of the church and the nobility, which had been loaded onto boats, were wafted by a gust of wind to the shore of the Iranian camp, and the spoil and keys of Alexandria were sent to Yazdin, the minister of finance at the court of Khusro. 144 It was not long thereafter that the cooperation of the two generals Shahin and Shahr-Baraz began to extend Iranian power up the river Nile, and they achieved the total submission of Egypt by the year 621. 145

IRANIAN RULE IN PALESTINE AND EGYPT Though the Iranian army had inflicted great damage upon Jerusalem, Khusro commanded that it be repaired, that its Christian population be re-established, that the Jews be expelled, and that donations be gathered for the restoration of churches. 146 The eschatological fervour, which Khusro had perhaps inspired, could never be satisfied, nor could it be controlled; and, once released, such enthusiasm could only produce hostility within a heterogeneous population. The moment is uncertain, but the favour of the Iranian government swiftly abandoned the Jews and settled upon the Christians of Jerusalem. The appointment of the bishop Modestos as overseer of the city signifies the return of Jerusalem to Christian control, and in a letter to his Armenian colleague Komitas, Modestos alludes to the change of Persian favour, and the alacrity with which money was raised and churches were reconstructed. 147 It was about the year 620 that a renegade Iranian cavalryman by the name of Magundad embraced the faith of Christ and was baptised at Jerusalem, and then established 142 143

Kaegi, W. E., Heraclius, p. 83. Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 25:

̈ ‫ܩܛܪܝܐ‬ ‫ܓܒܪܐ ܕܫܡܗ ܦܜܪܘܣ ܕܢܚܬ ܡܢ ܒܝܬ‬ Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 25–26. Tabari also mentions the keys to Alexandria (Tabari, v. 2, p. 182). 145 Kaegi, W. E., Heraclius, p. 91–92. The date is established in Altheim-Stiehl, R., “The Sasanians in Egypt – Some Evidence of Historical Interest,” Bulletin de la societé d'archéologie copte 31, 1992, p. 87–96. 146 Sebeos, p. 116. 147 Sebeoes, p. 116–118. 144

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himself at Caesarea in the midst of the Iranian occupation of Palestine. The biography of St Anastasius the Persian, as he was called, affords a reliable portrait of life in Palestine in the aftermath of the Iranian invasion, and it demands that the calamities of a siege and the image of an oppressive occupation yield to the portrait of the orderly administration of the Iranian empire. 148 The rites of the Zoroastrian religion were conducted discreetly within private houses, religious tolerance prevailed as Christians held high ranks in the civil service, and an efficient public administration maintained normal relations among a population of Jews and Christians, whose conventicles continued their customary operations. A signal punishment for the Iranian apostate was to carry stones – an activity which we would properly connect with the erection, or the repair, of a building at Caesarea. The advance of Iranian forces upon Alexandria produced a general panic. An exodus of refugees from the countryside fled to the city, but then many took flight including John III, patriarch of the Orthodox Church, and the Roman governor Nicetas. 149 The record of archaeology confirms a scene of destruction to the west of Alexandria: the monastery of St Menas, and the town surrounding it, were destroyed by fire and abandoned. 150 The progress of Shahr-Baraz southward into Upper Egypt was likewise attended by devastation, and seven hundred monks who had hidden themselves in the caves and mountains of Niciu were discovered and slain. 151 When news of the massacre reached the Thebaid, the bishop of Coptos blamed the Iranian conquest upon the sins of his flock, distributed his possessions amongst the poor and hid himself in Mt Shama. 152 Pisentius (that was the name of the bishop) discovered a subterranean passage which led to a large tomb hewn into the mountain: some mummies had lain there undisturbed for many centuries, and the sight of their coffins and the strong odour of funerary spices provoked a meditation on the vanity of earthly life and the various punishments prepared for the souls of the wicked. 153 A loyal disciple who ministered to Pisentius observed the saint in his new abode engaged in a nocturnal dialogue with a mummy concerning the idolatry of his ancestors and the torments of hell. 154 Such an existence was apparently preferable to the Iranian occupation of Egypt. 148

I am following Flusin, B., Saint Anastase le Perse, I, p. 57–75; II, p. 231–243; and Foss, C., “The Persians in the Roman Near East,” p. 159–160. 149 Kaegi, W. E., Heraclius, p. 93; Maspero, J. / Fortescue, A. / Wiet, G., Histoire des patriarches d’Alexandrie depuis la mort de l’empereur Anastase jusqu’à la réconciliation des églises jacobites (518– 616), 1923, p. 328. 150 Foss, C., “The Persians in the Roman Near East,” p. 165 with note 89a. 151 Severus ibn al-Muqaffa’, p. 486. This narrative is preceded by a mendacious account of the fall of Alexandria. 152 The Arabic Life of St Pisentius, p. 378–384. 153 The Arabic Life of St Pisentius, p. 421–422. 154 The Arabic Life of St Pisentius, p. 423–429: ��‫ ا‬،‫اما انا ��لست �ي الظ��م �متا ا�ى ا�ي وا��يت ا��ي يك��ه )ا��ي ا����� عنه ��نه ك�ن من دا�ل الباب( ���دث معه‬

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The subjugation of Egypt was indeed bloody and tumultuous. One of its immediate consequences was the cessation of the Egyptian grain dole at Constantinople in the year 619. 155 Ostraca and fragments of letters complain of abductions and torture, and beg for advice concerning the advance of the Iranian army. 156 But the calamities of a military conquest gave way to the peaceable administration of a new province of the empire of Iran. The evidence of papyrology suggests that the period of violence came to a swift end, that the collection of taxes continued, and that the public administration carried on its normal functions. The commands of new political masters, who only rarely employed their native language in official documents, imposed themselves lightly upon a Roman civil service. But even the requisitions for foodstuffs, levies of troops, and tax registers, which survive in Middle Persian, announce the undiminished activity of the Egyptian bureaucracy amidst a peaceable, military occupation. 157 Khusro issued a series of copper coins minted at Alexandria. They bear the image of the king and crescent moon on the obverse; and on the reverse is an image of the cross – a sign of the Iranian government’s desire to conciliate local opinion. 158

THE THIRD PHASE OF THE WAR 622–626 The third phase of the war was to be devoted to holding the Iranian position in Asia Minor, its total conquest, and the siege and capture of Constantinople. George of Pisidia, who lived through this grim time, has left us some verbose and bewildering poetry from which the main features of these years may nevertheless be reconstructed. 159 But it is difficult to produce a harmonious narrative from all available sources. An Iranian army had entered Anatolia from the northwest, and had passed the winter in the region of Pontus. 160 This army had been dispatched, as it seems, to I have supplied the punctuation. 155 Chronicon Paschale, p. 711; Nicephorus, Breviarium, 13; Kaegi, W. E., Heraclius, p. 88. 156 These are summarised in Altheim-Stiehl, R., “Egypt iv. Relations in the Sasanian period,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. VIII, fasc. 3, 1998, p. 252–254 and Altheim-Stiehl, R., “The Sasanians in Egypt,” p. 87–96. 157 Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses to a World Crisis, p. 440–441; Foss, C., “The Persians in the Roman Near East,” p. 167–169; MacCoull, L., “Coptic Egypt During the Persian Occupation: the Papyrological Evidence,” Studi Classici e Orientali, vol. 36, 1987, 307–313. Contra Kaegi, W. E., Heraclius, p. 94–99, who claims that Persian rule was onerous and ‘unpopular’, and that the new Iranian administration ‘offered the Byzantines nothing’. 158 Grierson, P., Catalogue of the Byzantine Coins in the Dumbarton Oaks Collection and the Whittemore Collection, vol. 2, 1968, p. 233 – 234; 336–338 with plate 18. 159 Howard-Johnston, J., Heraclius’ Persian Campaigns, p. 3. 160 ἐπεὶ γὰρ εἰς χειμῶνα πρὸς τὸ πόντιον κλίμα διατρίψας συντόμως ὁ βάρβαρος τὰς εἰσβολὰς κατέσχε τῆς ὁδοῦ φθάσας (George of Pisidia, Expeditio Persica II.256–258).

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intercept and to surround a small army commanded by the emperor Heraclius in Bithynia. The emperor and his troops forced their way out of this trap, and succeeded in winning a victory of small military importance. 161 Though the defeat of an Iranian army was a great boost to Roman morale, the threat to Constantinople was now so great that it required the emperor’s immediate attention in his capital. 162 The verses of George of Pisidia conceal the nature of the calamity, but Roman intelligence had surely recognised the imminent approach of a formidable enemy: the city of Thessalonica had lately suffered the horrors of a siege of thirty-three days, 163 and a similar fate awaited the first city of the Roman empire. If Khusro had meditated a naval assault upon Constantinople, as Sebeos alludes, his plans were never executed. But the Iranian navy, which dominated the waters of the Indian Ocean would not have shrunk from an attack upon the Roman capital, 164 and it is therefore likely that the policy of Khusro had decided against Iranian participation in the siege. The assault upon the City of Constantine would be entrusted to an ally. ‘Dividing, so to speak, the Thracian Bosporus between them, the Persians destroyed the Asiatic portion and the Avars ravaged the Thracian side; and the barbarians made a mutual agreement to capture Byzantium’. 165 The brief history composed by the patriarch Nicephorus in the ninth century is the source of that interesting notice, and it is the clearest indication that an alliance had been formed between the khaghan and Khusro. The writer Theophanes vaguely implies some form of ‘conspiracy’ between Iran and the Avars, 166 whose nomadic and sedentary subjects had already attacked Thessalonica. It was they who were to assault Constantinople from the north with a gigantic host of eighty-thousand men, and they were to employ the most fearsome engines of siege warfare including towers, mobile armoured shelters, and the mangonel. 167 We may infer, perhaps, that Khusro 161

ὁ δὲ στρατός σου δυσχερεῖς τὰς εἰσβάσεις ἁπαξ προληφθεὶς εἶχε τὰς πρὸς ἥλιον (George of Pisidia, Expeditio Persica II.259–260), etc. 162 Expeditio Persica III.305–340. 163 The evidence for the siege of Thessalonica is in Lemerle, P., Les plus anciens recueils des miracles de Saint Démétrius, 2 vols, 1979–1981, I, p. 180–184, II, p. 94–103. For analysis and the date, see Howard-Johnston, J., Heraclius’ Persian Campaigns, p. 14–15. 164 Howard-Johnston, J., “The Siege of Constantinople,” in Mango, C. / Dagron, G., Constantinople and its Hinterland, 1995, p. 133 with note 7. 165 Nicephorus, Breviarium, 13. 166 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 315. 167 Καὶ πρὸς τὰ τείχη τῆς φιλοξένου πύλης πλήθη προσῆλθεν, ὥσπερ ἦν εἰκασμένα, ὀκτὼ συναθροίζοντα μυριαρχίας (George of Pisidia, Bellum Avaricum, l. 217–219); Cf. Chronicon Pascale, p. 717 which states that the vanguard numbered thirty thousand men before the arrival of the main force commanded by the Avar khaghan (Howard-Johnston, J., “The Siege of Constantinople,” p. 137). The engines are mentioned in Nicephorus, Breviarium, 13. The mangonel, or the so-called traction trebuchet was invented in China in about the 4th century

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and the khaghan had agreed to divide the Roman empire between them, on condition that the Avar host prosecute the landward siege of Constantinople alone. When the emperor Heraclius returned to his capital in late summer of the year 622, the siege of Constantinople was imminent, and the Roman field army yet lingered in the east. At that moment, many within the city surely expected the defeat and partition of the Roman state. The force of diplomacy, and the inducement of money, were the only weapons that might compel the lord of the Avars to negotiate, or to pretend to negotiate, a treaty of peace. 168 A conference between emperor and khaghan was arranged for the summer of the year 623; and Heraclea, outside the Long Wall of Constantinople, was to be the place of that meeting in early June. But an ambush had been prepared for the emperor, his staff, and the other Roman delegates; and here we may behold the influence of the Persian king. Heraclius barely escaped alive as the Avars burst through the Long Wall and plundered suburban Constantinople. 169 These distractions accelerated the Iranian occupation of Asia Minor and other conquests also. Though the evidence is meagre, we may be certain that the mint at Nicomedia, the last Roman mint in operation in Asia Minor, had ceased to produce coins in the year 619, and by the year 623 the city of Ancyra had fallen, and the Iranian navy had subdued Rhodes, and other islands, at the same moment. 170 But negotiations were resumed between emperor and khaghan, and the Romans agreed to humiliating terms, including a huge tribute of two hundred thousand solidi and the surrender of hostages. 171 In the year 624 Heraclius returned to Asia Minor, and a Roman expeditionary army was mobilised and encamped at Caesarea of Cappadocia. At this moment, a letter arrived greeting the emperor Heraclius as the ‘vile and foolish slave’ of Khusro, the ‘lord and king of all the earth and offspring of Ahura Mazda’. In this haughty epistle, which Sebeos purports to preserve, the Persian king urged his counterpart to accept the inevitable destruction of the Roman state; and, in language reminiscent of the Bible, Khusro offered to the emperor fields, vineyards, and olive trees for him to tend in the vicinity of Ctesiphon. The Roman empire had been abandoned by God, and no assistance would come B.C., and evolved over time into the counter-weight trebuchet – ‘one of the greatest products of multiculturalism in the field of technology,’ apparently (Chevedden, P. E., “The Invention of the Counterweight Trebuchet: A Study in Cultural Diffusion,” Dumbarton Oaks Papers, vol. 54, 2000, p. 71–116). 168 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 302–303. Theophanes’ dates are all wrong for this period. 169 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 301–303; Chronicon Paschale, p. 712–713. 170 Theophanes, Chronography, p. 302; Chronicle to 1234, p. 133; Agapius, Kitab al-‘Unvan (ed. and trans. Vasiliev), Patrologia Orientalis 8, 1912, p. 458; Hendy, M. F., Studies in the Byzantine Monetary Economy, c. 300–1450, 1985, p. 416; Greatrex, G. / Lieu, S. N. C., The Roman Eastern Front and the Persian Wars, p. 197. 171 Nicephorus, Breviarium, 13. The hostages were the illegitimate son of Heraclius and his nephew, as well as the illegitimate son of Bonus, who was regent while the emperor was on campaign.

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from Christ who had failed to save himself from the Jews. ‘For if you descend into the depths of the sea,’ the king continued, ‘I shall stretch out my hand and seize you, and then you shall see me in a manner which you shall not desire’. 172 With that grim threat, the letter comes to an end. It is possible that this epistle is a piece of Roman propaganda, advertising a contest between antithetical religions, but it rightly discloses the Iranian war aims, as well as the customary Zoroastrian polemic against the Christian religion. 173 Meanwhile, Khusro was encamped at Ganzak in Azarbaijan at the head of a host of forty thousand men. 174 Roman disinformation had perhaps misled Iranian intelligence to expect an advance from Caesarea of Cappadocia into Syria or Cilicia; and the northern route from Anatolia through Armenia was left open. The Roman emperor and his troops proceeded without opposition up the Euphrates river past Theodosiopolis, along the swift stream of the Araxes, and they appeared in Iranian Armenia. 175 The Roman host left behind them a vast scene of devastation, and Dvin and Nakhchevan had been put to fire and sword. Heraclius now resolved to strike directly at Khusro at Ganzak, and he prepared to march into Azarbaijan. 176 If Theophanes may be believed, a Roman offer of peace was dispatched and rejected, and the host of Heraclius entered Azarbaijan on the twentieth day of April of the year 624. A band of Roman Saracens went ahead as scouts; and when they came upon an advance guard of Iranian soldiers, they slew some and others they carried off to Heraclius. Word of this came to Khusro, and he instantly resolved to abandon his camp and to move southward across the Zagros mountains. 177 The arrival of the Roman emperor scattered the dispirited Iranian army, and those troops began an ignominious and disorderly flight.

THE DESTRUCTION OF THE TEMPLE OF ADUR-GUSHNASP A singular act of pious destruction inflicted a deadly blow to the religion and to the empire of Iran. The great fire shrine of Adur-Gushnasp, at the modern site of Takht-i Suleiman, was surrounded by a wall of fifty feet in height and ten feet in breadth, and thirty-eight lofty towers marched around it in a grim procession, and

172

Sebeos, p. 123. Howard-Johnston, J., Heraclius’ Persian Campaigns, p. 16; Whittow, M., The Making of Orthodox Byzantium, p. 76. 174 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 307. 175 George of Pisidia, Heraclias II, l. 160–165; Moses Daskhurantsi, II.10, p. 78–79. The efforts of Shahr-Baraz to intercept and halt the Roman host had failed (Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 305–306). 176 Sebeos, p. 124. 177 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 307–308. 173

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the precinct of the temple was guarded by a second inner wall. 178 This was one of the holiest shrines of the Zoroastrian religion: here it was said that a sacred fire had burned since the days of the mythical king Kay Khusro, and a holy lake was enclosed within the walls of the temple. Heraclius smashed through the defences of that shrine, the fire of Adur-Gushnasp was extinguished, the waters of the lake were polluted with the corpses of men and animals, 179 and this violent desecration was the Roman revenge for the sacking of Jerusalem and the capture of the True Cross. 180 Khusro fled to the security of the palace of Dastgard between Ctesiphon and Hamadan, and the emperor Heraclius ravaged the countryside of Azarbaijan.

THE ROMAN AND TURKISH ALLIANCE The Roman strategy was to march into Caucasian Albania and to pass the winter near the regional capital of Partaw. 181 There, Heraclius summoned the Christian princes of Caucasia to participate in his struggle against Iran, and an embassy was dispatched to the Western Turks to invite that nomadic power to intervene on the side of Rome. 182 It was late in the year 624, or perhaps very early in the following year, that Heraclius dispatched his ambassador Andrew to the yabghu khaghan with a promise of immense wealth and countless treasures if he would add his forces to the Roman war effort. 183 One thousand Turkish troops escorted the return embassy through the Caspian Gates, up the valley of the river Kura, and through Iberia to the coast of the Black Sea. A ship bore those Turks to Constantinople, where their hearty agreement with the emperor’s proposal was announced to the Roman government. Meanwhile, some Iranian forces had assailed the Roman army on its progress into Albania, but a pitched battle was, for the moment, avoided. 184 In the spring of the year 625, Khusro sent three armies to encircle Heraclius in Albania. Shahr-Baraz had been recalled from Egypt in the previous year, and that general and his men had passed the winter at Nisibis. 185 It was now the task of Shahr-Baraz to block the Roman line of retreat westward into Iberia. 186 A second 178

Huff, D., “Takht-e Solayman,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, 2000 online edition; Boyce, M., “Adur Gushnasp,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. I, fascicle 5, 1985, p. 475–476; Yamamoto, Y., “The Zoroastrian Temple Cult in Archaeology and Literature II,” Orient, vol. XVII, 1981, p. 75. 179 George of Pisidia, Heraclias II, l. 167–230; Sebeos, p. 124; Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 308. 180 Maksymiuk, K. I., “Destruction of the Ādur Gušnasp temple in Ādurbādagān as a revenge for abduction of the Holy Cross from Jerusalem in the context of the letters of Heraclius,” Метаморфозы истории, no. 9, 2017, p. 109–125. 181 Sebeos, p. 125. 182 Moses Daskhurantsi, II.10, p. 79–81; II.11, p. 86–87. 183 Moses Daskhurantsi, II.11, p. 86–87. 184 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 308. 185 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 304–306. 186 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 309.

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general, whom the Armenian writer Moses Daskhurantsi calls Shahraplakan, 187 was instructed to forestall a Roman return to Azarbaijan; and the third commander was Shahin whose task was to occupy the Bitlis Pass and block the southern route through Armenia. 188 These three armies were to advance upon the Roman emperor, to unite their forces, and to destroy the invader. Sensible of the danger posed by three veteran armies, some of Heraclius’ new Caucasian allies defected to Iran. 189 But a complex series of manoeuvres, which are poorly described in the Chronography of Theophanes, and the use of false intelligence, delivered the Roman army from danger. Roman harassment of the army of Sharaplakan compelled the host of Shahr-Baraz to join it, but a feigned retreat issued in a direct confrontation and a Roman victory. The forces of Shahin arrived shortly thereafter and were defeated. 190 Iranian troops reunited under Shahin and Shahr-Baraz and renewed the assault upon Heraclius who had moved northwest toward the coast of the Black Sea. To the delight of the Iranian generals, and perhaps under their influence, the Lazian and Abazgian allies of Heraclius forsook their agreement with the emperor and returned to their own countries. 191 The forces of Iran then pursued Heraclius as he penetrated and marched throughout what was once the Iranian portion of Armenia, but another direct confrontation was avoided until the coming of winter. It was a mistake for Shahr-Baraz to dismiss many of his soldiers for that season, and a small force commanded by the emperor suddenly come upon the Iranian camp and slew nearly everyone within it. The general Shahr-Baraz was one of the few to survive, and in the opinion of Theophanes, he had climbed upon his horse naked and barefoot, and was borne away to safety. 192 The chronicler dwells with relish upon the general’s arms, his golden shield, his belt, and his sandals which had been encrusted with jewels, for these accoutrements were seized and carried off as trophies of war.

THE SIEGE OF CONSTANTINOPLE Those defeats must have been seen as but small reverses. The empire of Iran yet commanded enormous military and financial resources with which to carry on the destruction of the Roman empire, and the final blow was to fall upon the Roman capital itself. Heraclius had persuaded the khaghan to withdraw in the year 624, but the emperor’s diplomacy had served rather to postpone than to thwart the Avar siege; and the influence of Khusro’s envoys had restored the alliance between Iran 187

Theophanes calls him Σαραβλαγγᾶς (Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 309) and he is Շահրապղական in Armenian (Moses Daskhurantsi, II.10, p. 85). 188 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 310. For analysis, see Howard-Johnston, J., “Heraclius’ Persian Campaigns,” p. 17. 189 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 309. 190 Sebeos, p. 125; Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 310–312; Moses Daskhurantsi, II.11, p. 81. 191 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 310. 192 Sebeos, p. 126; Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 311.

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and the Avars. Many would have begun to contemplate the end of nearly eight hundred years of Roman rule in the eastern Mediterranean. But Iranian strategists were surely surprised that the emperor Heraclius did not proceed immediately to the Roman capital. Despite the pursuit and harassment of Shahr-Baraz, Roman forces were mobilised swiftly, they penetrated Anatolia through the Cicilian Gates, and near the city of Sebasteia they awaited the army of Shahin which had been sent to intercept them. 193 Some Roman reinforcements were immediately dispatched to Constantinople from Sebasteia across the Bosporus before Shahr-Baraz could occupy Chalcedon; and the invading force of Shahin was cut in pieces. So complete was the humiliation that Shahin fell ill and died; and, when word of this defeat reached Khusro, he commanded (says Theophanes) that the general’s body be preserved in salt and sent to the Persian court where the corpse was subjected to many indignities. 194 Heraclius now endeavoured to force Shahr-Baraz out of Asia Minor. Though he had not left the region of the Black Sea coast, the emperor spread the false information that he had returned to the Transcaucasus and begun to ravage Iran again. 195 But he continued to apply pressure upon the army of Shahr-Baraz which was encamped at Chalcedon. 196 Here the Iranian host awaited the descent of the Avars upon the northward side of Constantinople. The Avar vanguard was computed at thirty thousand men, and that host appeared before the Long Wall on the twenty-ninth day of June. 197 They crossed that fortification without opposition and advanced upon the Roman capital. The rest of the Avar host was encamped at Adrianople where they completed preparations for the siege. Fire signals were to communicate messages between the Iranian army at Chalcedon and Avar forces across the Bosporus, and these were established by the middle of July. 198 The ruler of the Avars dispatched an embassy, promising peace in exchange, we may presume, for an adequate payment of money. The Avar lord himself may have begun to suspect that the ramparts of the Roman capital might not be easily thrown down. But the citizens of Constantinople refused to come to terms with the khaghan. Despite popular confidence in the fortifications of the Roman capital, the imposing presence of two hostile armies glowering upon the imperial city must have produced a mood of alarm. Upon the twenty-ninth day of July, twelve thousand 193

Sebeos, p. 126; Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 312–314. Τούτου δὲ τὸ σῶμα κελεύει Χοσρόης ἅλατι ταριχευθὲν πρὸς αὐτὸν κομισθῆναι, καὶ τοῦτον νεκρὸν πολλαῖς αἰκίαις ἐπέβαλλεν (Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 315). 195 This is to be inferred from Theophanes’ claim that Heraclius was in Lazica (Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 315); the Paschal Chronicle is rather more vague (Chronicon Paschale, p. 722). 196 Howard-Johnston, J., “Heraclius’ Persian Campaigns,” p. 20. 197 Chronicon Paschale, p. 717. My brief summary follows Howard-Johnston, J., “The Siege of Constantinople,” p. 131–142. 198 Chronicon Paschale, p. 718. 194

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Roman cavalry within the city were confronted by an enemy computed at eighty thousand men, and the Avar host swarmed over the full breadth of the peninsula from the shores of the Propontis to those of the Golden Horn. 199 The Avar siege engines began to bombard the Theodosian Walls on the thirty-first day of July, and on the following day the canoes of the Avar’s Slavic subjects filled the harbour in preparation for an assault. An attempt to ferry some three or four thousand Iranian troops across the Bosporus miscarried and was thwarted by the Roman navy. 200 On the sixth day of August, the Avar host renewed the assault upon the full length of the walls, and was continued into the next night; and on the following day, a contingent of Slavs was to attack the sea walls. But the Romans had anticipated that nautical onslaught and frustrated it, and the Avar bombardment achieved no success against the ramparts of Theodosius. One day later, on the eighth day of August, the Avar host incinerated their engines and began to retreat. 201 The host of Shar-Baraz likewise withdrew from Chalcedon.

THE FOURTH PHASE OF THE WAR 627–628 In the winter of the year 627, the news from every front was grim. The destruction of the temple of Adur-Gushnasp, the death of Shahin, the defeat of Shahr-Baraz, and the failure of the Avar siege were surely great blows to morale, and Iranian spies would have communicated the dismal news of the emperor Heraclius’ formation of an alliance with the Western Turks. At a moment when Khusro and his ministers could do little but deliberate, that nomadic power smashed through the Caspian Gates into Iberia, and devastated the countryside of Azarbaijan, Albania, and Iberia. 202 The emperor Heraclius had now returned to Transcaucasia, and it was below the walls of Tiflis, before an assembly of soldiers, that the Roman emperor met the yabghu khaghan, deputy to the supreme khaghan, of the Turks. That nomad prince performed an act of obeisance to the ruler of a great sedentary power: the emperor reciprocated, called the yabghu his son, and placed his own crown upon his head. Feasting and a marriage between the daughter of Heraclius and the yabghu khaghan confirmed the military and political union of the Roman and Turkish powers. 203 If any Iranian effort had been exerted to frustrate this alliance, it failed; and the last

199

Chronicon Paschale, p. 719–720. Chronicon Paschale, p. 721 gives the number of 3,000; Sebeos claims that 4,000 men perished in a naval battle in the Bosporus (Sebeos, p. 123). 201 Chronicon Paschale, p. 722–725. 202 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 316; Moses Daskhurantsi, II.10, p. 85; Howard-Johnston, “The Sasanian’ Strategic Dilemma,” p. 65. 203 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 316; Nicephorus, Breviarium, 12; Moses Daskhurantsi, II.10, p. 85; Howard-Johnston, “Heraclius’ Persian Campaigns,” p. 24. 200

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resort of Khusro was a vow to send against the Turks his most potent generals. But this threat failed to halt the onslaught from the steppe for more than a moment. 204 Turkish and Roman ballistae, stone-throwers, and other siege engines, were directed against the walls of Tiflis, and the course of the river Kura was diverted so as to undermine their foundations. 205 The writer Moses Daskhurantsi has mistakenly divided the siege into two campaigns, but from his testimony we can reconstruct a single siege which lasted more than a year. 206 But the defenders’ will endured, and they mocked the Turkish commander by drawing the likeness of his face upon a pumpkin which they paraded above the battlements of the city, as they shouted abuse at the host encamped below. It was only the failed sortie of the Iranian client king Stephen which permitted Turkish and Roman forces to capture the lower city of Tiflis. 207 The army of Heraclius and that of his nomadic ally separated: Turkish troops remained to prosecute the siege below the ramparts of Tiflis, and the Roman host, together with an escort of forty thousand Turks, marched southward into the plains of northern Mesopotamia. Heraclius’ appeal to the Turks issued in a singular diplomatic exchange. A menacing letter, dictated in part by the supreme khaghan, was dispatched from the tent of the yaghbu to the palace of Khusro. The king who had subdued the Roman Near East was addressed as nothing more than the governor of Assyria, and the ruler who had identified himself as a god among men, was instructed to vacate the lands which he had conquered and to return the wood of the cross which he had stolen. The supreme khaghan, who called himself ‘the king of the north, the lord of the whole world, your king and the king of kings’, 208 vowed to destroy the empire of Iran if his demands were not met, and the display of arms and siegecraft at Tiflis announced that the Turks were prepared to match words with deeds. So threatening an epistle, and the implication of an alliance between Roman and Turk, surely revived the fear and alarm of the year of 573, when Iran had been surrounded on all sides by enemies. 209 The power of the Western Turks had grown since that horrible year, and Tong (the supreme khaghan) had lately re-established his authority over the Töles people to the northeast, he had conquered the region of Kapisi in the Hindukush, and his capital had been founded near the modern city of Tashkent. It was Tong’s uncle Sipi, whom Roman sources call Ziebel, who held the second rank in the Western Turkish empire, and with whom Heraclius had formed 204

Moses Daskhurantsi, II.10, p. 82. Moses Daskhurantsi, II.10, p. 85–86. 206 Howard-Johnston, “The Sasanians’ Strategic Dilemma,” p. 66; Howard-Johnston, J., “Heraclius’ Persian Campaigns,” p. 24 with note 76. 207 Moses Daskhurantsi, II.14, p. 94–95. 208 The whole letter is found in Moses Daskhurantsi, II.12, p. 88. 209 Howard-Johnston, “The Sasanian’ Strategic Dilemma,” p. 65–66. 205

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his alliance. 210 The two Turkish kings were surely figures of universal dread, but Khusro concealed his fear of nomad power, and addressed Ziebel in haughty language: ‘Go and tell your king, my brother khaghan, that your house has been honoured and respected for ages by my ancestors and myself as that of our beloved brother, for we were allied with each other through our sons and daughters. It was unworthy of you to be paralysed and to allow yourself to be perverted by the words of the hothead of the Romans, a slave who belongs to me!’ 211

It is possible that the words of this correspondence were invented by Moses Daskhurantsi who reports them, and yet the force of the language and the character of the exchange must be genuine. 212 However this may be, the condescending letter of Khusro had no effect, and Iranian policy resolved upon another attempt to intercept and to destroy Heraclius and his allies in the Transcaucasus. An army was assembled in haste and placed under the command of a courtier who bore the name Rahzad. Khusro flattered him, promoted him, gave him riches, and bestowed upon him the appellation of Ruz-Beh, or ‘lucky’. 213 It was a fateful nickname, for upon that man depended the honour of Iran, together with the throne and the life of Khusro. The small force of Rahzad confronted the Roman host upon the plain near the ancient ruin of Nineveh. Three thousand Iranian troops dispatched from Ctesiphon joined the cause of Iran, but failed to withstand the onslaught of the Roman host. This was in the year 627 on the twelfth day of December. The Iranian army suffered heavy losses but it had not been routed, and the two hostile forces remained on the field. Roman knights watered their horses at a distance of two bow shots from their Iranian antagonists who watched over their dead until the seventh hour of the night. At the eighth hour, the Iranian host withdrew suddenly to the root of a steep mountain – perhaps to the Jabal ʿAyn alSafra. 214 Rahzad himself had perished, four thousand men were taken prisoner, and only the natural and artificial defences of the Cut of Khusro and the Nahrawan canal stood between Heraclius and the Iranian capital. 215 The further advance of the em210

De la Vaissière, E., “Ziebel Qaghan Identified,” in Zuckerman, C. (ed.), Constructing the Seventh Century, Travaux et mémoires 17, 2013, p. 741–748. The name is Ζιέβηλ according to Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 316. 211 Moses Daskhurantsi, II.12, p. 88. This is Dowsett’s translation, and I cannot improve it. 212 Kaegi, W. E., Heraclius, p. 158. But Howard-Johnston seems to consider the words to be genuine (Howard-Johnston, J., “The Sasanians’ Strategic Dilemma,” p. 66. 213 In Armenian, this is rendered Roc Vehan (Moses Daskhurantsi, II.12, p. 89). 214 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 319; Kaegi, Heraclius, p. 163. 215 Sebeos, p. 126; Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 317–319. The figure of 4,000 prisoners is given in Thomas Artsruni, p. 160. It was said that, before Rahzad was slain, he called upon all the powers of heaven and said: ‘my gods! Judge between me and my merciless king!’ (Mo-

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peror was attended by ravaging and pillage, and on Christmas day, the Roman army stood upon the nearer shore of the Lesser Zab. In the palaces of Khusro, which were captured and plundered, every amenity for the pleasure of a monarch was found including three hundred antelopes, a hundred wild asses, and countless sheep, pigs, and cattle. 216 These were seized and eaten by Heraclius’ men. Word reached the Roman force that their inexorable advance had compelled Khusro to abandon his favourite palace north of the capital, and the king fled to Ctesiphon together with all his money, his treasures, and his elephants. 217 At the palace called Dastgard, the soldiers of Heraclius found three hundred Roman standards, which had been captured at various times; aloes, agarwood, silk, pepper, a vast array of linen shirts, and piles of sugar and ginger were discovered also. The weighty cloaks of silk, the fleecy carpets, and the heavy woven rugs, which the soldiers found, were instantly incinerated. The ostriches, antelopes, wild asses, peacocks, pheasants, lions, and tigers which dwelt in the king’s hunting grounds were objects of marvel to the soldiers of Heraclius, but many of these animals were surely devoured by a hungry army. Prisoners from the cities of Edessa and Alexandria, who had languished in the dungeons of Dastgard were released; and, after a brief rest, on the sixth day of January the Roman army utterly destroyed that palace in an exemplary act of terror and revenge. 218

THE COUP OF 628 It is still possible to imagine the anxieties and tension which filled the councils of Khusro when he had returned to Ctesiphon. The mood was desperate; and, if we may reason backward from later events, the opposition to the Persian king may have begun to organise itself as early as the failure to capture Constantinople in the year 626. 219 Theophanes offers us a small glimpse of the grim circumstances of Khusro’s return to the Iranian capital, and we may yet sense feelings of suspicion and paranoia which centred upon the person of Shahr-Baraz whose death warrant Khusro had prepared and signed. 220 We shall never know the reaction of the common people, whose taxes had supported the war effort, and whose opinion had never been consulted. But the writer Moses Daskhurantsi has left us a speech, attributed to the nobles of Iran, which most clearly captures the spirit of the aristocracy: ses Daskhurantsi, II.12, p. 89). For a modern analysis, see Kaegi, W. E., Heraclius, p. 160– 169. 216 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 321. 217 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 321–322; Kaei, W. E., Heraclius, p. 174. 218 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 322. 219 Cf. Howard-Johnston, J., “Pride and Fall: Khusro II and his Regime, 626–628,” in Gnoil, G., La Persia e Bisanzio (Atti dei Convegni Lincei 201), 2004, p. 96. 220 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 324. Fanciful rumours of Shahr-Baraz’ treason appear in the history of Tabari also (Tabari, v. 2, p. 185–186).

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‘How long shall we fear and tremble before this bloody king? How long shall our goods and chattels, our gold and silver be gathered into the royal treasury? How long shall our roads be shut off and blocked to the detriment of the prosperity of many kingdoms and countries? How long shall the souls quake in our bodies and be repressed by his terrible command? Did he not destroy and swallow up like the sea the very best of our comrades, the country’s leaders? Did not many of our brothers perish on countless occasions, in hundreds and thousands, by all manner of torments, some even by drowning, at his command? Did he not take men from their wives and fathers from their sons and send them to distant peoples as slaves and bondmen and conscripts against cruel foes?’ 221

The Iranian nobility had cooperated with Khusro’s war effort for nearly thirty years, and an entire generation had arisen without ever knowing peace between the two great powers. But the noble houses of Iran had willingly sacrificed their sons and their patriarchs, and their private fortunes had supported the operations of the military; and in the year 626 they had expected that victory was imminent only to be disappointed. Any mention of trade in an ancient speech attributed to aristocrats must be taken seriously, and we should assign considerable weight to the claim that the war had depressed commerce. Perhaps it had once seemed that any price was worth the annexation of Iran’s great western foe; but now Khusro’s ministers and nobility faced the brute reality that this was impossible, and they resolved to terminate both the war and the reign of Khusro. A relic of the Persian royal tradition confirms and augments the complaints transmitted by Moses Daskhurantsi. The writer Tabari depicts a monarch transformed by his own good fortune and by his astounding military success into a conceited, boastful, and avaricious man. 222 The ministry which oversaw state revenues had been entrusted to a foreigner, who carried out his duties in a tyrannical fashion. His methods were aggressive and illegal, and he punished a real or fictive arrears of the land tax by confiscating property. 223 Khusro’s detractors further arraigned his abuse of noble women and the lengthy military campaigns which kept soldiers far from their families. 224 Political prisoners had filled Khusro’s dungeons, and soldiers who had returned in defeat were likewise incarcerated. When Heraclius’ advance upon Ctesiphon was imminent, Khusro commanded that every prisoner, and every defeated soldier, be murdered. 225 This was the tyrant’s final act which prompted his 221

Moses Daskhurantsi, II.12, p. 89–90 (Dowsett’s translation). Tabari, v. 2, p. 215. 223 Tabari, v. 2, p. 215. He was a Nabataean of Iraq, apparently (Bosworth E. (trans.), The History of al-Tabari, p. 375–376. 224 Tabari, v. 2, p. 218–220. For analysis, see Howard-Johnston, J., “Al-Tabari on the Last Great War of Antiquity,” p. 16–17. 225 Khusro commanded his chief body guard (Tabari, v. 2, p. 216): 222

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court to overthrow him, and when the emperor Heraclius had withdrawn to Ganzak in Azarbaijan, he received word that Khusro had been slain on the twenty-eighth day of February. But let us return to Khusro’s reappearance at Ctesiphon, and reconstruct the plot which ended his life and reign. The Roman emperor’s last demand for peace had been refused; and Khusro, having arrived in the capital, commanded that the bridges over the Nahrawan canal be severed. 226 This was a trap, but Heraclius avoided the errors of his predecessor Julian. 227 Amidst the calamities of foreign invasion, a collapsing government, and royal isolation, 228 Khusro’s instincts instructed him to strengthen whatever support remained and to look to his legacy. Accordingly, it was Khusro’s intention to crown Mardanshah, a son begotten on his popular Christian wife Shirin, and to appoint him as his successor. But the first-born son of Khusro, who had been confined within a palace away from Ctesiphon, 229 objected. Shiruya (that was his son’s name) instantly made contact with a party of disaffected nobles who had long awaited a moment to destroy their tormenter. 230 It was either the foster-brother, 231 or the tutor, 232 of Shiruya who brought word to Gurdanasp, a general who had fought with Shahr-Baraz and apparent leader of the opposition to Khusro. That retired veteran refused a personal interview with Shiruya, but requested that the youth express himself in the form of a letter. ‘You know,’ wrote the king’s son, ‘how the Persian state has been destroyed by that evil man Khusro, and that he wishes to crown Mardanshah and he has overlooked me. If you speak to the army so that they accept me, I shall be able to increase their wages, and I shall make peace with the emperor of the Romans and with the Turks.’ 233 Shiruya wisely promised to exalt Gurdanasp and to promote all fellow conspirators, for his letter was circulated within a large body of disgruntled aristocrats. Twenty-two men, whom Theophanes calls counts are noted, together with other military officers, Now-Hurmazd, captain of Khusro’s bodyguard, two sons of Shahr-Baraz, and Shamta the son of Yazdin the former minister of finance. 234 The identities of the conspirators, and their singular purpose, were communicated in secret to Heraclius, and the emperor and his troops were instructed to re226

Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 324–325. Kaegi, W. E., Heraclius, p. 173. 228 The Acts of St Anastasius depict Ctesiphon as a horrific and disorderly scene in which corpses littered the roads (Flusin, B., Saint Anastase le Perse, I, p 82–91; II, p. 256–263). 229 Ferdowsi, Khusraw-i Parviz, l. 3533–3544. 230 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 325–326. I am following Howard-Johnston, J., “Al-Tabari on the Last War of Antiquity,” p. 17–18. 231 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 325. Ferdowsi seems to agree that it was a foster-brother also (Ferdowsi, Khusraw-i Parviz, l. 3536). 232 Moses Daskhurantsi, II.12, p. 90. Dowsett’s translation ‘governor’ should be amended. 233 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 325–326. 234 Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 28; Kaegi, W. E., Heraclius, p. 174 – 177. 227

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main where they were. 235 The release of prisoners of war was the only Roman demand, and the conspirators complied. The rebellion began immediately: horsemen were stationed upon the bridge which united Ctesiphon with Veh-Ardashir where Khusro resided, the gates of the Prison of Oblivion were flung open, and the new reign of Shiruya was proclaimed by heralds. 236 This disorderly clamour disturbed the repose of the tyrant who beheld from a window or a balcony the vast multitude arrayed against him. He disguised himself and attempted to hide among the trees of his garden as the soldiers of Shiruya surrounded his palace. A search party found the king and imprisoned him in the palace of the nobleman Mahraspand, where he languished for four days. 237 At the behest of Shiruya, as it was said, grandees and aristocrats were sent to revile and to spit upon his father. Mardanshah, and every other son of the former king, were maimed and at length murdered; and then Khusro II, ‘the deadly hunter, the lion of the east, at whose roar distant peoples trembled and those nearby melted as wax’, 238 was shot to death with arrows. 239

THE VICTORY OF HERACLIUS The emperor Heraclius could not have expected to overturn in a moment twenty years of Iranian dominion over the Roman east. The emperor’s small force, which numbered between fifteen and twenty-five thousand men, 240 had surely received a rigorous training in the tactics of the battlefield, and the capacities of Heraclius as a general and a political leader were perhaps unequalled. 241 But when the invasion of the Iranian empire began in the year 624, the outcome was doubtful, for a direct confrontation between the full weight of Khusro’s forces and those of Rome would have favoured Iran. It is therefore unlikely that the Roman government could have contemplated or expected victory without the implementation of three important policies. I. In the early seventh century, the Turkish empire was the third great power of western Eurasia. 242 Bringing this power into the war with Iran greatly enlarged the military pressure applied to Khusro’s government, and it increased the likelihood of a swift political resolution of the war. Heraclius’ penetration of the Iranian empire from the north brought Roman forces near the western extremity of the Turkish state and within easy diplomatic reach. Moses Daskhurantsi, whose history is the 235

Moses Daskhurantsi, II.13, p. 90. Sebeos, p. 127; Moses Daskhurantsi, p. 90–91; Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 28; Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 327; Chronicon Paschale, p. 729. 237 Moses Daskhurantsi, II.13, p. 91. 238 These are the epithets assigned in Moses Daskhurantsi, II.13, p. 90. 239 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 327. 240 Howard-Johnston, J., “Heraclius’ Persian Campaigns,” p. 32. 241 Howard-Johnston, J., “Heraclius’ Persian Campaigns,” p. 29–36; 42–43. 242 Barfield, T. J., The Perilous Frontier, p. 131–145. 236

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source of those events, draws a veil over the formation of military plans – but it is obvious that the Roman and Turkish powers decided swiftly upon a strategy, and executed it in the year 626. 243 Iranian defences gave way in Albania, the siege of Tiflis loosened Iranian control of the Caucasus, and Heraclius’ destructive incursion into Azarbaijan was a grievous abasement of Sasanian power. These humiliations raised the grim prospect of the complete collapse of Iran’s northern frontier, and many within Khusro’s government would have contemplated the total destruction of highland Iran. 244 It is noteworthy that a Chinese source attributes the overthrow of Khusro II to the Turks alone. 245 The murder of Khusro, as well as that of his supposedly female successor, are credited to the influence of the Turkish yabghu khaghan who is said to have installed one of his subordinates as governor at Ctesiphon. Chinese opinion on the downfall of Khusro II is surely founded upon the Turkish view of their intervention, and it cannot be corroborated. But it is obvious that Heraclius’ invasion could not have succeeded without Turkish assistance. II. Deception and false information, disseminated by the spies of Heraclius, greatly increased the emperor’s capacity for strategic surprise. When Roman forces first assembled at Caesarea of Cappadocia, their purpose was to suggest an invasion of Syria, thither to divert Iranian troops, and the later movements of that army eluded Iranian interception in the Transcaucasus. But the greatest deception of Heraclius threw discord into the heart of the Persian court. Sources of the Persian royal tradition declare that the great general Shahr-Baraz had defected to the Roman side in about the year 626, after the abortive siege of Constantinople. 246 But this is most improbable. Those accounts are fanciful and contradictory, and the more reliable testimony of Sebeos depicts Shahr-Baraz as a forceful and obstinate negotiator of the peace settlement in the year 629. 247 The image of a high-ranking general who forsook his Sasanian master and embraced the cause of Heraclius must have been 243

Howard-Johnston, J., “Heraclius’ Persian Campaigns,” p. 41 with notes 127 and 128. Moses’ reckoning is off by one year. 244 Howard-Johnston, J., “Heraclius’ Persian Campaigns,” p. 41–42. 245 I am referring to the Xin Tang Shu, or the New Book of Tang, which I cannot read, but there is a serviceable translation of a part of it in Tashakori, A., Iran in Chinese Dynastic Histories, p. 100–105. See also Chavannes, E., Documents sur les Tou-Kiue (Turcs) occidentaux. Recueillis et commentés par Édouard Chavannes, 1900, p. 172. 246 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 323–324; Nicephorus, Breviarium, 12; Chronicle of Seert, II(2), p. 540–541; Tabari, v. 2, p. 226–228. For analysis see Howard-Johnston, J., “Al-Tabari on the Last Great War of Antiquity,” p. 12–14; Howard-Johnston, J., “Pride and Fall,” p. 103. But Cobb, Kaegi, and Mango are inclined to believe the story (Kaegi, W. E. / Cobb, P. M., “Heraclius, Shahr-Baraz, and al-Tabari,” in Kennedy, H. (ed.), Al-Tabari: A Medieval Muslim Historian and His Work, 2008, p. 95–112; Kaegi, W., Heraclius, 148–153; Mango, C., “Deux Études sur Byzance et la Perse sassanide,” p. 107–108. 247 Sebeos, p. 128.

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propagated by Roman counterintelligence, and the force of that rumour provoked the order of execution against Shahr-Baraz. III. In the Iranian capture of Jerusalem, the Roman state beheld the double humiliation of imperial power and religious authority. Propaganda, such as we read in the lurid account of Antiochus Strategus, accused the Iranian state of horrendous acts of terror and sacrilege. The removal of the Holy Cross from its proper place in Jerusalem deprived the Roman empire of its most important symbol of salvation, victory, and power. Two hundred years earlier, the empress Pulcheria had sought to avenge the persecuted Christians of Iran by means of a holy war, and the main organ of communication was an issue of gold coins adorned by a large cross, and bronze crosses were emblazoned upon soldiers’ cloaks also. 248 Heraclius employed the emblem of the cross to far greater effect. In imitation of the Iranian drachm, a new issue of silver currency began in the year 615, and those coins depicted a large cross mounted above a globe resting upon three steps. This was an announcement that the Roman state alone had been ordained by God to rule the world, and a small legend invoked the aid of the deity in the struggle against the empire of Iran. 249 In spring of the year 622, the emperor urged his soldiers to behave as obedient agents of God’s will, and the Roman invasion of Iran in the year 624 was the moment of a singular transformation of the idea of holy war. The Roman troops and their Caucasian allies were stirred up to martial and religious fervour by the promise of immediate salvation. The emperor reminded his troops that they were within the land of the Persians, and that flight was dangerous, but ‘our danger’, said Heraclius ‘is not without reward, for it is the harbinger of everlasting life’. 250 The destruction of the temple of Adur-Gushnasp followed this exhortation. The desertion of some of the Romans’ Caucasian allies was the occasion for a more explicit elaboration of the new doctrine: ‘Brethren, be not troubled by the multitude of the enemy, for if God wills it one man shall rout thousands! Let us sacrifice ourselves to God for the salvation of our brethren. Let us win the crown of the martyrs, that a future age may laud us, and that God may give us our recompense!’ 251

In an era in which the end of the world was widely expected, there was perhaps no more appropriate message for an army of soldiers fighting for their religion, and the 248

Holum, K. G., “Pulcheria’s Crusade,” p. 153–172. Deus adiuta Romanis was the legend (Yannopoulos, L’Hexagramme, un monnayage byzantine en argent du VIIe siècle, 1978, p. 102–108; Bellinger, A. R. / Grierson, P., Catalogue of the Byzantine Coins, 1968, p. 17–18; 95–99). For analysis, see Howard-Johnston, J., “Heraclius’ Persian Campaigns,” p. 37–39. 250 Οὐκ ἔστιν ἄμισθος ὁ κίνδυνος, ἀλλ᾽ αἰωνίου ζωῆς πρόξενος (Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 307). 251 Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 310–311. 249

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memory of the Battle of Avarayr, in which it had been better to die than to renounce the Christian faith, had surely prepared Heraclius’ Caucasian allies to hear it. 252 The Iranian state responded to Roman propaganda with announcements that Khurso was the protector of all Christians. His favouritism of monophysites counterbalanced the real or imaginary torments which the Roman government had inflicted upon the most populous Christian community of the Near East, and myths of the conversion of Sasanid kings and noble martyrs may have helped to ensure monophysite loyalties also. But, despite the success of conquest, the reign of Khusro came to a humiliating end; and, as it appeared at the time, the Near East would soon return to Roman rule.

THE LEGACY OF KHUSRO II In the year 626, Khusro and his ministers surely expected the collapse of the Roman state and the establishment of Iranian rule from the Nile to the roots of the Hindukush mountains and from the Euphrates to the Strymon. The city of the Caesars was surrounded by armies obedient to Khusro and the foolhardy emperor of the Romans and his forces had lately been expelled from Transcaucasia. This was the occasion for the Iranian court to commemorate the proximate victory in monumental rock reliefs – a custom which had lain in abeyance for two centuries. 253 Such evidence may provide a deeper understanding of Khusro’s character than the testimony of hostile, or imaginary, written sources. At Taq-e Bostan we find the investiture scene of Khusro II hewn within a large niche. 254 In the upper portion the great king is flanked by the supreme god Ahura Mazda and the goddess Anahita; and below in high relief a figure, which may represent the king or his protective spirit, sits upon a horse clad in heavy armour. A nimbus surrounds his head, and a lance, a shield, and a scabbard are still clearly visible amidst the worn carving of chain mail and faded paint. Unfinished panels on either side depict scenes of hunting stags and wild boar amidst the marshes of Mesopotamia. 255 At Bisutun a panel six hundred and fifty feet in width was smoothed down and prepared for carving, and below it was a large viewing platform, a palace, a new road, and a bridge over the river nearby. 256 In comparison with this huge complex of 252

Howard-Johnston, J., Heraclius’ Persian Campaigns, p. 40. I am following Howard-Johnston, J., “Pride and Fall,” p. 94–96. 254 There is are two interesting pictures of it in Canepa, M., The Two Eyes of the Earth: Art and Ritual of Kingship between Rome and Sasanian Iran, 2010, p. 141 and 142. 255 Canepa, M., The Two Eyes of the Earth, p. 157. 256 Salzmann, W., “Die ‘Felsarbeitung und Terrasse des Farhad’ in Bisutun: Ein spätsasanidisches Monument,” Archäologischer Anzeiger, 91, 1976, p. 110–134. See also Luschey, H., “Bisutun: Geschichte und Forschungsgeschichte,” Archäologischer Anzeiger, 89, 1974–1975, p. 126–134. 253

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monuments, the neighbouring inscription of Darius I would have seemed mean and insignificant. Another large, unfinished panel can be seen at Naqsh-e Rostam, and it may be possible to attribute it to Khusro II also. 257 But the reliefs were never finished, and the House of Sasan would never again dream of world empire and the conquest of Constantinople; and we may interpret them as symbols of a king whose humiliation brought ruin upon the whole world. It was perhaps a scene reminiscent of that at Taq-e Bostan which adorned the temple of Adur-Gushnasp. The Roman soldiers who destroyed that shrine claimed to recoil in horror and disgust from a depiction of Khusro seated in the heavens like a god, surrounded by stars, the sun, and the moon, and attended by angels. The Christians who beheld that supposedly blasphemous image claimed also to have seen a mechanism for producing the sound of thunder and artificial rain; and the emperor Heraclius commanded that this abomination be thrown down and pounded into dust. 258 There remains no trace of what the invaders really saw within that fire temple, and it is possible that the Romans mistook the image of the great god Ahura Mazda for that of the Persian king. 259 But Khusro’s efforts to celebrate his victories and to overawe his subjects cannot be doubted, and we may conclude that the art of his time, as well as his diplomatic correspondence, announced him as ‘a most manifest god among men’. 260

257

See panel no. 17 in fig. 2 of Schmidt, E. F., Persepolis III: The Royal Tombs and Other Monuments, 1970. 258 Nicephorus, Breviarium, 12. 259 Canepa, M., The Two Eyes of the Earth, p. 148–149. 260 Recall the letter which Khusro is said to have written to Bahram Chobin (Theophylact, IV.8.5–8).

IX. THE COLLAPSE OF THE HOUSE OF SASAN THE REIGN OF SHIRUYA AND HIS EPHEMERAL SUCCESSORS Shiruya, who had taken the royal name of Kavad II, had dispatched a letter to the Roman emperor; and this communication inaugurated an armistice in which the two powers began the negotiation of a treaty. 1 The epistle of the new Kavad announced the release of all prisoners of war as well as his willingness to do anything to assure tranquillity between himself and Heraclius. The second half of Kavad’s letter and the reply of the emperor, are preserved in mutilated form in the Pascal Chronicle; and, according to the reconstruction of a modern writer, the Roman position was not wholly conciliatory. Though Heraclius ordered the release of the prisoners and booty which he had captured, he emphasised the inferiority of Kavad by designating him as his son, and he invoked the late Khusro’s murder of two Roman ambassadors in the year 615. 2 Nevertheless, on the eighth day of April in the year 628, the Iranian envoy Rashnan who represented his king at the camp of Heraclius departed for Constantinople in the company of the Roman ambassador Eustathius, and their purpose was to establish the terms of a permanent peace. 3 The writer Sebeos portrays the new king as ready and eager to return all Roman territory to its traditional masters. But the representatives of either government were surely preoccupied by defining the proper limits of that territory, and it is most unlikely that the two sides reached an easy agreement. Shahr-Baraz, who had subdued the Roman east, yet retained his post in Egypt, and he could not have been expected willingly to relinquish his conquests at the behest of a feeble king to whom he owed no loyalty. The emperor Heraclius and his advisers must have understood this, and they surely knew that demanding the retrocession of all territories taken from Rome by Iran would provoke strife between general and king. A letter, composed at the behest of Kavad, ordered Shahr-Baraz to vacate his conquests and return to Iran, the general refused, and the new king was powerless to enforce the 1

Chronicon Paschale, p. 735; Howard-Johnston, J., “Heraclius’ Persian Campaigns,” p. 26. Oikonomidès, N., “Correspondence between Heraclius and Kavadh-Siroe in the Paschal Chronicle (628),” Byzantion XLI, 1971, p. 269–281. 3 Sebeos, p. 128; Chronicon Paschale, p. 734. 2

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agreement which he had made with the Roman government. 4 There were perhaps many examples of insubordination and mutiny, but only one has survived. The Iranian garrison at Edessa refused to evacuate that city, and only Roman bombardment and the threat of a prolonged siege persuaded them to depart. 5 After the passage of eight months, the ignominious reign of Kavad II came to an end. His brief reign was disgraced by the massacre of his brothers. Moses Daskhurantsi notices the maiming and subsequent execution of every living son of Khusro, 6 and in the opinion of Tabari seventeen sons of Khusro were murdered at new king’s command on the advice of his ministers Peroz and Shamta. 7 The near extermination of the male line of the Sasanid family was to disrupt the royal succession forever, and royal prestige never recovered. But a worse calamity befell the people of Iran, when the pestilence began again to afflict the empire. The Persian king himself was the most exalted victim of that disease, 8 whose effects were very severe. The writer Masʿudi suggests that either half the population of Iran, or at least a third, were destroyed, and Tabari claims that ‘most of the Persians perished’. 9 Amidst the dense and populous settlements of Mesopotamia, epidemic disease would have spread swiftly. Highland Iran may have been untouched, but the effect of the pestilence upon the metropolitan region of Ctesiphon may well have been as severe as our sources claim. Though Ardashir III replaced his father Kavad II, the new king was a boy of seven years, supervised by a regent called Mih-Adur-Gushnasp. 10 The general ShahrBaraz was now the most powerful figure in the empire of Iran; and, though the young king and his protector were surely supported by a faction of nobles, the Roman government directed its attention to Shahr-Baraz alone. Negotiations proceeded over the course of about a year and half, the duration of the new reign, 11 as epistles were exchanged between Alexandria and Constantinople. The great general refused to surrender the full measure of the conquests which he and Shahin had achieved, until the emperor Heraclius offered political and military support for the monarchy of Shahr-Baraz. 12 Apart from concessions of territory, the chief demand of Heraclius was the return of the Holy Cross, which the plunderer of Jerusalem was 4

Sebeos, p. 128; Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 29. Agapius, Kitab al-ʿUnwan, p. 446. 6 Moses Daskhurantsi, II.12, p. 90. 7 Tabari, v. 2, p. 229. 8 Tabari, v. 2, p. 229; Nöldeke, T., Geschichte der Perser und Araber, p. 385, n. 4. 9 Masʿudi, Muruj al-Dhahab, v. 2, p. 232; Tabari, v. 2, p. 230. The outbreak of the disease is also noticed in the Annals of Eutychius, v. 2, p. 8). 10 Tabari, v. 2, p. 230; Shahbazi, S., “Ardashir III,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. II, fasc. 4, 1986, p. 381–382; Nöldeke, T., Geschichte der Perser, p. 386. 11 This was the length of Ardashir III’s reign (Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 30). 12 Sebeos, p. 129; Kaegi, W. E., Heraclius, p. 212. 5

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pleased to grant. 13 The border between the two powers was established along the river Euphrates; and southwestern Armenia, the mountains of the Armenian Taurus, and all Mesopotamia south of the fortress of Amida were retained by Iran. 14 The frontier between the two great powers had not been so far westward since the first century of our era, and so the Iranian government might yet have announced a strategic victory. The writer Sebeos has preserved the mere fact of the negotiation, but his exiguous testimony forbids us from following the course of it. Discussions were concluded, as it seems, in early summer of the year 629, and the Iranian evacuation of Egypt began in the month of June. It was not long thereafter, on the seventeenth day of July, that Heraclius and Shahr-Baraz met at the site of Arabissus in southern Cappadocia to ratify their agreement. 15 Heraclius sought to unite himself with the new king of Iran by ties of marriage, and he betrothed his son Theodosius to Nice, the daughter of Shahr-Baraz, who bore a conspicuously Hellenic name. 16 A church was later erected upon the site of the meeting and it was given the name of Peace in the Greek language. Not long thereafter Shahr-Baraz and his forces occupied the Persian capital. His siege of Ctesiphon was assisted by a motley army of six thousand Roman and Iranian troops, whose attack was briefly resisted by Mih-Adur-Gushnasp who had exerted every effort to strengthen the walls and gates of Ctesiphon. The city withstood the assault of the usurper’s siege engines; but subterfuge succeeded where force had failed. Nev-Khusro (who was captain of Ardashir III’s bodyguard) and Namdar Gushnasp (the General of the South) were enticed to open the gates of Ctesiphon to the conqueror. 17 Ardashir III and the noblemen who had supported him were slain, and their wives were ravished, by the troops of Shahr-Baraz. But the coronation of the usurper was delayed until twenty-seventh day of April in the year 630. 18 We may perhaps find the cause of that delay in the perilous condition of Iran’s northern defences lately ruined by the Turkish allies of Heraclius. It was late in the year 629, or very early in the following year, that a sudden Turkish incursion into Armenia inflicted a humiliating defeat upon the troops whom Shahr-Baraz had sent

13

Sebeos, p. 129–130. Howard-Johnston, J., “Heraclius’ Persian Campaigns,” p. 28. 15 Chronicle to 724, p. 17–18. 16 Nicephorus, Breviarium, 17. 17 Tabari, v. 2, p. 230. 18 The chronology of this period is somewhat difficult to discern. Shahr-Baraz was unquestionably the supreme authority in the empire of Iran at the end of the 620s, and he is credited with the return of the Holy Cross; but he was not crowned until 27 April in the year 630 (Greatrex, G. / Lieu, S. N. C., The Roman Eastern Frontier and the Persian Wars, p. 227–228). 14

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to confront the invaders. 19 Ten thousand Arab auxiliaries were dispatched to crush the Turks with the hooves and flanks of their horses, and ‘to scatter them like dust on the wind’. 20 But a feigned retreat led those Arabs into an ambush where they were surrounded and cut in pieces. In a short while the Turkish khaghan might have added the failing Sasanid state to his conquests. 21 But human affairs must often be decided by chance, and the empire of Iran and the unsteady monarchy of a usurper were saved from premature destruction when Turkish forces were withdrawn from the region of the Caucasus. The writer Moses Daskhurantsi notes the sudden outbreak of conflict amongst the Turks, but failed to discern the reason for it. 22 A united China under the Tang dynasty had overwhelmed the Turks in Central Asia, and received their immediate surrender. 23 Turkish power was engulfed by civil war, the invaders of Armenia hastened to participate in the struggle, and Iran was spared further aggression from the north. In the meanwhile, Iranian forces had withdrawn beyond the Euphrates, and the fragments of the True Cross had been returned to Roman control. 24 The recovery of Rome’s lost provinces and Christendom’s holiest relic were celebrated at Constantinople and Jerusalem. Roman propaganda saluted Heraclius as a new David, a second Alexander, and the saviour of the empire, and consigned Khusro to the unquenchable fires of hell. 25 Rome’s greatest trophy of victory, the Holy Cross, was carried into Jerusalem by the emperor himself, and Heraclius deposited it within the Church of the Resurrection on the twenty-first day of March – the day of the Zoroastrian festival of Now Ruz. 26 This important gesture had a double significance. The theological speculation, which had divided Christendom, might yet have been vanquished by the symbol of a universal Christian faith and a common Roman government; and the eschatological fervour aroused by the past war might have subsid-

19

Moses Daskhurantsi, II.16, p. 104–105. I am paraphrasing the orders of Shahr-Baraz: ընդ ոտս եւ ընդ լանջս երիվարաց քոց կոխեսցես զնոսա, եւ հոսեսցես զնոսա որպէս զփոշի առաջի հողմոյ (Moses Daskhurantsi, II.16). 21 Hoyland, R., In God’s Path, p. 32. 22 Moses Daskhurantsi, II.16 p. 106. 23 Barfield, T. D., The Perilous Frontier, p. 142–145. 24 Sebeos, p. 130. 25 George of Pisidia, Heraclias I, l. 56; Heraclias II, l. 228–230; Expeditio Persica III, l. 48; Chronicon Paschale, p. 728. On the portrayal of Heraclius as a new Alexander, see Reinink, G. J., “Heraclius, the New Alexander,” p. 81–94; as a new David, see Alexander, S. S., “Heraclius, Byzantine Imperial Ideology, and the David Plates,” Speculum, vol. 52, No. 2, 1977, p. 217– 237. 26 Sebeos, p. 131; Kaegi, W. E., Heraclius, p. 204–207. 20

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ed amidst an unambiguous Christian triumph over a Zoroastrian and, as it was alleged, a Satanic foe. 27 Such, at least, were the hopes of Heraclius. But the project of Christian unity failed, 28 and Heraclius’ expectation of a theological victory over the Sasanid House also came to nothing. The emperor had surely looked forward to the accession of his son Theodosius, who had married the daughter of Shahr-Baraz, and the inauguration of a new Christian dynasty descended from the conqueror of the Roman east. 29 But the elevation of the great general served rather to exacerbate than to subdue factional strife at the Persian court, and his reign was brief and unstable. No sooner had he mounted the throne than a plot was formed to slay him, and the usurper perished after forty days of rule.

THE BRIEF REIGN OF BORAN When the princess Boran, daughter of Khusro II and wife to the unfortunate Shiruya, ascended the throne, the Sasanid state received its first female monarch. 30 Sebeos, who may have misunderstood his source, alleges that Boran had married Shahr-Baraz, and that when the conqueror of the Roman east had been murdered by his enemies, she became queen. 31 However this may be, her reign filled a year and four months, and was not auspicious. A laudatory reference to her policy of exempting the common people from an onerous taxation is noticed in the Persian royal tradition. 32 Her coins announce her as the restorer of the ‘race of the gods’ – an announcement that the Sasanid family had returned to the throne. 33 But, despite the success she may have had in conciliating common, noble, and hieratic opinion, it was the enfeebled government of Boran that yielded to the Roman demand to modify the terms of peace. An embassy led by Ishoʿyahb the patriarch of SeleuciaCtesiphon was dispatched to Aleppo, and a humiliated Iran restored the old frontier of the year 591. 34 27

The victory dispatch of Heraclius is especially aggressive on this point: εἰς τὸ πῦρ τὸ ἀκατάσβεστον τὸ ἡτοιμασμένον τῷ Σατανᾷ καὶ τοῖς ἀξίοις αὐτοῦ ἀπῆλθεν (Chronicon Paschale, p. 729). See also Heilo, O., Eastern Rome and the Rise of Islam, p. 24–25. 28 Kaegi, W. E., Heraclius, p. 213–217. 29 Cf. Mango, C., “Deux études sur Byzance et la Perse sassanide,” p. 91–118. 30 Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 30. 31 Sebeos, p. 130; Tabari, v. 2, p. 231–232; Kaegi, W. E., Heraclius, p. 212–213. Noble disgust at the usurpation of Shahr-Baraz is represented in the strange tale, reported by Tabari, that he defecated into a bucket beside the throne immediately after his coronation. 32 Dinawari, p. 111. 33 For a modern treatment of Boran’s reign, see Malek, H. M. / Sarkosh Curtis, V., “History and Coinage of the Sasanian Queen Boran (AD 629–631),” The Numismatic Chronicle (1966–), vol. 158, 1998, p. 113–129. 34 Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 30; Chronicle of Seert II(2), p. 557–560. For analysis, see HowardJohnston, J., “Heraclius’ Persian Campaigns,” p. 29.

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THE RISE OF YAZDGARD III The Persian royal tradition offers only exiguous notices of the monarchs and pretenders who occupied the throne, or who attempted to occupy it, between the years 630 and 632. After a reign of one year and four months, Boran is said to have been strangled by a general called Peroz, 35 and a mysterious man whom Tabari calls Gushnasp-Dih, apparently ruled after her for less than a month. 36 Azarmidukht followed her royal sister upon the Iranian throne, and poison ended a reign of sixth months. 37 If the anonymous Chronicle of Seert may be trusted, the rule of Azarmidukht had been rejected by the eastern quarter of the Iranian army, and that military faction acknowledged as king a child by the name of MihrKhusro. 38 The writer Tabari lists other kings who are little more than names to us: Khusro III, Khurrazad-Khusro, and Peroz II each reigned for only a few days, and a reign of sixth months is attributed to a certain Farrukhzad-Khusro, who was either deposed or murdered by the nobility. 39 But order returned, or seemed to return, with the accession of Yazdgard III, a grandson of Khusro II, who reigned for nineteen years. The disorderly state of the Ctesiphon compelled the court of Yazdgard to perform his coronation and investiture at Istakhr, the putative origin of the House of Sasan. 40 The rapid succession of monarchs and pretenders, which I have rehearsed, suggest a period of civil war between the fall of Kavad II to the rise of Yazdgard III. Such convulsions at the Persian court suggest that the Roman government had erred in humiliating the royal house and sponsoring the rise of Shahr-Baraz. The brief reign of the usurper Bahram Chobin, and the trouble that ensued, should have dissuaded the government of Rome from the foreign policy enacted by Heraclius; and a prostrate, exhausted Iran would be of no help in guarding Rome’s eastern frontier. A policy of reconstruction and support might have restored the era of peace and mutual cooperation; and the two powers might have resisted a common threat which had already begun to emerge from the south. In about the year 632, Maximus the Confessor, a Christian theologian resident in Egypt, composed a letter to the governor of Numidia, and he expressed alarm at the terrible events of the day in which a barbarous people of the Arabian desert, who in his opinion scarcely deserved the appellation of men, had overrun and ravaged the settled lands to the 35

Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 30; Chronicle of Seert II(2), p. 579. Tabari, v. 2, p. 231–232. 37 Tabari, v. 2, p. 232. The reign of the last Sasanid queen is described in Daryaee, T., “The Last Ruling Woman of Eranshahr: Queen Azarmigduxt,” International Journal of the Society of Iranian Archaeologists, vol. 1, no. 1, winter-spring, 2015, p. 58–61. 38 Chronicle of Seert II(2), p. 579. 39 Tabari, v. 2, p. 233–234. 40 Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 30. 36

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north. 41 Such raids would normally have had little significance for the two great sedentary powers, but these were the beginning of a momentous revolution.

ARABIA In the ancient world Arabia was the proper name for the desert wastes on the fringes of Egypt and the Fertile Crescent. 42 The respective administrations of the Assyrian and Achaemenid empires had called that region after the people who dwelt there, and the Hebrew prophet Jeremiah similarly called the nomads of the Syrian desert Arabs. 43 Legal texts of the Achaemenid age suggest that some of the inhabitants of Babylon, Nippur, Sippar, and Uruk were called Arabs, and when Xenophon and his ten thousand Greeks marched from Sardis to Babylon, it was the region east of the Euphrates that they acknowledged as Arabia. 44 But Herodotus knew of another Arabia far to the south. It was a mysterious country of fragrant trees yielding aromatic gums, and the historian’s imagination filled it with vipers and winged serpents. 45 It is to this strange land that we must now turn our attention. The conquests of Ardashir I had embraced the regions of Oman, Bahrain, and Yamama, and they inaugurated nearly four centuries of Iranian dominion along the eastern coast of Arabia. This hegemony is proudly asserted in Shapur I’s monumental inscription at Naqsh-i Rustam. 46 Ammianus has left us an interesting description of that region, its bustling towns, and the nautical traffic of the Persian Gulf in the 41

In the opinion of Maximus the Confessor, there was nothing worse than ἔθνος ὁρᾷν ἐρημικόν τε καὶ βάρβαρον, ὡς ἰδίαν γῆν διατρέχον τὴν ἀλλοτρίαν, καὶ θηρσὶν ἀγρίοις καὶ ἀτιθάσσοις, μόνης ἀνθρώπων ἔχουσι ψιλὸν σχῆμα μορφῆς, τὴν ἥμερον πολιτείαν δαπανωμένην (Maximus Confessor, Epistula XIV). The rest of this letter is a bizarre rant against Jews. For analysis, see Hoyland, R., Seeing Islam as Others Saw It: A Survey and Evaluation of Christian, Jewish, and Zoroastrian Writings on Early Islam, 1999, p. 76–78. 42 Herodotus II.8; 11–12; 75; 158; III.5; 9; Pliny V.65 43 Jeremiah 3:30: ‫ֲﬠ ָר ִ ֖בי ַבּ ִמּ ְד ָ ֑בּר‬ Hoyland, R., Arabia and the Arabs from the Bronze Age to the Coming of Islam, 2001, p. 5–8. 44 Xenophon, Anabasis, I.iv.19. See also Zadok, R., “Arabians in Mesopotamia during the late-Assyrian, Chaldean, Achaemenian and Hellenistic Periods,” Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft 131, 1981, p. 42–84. 45 Herodotus, III.107–109. The first attested reference to winged serpents, and their connexion with Arabia, appear in a fragment of a clay tablet which narrates a military campaign of the Assyrian king Esarhaddon in the seventh century before Christ (Borger, R., Die Inschriften Asarhaddons, 1956). It is possible that certain fossils in the Negev desert inspired the legends of winged snakes, and Herodotus may have misunderstood and embellished them (Radner, K., “The Winged Snakes of Arabia and the Fossil Site of Makhtesh Ramon in the Negev,” Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde des Morgenlandes, vol. 97, 2007, p. 353–365). 46 Back, M., Die Sassanidischen Staatsinschriften, p. 288.

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fourth century; 47 and this is an important suggestion that Sasanian policy aimed to dominate that prosperous trade route from the beginning. 48 In the early reign of Shapur II, that control had been threatened by the Bedouins of southern Iraq, and a punitive expedition spread terror and destruction throughout the Arabian peninsula, and the Arabs never forgot the cruelty of the Persian king who had slain or taken prisoner so many of their countrymen. This campaign gave way to the erection of some impressive fortifications at the southern end of the river Euphrates; and the Lakhmid dynasty of Hira was instructed to rule and control the riders of the desert. The reign of Khusro I is distinguished for two important developments in Arabia. An Iranian governor was appointed directly by the court at Ctesiphon, and he exerted his authority over the further shore of the Persian Gulf from the island of Bahrain. In the year 570, Khusro I extended Iranian rule deeper into Arabia when he subjugated the Yemen. The conquest of the southern shore of the Arabian Peninsula was of great military and economic significance, for it permitted the Iranian government to outflank any potential threat from the north, and to dominate the trade route of the Red Sea. Control of that region had been the ambition of many a local and foreign ruler for some time, and the expedition of Khusro came at the end of many centuries of conflict and invasion in South Arabia. An ancient struggle for control of the Yemen first gave way to stability at the end of the third century of our era. 49 Shammar Yuharʿish, the king of Himyar, united the whole of South Arabia under his authority: a large and dense population arose there, and the solid institutions of the south permitted the Himyarite kingdom to project power and influence northward, up the western coast of Arabia, through the Hijaz, and perhaps even into Roman Syria. The Himyarite rulers of South Arabia were distinguished by their embrace of the law of Moses and the Jewish religion, and their supposed persecution of Christians was the cause, or the pretext, of the alliance between Rome and the kingdom of Ethiopia across the Red Sea. In about the year 520, at the instigation of the Roman emperor, an Ethiopian army crossed that narrow straight, and overthrew the Himyarite monarchy and dissolved its alliances with the tribes of interior Arabia. 50 Amidst the disorder which ensued throughout the Arabian Peninsula two important events occurred. The first was the conquest of the Yemen initiated by Khusro I. The second was that the Quraysh, a 47

Ammianus, XIII.vi.10. Hoyland, R., Arabia and the Arabs, p. 27–28. 49 I am following Retsö, J., “The Road to Yarkmuk: The Arabs and the Fall of the Roman Power in the Middle East,” in Rydén, L. / Rosenquist, J. O. (eds.), Aspects of Late Antiquity and Early Byzantium, vol. 4, 1992, p. 31–41. 50 For more detail, see Nebes, N., “The Martyrs of Najrān and the End of the Ḥimyar: On the Political History of South Arabia in the Early Sixth Century,” in Neuwirth, A., Sinai, N., Marx, M. (eds), The Qur’an in Context: Historical and Literary Investigations into the Qur’anic Milieu, 2010, p. 27–59, and Shahid, I., The Martyrs of Najran: New Documents, 1971. 48

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small clan belonging to the Kinana tribe, settled at the hamlet of Mecca in northwestern Arabia. The Yemen was distinguished from the rest of Arabia by the blessing of predictable rainfall in quantities large enough to sustain irrigation and agriculture. Settlement throughout the rest of the Arabian Peninsula was sparse and impoverished. Amidst a vast wilderness of sand and stone, some small towns had nevertheless arisen upon permanent sources of water or oases. Such colonies might support cultivation, but they rarely nourished more than a few merchants and peasants, who hardly rose above the level of bare subsistence. 51 The wanderings of the nomadic Bedouin of interior Arabia combined the slow rhythms of pastoralism and the elusive movement of raiders mounted upon swift camels. They were, in the opinion of Procopius, ‘the cleverest of all men at plundering’, and their military might was formidable. 52 But the absence of a fixed centre of power, and the general poverty of the interior forbade the formation of any form of state, and so direct rule of the Bedouin by other Arabs, or by a sedentary power, was impossible. Yet the inertia of a sedentary culture and stable government to the south meant that northern and central Arabia would be susceptible to the influence of the Yemen. Moreover, the Lakhmid kingdom at Hira, and their successors the Banu ʿIjl, were important organs of Iranian influence over the Bedouin Arabs, and the Iranian government seems to have attempted to rule, or at least to control, all Arabia from their three bases at Hira, Bahrain, and the Yemen. 53 Though the Bedouin of the interior might never be properly subjugated, the empire of Iran was nevertheless the dominant power of Arabia at the end of Antiquity. The Lakhmid king of Hira had even appointed a ruler over the city of Yathrib in the Hijaz, and he oversaw the collection of taxes payed to Khusro I. 54 This is an important piece of evidence which suggests that Iranian authority may have been exercised along the entire cost of Arabia and northward into the Hijaz. Successive borrowings from Ancient Egypt, the Semitic civilisations of Mesopotamia, the Hellenistic world, and Iran had adorned and augmented the culture of settled Arabs and Bedouins alike; and it is possible to imagine that, with time, the Sasanian government might have assimilated all the Arabs. But a social order based upon real or imaginary descent from a common ancestor meant that the tribe was the largest, and most important, group to which a person could belong; and no alliance, or religion, not even a common code of laws, had yet united the Arabs within a single state, nor 51

Donner, F., The Early Islamic Conquests, p. 14–15. …Σαρακηνοὶ…ἐς…τὸ ληίζεθαι πάντων μάλιστα δεξιοί (Procopius, Bellum Persicum, II.xix.12). The context is a pep-talk delivered by the general Belissarius to his men at Nisibis. 53 Donner, F., The Early Islamic Conquests, p. 11–14. 54 The evidence for this is found in Ibn Khurradadhbih, Kitab al-masalik wa-l-mamalik, p. 128. For analysis, see Lecker, M., “The Levying of Taxes for the Sassanians in Pre-Islamic Medina (Yathrib),” Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 27, 2002, p. 109–126. 52

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had the various tribes been taught to feel a common identity or a common purpose. 55

THE MESSAGE OF MUHAMMAD An Arabian merchant, to whom I have alluded obliquely before, was born in the reign of Khusro I. 56 He had attained about the age of forty years when he began to seclude himself in the rocky wastes surrounding his hometown of Mecca. He belonged to the clan of the Quraysh who had drifted northward after the collapse of the Himyarite kingdom. It was about the year 610, in a cave of the mountains near Mecca, that Muhammad is said to have found the solitude which a Christian hermit might have enjoyed, and there his meditations on the vanity and fragility of the world began. The solitary reflections of Muhammad took shape in an atmosphere of profound anxiety and tension. 57 To the north, a great war of increasing violence threatened to destroy the binary world order of Iran and Rome which had endured for centuries. The mercantile interests of the class of Arab traders, to which Muhammad belonged, were likewise imperilled by feelings of uncertainty and instability. But it was in the realm of eschatological speculation and religious fervour that the war had its greatest effect. Jewish apocalyptic texts, which foresaw the collapse of Roman power and the coming of the Messiah, had inspired a superstitious people with fear and alarm. In their reflections upon the great clash of empires, Christian ascetics of the Palestinian desert, and such holy men as Theodore of Syceon, and George of Choziba had called a sinful people to repentance in anticipation of the imminent end of the world. George beheld terrible visions of the Last Day, and he urged his fellow monks to pray that the oncoming calamity be averted. Likewise, Theodore of Syceon had prophesied the coming instability of the Christian faith and widespread apostasy, barbarian incursions, bloodshed, the destruction of churches, the cessation of the divine liturgy, and the disorderly collapse of the Roman state, and he announced that the coming of the Adversary was at hand. Mihr-MahGushnasp, an Iranian Christian holy man who had taken the baptismal name of George, was convinced that the last war of Antiquity was the war of nation against nation foretold in the Gospel of St Matthew, and it was a clear sign that the world 55

Donner, F., The Early Islamic Conquests, p. 20–28; 39–41; Hoyland, R., Arabia and the Arabs, p. 113–117. 56 That he was a merchant is first declared by Sebeos, p. 135. For the traditional account of the life of Muhammad, see Donner, F. M., Muhammad and the Believers at the Origins of Islam, 2010, p. 39–50, and the more exhaustive Rodinson, M., Mahomet, 1968. For related historiographical problems, see Donner, F. M., Muhammad and the Believers, p. 50–56. 57 Cameron, A., “Late Antique Apocalyptic: a Context for the Qur’an?” in Amirav, H. / Grypeou, E. / Stroumsa, G. G. (eds), Visions of the End: Apocalypticism and Eschatology in the Abrahamic Religions, 6th–8th Centuries, 2017 (forthcoming).

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was approaching its end. 58 But what of Zoroastrian Iran? The apocalyptic propaganda circulated amidst the usurpation of Bahram Chobin and the rise of Khusro II suggests that the Iranian people had lately been accustomed to contemplate the end of an age and the renewal of the world. 59 Such speculation must have attended the great westward thrust of the Iranian empire in the early seventh century. As the earthly agents of Ahura Mazda established the rule of the Persian king upon the ruins of Roman power, many would have meditated upon the primordial unity of religious, ethnic, and political order ordained by the Wise Lord. Many would have contemplated the supremacy of the Iranian empire over all civilised peoples; and some believed, perhaps, that mankind’s final ordeals were imminent, and that the appearance of Astwaterta, the saviour who would lead the final defeat of Angra Mainyu, had drawn near. 60 The preaching of Muhammad gave voice to the same hopes and anxieties. 61 But the startling utterances of his Recitation, or Qur’an as it is called in Arabic, made a greater impression upon the minds of men than the exhortations of any other contemporaneous ascetic, holy man, prophet, or priest. The preaching of Muhammad was directed at a community of men whose highest obedience was to the tribe, whose highest value was loyalty to their kin, and whose greatest fear was to be isolated from their nearest relatives. 62 The inhabitants of a vast desert would have 58

Matthew 24:7; Vita S. Georgii Chozebitae, c. 18 (p. 117: l. 12 to 118: l. 6); Vita S. Theodori, v. II, 127.14–20; 134.20–34 (on these sources, see Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses to a World Crisis, p. 167–171); Life of George, p. 475–477. For discussion of eschatological expectation, see Shoemaker, S. J., The Apocalypse of Empire: Imperial Eschatology in Late Antiquity and Early Islam, 2018, p. 74–79 and Reinink, G. J., “Heraclius, the New Alexander: Apocalyptic Prophecies in the Reign of Heraclius,” in Reinink, G. J. / Stolte, R. H., The Reign of Heraclius (610– 641): Crisis and Confrontation, 2002, p. 81–94. 59 Cf. Shoemaker, S. J., The Apocalypse of Empire: Imperial Eschatology in Late Antiquity and Early Islam, 2018, p. 105–113. 60 Cf. the ingenious arguments in Payne, R., “Cosmology the Expansion of the Iranian Empire, 502–628 CE,” Past and Present, no. 220, 2013, p. 3–33. 61 Tesei, T., ““The Romans Will Win!” Q 30:2‒7 in Light of 7th c. Political Eschatology,” Der Islam 95 (1), 2018, p. 1–29; Shoemaker, S. J. “‘The Reign of God Has Come’: Eschatology and Empire in Late Antiquity and Early Islam,” Arabica 61 (5), 2014, p. 515–517; Denkha, A., “L’Eschatologie Musulmane,” Revue des Sciences religieuses, 87/2, 2013, p. 201–217; Casey, D., “Mohammad the Eschatological Prophet” in Mayer, W. / Neil, B. (eds)., Religious Conflict from Early Christianity to Early Islam, 2013, p. 229–244, especially 238 et seqq; Shoemaker, S. J., The Death of a Prophet: The End of Muhammad’s Life and the Beginning of Islam, 2012, p. 118–196; Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses to a World Crisis, p. 445–446. 62 This observation, and those of the following two sentences are derived from Chabbi, J., Les trois Piliers de l’islam: lecture anthropolgique du coran, 2016. Chabbi’s attempt to reconstruct the original message of Muhammad is founded upon the assumption that primitive Islam cannot be understood without grasping its tribal and patriarchal origin. Few would disagree. But I

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heard in the voice of the prophet some comforting allusions to the importance of well-trodden paths through the wilderness, firm alliances among men, and the benefit of a reliable guide. Isolation in the inhospitable wastes of Arabia, haunted by strange spirits, and blasted by the fire of the sun, was perhaps Muhammad’s earliest notion of hell. Muhammad’s depiction of the proximate end of the world was similarly stark and frightening. 63 Incantatory, rhyming ejaculations, which had formerly been associated with Arabian soothsayers, formed a series of jagged and disjointed announcements of the fearsome calamities preceding the Day of Judgement. 64 The earliest parts of Muhammad’s incantations invoke seas of fire, earthquakes, overturned graves, mountains thrown down, stars falling from the heavens, the moon cleft in two, and the sky rent asunder. 65 A single, remote, and omnipotent deity without a rival, and without a son, had recorded every thought, word, and deed of every human person; and all mankind would soon be held to account. 66 God was susceptible to no human feelings, nor had he suffered for the salvation of his creatures. The whole universe was governed by this solitary divine power, and he was surely a better object of worship than a vast array of local divinities who could not

cannot accept her assumption that the world of Muhammad was so insular and remote that it had not been influenced by interaction with the two great powers to the north (Chabbi, J., Les trois piliers, p. 220–221, although this claim is reiterated frequently in the book), and that the great religions of the day had had no influence upon Muhammad’s thoughts (Chabbi, J., Les trois piliers, p. 100–107). Chabbi is rightly suspicious of later misinterpretations, distortions, or interpolations, which come from the Abbasid age; but she fails to explain how these later influences may be recognised. Any word or passage of the Quran which seems to militate against her assumptions is discarded as a product of mediaeval exegesis. But, paradoxically, Chabbi has no problem relying on the work of Ibn Manzur, a 14th-century Muslim encyclopaedist, or the 19th-century travel literature of Thesiger and Doughty. Apart from these, there are very few references, and it is impossible to discern how Chabbi’s work may be fitted into the vast, and growing, body of literature on the Quran and early Islam. Nevertheless, it is an interesting and challenging book which suggests, inter alia, some new interpretations of the terms sharia, sunna, and umma (Chabbi, J., Les trois Piliers, p. 174–189). For a thorough review, see Pisani, E. / Chabbi, J. “Les trois piliers de l’islam,” Midéo, no. 33, 2018, p. 295– 304. 63 Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses to a World Crisis, 2010, p. 355–358; 449. The success of the Quran is surely a good proof that the medium is the message (McLuhan, M., Understanding Media: The Extension of Man, 1964). The Quran declares, or implies, that the end of the world is imminent in Quran 16:1; 16:79; 19:75; 21:1; 36:49; 40:18; 51:6; 52:7–8; 54:57; 56:1–2; 78:40. 64 Neuwirth, A., “Structural, Linguistic and Literary Features,” in MacAuliffe, J. D. (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Qur’an, 2006, p. 97–113. 65 Quran 54:1; 81:1–14; 82:1–4; 99. 66 Quran 10:61; 67:13–14; 82:6–19.

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protect their Arabian votaries from the grim vicissitudes of life in the desert, and who would be of no assistance at the awesome tribunal of God. 67 But Muhammad had also depicted a vivid and alluring portrait of heaven. The pious dead would abide in spacious mansions amidst orchards and gardens; and, clad in robes of silk, and adorned by pearls and bracelets of gold, they would recline upon soft couches amidst cool streams shaded by the leaves of fruitful trees, as comely boys and shy virgins served them food and drink from chargers and goblets of silver. 68 Carpets, brocade, rubies, coral, dates, pomegranates, goodly pavilions, raised thrones with green cushions, and vessels of gold, silver, and crystal are all provided for the repose of the righteous. Here we surely behold a picture, or a caricature, of the leisure hours of an Iranian nobleman. 69 But, in imitation of the Roman doctrine of holy war, Muhammad promised his audience that death in battle assured admittance to Paradise. The emperor Heraclius had announced the new doctrine in the year 624 at the moment of the Roman invasion of Iran, and the Arab soldiers 70 who had accompanied the Roman army would have heard and transmitted it. In the very same year, when the army of Muhammad’s community at Yathrib confronted their Meccan antagonists at the Battle of Badr, 71 the Apostle of God declared: ‘no man shall be slain this day who fights with patient courage without retreating but God shall admit him to Paradise!’ 72

THE ORIGIN OF THE ARAB CONQUESTS Modern writers have argued that the message of Muhammad was so potent that it swiftly wore down and destroyed the ties of kinship and tribal loyalty which had 67

Quran 35:18; 44:41–42; 53:36–39. Quran 9:72; 22:23–24; 55:46–78; 76:11–22. 69 Cf. Courtieu, G., “Das Glück bei Allah oder bei Khosrau? Prachtentfaltung wie bei einem persischen Gastmahl in den Paradiesversen des Koran,” in Groß, M. / Ohlig, K.-H. (eds.), Die Entstehung einer Weltreligion IV: Mohammed – Geschichte oder Mythos?, Inârah – Schriften zur frühen Islamgeschichte und zum Koran, Band 7, 2017, p. 499–546. 70 Their participation is noted by Theophanes, Chronographia, p. 307. 71 For the date of the Battle of Badr, and a brief description of it, see “Badr,” in The Encyclopaedia of Islam, vol. 1, 1986, p. 867–868; Watt, M., Muhammad at Medina, 1956, p. 10–13. On the coincidence of the doctrine in the exhortations of both Muhammad and Heraclius, see Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses, p. 447; Howard-Johnston, J., “Heraclius’ Persian Campaigns,” p. 39–40; Howard-Johnston, J., “The Official History of Heraclius’ Persian Campaigns,” in Dabrowa, E. (ed.), The Roman and Byzantine Army in the East, 1994, p. 85. 72 I have paraphrased Ibn Ishaq, Sirat Muhammad, v. 1, p. 445: 68

.‫ل في ُقت َل صا��ا ً ��تسبا ً م ُقب�� ً ��� م ُد�� ا�� اد��� ا��� ��ن ّة‬ ٌ �‫… �� يقاتلهم اليوم ر‬

And see also Ibn Ishaq, Sirat Muhammad, v. 1, p. 453. On the trustworthiness of this source, see Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses, p. 402–408. Some of Muhammad’s followers eagerly plunged themselves into the mellay without armour: see the anecdotes about ʿUmayr ibn alHumam and Asim ibn ʿUmar ibn Qatada in Ibn Ishaq, Sirat Muhammad, v. 1, p. 445.

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determined the shape of Arabian society. 73 The preaching of Muhammad would come to form the basis of the religion of Islam, and its principal effect, so the argument goes, was to transform each individual man into one of God’s earthly agents, subject to a single divine set of laws, whose highest purpose was to fight for the new religion without reckoning the cost. 74 An ancient enthusiasm for plunder and raiding could now be subordinated to that purpose; and the troops who believed in the message of the prophet were utterly devoted to a struggle for which they were prepared to die. Such, we may be tempted to believe, was the origin of Arab unity. This interpretation has the sanction of later Islamic orthodoxy, but it is a distortion of the truth. 75 The age of Muhammad was as well a time of religious as of political tension. The outcome of the great war to the north was uncertain. The fabric of a political order which had held for centuries had frayed and was on the point of unravelling; and, to the south, the future of Iranian power, which had appeared after the collapse of the Himyarite state, was doubtful. In an atmosphere of anxiety new political and religious authorities had begun to take shape throughout Arabia. Muhammad was but one of many political leaders who had seemed to derive their authority from God, and several enthusiasts vied for supremacy. Musaylima, Tuhayla, Aswad, Sajah, Laqit, and Ibn Sayyad are the names of the most prominent such religious leaders; and it is possible to imagine that a rival prophet and a rival doctrine might have triumphed over Muhammad and his preaching. 76 The message of that merchant had been rejected at Mecca and might have been forgotten. But in the year 622 the people of Yathrib offered shelter and protection to the prophet and his associates, and the community of believers 77 migrated northward. Tribal feuds had raged at Yathrib with inexorable fury, no one had succeeded in halting the discord, and this was the pretext upon which a representative of the new species of political prophet was asked to intervene.

73

Donner, F. M., The Early Islamic Conquests, p. 55–57. Quran 3:16–20; 22:78. Donner, F. M., The Early Islamic Conquests, p. 58–62. 75 Although I cannot agree with all her arguments, Chabbi is undoubtedly right to draw a distinction between the original message of Muhammad and the later development of it in the Middle Ages, and she is right to insist that the latter cannot be used to reconstruct the former (Chabbi, J., Les trois Piliers de l’islam). 76 I am following Hoyland, R., In God’s Path, 2017, p. 34–38. On the matter of rival prophets, see Robin, C., “Les Signes de la prophétie en Arabie,” in Georgoudi, S., et al. (eds.), La Raison des signes, 2012, and Makin, A., Recontructing the Enemy: Musaylima in Muslim Literature, 2010. 77 This is how Donner characterises a movement which had yet to take the shape of orthodox Islam familiar from mediaeval and modern times (Donner, F. M., Muhammad and the Believers, p. 56–61. 74

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A solemn agreement, known to posterity as the Constitution of Medina, 78 cemented the alliance between Muhammad, the Meccan exiles who followed him, and the people of Yathrib. That town came to be called the City of the Prophet, or Madinat al-Nabi in the Arabic language; and it has thereafter been known in the West as Medina. 79 In the opinion of Muhammad, the time of peaceable exhortation had passed; and where words had failed the sword would succeed. At the command of the prophet the community at Medina compelled the circumjacent tribes by force of arms to participate in the struggle of Muhammad. The ever-widening reach of this warfare issued in the Battle of Badr in the year 624, a counterattack at the well of Uhud in the year 625 or 626, and the annexation of Mecca followed no later than 630. Abu Sufyan ibn Harb, a powerful leader of the Qurayshite tribe, gave his daughter in marriage to Muhammad and the union of the communities of Mecca and Medina was complete. The fertile oasis town of Ta’if fell shortly after the capitulation of Mecca, and the new triple alliance extended the sway of the prophet throughout the Hijaz in north-western Arabia. 80 The armies of Muhammad penetrated northward into Roman lands in the year 630. We are reliably informed by the testimony of Baladhuri that Muhammad’s first thrust out of Arabia was prompted by intelligence of an attack meditated by three tribes loyal to the empire of Rome. The tribes of ʿAmila, Lakhm, and Judham had perhaps been induced by the Roman government to pacify or to destroy the polity of Muhammad, but their plans issued in defeat and subjugation. 81 The great Arab general Khalid ibn Walid and the prophet himself advanced at the head of their respective forces along the trade routes which for centuries had carried merchants northward into Syria. They met no resistance at the oasis of Tabuk; and Aila (now the town of ʿAqaba) and Udhruh (near the site of Petra) were subjugated in turn. These and other settlements which submitted themselves to Muhammad agreed to different terms, and the lineaments of many heterogeneous treaties are preserved upon the pages of Baladhuri. From these interesting facts, we may infer the disorderly and weakened condition of Rome’s southern frontier and the absence of a single political and military authority after the withdrawal of the armies of Iran. 82 This was the beginning of the Arab conquest of the Roman empire, noted by Maximus the Confessor. 78

See Walker, A., “Constitution of Medina” in Fitzpatrick, C. / Walker A., Muhammad in history, thought and culture (2 vols), 2014, p. 113–115. But Donner calls this the ‘umma document’ (Donner, F. M., Muhammad and the Believers, p. 228–232). 79 Donner, F. M., Muhammad and the Believers, p. 43. 80 These events are described in Baladhuri, p. 35–59. The dates are variously interpreted by Hoyland Hoyland, R., In God’s Path, p. 34–38) and Donner (Donner, F. M., Muhammad and the Believers, p. 46–49). 81 Baladhuri, p. 59–61. 82 Hoyland, R., In God’s Path, p. 39–41.

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In the year 632, Muhammad was dead. Later Islamic tradition would have us believe that the prophet’s message had prevailed over all the Arabs; but that the authority of Abu Bakr, successor to the prophet, had retreated within the confines of the Hijaz. Rival prophets and refractory Bedouins are said to have abandoned the doctrines of Muhammad, and they refused to submit themselves to the empire of Medina. A series of conflicts known to posterity as the Wars of Apostasy filled the year 632, and the authority of the first caliph (as the successor to the prophet was called) was at last restored and confirmed by the military genius of Khalid ibn alWalid. 83 It was only after the triumph of Abu Bakr, as we are assured, that the Arabs as a united body embarked upon the project of conquering the whole world. But this imaginary account is founded upon the double exaggeration of Muhammad’s success at converting his compatriots and the authority of Abu Bakr. The real task of the first caliph was not to restore the authority of Medina, but to impose it for the first time throughout the Arabian Peninsula and to involve his countrymen within the imperial project established by Muhammad. But the tribes of north-eastern Arabia listened to the voice and acknowledged the authority the prophetess Sajah whose preaching was informed by her ancestral Christianity. 84 In her youth she had perhaps observed the dissolution of the Iranian alliance with the Lakhmid dynasty at Hira which had provoked the skirmish at Dhu Qar; and as the Arabs who dwelt upon the Iranian border grew increasingly refractory, 85 she began to command and direct their energies. It was in the reign of the Persian queen Boran, under the leadership of Sajah, that Arab razzias across the border began to grow in frequency and intensity. ‘They say,’ declares Dinawari, ‘that when the monarchy passed to Boran, daughter of Khusro son of Hurmazd, word spread everywhere that the empire of Persia had no king and they had had recourse to a woman,’ and the generals Muthanna ibn Haritha and Suwayd ibn Qutba began to raid the frontier of Iran. 86 This was in the year 630 – two years before the death of Muhammad. Three years later, the Arabs of the north-east were united under the command of Khalid ibn al-Walid, who had been dispatched to bring them under the yoke of Medina; and their raiding was transformed into a project of conquest. The

83

Baladhuri, p. 104–107; Tabari, v. 3, p. 243–384; Donner, F. M., The Early Islamic Conquests, p. 85–90; Howard-Johnston, Witnesses, p. 464–465; Kennedy, The Great Arab Conquests, p. 72– 105. 84 Robin, C. J., “Les Signes de la prophétie en Arabie,” Makin, A., Recontructing the Enemy, p. 456, and Kister, M. J., “The Struggle against Musaylima and the Conquest of Yamama,” in Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam, 27, 2002, p. 23–25. 85 Chronicle of Seert II(2), p. 539–540. 86 Dinawari, p. 116–117.

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outer defences of Iranian Mesopotamia gave way, the city of Hira fell to Khalid, and the fortress of Peroz-Shapur was seized in the year 633. 87

THE BATTLE OF THE BRIDGE In the year 634, Arab armies had subdued much of the Roman Orient, and the regions of Syria and southern Mesopotamia were secure in preparation for an assault upon Ctesiphon. 88 Khalid was relieved of his command, and for a moment Muthanna alone oversaw the invasion of Iran until the new caliph ʿUmar dispatched the general Abu ʿUbayd at the head of a small force. His orders were to unite with Muthanna and to advance upon the Persian capital. In the opinion of the writer Sebeos, the army of Abu ʿUbayd began a siege of the royal city, but was driven off and pursued to the shore of the river Euphrates. 89 An Iranian army commanded by the general Rustam confronted the Arab host at a crossing at the site of Marawha near Kufa, and it was the scene of an Iranian victory which came to be known as the Battle of the Bridge. 90 There the Arab host is said to have marvelled at the royal standard, which was fashioned from the skins of several tigers. 91 The insignia of Rustam’s warriors, and the dense plate mail of their horses, which had so impressed Plutarch and Ammianus, were alike objects of fear and amazement. The hideous sight of the Iranian elephants, and volleys of innumerable arrows, terrified the invaders and threw them into confusion. 92 Abu ʿUbayd, who had attempted to sever the trunk or the head of an elephant, was himself crushed by the beast which he had tried to destroy. An ignominious rout ensued, and an Arab soldier cut the bridge over the river in an effort to prevent the retreat of his countrymen; but the result of this was that many Arabs drowned as they tried to swim to safety. Muthanna, who had survived this embarrassment, rallied the few troops who remained alive, and retreated into the desert. The failure of the general Rustam to pursue and destroy the flying enemy accuses the weakness of the Sasanian state and the unsteady monarchy of Yazdgard III.

THE BATTLES OF QADISIYA AND BABYLON The defeat at Marawha was a severe blow to Arab morale, and it might have halted their advance altogether. Their project of conquest sunk into desultory raiding across the alluvial plain of Babylon, while the government at Medina issued a general call to arms for a renewed assault upon the Persian capital. Tabari’s long exposi87

Baladhuri, p. 241–250; Kennedy, The Great Arab Conquests, p. 103–104; Donner, F. M., The Early Islamic Conquests, p. 183–184. 88 Hoyland, R., In God’s Path, 2017, p. 31–65. 89 Sebeos, p. 136–137. 90 Baladhuri, p. 251–252; Tabari, v. 3, p. 453–459. 91 Tabari, v. 3, p. 453–454. 92 Tabari, v. 3, p. 456.

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tion of anecdotes, and the shorter treatment of Baladhuri, cannot be shaped into a narrative of the confrontation between the forces of the general Rustam and those of the Arab commander Saʿd ibn Abu Waqqas, who had replaced Abu ʿUbayd. 93 But we may be certain of the date and place of the conflict, for the Armenian writer Moses Daskhurantsi claims that battle was joined at the village of Qadisiya, in the vicinity of Hira, on the sixth day of January of the year 638. 94 But neither Moses, nor Sebeos who also mentions the battle, furnish any further details, save that the general Rustam was slain together with many of his Caucasian allies, and the Iranian army barely escaped total destruction. 95 The way to the Persian capital was now open, and the army of Saʿd pursued the relics of the Iranian host across an expanse of mudflats, canals, and palm groves towards the ancient site of Babylon. The ruins of Hammurabi’s capital and the seat of Nebuchadnezzar, now scarcely more than a few hills of earth, were the scene of another Iranian rout. The Nakhwaragan, Mihran of Rey, and two generals known as Hurmazdan and Perozan, were scattered together with all their troops. Perozan fled northward to the village of Nihavand in Media, where he began to muster a new army; and Hurmazdan moved south to Khuzestan, where he raised taxes and levied a new force for the defence of southern Iran. 96 The others repaired to Ctesiphon where they readied themselves for an obstinate siege. Let us pause here and examine a curious feature of the Shahnameh. Toward the melancholy end of that poem, we find the contents of a letter addressed by the general Rustam to his brother Khurrazad. The Iranian hero has resigned himself to the inevitable victory of the Arabs at Qadisiya, which he discerned from the position of the stars, and the ensuing lamentation is a strange mixture of grief and rancour. 97 ‘When the Arabs,’ says Rustam, ‘have made the pulpit level with the throne, they shall call every name Abu Bakr and ʿUthman.’ All royal glory, he says, shall perish from Iran; Persians, Turks, and Arabs shall dwell together and mingle; the revolution of the seasons shall cease to be celebrated; and the true religion shall be replaced by a base counterfeit. Much of the letter must have originated within the imagination of Ferdowsi; and in the condemnation of the victorious Arab troops clad in black and the future reign of an unworthy king, we may detect the poet’s hatred of the caliphs who ruled the declining Abbasid state in the eleventh century. 98 But one important detail within the letter merits careful scrutiny. 93

Kennedy, p. 109–118. Moses Daskhurantsi, II.18, p. 110–111. 95 Sebeos, p. 137; Moses Daskhurantsi, II.18 p. 110–111. 96 Tabari, v. 3, p. 619–622; Kennedy, p. 116. 97 The whole epistle may be found in Ferdowsi, Yazdgard-i Shahriyar, l. 35–133. 98 Ferdowsi, Yazdgard-i Shahriyar, l. 91: 94

.‫شود ���ا شاه ��دن فراز‬

‫چو روز ا��آ�� به روز دراز‬

The second hemistich is a variant reading which we should prefer over the rather banal text which Khalegi-Motlagh has printed.

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Rustam’s epistle claims that, before the battle of Qadisiya, an Arab emissary came to him offering terms. ‘From Qadisiya to the shore of the river, we shall grant that territory to your king; but a road must be opened in that direction to the markets of your empire, so that we may buy and sell there. This is all that we seek and nothing more. We shall pay tax and heavy tribute, for we do not seek the diadem of the mighty. We shall also obey the command of the monarch; and, if he so demand, we shall give hostages.’ 99

These terms create a strange tension with the poet’s effusive embellishment of Rustam’s missive. This suggests an origin within an indigenous Iranian account of the Arab conquest, and it is most improbable that Ferdowsi invented what the Arab ambassador had proposed. Can it be that Arab confidence waivered after their defeat at Marawha to such a degree that Saʿd had attempted to come to terms with Rustam? Or had the merchants of the Quraysh, who sought access to Iranian markets, directed the forces of Saʿd for their own benefit? 100 Either possibility suggests a startling departure from the orthodox Muslim account of the conquest of Iran.

THE FALL OF CTESIPHON The people of Ctesiphon and its environs and the court of Yazdgard now endured a siege of a year and a half. It was about the middle of the year 639 when resistance gave way and the Persian capital was stormed. At least one Iranian sortie had been beaten back within the walls of the capital; and, if we can trust the word of Tabari, the proposal of a truce came to nothing. The Persian government, as it is said, offered to establish the river Tigris as the boundary between the empire of Iran and that of the Arabs – an important concession since that river bisected the agglomeration of cities which formed the Iranian capital, whose western portion Veh-Ardashir was occupied by the invaders. 101 But the terms were refused, and the Arabs who had vowed to conquer Iraq and Iran, 102 would not relinquish the siege. 99

Ferdowsi, Yazdgard-i Shahriyar, l. 48–51:

100

،‫��ن رفت هر گونه �� ا���ن‬ ‫زم�ن را ���ش�� با ��ر يار‬ ،‫به ��رى ��ا هست بازارگ�ه‬ ،��‫و زان �� فزو�ى ��و ي�� ن‬ ‫��و ي�� د���� گُنداوران‬ !���� ‫�� از ما ��واهد ��وگ�ن‬

Howard-Johnston, J., Witnesses to a World Crisis, p. 352. Tabari, v. 4, p. 7. 102 This is the force of the phrase (Tabari, v. 4, p. 7): 101

‫از�ن فرستاده آمد به من‬ ‫�� از قاد�� تا لب رودبار‬ ‫و زان سو ي�� ��گشايند راه‬ ��� ��‫��ان تا ���� و فروش‬ ‫������ ما ساو و باژ ��ان‬ ���� ‫��نشاه را ب�� فرمان‬

.‫�� يكون بيننا وبين�� صلح ا��ا ً ح� ّى ناك� عسل افر���ن با��ج كو�ى‬ ‫ افر���ن‬should perhaps be amended to ‫افر��ون‬.

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Later tradition transformed the Arabian crossing of the Tigris into a furious, but improbable, battle in the midst of that high and swift stream. 103 That strange anecdote may be a reminiscence of a severe flood which afflicted Ctesiphon at that time, and which is noticed by Baladhuri. 104 However that may be, at the Arabs’ advance across the Tigris, the court of Yazdgard resolved upon a tactical retreat and a hasty withdrawal from the capital. But the evacuation was intercepted: the king and his retinue fled along the highway across the Nahrawan canal, the royal baggage and insignia were captured, and a contingent of Arabs pursued the fugitives as far as Jalula at the root of the Zagros mountains. 105 When the victorious Arabs entered the eastern portion of the Persian capital, they found it almost totally deserted. The palace erected by Khusro II, or perhaps by his grandfather, was the scene of some small resistance, but that building was swiftly occupied. The White Palace, as it was called, became the abode of the conqueror Saʿd, and the great hall nearby was transformed into a place of public worship. 106 A vast arch and the largest vault ever constructed were the most conspicuous features of that hall, which had once been the audience chamber, or perhaps the throne room, of the Persian kings. Now the recitations of Muhammad, and a weekly sermon, were to reverberate below that huge vault; and the writer Tabari observes that statues of men and horses looked down from the walls as the faithful performed their prayers. 107 The writer Tabari dwells with relish upon the great mass of booty retrieved from the royal city. Treasure valued at three thousand million drachms was taken from the king’s storehouse; 108 and the royal insignia, plundered from the king’s baggage train, included fine clothes, gems, a sword belt and a coat of mail encrusted with jewels, and perhaps the royal crown and other accoutrements befitting a king. 109 An enormous carpet of about one hundred square feet in size depicted a vast garden, and was inlaid with precious stones and woven with golden thread. When this extraordinary object was discovered within the palace, the conquerors are said to have divided into equitable portions; and Ali, the cousin and son-in-law of 103

Baladhuri, p. 263; Tabari, v. 4, p. 8–9; Kennedy, p. 119–121. Baladhuri, p. 292–293. 105 Sebeos, p. 137; Moses Daskhurantsi, II.18, p. 112; Tabari, v. 4, p. 13–14. 106 Tabari, v. 4, p. 14–15. The White Palace and the so-called Arch of Khusro are not one and the same structure (Keall, E. J., “Ayvan-e Kesra” in Encyclopaedia Iranica, Vol. III, fasc. 2, 2001, p. 155– 159. 107 Tabari, v. 4, p. 15–17. 108 Tabari, v. 4, p. 10. 109 Tabari, v. 4, p. 17–18. Arab tradition rather implausibly mentions the king’s swords, his aventail, his greaves, arm plates, and coats of mail which had supposedly belonged to the emperor Heraclius, to the khaghan of the Turks, to Bahram Chobin, and to other foes of the House of Sasan. 104

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Muhammad, received a fragment which he sold for twenty thousand drachms. 110 The Arabs, who were unaccustomed to the luxuries of the Persian court, seized a great quantity of camphor which the domestics of the palace had burnt to purify the air; and, mistaking it for salt, the conquerors mingled it with their food. 111 These notices, which may not be genuine, announce the powerful impression which the riches of the House of Sasan made upon the poor Bedouins of Arabia; and they may be compared with the report of the treasures seized by Heraclius and his men at Dastgard. At Jalula, the forces of Yazdgard confronted an army of twelve thousand Arabs who pursued them. Khurrazad, the brother of Rustam, had assembled an army of reinforcements from the highlands of Media, and, joining forces with Mihran of Rey, this host is said to have mounted the staunchest resistance which the invaders had yet faced. 112 A large trench surrounded by hedges and sharpened stakes fortified the Iranian position. 113 When battle was joined, ‘arrows and lances,’ says Baladhuri, ‘were employed until shivered in pieces, and swords were applied until bent’, a furious charge drove the Iranian army from its stockade, and the relics of the shattered host were pursued until nightfall. 114 But Yazdgard, who had fled to Hulwan, escaped destruction.

THE CONQUEST OF KHUZESTAN The Chronicle of Khuzestan acquired its name because of its circumstantial narrative of the Arab conquest of that region in southwestern Iran. 115 This narrative describes the long and vigorous resistance mounted by the Persian general Hurmazdan against the armies of the Arab general Abu Musa, and it was compiled shortly after the events in question. 116 Diplomatic exchanges, treaties, and the payment of tribute delayed a direct confrontation for two years, and during that interval Hurmazdan raised money and an army of considerable size. The declaration of war was signalled by the murder of Abu Musa’s ambassadors; but Iranian confidence was humbled when the large force dispatched by Hurmazdan confronted the invaders and was destroyed. The towns of Khuzestan were severally attacked and subjugated, and the history of Tabari notes in some detail that the city of Gundishapur was taken by 110

Tabari, v. 4, p. 21–23. Tabari, v. 4, p. 17; Baladhuri, p. 264. 112 Baladhuri, p. 264. 113 Tabari, v. 4, p. 24. 114 Baladhuri, p. 264. 115 For a solid analysis of the worth of this source in connexion with the conquest of Khuzestan, see Robinson, C., “The Conquest of Khuzistan: A Historical Reassessment,” Bulletin of SOAS, 67 (1), 2004, p. 14–39. 116 The account begins at Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 36. For modern interpretations of it, see Hoyland, R., In God’s Path, p. 83–84; and Kennedy, H., The Great Arab Conquests, p. 127. 111

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subterfuge. 117 The siege of Susa filled only a few days, and the victorious Arabs burst through its walls, slew the most prominent citizens, occupied the church dedicated to Daniel the prophet, and carried off the royal treasures which had accumulated at Susa since the days of Cyrus. The sarcophagus, which was said to contain the body of Daniel, was opened; and the mummified corpse was extracted and buried at the behest of the caliph ʿUmar. 118 Soon only one free city remained in Khuzestan. Shushtar sits upon a rocky eminence above the river of the same name, where four centuries earlier Roman prisoners of war had constructed a dam for Shapur I. The ruins of a large castle still attest the strong defences of that city, and it was here that Hurmuzdan and his troops endured a siege of two years. 119 A citizen of Shushtar, whose origin was on the Arabian side of the Persian Gulf, 120 conspired with a man whose house abutted the wall of that city. They approached the Arabs in secret and offered, in exchange for one third of the eventual booty, to lead the invaders into the city through a tunnel which they had dug beneath the wall. The Chronicle of Khuzestan alludes to a promiscuous massacre which is corroborated by the accounts of Baladhuri and Tabari, and the general Hurmazdan was captured alive and sent to the caliph ʿUmar at Medina. 121 This was about the year 641.

THE BATTLE OF NIHAVAND AND THE PENETRATION OF THE IRANIAN PLATEAU Arabian forces now began to march northward into the highlands of Iran, and it was the firm resolve of Sasanian loyalists to resist them at the plain of Nihavand near Hamadan in Media. There the general Perozan had mustered an army of sixty thousand against an Arab host computed at forty thousand men. 122 For three days the battle raged, until (as Sebeos informs us) the rumour was diffused that a contingent of reinforcements had given the Arabian host the advantage. Iranian forces fled in terror and confusion, the invaders found their camp deserted, and Tabari adds the credible details that many a soldier fell to his death in a nearby ravine and that the general Perozan and a few survivors were intercepted and slain on their flight to117

Tabari, v. 4, p. 93–94. Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 37; Tabari, v. 4, p. 92. It was said that a signet ring was found upon the body of Daniel and it depicted a man between two lions. According to the Chronicle of Khuzestan the coffin of Daniel was made of silver; but according to Sebeos it was a container of bronze. 119 Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 37. 120 The Chronicle of Khuzestan (p. 37) says that he came from Qatar. 121 Chronicle of Khuzestan, p. 37; Baladhuri, p. 370; Tabari, v. 4, p. 85–86; Kennedy, The Great Arab Conquests, p. 129–130. 122 Sebeos, p. 141. 118

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wards the city of Hamadan. 123 The town of Nihavand itself was surrendered by a Zoroastrian priest who offered to the conquerors a great mass of treasure in exchange for the safety of the town and its inhabitants. 124 With confidence and precision the writer Sebeos situates the Battle of Nihavand in the tenth regnal year of Yazdgard III, or the year 641. 125 The fall of Nihavand and the rout of the forces assembled by Perozan opened the Iranian plateau to conquest. Later traditions recorded by Tabari describe the Battle of Nihavand as a vast scene of carnage in which men and horses lost their footing upon a battlefield inundated with blood. 126 Sebeos offers a grim, but vague, allusion to the Arab host’s advance across ‘the whole land’, as they put man and beast to the sword everywhere and slew all living things within the fortresses which they captured. 127 But this is an exaggeration: the slaughter at Nihavand gave way to the peaceable capitulation of cities and fortresses, and the subjugation of Iran was far less violent than Sebeos would have us believe. The cities of Hamadan, Isfahan, and Gay surrendered without opposition, but for thirty loyalists who departed Gay to join the Iranian resistance at Kirman. 128 At the city of Qum the local ruler Yazdanfar granted the invaders lands, beasts, and seeds in exchange for their protection against the men of Daylam whose predations had annoyed his fellow citizens for some time. 129 Rey, the greatest city of Media, was defended by Siyavakhsh, the grandson of the usurper Bahram Chobin, of the illustrious clan of Mihran. The rival family of Zinab made peace with the invaders and solicited their intervention in their feud with Siyavakhsh, and the Arabs complied. They were led into Rey by a secret entrance, Siyavakhsh and the Mihran family were deposed and slain, and the government of Rey was entrusted to a new master. 130 The Arab general Suwayd invited the governors of Qumis, Gilan, Tabaristan, and Gurgan to pay tribute, and the people of those regions were left unmolested. 131 The penetration of Azarbaijan occurred at the same time: a momentary resistance led by Isfandiyadh, brother to the late general Rustam, gave way to defeat and capture. But 123

Tabari, v.4, p. 132. The orthodox Muslim traditions concerning the Battle of Nihavand can be found in Baladhuri, p. 302–306 and Tabari, v. 4, p. 114–137. 124 Baladhuri, p. 305; Tabari, v. 4, p. 133. 125 Յամի տասներորդի Յազկերտի արկային Պարսից... (Sebeos, p. 141). The various dates provided by Tabari cannot be trusted. 126 Tabari, v. 4, p. 132:

‫فقت��ا ف��ا من أهل فارس فيما ب�ن ا��وال وا��عتام ما طبق أرض ا��عر�� دما ��لق الناس وا��واب فيه وأصيب فرسان من‬ .‫فرسان ا��س���ن �ي ا��لق �ي ا��ماء‬

127

Sebeos, p. 141. Baladhuri, p. 309–314; Tabari, v. 4, p. 130–131. 129 See the evidence presented in Pourshariati, P., “Local Histories of Khurasan and the Pattern of Arab Settlement,” Studia Iranica 27, 1998, p. 41–81. 130 Tabari, v. 4, p. 150–151. 131 Tabari, v. 4, p. 151–153. 128

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the Iranian general took on the role of mediator between the conquerors and the subject people, and he ensured their peaceful subjugation and obedience. 132 Similar cooperation attended the conquest of the Iranian fortifications in the Caucasus. The commander of the garrison at Darband, who bore the title Shahr-Baraz, made common cause with the invaders, and he and his troops were exempt from taxation in exchange for military service. 133

THE CONQUEST OF PERSIA The invasion of Persia, properly so called, began in the year 634 when Arabs began to cross the Gulf and to raid the southern coast of Iran. An expedition launched from Bahrain, captured the island of Abarkavan in the year 639, and in the following year Arabian armies had reached the ancestral heartland of Cyrus and Ardashir. 134 The governor of Kirman had perished in the struggle at Abarkavan, and Shahrak, the governor of Persia, attempted to resist the conquerors in the vicinity of Tawwaj – but without success. 135 In the following year, the cities of southern Iran successively capitulated to the victorious Arabs, and the ancient capital of Istakhr endured and survived a siege in the year 644. 136 The city of Bishapur fell three years later, and a Zoroastrian priest negotiated the surrender of Darabgird in the year 648. 137 By the year 650 only Gor and Istakhr remained free. The Arab siege of Gor failed to capture that city until the invaders followed a dog through a secret passage in its walls. 138 At the regional capital of Istakhr the Arabs met greater resistance; for the period of peace, which had followed capitulation, swiftly gave way to an implacable rebellion, bombardment by siege engines, and a sanguinary massacre of forty thousand persons. 139 Yazdgard III had fled the calamities of siege and slaughter towards north-eastern Iran where he attempted to rally a host to oppose the Arabs. But appeals for troops to the governors of Kirman and Sistan failed, for they preferred rather to negotiate a peace with the invaders than to support a tottering monarchy. 140

132

Tabari, v. 4, p. 153–155. Tabari, v. 4, p. 155–160. 134 I am following Hinds, G. M., “The First Arab Conquests in Fars,” Iran vol. 22, 1984, p. 39–53. 135 Baladhuri, p. 387. 136 Tabari, v. 4, p. 174. 137 Baladhuri, p. 388. 138 Baladhuri, p. 689. 139 Baladhuri, p. 689–690; Tabari, v. 4, p. 175–176. 140 Baladhuri, p. 315–316; Tabari, Kennedy, The Great Arab Conquests, p. 187. 133

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THE FLIGHT AND DEATH OF YAZDGARD III The fugitive king and his degraded retinue made their way to the city of Marv. The writer Tabari alleges that Yazdgard had dispatched an embassy to the Chinese court, and it was at Marv that he received the Tang emperor’s formal refusal to assist him. 141 But the Persian king endured a greater disappointment. Sebeos invokes a certain ‘prince of the Medes’ whom we may perhaps identify with Khurrazad, brother to the late Rustam. This prince had earlier agreed to join his king in the northeast, but he rebelled and submitted himself to Arab rule. 142 This is surely evidence of a disagreement between a king who had sought a military confrontation and a prince who wished to make peace with the Arab conquerors. 143 Deprived of the reinforcements of the Median army, Yazdgard resolved to flee into the Asiatic steppe, but his small host was intercepted and routed by an Arab army sent to pursue him. The last hope of Yazdgard was to seek refuge among the relics of the Hephthalite Huns whose troops had formed part of the loyalist army. 144 But the alliance between the king of Iran and those Huns was of short duration, for under mysterious circumstances they slew Yazdgard; and, in the opinion of Sebeos, ‘they extinguished the rule of the Persians and the race of Sasan’. 145 The mysterious end of the last Sasanid monarch has given rise to much emotive speculation. A modern Iranian dramatist has employed the collapse of the House of Sasan as means to examine the social and political troubles of his own day; and we may detect in the play The Death of Yazdgard III some oblique criticisms of the House of Pahlavi in the late 1970s; and in the Arabian onslaught we find a parallel with the victorious Islamic revolution of the year 1979. 146 The pathos of Yazdgard’s death struck the poet Ferdowsi a millennium earlier, and in the Shahnameh we read the bitter tale of a monarch who failed to evade a noble plot to murder him. None of the details may be corroborated, but it may be instructive to examine Ferdowsi’s narrative. A servant of a Turkish or Hephthalite ruler conspired with the governor of Marv; and Mahuy (that was the governor’s name), and his troops, abandoned his king in the midst of a skirmish with those nomads. Yazdgard fled the scene of the 141

Tabari, v. 4, p. 171–172. Sebeos, p. 164. Sebeos says rather vaguely that the prince had ‘fortified himself in some place’. 143 Cf. Hoyland, R., In God’s Path, p. 86. 144 Եւ փախուցեալ անկաւ ի զաւրս Թէտալաց, որ էին ի կողմանցն եկեալ նմա յաւգնականութիւն (Sebeos, p. 163). 145 Sebeos, p. 164. 146 Beyzaie, B., Marg-e Yazdegerd: Majles-e Shah-koshi, 2014. That is the eleventh edition of the play which was first performed on 10 September 1979. My analysis follows Farhadi, R. / Mozaheb, M. A., “History, Aporia and Politics in Bahram Beyzaie’s Death of Yazdgerd,” Annals of Language and Literature, Volume 2, Issue 2, 2018, p. 19–25. 142

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battle and hid himself within a mill by the river Zarq. There the degraded successor to Cyrus and Ardashir passed the night upon a heap of straw, awaiting the return of the absent miller. He appeared at dawn, and a melancholy conversation gave way to the king’s request for food and the barsom twigs essential to Zoroastrian ritual. Barley bread and herbs were produced at once, but the search for barsom compelled the miller to inquire at a nearby toll house upon the river. The suspicion of the superintendent of the toll house was aroused by the miller’s request and he referred him to the governor Mahuy. In the opinion of the governor, only the Sasanid king would have requested the barsom twigs, and he instantly commanded that the miller slay his royal guest. 147 As the weeping miller prayed for Yazdgard’s painless death, he plunged a dagger into the breast of the king. Mahuy’s soldiers, who had gathered outside the mill, removed the clothing and jewels from the king’s body, and brought them to their master; and after nightfall the corpse of Yazdgard was cast into the mill pond. 148 If we can trust the word of Ferdowsi, what follows is an extraordinary example of popular devotion to the House of Sasan. Two Christian monks appeared and beheld the dead king floating in the water. They returned to their convent and spread word to their companions that Yazdgard had perished: a crowd of monks and priests issued from the monastery to retrieve the body from the pond. Four monks removed their clothes, entered the water, and dragged the descendant of Ardashir to shore. 149 In the garden of their convent, they erected a tomb for the late king. The monks dried his wound, they embalmed his body with funerary unguents, and dressed it in golden brocade. A bishop anointed the resting place of the king with wine, musk, camphor, mistletoe, and rosewater. 150 This surprising narrative must repose upon a popular, Christian reminiscence of the fall of the Sasanid monarchy. It is proof, perhaps, of the Iranian Christians’ staunch support of the House of Sasan even as its power crumbled and even amidst the desertion of its Zoroastrian followers. 151

THE EXTINCTION OF THE HOUSE OF SASAN The king was dead, slain like the first Yazdgard in a noble plot in the north-east of his empire, and a fugitive like Darius III. But, despite the testimony of Sebeos, this was not the end of the House of Sasan. Though deprived of a throne and a country, 147

Ferdowsi, Yazdgard-i Shahriyar, l. 456–544. Ferdowsi, Yazdgard-i Shahriyar, l. 649–686. 149 Ferdowsi, Yazdgard-i Shahriyar, l. 687–701. 150 Ferdowsi, Yazdgard-i Shahriyar, l. 702–705: 148

151

،‫��ش را به ا�� ا��ر افراختند‬ ‫به دبق و به ق�� و به ك�فور و مشك‬ ‫قصب ز�� و دس�ى ز �� ��ژورد‬ .‫سكوبا بيندود �� �اى خواب‬

Payne, R. E., A State of Mixture, p. 199–200.

‫به باغ ا��رون د��ه يى ساختند‬ ‫�� زخم آن دشنه ��د�� خشك‬ ‫بياراستندش به ديباى زرد‬ ‫�ى و مشك و ك�فور و دبق و گ��ب‬

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339

Peroz (the eldest son of Yazdgard) sought help alike from the Turks and the empire of China. 152 Gaozong (the third emperor of the Tang dynasty) refused military assistance, but granted Peroz a protectorate in a place which the Chinese called Jiling. This region, most probably Zarang in Sistan, received the name of the Persian Area Command, where later sources describe vigorous resistance during the first Arab civil war between the years 656 and 680. 153 Peroz was its governor from the mid650s until the year 663 when the Arabs resumed their victorious advance to the east. In that tense period Peroz dispatched several embassies, and then fled, to the Chinese capital at Chang’an, where he established a court in exile at some point between the years 673 and 675. Gaozong bestowed upon Peroz the sonorous title of ‘awe-inspiring general of the Left Guards’. 154 It was at Chang’an, in about the year 680, that Peroz died after two failed attempts to persuade the Tang emperor to send an army into Iran, to expel the Arabs, and to enthrone either himself or his son Narseh. 155 A statue stands before the tomb of Gaozong at the Qianling mausoleum near Chang’an, and it commemorates ‘Peroz, king of Persia, grand general of the right courageous guard, and commander-in-chief of Persia’. 156 The Tang emperor had failed to restore Peroz to his throne, but the title which he bestowed may have flattered the son of Yazdgard at the end of his life, and soothed the grief and rancour of a king without a country. His brother Bahram survived him, and inspired belief in a future saviour known as the Miraculous Bahram who should come for the deliverance of Iran and the final defeat of the Arabs. 157 Such beliefs have left their mark in Zoroastrian scripture, and they were nourished, as it seems, by the lingering presence of some displaced Iranian aristocrats in the region of the Hindukush who regularly communicated with the Chinese court until late in the eighth century. 158 152

Chavannes, E., Documents sur les Tou-Kiue, p. 172. The evidence is summarised in Boqin, J., “The Chinese Persia Expeditionary Force as Referenced in the Turfan Documents,” in Luo, X. (ed.) / Covey, R. (trans.), Chinese Scholars on Inner Asia, 2012, p. 41, and Crone, P., Nativist Prophets, p. 4. 154 I am following the most recent translation of this title in Zanous, H. P. / Sangari, E., “The Last Sasanians in Chinese Literary Sources: Recently Identified Statue Head of a Sasanian Prince at the Qianling Mausoleum,” Iranian Studies, vol. 51, no. 4, 2018, p. 499–515. 155 Chavannes, E., Documents sur les Tou-Kiue, p. 173; Boqin, J., “The Chinese Persia Expeditionary Force,” p. 42–56. 156 Compareti, M., “The Last Sasanians in China,” Eurasian Studies 2/2, 2003, p. 203. 157 Cereti, C. G., “Again on Wahram i Warzawand,” La Persia e l’Asia Centrale da Alessandro al X secolo, 1996, p. 629–639. 158 Stark, S. / Agostini, D., “Zāwulistān, Kāwulistan and the Land Bosi 波斯 – on the question of a Sasanian Court-in-Exile in the Southern Hindukush” in Studia Iranica 45, 2016, p. 17–38. The evidence of the Bundahishn, XXX, the Jamasp Namag, and the Zand Wahman Yasn is translated and analysed in Stark, S. / Agostini, D., “Zāwulistān, Kāwulistan and the Land Bosi,” p. 26–30. 153

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Chinese sources record that Narseh, the son of Peroz, remained at the court of Chang’an. In the year 670, the general Wang Fangyi had promised to make common cause with the Western Turks, to lead an expedition into Iran, and to place Narseh upon the Sasanid throne. But the real aim of that duplicitous general was to restore Chinese authority over lands ruled by the Turks and invaded by the Arabs: he abandoned the cause of Narseh when that objective had been achieved. 159 Narseh returned to Chang’an where an unnamed disease ended his life in the late first, or early second, decade of the eighth century. 160 A certain Khusro, another descendant of Yazdgard, is said to have formed a fruitless alliance with the Western Turks in about the year 728 with the purpose of expelling the Arabs from Iran. 161 His failure was the last attempt to restore the House of Sasan, and thereafter the descendants of Ardashir and Yazdgard, and the nobles who followed them, were absorbed insensibly within the Tang aristocracy. Near Chang’an a funerary stele, bearing an inscription in the Middle Persian and Chinese languages, announces that it was erected by an Iranian aristocrat of the Suren family. He had buried his daughter, who had died at the age of twenty-six, in about the year 872. 162 Thereafter we hear no more of the Sasanid court in exile.

159

Boqin, J., “The Chinese Persia Expeditionary Force,” p. 56–58; Compareti, M., “The Last Sasanians in China,” p. 210. 160 Chavannes, E., Documents sur les Tou-Kiue, p. 173. 161 Compareti, M., “The Last Sasanians in China,” p. 211. 162 Baghbidi, H. R., “New Light on the Middle Persian-Chinese Bilingual Inscription from Xi’an,” Maggi, M. / Orsatti, P., (eds.), The Persian Language in History, 2011, p. 105–115; p. 106–107 for the inscription itself.

X. OBSERVATIONS ON THE FALL OF THE IRANIAN EMPIRE The government of Iran had always imagined that the most serious menace to its survival would come from the northeast. Ardashir I had established the Kushan state, which he had subjugated, as a buffer between his empire and the world of the nomad. The vast wall at Gurgan and the defences of the Caucasus proclaimed Iranian fear of the men of the steppe, and these fortifications may be compared with a looser system of castles along the Roman frontier. The astonishing rise of Palmyra, the predations in the reign of Shapur II, and the achievements of the Lakhm and Ghassan, may have suggested that the Arabs might on occasion torment the two great powers; and the linear defences, which abutted the Arabian desert to the southwest, announce a prudent fear of the Bedouin and the harmful effect of their razzias. But no one expected that the Arabs would destroy the empire of Iran with such astonishing speed. The slow decline of Rome’s western empire between the early fifth and late sixth centuries is separated from its final extinction in the east by an interval of nearly a thousand years. The decay and disappearance of the Abbasid and Ottoman empires similarly filled many centuries. A far shorter time, a mere two decades between the victory of Heraclius and the death of Yazdgard III, was required for the humiliation of Iran; and only a little less than a century elapsed before the exiled House of Sasan at last relinquished the hope of expelling the Arab conquerors. The speed and permanence of the failure of the Iranian state are indeed surprising, and seem to require explanation.

THE REASONS FOR THE COLLAPSE OF THE SASANIAN EMPIRE Modern writers have claimed that the disintegration of the empire of Iran was hastened by the exhaustion of warfare, by royal decadence and aristocratic divisions, the effects of epidemic disease, corruption and moral decay, and by the centrifugal

341

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force of ethnic separatism. 1 One writer has attributed the collapse to nothing more than old age. 2 It is possible to find notices which support, or appear to support, those claims, but none of them, by itself, is wholly satisfactory. We may observe that, over the course of four centuries, the Iranian empire had successively overcome foreign invasion, pestilence, and civil war; but in the seventh century of our era, such disasters assailed the empire all at once. Amidst those calamities, jealousy, or fear, had perhaps instructed Kavad II to murder his brothers, and when disease ended the life of that king, the House of Sasan was nearly extinct. The prestige of the ruling family never recovered, and the aristocrats who served it struggled to support a tottering monarchy. But we cannot be persuaded by the theory of a distinct identity amongst Iranian aristocrats of real or imaginary Parthian ancestry, who (as the argument goes) happily betrayed their sovereign and ushered in the Arab invaders. 3 Though the impressions of seals and bullas announce the heritage of certain families whose lineage can be traced to the Arsacid era, 4 these are not evidence of a tribal identity, nor even that of a distinct society. The House of Sasan itself claimed authority neither by virtue of regional identity nor because of Persian ethnicity, and they held dominion over Aryans and non-Aryans alike. 5 The earliest inscriptions put up by Sasanian kings were regularly composed in three languages: Middle Persian, Greek, and Parthian. We may fairly infer then that the Parthian and Hellenistic identities lingered on in some form in the early days of Sasanian rule, but soon thereafter Parthian and Greek vanish altogether from inscriptions. Such evidence militates against the claim that a distinct Parthian identity persisted until the Arab conquest of Iran. It is also noteworthy that the last vestige of the Sasanid court in exile is a monument erected by the family of Suren – proof that that clan willingly shared in the exile of the House of Sasan. It is true that the Arabs could not have crossed the alluvial plain of Babylon, nor could they have traversed the numerous canals and watercourses, without the help of local landowners. The writer Tabari draws our attention to two such men. 1

See, for example, Pourshariati, P., Decline and Fall, and Zarrinkoub, A. H., “The Arab Conquest of Iran and its Aftermath,” in The Cambridge History of Iran, vol. IV., 1975, p. 1–56. The theories of Zarrinkoub are fully articulated in his flamboyant book Do Qarn-e Sokut originally published in 1957 in Tehran, and which has seen four editions since then. 2 Yarshater, E., “Re-emergence of Iranian Identity after Conversion to Islam,” in Curtis, V. / Stewart, S., The Rise of Islam: The Idea of Iran, v. IV, I. B. Tauris, London, 2009, p. 5–12. 3 Pourshariati, P., Decline and Fall. 4 Gyselen, R., “The Great Families in the Sasanian Empire,” p. 107–114. 5 I am following Daryaee, T. / Pourshariati, P., Decline and Fall of the Sasanian Empire, 2009, Journal of Persianate Studies 3, 2010, p. 239–254, and Greatrex, G. / Pourshariati, P., Decline and Fall of the Sasanian Empire, 2009, Speculum, vol. 85, Issue 4, 2010, p. 1009–1010.

X. OBSERVATIONS ON THE FALL OF THE IRANIAN EMPIRE

343

Bistam the dihqan of Burs constructed a pontoon bridge for the army of Saʿd; 6 and the dihqan Shirzad, who had (as it seemed) joined the Arabian side, is said to have advised his new masters to construct siege engines. 7 Such notices, if they be genuine, may attest the Arabs’ skill at employing the knowledge and talents of the peoples whom they subjugated; and the farmers and landowners of Babylon, suspecting that the invaders from the south were soon to become their permanent masters, may have eagerly thrown off the Sasanid yoke. Yet the example of the emperor Julian’s disastrous invasion of Iran suggests that Iranian policy may have aimed at luring the invaders into a trap, and it is possible to doubt the sincerity of Bistam and Shirzad. But, that the defence of the Iranian state was left to aristocrats and local armies was surely a consequence, and not the cause, of the collapse of their empire. The formation of peace treaties by local rulers and priests, and the subsequent outbreaks of rebellion against the conquerors were policies required by the absence of a central authority. The first great victory of the Arabs was the capture of the Persian capital and the principle organs of the Iranian administrative state, and herein we surely behold the most important reason for the swift failure of the empire of Yazdgard III. 8 The analysis of Ibn Khaldun remains convincing: when the Arabs captured Ctesiphon, he wrote, ‘the whole Persian empire perished and the regions which remained in Yazdgard’s possession were of no avail to him’. 9 This presents, as Ibn Khaldun argued, an obvious contrast with the other great sedentary power of the ancient world. The eastern Roman state was deprived of its richest provinces, but retained its capital at Constantinople; and for more than three centuries the rugged terrain of Anatolia formed an impassable barrier to the successors of Muhammad. An Iranian capital more remote than Ctesiphon would have been guarded by high mountains and inhospitable deserts, but the natural and artificial defences which fortified the Babylonian plain yielded swiftly to the Arab onslaught. Though the highlands of Iran offered periodic resistance, the subjugation of the capital was permanent.

THE AFTERMATH OF DEFEAT The Umayyad clan of the Quraysh had established themselves as the first Arabian dynasty to rule the new empire. For nearly a century they held sway from their capital at Damascus, and the soldiers of Syria enforced, or attempted to enforce, their 6

Tabari, v. 3, p. 620. Tabari, v. 3, p. 622–623, although Kennedy is inclined to doubt it (Kennedy, H., The Great Arab Conquests, p. 118). 8 Cf. Crone, P., The Nativist Prophets, p. 1–2. 9 Ibn Khaldun, Muqaddima, III.7, p. 274: 7

.���‫ و�� ينفع ��د��د ما ب�� بيده من أطراف ممال‬، ‫ف��ا �لب ا��س��ون ��� ا��دا�ن انقرض أ�� فارس أ��ع‬

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authority over the provinces of the old Iranian empire. 10 But fifty-thousand Arabian troops stationed at the city of Marv mingled with the local population toward the end of the seventh century; and, without the prompting of a new Alexander, they took Iranian wives and adopted the culture of Iran. In the year 750 a mysterious figure by the name of Abu Muslim led in revolt the branch of the Quraysh who traced their lineage to Muhammad’s uncle ʿAbbas, and their insurrection soon united the forces of Marv in the project of overthrowing the Umayyad dynasty. 11 The new dynasty, known to posterity as Abbasid, established a new capital between the rivers Euphrates and Tigris at Baghdad only about twenty miles from the derelict site of Ctesiphon. The workings of the civil administration imitated the customs of the Sasanian chancery, and a new generation of Iranian functionaries arose in service to the new empire. Pride in their ancient civilisation, and confidence in the new dynasty, instructed those men to celebrate the culture of their ancestors. The Arabian empire took on an Iranian identity, 12 and the successors of the Arabian prophet were instructed and edified by volumes of Persian wisdom literature, treatises on Iranian courtly manners and good government, and the history of the House of Sasan. 13 Al-Nabigha al-Jaʿdi, an Arab poet of the seventh century marvelled at the extraordinary collapse of the Sasanid state, as though the empire of Iran had been nothing but a dream. 14 But we might say with more truth that the empire had vanished but the dream lived on. There had been bitter resistance and rebellion in the regions of Tabaristan and Khurasan. The authority of the caliph sat lightly upon the more remote regions of the old Iranian empire. At the beginning of the Abbasid revolution, in the year 755, a rebellion was launched from Tabaristan by a Zoroastrian nobleman who traced his lineage to the House of Karen. The aim of Sunpad (that was the rebel’s name) was to expel the Arabs and to re-establish the Zoroastrian religion, but his attempt ended in failure. 15 A similar motive, and a similar failure, are attributed to a Daylamite warlord of the tenth century by the name of 10

Kennedy, H., The Prophet and the Age of the Caliphates: The Islamic Near East from the Sixth to the Eleventh Century, third edition, 2016, 71–106. 11 Kennedy, H., The Prophet and the Age of the Caliphates, p.107–128. 12 Cf. Katouzian, H., The Persians: Ancient, Medieval and Modern Iran, 2010, p. 73–79. 13 Hoyland, R., The ‘History of the Kings of the Persians’ in Three Arab Chronicles: The Transmission of the Iranian Past from Late Antiquity to Early Islam, 2018, p. 4–5; Savant, S. B., The New Muslims of Post-Conquest Iran: Tradition, Memory, and Conversion, 2013; Crone, P., God’s Rule: Government and Islam, 2004, p. 148–164. 14 al-Nabigha al-Jaʿdi, Diwan (ed. Wadih al-Samad, Beirut, 1998), 71: l. 12–13 [p. 149]: 15

‫فارس بادت و� ُ ّدها ر�ِ�َا؟‬ ‫ك���ا ك�ن م ُل��هم � ُ�ُ�َا‬

‫ هل �� َون إ�ى‬،‫الناس‬ ُ ‫يا أ��ا‬ ��َ‫أمسوا عبيدًا ��ع َون شاء‬

Crone, P., The Nativist Prophets, p. 32–40. Crone doubts, of course, that Sunpad, also called Sundbadh, had really determined to march on Mecca and destroy the Kaaba.

X. OBSERVATIONS ON THE FALL OF THE IRANIAN EMPIRE

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Mardavij. 16 In the ninth century, competition arose between rival Iranian families, whose power and prestige the caliph could only grudgingly acknowledge. The Tahirid, Saffarid, Samanid, Ziyarid, and Buyid monarchies arose amidst the decadence of the Abbasid caliphate. For a little more than a hundred years, the Buyid monarchs ruled over Tabaristan, Iraq, and Persia, the heartland of the defunct Sasanian state. 17 The degraded caliph at Baghdad ruled at the pleasure of Buyid monarch, who revived the ancient title of king of kings until that state was dismembered by the Seljuk and Ghaznavid Turks. 18 But there would be no Persian Justinian to reconquer his ancient patrimony, no Iranian Charlemagne would revive the religion and monarchy of Ardashir, and there were no Zoroastrian monasteries to copy and to preserve the literary heritage of Iran. The uniformity of Zoroastrian ritual, the dream of Kirder and Mihr-Narseh, was no more, and the many local variations of that religion began once again to diverge. Yet the vision of a vast sedentary empire stretching from the Nile to the Euphrates, and from the Tigris to the Indus, never perished. Most of the high aristocracy of Iran had perished in battle, or had fled to China. It was the fate of the landed gentry, the dihqans, to preserve and transmit the heritage of Iran to successive generations of Iranian Muslims. 19 The local gentry survived in no other part of the Islamic empire, for the great families of Roman Syria and Egypt vanish from the page of history in the early seventh century and never return. 20 It was the dihqans, who had arisen under the monarchy of Khusro I, who could look back with pride upon their Iranian and Zoroastrian ancestors and boast of the achievements of their ancient kings and heroes. Caesar, Constantine, and Justinian were nothing but names to the victorious Arabs and their subject people, and their reigns were forgotten. But Khusro I became the model of a wise and just ruler, and the real or imaginary maxims of the first Ardashir were copied and repeated for centuries. The mighty hunter Bahram V, from whom the Buyid kings claimed to be descended, was commemorated in poetry as a paragon of luxury and sybaritic living. Bahram Chobin, the imaginary ancestor of the Samanid kings, became the tragic rebel, whose failure was yet worthy of admiration, and Khusro II was the model of a tyrant corrupted by his own success. The more an16

Kennedy, H., “Survival of Iranianness,” in Curtis, V. / Stewart, S., The Rise of Islam: The Idea of Iran, v. IV, 2009, p. 21–22. 17 Kennedy, H., The Prophet and the Age of the Caliphates, p. 182–213. 18 Madelung, W., “The Assumption of the Title Shāhānshāh by the Būyids and “The Reign of the Daylam (Dawlat Al-Daylam)”,” Journal of Near Eastern Studies, vol. 28, No. 2, 1969, p. 84–108. 19 I am following Kennedy, H., “Survival of Iranianness,” p. 13–29. 20 A good example is the Apion family resident in Egypt, whose existence (unlike that of the dihqans) cannot be discerned in the papyrological record.

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cient, and legendary, heroes of Iran recalled a time when Rome was a village and the Arabs were servants of the Persian king. But the Achaemenids were soon forgotten, and the ruins of Persepolis were attributed to the mythical king Jamshid, the founder alike of monarchy and civilised life. The lore of Iran was recorded in what I have called the Persian royal tradition, and it achieved its greatest expression in the Shahnameh of Ferdowsi in the eleventh century of our era. The survival of the Persian language, in which the Shahnameh was composed, may have seemed doubtful at first. The Coptic, Aramaic, and Greek languages ceased to be heard in the empire of the caliphs, and the modern citizens of Egypt, Syria, and Iraq mostly speak Arabic and call themselves Arabs. We may note an impressive contrast between the Arabs and the conquerors of the Roman west, or the foreign rulers of China, whose ancestral languages were forgotten, and whose manners yielded to those of the people whose government they supplanted. 21 Only in Iran did the Arabs meet a people who would not assimilate themselves to their conquerors. Though the cumbrous writing system of Middle Persian gave way to an elegant modification of the Arabic script, and many an Arabic word was borrowed, the Persian tongue continued to be spoken. In the ninth century, the Samanid court at Bukhara produced the poet Rudaki who elevated the new language into the finest poetic idiom in the world. 22 The vivid and manly distichs of Daqiqi and Ferdowsi, which commemorate the entire history of Iran, are in no way inferior to the rough tones of Homer or the clarity of Vergil. 23 The poet Nizami 24 was inspired by the legends of Bahram V and the romance of Khusro and Shirin, the charming quatrains of Omar Khayyam 25 invoke the mythical kings of the Iranian past, and the most famous work of Khaqani 26 is a solemn meditation on the royal palace at Ctesiphon. Mowlavi, Sana’i, Attar, Saʿdi, and Hafez may be the finest metaphysical poets who ever lived. 27 The language in which they wrote, and the theme of the ancient splendour of Iran, remain the most potent symbols of a national identity, and not even the Ayatollah Khomeini, who overthrew the last monarch of Iran, refrained from invoking Sasanian imagery and legends in his poetry. 28

21

Cf. Kennedy, H., The Prophet and the Age of the Caliphates, p. 102–103. Rypka, J., History of Iranian Literature, 1968, p. 144–145. 23 Rypka, J., History of Iranian Literature, p. 153–162. 24 Rypka, J., History of Iranian Literature, p. 210–213. 25 Rypka, J., History of Iranian Literature, p. 189–193. 26 Rypka, J., History of Iranian Literature, p. 202–208. 27 Rypka, J., History of Iranian Literature, p. 236–242; 250–253; 263–271. 28 Divan-e Emam: sorude-ha-ye hazrat-e emam Khomeini, Rasuli, J. (ed.), sixth edition, 1998. 22

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CONCLUSION For nearly three hundred years Umayyad and Abbasid caliphates bound together the economic and cultural heartlands of the Roman and Iranian worlds. Upon the ruins of the two great sedentary empires, they established and maintained a vast common market of both trade and ideas. 29 This astonishing success proves that the ambition of the House of Sasan was far from unreasonable or impossible. The edifice was erected by the caliphs, but the ground had been loosened and the foundation dug long before. A Parthian king had vowed that he would restore the ancient limits of the empires of Cyrus and Alexander. Ardashir and Shapur had repeated the same boast and asserted a hereditary right to those lands, and the ephemeral successes of Khusro II seemed to announce the achievement of that ancient ambition. But in the end, the civilised world was united not by the successors to the mythical kings from the Abode of the Aryans, but by those of Muhammad.

29

Kennedy, H., The Prophet and the Age of the Caliphates, p. 103–106; Frankopan, P., Silk Roads, p. 88–91.

BIBLIOGRAPHY PRIMARY SOURCES Acta Martyrum et Sanctorum Syriace, v. II, Bedjan, P. (ed.), Harrassowitz, Paris, 1891. Aeschylus, Persae = Aeschylus with an English Translation by Herbert Weir Smyth, v. I, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1930. Afrahat, Demonstratio XXIII in Patrologia Syriaca, I(2), Graffin, R. (ed.), FirmanDidot, Paris, 1907, p. 1–149. Agapius, Kitab al-ʿUnwan (ed. and trans. Vasiliev), Patrologia Orientalis 8, 1912. Agathangelus = Agathangelos: History of the Armenians, Thomson, R. W. (trans.), SUNY Press, Albany, 1976. Agathias = Agathias Scholasticus, Historiarum libri quinque, Keydell, R. (ed.), Brill, Leiden, 1967. Alexander Lycopolitanus, §II = Alexandri Lycopolitani contra Manichaei opinions disputatio, Brinkman, A. (ed.), Leipzig, 1895, p. 4. Ammianus Marcellinus = Ammianus Marcellinus with an English Translation by John C. Rolfe, 3 vols, William Heinemann, 1935. Ananias of Shirak = The Geography of Ananias of Shirak: Ashxarhacoyc, the Long and the Short Recension, Hewsen, H. R. (ed. / trans.), Beihefte zum Tübinger Atlas des vorderen Orients, 77, Reichert, Wiesbaden, 1992 Anecdota Syriaca, tom. I, Land, J. P. N. (ed.), Brill, Louvain, 1862. Annals of Eutychius, v. 2 = Eutychii Patriarchae Alexandrini, Annales, v. 2, Corpus Scriptorum Christianorum Orientalium, Chabot, J.-B., et al. (eds), Scriptores Arabici, tom. VIII, Harrassowitz, Beirut, Paris, Leipzig, 1909. Antiochus Strategus = Connybeare, F. C. (trans.), “The Capture of Jerusalem by the Persians in 614 AD,” English Historical Review 25, 1910 p. 502–517. Appian = Appian’s Roman History with an English Translation by Horace White, 4 vols, William Heinemann, London, 1912–1913. The Arabic Life of St Pisentius = The Arabic Life of S. Pisentius, O’Leary D. (ed.), Patrologia Orientalis, 22, Firmin-Didot, Paris, 1930, p. 315–488. Arda Viraz Namag = Le Livre d’Arda Viraz, Gignoux, P. (ed. / trans.), Éditions Recherche sur les Civilisations, Paris, 1984. 349

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INDEX Abarsam, vizier to Ardashir I, 31, n. 38; 49–50; 121; 276 Abbasid caliphate, 3; 324; 330; 341; 344; 346 Achaemenid monarchy, 7–10; 15; 26; 28; 29; 32; 36; 37; 43; 47–48; 53; 54; 98; 270; 282–283; 319; 345 Adrianople, battle of, 94 Adur-Narseh, Sasanian king, 66–67 Aegean Sea, 7; 36 Africa, 1; 8; 176; 179; 191 Agathias, Roman historian and lawyer, 27; 35; 52; 60; 67; 104; 129; 146; 147; 177; 205–207; 234; 279; Airyanem Vaejo, the mythical Aryan homeland in Zoroastrian scripture, 4; 47 Alans, a nomadic people, 21–22; 96; 195; 202; 208; 229 Aleppo, city in Syria, 194, n. 123; 317 Alexander Romance, 37 Alexander Severus, Roman Emperor, 35–37; 39; 42 Alexander the Great, 10–11; 22; 26; 28; 33–34; 36–37; 40; 97; 316 Alexandria, city in Egypt, 130; 191; 234; 285, n. 101; conquest by Khusro II, 291–294; 314 Altai mountains, 14; 76–77 Amida, 80; conquest by Shapur II, 81 – 84; 88; conquest by Kavad I, 153– 157; 158; 163; 233; 245–246; 281; 315

Ammianus Marcellinus, Roman historian, 4; 55; 79–83; 87–90; 127; 279; on Arabia, 319–320; 329 Ananias of Shirak, Armenian geographer, 150; 163, n. 228 Anatolius, Roman general, 118 Antioch, 12–13; 39; 51–52; 55; 79–80; 83; 85; 111; 151; 167; 169; 173; 179; 184; conquest by Khusro I, 185–186; 192; 281; 284; Anush-Zad, revolt of, 195–199 Arabic language, 70; 109; 346 Arabs, 2; 69–71; 114, n. 97; 145; 153; 155; 167; 183; 186; 211; 244; 245; 253; 267; 273; 288; 316; 319–347 Araxes, river, 251; 281; 297 Ardaburius, Roman general, 111; 126– 127 Ardashir I, Sasanian king, 1; 25–48; 49– 50; 57–59; 65; 76; 98; 115; 120–122; 262; 276; 278; 288; 319; 336; 338; 340–341; 345; 347 Ardashir II, Sasanian king, 101 Armenia, between Rome and Iran, 17– 22; 32; 34–35; 38–39; 51; 53–55; 58; 61–62; 64; 68; 70–71; 73–74; 84–85; 88; 94; 95; 108; 120; 134; 141; 144; 153; 155; 166; 168; 169; 176; 183; 188–189; 225–227; 231–232; 242– 243; 245; 262–263; 265; 273; 281; 297; 299; 315; 316; its partition, 89– 90; abolition of its monarchy, 115– 116; tolerance of its Christianity, 138–139

389

390

THE LAST EMPIRE OF IRAN

Arsacid dynasty, 3; 12–23; 36; 43; 45; 49; 54; 59; 63; 88; 91; 115; 120; 178; 248; 251–252; 262–264; 342 Arshak I, Parthian king and founder of the Arsacid dynasty, 12; 21; 32; 49 Arshak, Armenian king deposed by Shapur II, 89–90 Artaban II, Parthian king, 89–90 Artaban V, Parthian king, 32–35; 44 Aryavarta, the mythical Aryan homeland in Vedic scripture, 47 Assyria, 7; 9; 284; 302 Attila the Hun, 75; 112; 118; 215 Avarayr, battle of, 116–117; 118; 133; 310 Avars, 160–161; 215; 217; 277; 295–296; 300 Avesta, Zoroastrian holy book, 31, n. 38; 47; 177; 184; 234; 276 Azarbaijan, 149, n. 144; 184; 194; 229; 232; 235; 251; 256–258; 262–263; 265; 281; 297–298; 299; 301; 306; 335

Babylon, 7; 9; 11; 13; 15; 16; 86; 93; 128; 137; 243; 282–283; 319; 329–331; 342–343 Baghdad, 71; 344; 345 Bahram I, Sasanian king, 58–59 Bahram II, Sasanian king, 60–61 Bahram III, Sasanian king, 61 Bahram IV, Sasanian king, 102 Bahram V, Sasanian king, 108–116 Bahram Chobin, 241; his rise, 247–251; his rebellion, 251–257; his brief rule, 257–261; his fall, 263–266; his death, 268–271; 318; 323; 335; 345 Bahram son of Siyawushan, 262–263 Balkans, 287 Baladhuri, Muslim historian of the Arab conquests, 3; 327; 330; 332–334 Balash, Sasanian king, 117; 134; 138– 141; 145; 156; 152 Balkh, city in Bactria or modern-day Afghanistan, 35; 124; 126; 218; 220; 237; 249; 250; 266; 270, n. 15 Banu ʿIjl, 288

Barbalissus, city in Syria, 51; 169 Binduya, uncle to Khusro II, 255–260; 263–269 Bistam, uncle to Khusro II, 33; 108; 255–259; his rebellion and death, 268–271; 277 Bistam, dihqan of Burs, 342–343 Boran, Sasanian queen, 317–318; 328 Bounteous Immortals, lesser Zoroastrian divinities, 46; 258; 274 Bukhara, city in Central Asia, 217–218; 346 Bumin, khaghan of the Turks, 213; 215; 247 Byzantium, 79; 295; see also Constantinople

Cappadocia, a region of Asia Minor, 51; 95; 231; 296; 297; 315 Caracalla, Roman emperor, 23; 33–34; 37 Carrhae, battle of, 17–18; 34; 39; 62; 81; 155; 187; 281 Caspian Gates, 95–96; 173; 174, n. 13; 298; 301 Caspian Sea, 12; 15; 81; 94; 97; 224; 232 Cassius Dio, Roman historian, 37–38 Caucasus, 19; 90; 95–97; 99; 112–113; 117; 120; 129; 133–134; 138–139; 158–159; 165–166; 183–184; 192; 199; 227–228; 316; 336; 341 Central Asia, 1; 7; 8; 11; 22; 40; 43; 98– 99; 102; 119; 120; 160; 191; 212; 219; 220; 229; 238; 251; 271; 290; 316 Chang’an, Chinese capital, 77; 339; 340 Christ, 31, n. 38; 71; 73; 90–91; 159; 297 Christianity, 71–72; 90–91; 115–116, 196–198, 199; 309; its evolution in Iran, 102–105; persecution under Shapur II, 71–73; toleration under Yazdgard I, 106–108; persecution under Bahram V, 110–111; persecution under Yazdgard II, 117–119; and Peroz’ policy, 129–134; toleration under Balash and Kavad I, 139, 153, 156, 157, 166; and Khusro I’s policy, 209, 226, 233–235; Hurmazd

INDEX IV’s refusal to persecute, 237–238; and Khusro II’s policy, 271–277, 293; Khusro II’s flirtation with, 271– 272; and the death of Yazdgard III, 338 Christology, 130–133 Chubriadanes, garrison commander at Nisibis mentioned by Theophylact Simocatta, 253 Cilicia, 173; 297 Circesium, a Roman fortress, 62; 184; 230; 260 Constantinople, 73; 83; 85; 104; 113; 126; 127; 130; 131; 166; 171; 174; 181; 184; 193; 194; 201; 202; 203; 207; 221; 222; 224; 225; 227; 240; 242; 243; 244; 245; 260; 275; 277; 280; 281; 287; 290; 294; 295; 300; 304; 311; 313; 314; 343; Persian and Avar siege of, 296–297; 299–301 Crassus, Roman patrician, his defeat by Parthia, 16–19; 20; 22; 39, n. 77 Ctesiphon, Sasanian capital, 2; 4; 21; 43; 55; 58; 78; 84–85; 94–95; 103; 104; 108; 123; 167; 190; 194; 196; 207; 221; 222; 223; 228; 231; 242; 243; 245; 247; 250; 262; 263; 270; 273; 275; 278; 281; 285; 288; 290; 296; 298; 303–307; 314; 317; 318; 320; its foundation, 13; its sack by Trajan, 22–23; its capture by Carus, 60; Julian’s siege of, 84–87; fortifications surrounding it, 178–179; siege by Bahram Chobin, 253–259; recovery by Khusro II, 265–266; 267–271; siege by Shahr-Baraz, 315; Arab siege and conquest of, 331–333; 343–344 Consanguineous marriage, 58 Cyrus, Achaemenid king, 1; 7; 9–10; 12– 13; 20; 28, n. 20; 29; 31–32; 36; 99; 282–283; 334; 336; 338; 342

Dara, Roman fortress, 163; 167; 168– 169; 174; 175; 179–180; 186–188; 200–201; 208; 230; 232; 233; 242– 243; 246; 248; 263–264; 278; 280– 282

391

Dastaba, 270 Daylam, 20; 195; 269; Daylamites, 204; 335; 344 Diocletian, Roman emperor, 61–67; 74; 177 Dvin, Armenian capital, 94; 189; 197– 198; 241; 263; 273; 297 Dinawari, Iranian polymath and historian, 2; 3; 26; 28; 49; 50; 108–109; 110; 114–115; 117; 124–125; 128–129; 139; 140–141; 143; 148–150; 183; 195–196; 217; 239; 248; 249–250; 254–257; 259; 262–263; 268–270; 275; 280; 328

Eastern Wei, Chinese dynasty, 213 Edessa, 51–52; 67; 81; 88; 131; 155; 157; 163; 187; 190; 234; 244; 278; 280– 281; 304; 314 Egypt, 7; 12; 55–56; 66; 131; 191; 192; 290; 298; 313; 319; 321; 322; 345; 346; conquest by Cambyses, 7, conquest by Khusro II, 291–294; Sasanian evacuation of, 315 Elishe, Armenian historian, 116; 118– 120; 122; 124–125; 133; 135, n. 55 Eranshahr, name of the Sasanian empire, 4; 129, n. 32 Eternal Peace, 175–176; its aftermath, 176–180; its collapse, 182–184 Euphrates, river, 1; 11; 13; 17; 38; 39; 52; 55; 56; 62; 67; 68; 69; 81; 85; 86; 88; 93; 94; 95; 111; 128; 158; 169; 184; 185; 187; 188; 189; 230; 231; 243; 259; 265; 280; 281; 297; 310; 315; 316; 319; 320; 329; 344; 345;

Feudalism, 16; 73; 198, n. 145 Ferdowsi, author of the Shahnameh, 2; 14; 26; 29; 30; 49; 50; 140; 142; 148; 149; 150; 181; 182; 184; 195; 196; 198; 218; 221; 222; 238; 248; 249; 254; 255; 262; 280; 291; 330; 331; 337; 338; 345; 346 Ghassanid Arabs, 70; 157; 183; 227; 230; 244–245; 288; 241

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THE LAST EMPIRE OF IRAN

Gog and Magog, biblical invaders of Israel prophesied to opposed Christ and his saints, 97; 114, n. 97; 159; 284 Graeco-Bactrian kingdoms, 10–12; their collapse, 14; 29; 40; 76 Gondeshapur, 196 Gurdiya, wife and sister to Bahram Chobin, 249; 268; 271 Gurgan, region of north-eastern Iran, 12; 21; 22; 38; 94; 108; 119; 136; 178; 269; 335; 341; wall of, 97–98; 120; 121, n. 120; 218; 229

Hamadan, city in Media, western Iran, 270; 298; 334–335 Han, Chinese dynasty, 1; 13–14; 41–42; 76; 77 Hatra, 22; 38; 39; 42; 50; 51; 69; Hephthalites, 98; 100–101; 120; 124– 126; 128; 134; 140; 141; 143; 145; 146; 151; 152; 159; 212; 213; 219– 221; 223; 224; 238; 239; 247; 290; 237; Peroz’ wars with, 135–138; their decline, 160–161; collapse of their empire, 214–218 Heraclius, Roman emperor, 240; 278; 279–280; 282; 284; 289; 318; 325; 333; 341; his campaigns 295–307; his victory, 307–311 Herodian, Roman historian, 34; 36, n. 66; 39, n. 77 Herodotus, 9; 12; 93; 125, n. 12; 256, n. 118; 319 Hexi corridor, 13; 76 Hindukush, mountain range, 1; 23; 40; 100; 302; 339 Huns, 1; 14; 78; 81; 82; 91; 94–95; 98; 112–113; 118; 124–126; 127; 128; 133; 134; 143; 145; 146; 151; 152; 158–159; 161–162; 163; 174; 186; 190; 199; 208; 213–221; 238; 247; their attack on the Tocharians, 14– 15; 40–42; their origin and interactions with China, 75–78; their migration westward, 77–78; their influence on Iran, 98–101; Bahram V’s wars

with, 114–115; Yazdgard II’s wars with, 118–120; Peroz’ wars with, see Hephthalites; Yazdgard III seeks refuge among them, 337 Hurmazd-Ardashir, Sasanian king, 55; 58 Hurmazd, Sasanian pretender and fugitive, 68; 84–85; 146 Hurmazd I, Sasanian king, 26 Hurmazd II, Sasanian king, 66–67 Hurmazd III, Sasanian king, 123–125 Hurmazd IV, Sasanian king, 217; the sources for his reign, 237–241; his early reign, 241–243; his war with Rome, 243–247; his war with the Turks and its consequences, 247– 253; his war with Bahram Chobin, 253–255; his deposition and death, 256–266

Iberia, 64–65; 71; 83; 89–90; 95–96; 96, n. 11; 123; 134; 138; 158, n. 201; 166; 168; 175; 184; 199; 201; 204; 206; 232; 241; 251; 263; 298; 301 Ibn Miskawayh, Iranian historian and bureaucrat, 4; 228–229; 238; his value as an historian, 171–172 India, 11; 28–30; 39; 40; 43; 57; 100; 109; 160; 161; 191; 192; 234; 252; its profitable trade, 162–163; 210; 212; 223 Islam, 2; 47; 171; rise of, 325–329 Istakhr, 27–29; 60; 318; 336 Istemi, yabghu of the Turks, 215–216; 217; 224; 247

Jamasp, Sasanian king, 140; 143; 145, n. 116; 146; 152 Jamshid, legendary Iranian culture-hero, 275; 345 jarib, a unit of area, 148 Jesus, 31; 110; 115; 130; 156; 276; 285; 286 Jin, Chinese dynasty, 76–77 John Malalas, Roman chronicler, 62; 140; 166–167; 172–176; John of Epiphaneia, Roman historian whose work is lost, 240

INDEX Julian the Apostate, Roman emperor, 82–87; 94; 101; 157; 243; 306; 343 Justin I, Roman Emperor, 164–166 Justinian I, Roman emperor, 1; 63; 70; 104; 114; 135; 167–168; 171–174; 176–179; 181–187; 190–193; 196– 197; 199; 201; 203–204; 205–206; 209; 211–212; 217; 221; 222; 234; 243; 245

Karashahr, a town northeast of the Taklamakan desert, 160; 213 Kashmir, 160 Kavad I, Sasanian king, 99; 114; 135; 137; 138; 139; his rise, 140–142; his patronage of Mazdakism, 142–144; his deposition and restoration, 144– 147; his reforms, 147–151; his first war with Rome, 151–158; his war with the Hephthalites, 158–159; his diplomacy, 160–163; his domestic troubles, 163–166; his second war with Rome, 166 –169; his sudden death, 170 Kavad II, Sasanian king, 313–314; 318; 342 Khabur, river, 62 Khotan, an oasis town south-west of the Taklamakan desert, 160 Kidarites, see also Huns, 100; 115; 119; 125 Kirder, a Zoroastrian high priest, 57–60; 66; 102; 122; 345 Kermanshah, 101 Kurds, 28; 32 Kushans, 14; 22; 29; 40–41; 50; 78; 91; 100; 341 Kabul, 40; 102; 124 Karnamag of Ardashir son of Pabag, 25–36; 28; 30; 32; 33; 49 Kufa, town in Iraq, 329

Lazar Parpetsi, Armenian historian, 118– 119; 122; 124–125; 129; 134; 137, n. 70; 138; 139; 141; 241 Lazica, war in, 184; 188; 189; 190; 191; 197; 199–207

393

Lakhmid Arabs, 70–71; 109; 155; 157; 163; 166; 167; 179; 183; 188; 204; 221; 227; 228; 253; 273; 288; 320; 321; 327; 328; 341 Luoyang, Chinese capital, 76; 77; 213; 219

Mani, 57–59 Manichaeanism, 57; 66; 165, n. 241; 172 Mark Antony, Roman general, 18–19; 22 Martyropolis, 153; 154; battle of, 169; 245; 247; 264 Marutha, bishop of Sophanene in Armenia, 105–106 Maurice, Roman emperor, 232–233; 244–245; 251; 260–264; 272; 273, n. 33; 275; 277–278; 287; 289 Mazdak, a Zoroastrian heretic, 142–144; Mazdakism, 148; 151; 165; 173; 195 Mecca, 70; 287; 321–322; 325–327 Medina, 327–329 Menander the Guardsman, Roman diplomatic historian, 172; 207; 208; 215; 216; 218; 220; 221; 223; 226; 230; 232; 239; 240; 241; 242; 243; 270 Mihrdad I, Parthian king, 12–13 Mihrdad II, Parthian king, 15; 20 Mihrdad VI, king of Pontus, 36 Mihr-Narseh, vizier to several Sasanian kings, 106; 111; 113; 116; 117; 121– 122; 129; 345 Middle Persian language, 43 Modu, king of the Xiongnu, 76; 77 Moses Chorenatsi, Armenian historian, 25; 35; 51; 276, n. 51 Moses Daskhurantsi, Armenian historian, 299; 302–305; 308–309; 314; 316; 330; Mushel Manikonean, an Armenian nobleman loyal to the House of Sasan, 262–263; 265 Muhammad, founder of Islam, 48; 71; 287; 288; 322–328; 332–333; 343– 344; 344; 347 Muqan, khaghan of the Turks, 215; 224; 239, n. 11; 247

394

THE LAST EMPIRE OF IRAN

Narseh, Sasanian king, 27; 57; his ignominious reign, 61–66 Narses, commander of the eastern Roman field in the early seventh century, 263–265; 278; 281; 287 Nisibis, 34; 39; 63–64; 67; 71; 74–75; 78; 84; 88; 93–94; 104; 111; 118; 127; 128; 132; 129; 145; 152; 157; 163; 179; 188; 200; 208; 229–231; 233– 234; 245; 253; 260; 264; 276; 298 Nomads, 8–10; 21; 23; 42; 46; 94–95; 97; 160; 173; 183; 195; 213–215; 219; 228; 260–261; 287; 290–291; 319; 321; 337; 341 Northern Wei, Chinese dynasty, 125– 126; 136; its foundation, 160–162; and the Turks, 212–214 Northern Zhou, Chinese dynasty, 216; 218; 222; 239, n. 11 Osrhoene, 62; 68; 80; 127; 157 Oxus river, 11; 40; 50; 114; 220; 237; 250; 268; 290

Pabag, father of Ardashir I, 25–31; 33; 39; 45 Pariovk, a Hephthalite king mentioned by Sebeos, 270–271 Pawstos Buzandatsi, Armenian historian, 91 Persepolis, 32; 54; 345 Philip the Arab, Roman emperor, 51; 53–54 Philip of Macedon, 37; 72 Phocas, Roman Emperor, 277–278; 281–284; 286–287; 289 Photius, patriarch of Constantinople and epitomist, 219; 240 Plague, 56; the Justinianic Plague, 171; 191–193; its effect on Iran, 194–199; 221; 225; 275; later outbreaks, 314; 342 Plataea, battle of, 10 Pliny the Elder, 15; 210 Pompey, 16; 20 Procopius of Caesarea, Roman historian, 4; 104; 123; 135–138; 140; 143; 145–

147; 152–155; 158–159; 163–165; 168–169; 172–176; 180–212; 240; 279; 321 Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, Syrian historian, 113; 127; 129; 135–137; 139; 142; 144; 147; 154–158 Pulcheria, sister to Roman Emperor Theodosius II, 111; 309 Peroz I, Sasanian king, 1; 98; 100–101; 108; 113; 115; 117; 120; 121; 151; 159; 218; 219; his rise, 123–126; his tensions with Rome, 126–128; his domestic policies, 128–133; his Transcaucasian policy, 133–134; his wars with the Hephthalites, 135–138 Peroz II, Sasanian king, 218 Peroz III, Sasanian pretender, 339–340

Quran, Muslim holy book, 279; 323–325 Quraysh, 324; 326–327; 331; 343–344 Rey, 178; 248; 253; 270; 290; 330; 333; 335 Rouran, a nomadic confederacy, its establishment, 160–161; its collapse 212–214; 215; 247

Sabirs, a nomadic people, 159; 166; 169; 173–174; 183; 186; 199; 202; 204; 205 Sabrishoʿ, catholicos under Khusro II, 271–276; 278; 289 Salamis, battle of, 10; 199 Samarqand, 115; 217; 220; 238 Samosata, city on the upper Euphrates now in southern Turkey, 51 Sanʿa, capital of the Yemen, 228 Saracens, 70; 109–112; 157; 179; 183; 188; 204; 208; 221; 227; 243; 297; see also Arabs Sasan, putative ancestor of Ardashir I, 25–31 Sebeos, Armenian historian, 233; 239; 240; 249; 250; 256–257; 264–271; 276; 281; 290; 295; 296; 331; 315; 317; 329; 330; 334; 335; 337; 338; the value of his history, 241; 279

INDEX Seleucia, 11; 12–13; 17; 21; 44; 86; 105 Seleucid monarchy, 11–12 Shahnameh, the Iranian national epic, 2; 14; 26; 29; 49; 97; 142; 171; 182; 183; 195–196; 198; 218; 222; 249; 252; 262; 291; 330; 337; 345–346 Shahrestaniha-yi Eranshahr, 50; 105; 150 Shapur I, Sasanian king, 26; 27; the beginning of his reign, 49–50; his war with Rome, 51–54; his seizure of Armenia, 54–55; and Palmyra, 55–57; his interactions with Mani and Kirder, 57–59; his later reign, 59–66 Shapur II, Sasanian king, 25; his rise, 66– 68; his relations with the Arabs, 69– 71; his persecution of Christians was war with Rome, 71–75; 78–89; his partition of Armenia, 89–91; his wars in the east, 91 Shawg, a Hephthalite king mentioned by Sebeos, 270 Shirin, wife to Khusro II, 272–276; 285; 289, n. 127; 206; 346 Silk, 17; 211–212; 219; 222–224; 204; 325 Silzabul, see Istemi Sinjibu, see Istemi Sima Qian, grand historian of China, 8, n. 9; 9, n. 11; 75 Socrates Scholasticus, Roman ecclesiastical historian, 106; 108; 111 Sogdiana, 11; 115; 212; 214; 217; 219; 223; 238 Sogdians, 218–219; 223–224 Sui, Chinese dynasty, 247, 287, 290–291 Suren, family of Parthian origin, 13; 15; 17–18; 18, n. 67; 35; 88; 225; 340 Tacitus, Roman historian, 15; 20; 80; 210 Tabari, Persian universal historian, 2; 3; 27; 28; 40; 50; 60; 66; 68; 101; 108; 109; 113; 117; 123; 125; 128; 139; 141; 143; 148; 149; 150; 180; 183; 194; 195; 218; 228; 229; 238; 239; 248; 249; 261; 274; 280; 305; 314; 318; 329; 331; 332; 333; 334; 335; 337; 342

395

Taklamakan desert, 13; 76; 160 Tang, Chinese dynasty, 316; 337; 339; 340 Tardu, khaghan of the Turks, 247; 287 Theophanes the Confessor, Byzantine chronicler, 104; 165; 166; 172; 173; 221; 282; 284; 295; 299; 300; 304; 306 Theophanes of Byzantium, a Roman historian whose work is lost, 219; 228 Theophylact Simocatta, a verbose Roman historian, 225–226; 238; 242– 251; 253–265; 269; 278; 279; the value of his history, 240 Thermopylae, battle of, 10 Tigris river, 11; 13; 21; 39; 60; 64; 65; 80–81; 85–88; 93–94; 128; 156; 174; 178; 244; 253; 257; 264; 269; 331– 332; 344; 345 Tirmiz, 125; 249 Tocharians, 13–14; 22; 40; 76; 77; 94 Tuoba, a nomadic people who founded the Chinese dynasty of the Northern Wei, 160–161 Turan, 14; 97; 248 Turfan, a region northeast of the Taklamakan desert, 213 Turks, 2; 100; 171; 237; 256; 261; 264; 266; 268; 306; 330; 337; 339–340; 345; their rise, 212–214; their destruction of the Hephthalites, 214– 218; their seizure of Sogdiana, 219– 221; their diplomacy and alliance with Justin II, 222–230; defection of some Turks to Iran, 238; their war with Iran, 247–251; their wars with Sui China and crises of succession, 287–288; 290–291; their alliance with Heraclius, 298–299; 301–303; 308– 309; their invasion of Iran in the reign of Shahr-Baraz, 315–316

Valens, Roman emperor, 90; 94 Valerian, Roman emperor, 52–53; 54– 56; 63–64

396

THE LAST EMPIRE OF IRAN

Vakhtang, king of Iberia, 123; 134; 166; 199 Verethragna, Zoroastrian hypostasis of victory, 271

Wahrez, commander of Khusro I’s invasion of the Yemen, 228 Western Wei, Chinese dynasty, 213 Wusun, a nomadic people, 14 Xerxes, Achaemenid king, 10; 199 Xianbei, a nomadic confederacy, 41; 42; 76; 151; 160; see also Sabirs Xiongnu, 8, n. 9; 15; see also Huns Yahballaha I, bishop of SeleuciaCtesiphon and Iranian diplomat, 108

Yazdgard I, 95; 100; 102–109; 128; 133; 164; 179; Yazdgard II, 115–121; 123; 125; 129; 133–134; 151; 282 Yazdgard III, 318; 329–333; 341; 343; his flight and death, 337–338; his descendants, 338–340 Yuezhi, a nomadic people defeated by the Xiongnu, 14; see also Tocharians

Zareh, one of Peroz I’s sons, 138 Zoroaster, founder of the Iranian religion, 4; 30; 59; 199; his religion, 107; 123; 234; 275; 286 Zoroastrianism, its doctrines, 45–48; 262; its assimilation with Christianity, 276–277