[Aidashu I]
When there had elapsed, according to what the Christians and
the possessors of the early Scriptures relate, 523 years, but
according
to the Zoroastrians ( al-Majus ), 2 66 years, since Alexander had
taken control of the land of Babylon, 3 there arose Ardashlr, 4 son
of
Babak Shah, King of Khlr, son of the younger Sasan, son of Babak,
son of Sasan, son of Babak, son of M.h.r.m.s, son of Sasan, son of
Achaemenids from earlier Sasanid sources, citing the
veneration by the Sasanids of Persepolis as a sacred site (but they regarded it
as stemming from legendary or
semilegendary times!) and suggesting that non-Persian
authors such as Greek,
Armenian, Jewish, and Muslim ones (including, of these
last, the Khwarazmian al- Blruni in his al-Athar al-baqiyah) were well aware of
the Achaemenids; see his
"National History or Keyanid History? The Nature of
Sasanid Zoroastrian Histo-
riography," 129-41. Nevertheless, as emphasized
above, the weight of opinion
concurs in the view that the Sasanids did not regard
themselves as heirs to the
Achaemenids, but to the Kayanids.
2. See The History of al-Tabari, vol. Ill, The Children
of Israel, and vol. IV, The
Ancient Kingdoms.
3. The chronology attributed by al-Tabari to the
Christians here, and elsewhere,
as the "Years of Alexander," is based on the
Seleucid era, that commemorating
Seleucus I's assumption of power at Babylon, commonly
fixed at 1 October 3 1 2 b.c. The Byzantine historian Agathias dated the beginning
of Ardashlr's reign to the year 538 of the era of Alexander, i.e., a.d. 226-27,
probably with Ardashlr's coronation at Ctesiphon in mind (cf. Averil Cameron,
"Agathias on the Sassanians, " 1171-
Interpretation of the bilingual, i.e., Parthian and
Middle Persian, inscription at
Bishapur would seem to point to the "official"
beginning of the Sasanid dynasty's
rule as being in the calendar year 27 September 223 to 25
September 224; but the
topic remains uncertain and controversial. Since Alexander's
era was considered to have begun with his accession, the traditional figure for
the length of his reign,
fourteen years (e.g., in al-Tabari, 1, 702, citing
"the Persians"), these years had to be subtracted from the known
figure of 537 years to give 524 years as the interval
separating Ardashlr from Alexander's death. The lesser
figure of the Magians or
Zoroastrians given here reflects Sasanid ideological considerations,
foreshortening the actual 474 years of Parthian rule in an attempt to
depreciate the duration of their predecessors' power (in reality, this had been
longer than the rule of the Sasanids was to extend). See Th. Noldeke, trans. 1 n.
i; Eh s.v. Arsacids. V. The Arsacid Era, and VI. Arsacid Chronology in
Traditional History (A. Sh. Shahbazi).
4. MP '.r.t.h.lt.r, pronounced ArdaxSIr, from a
hypocoristic form *RtaxSiia of
the full OP form *Rtax$athra, i.e., Artaxerxes. The name
had apparently continued in use among local princes of Fars during the Arsacid
period, on numismatic evidence. See Noldeke, trans. 1 n. 2; D. Sellwood,
"Minor States in Southern Iran,' 304-305; Eh, s.v. ArdaSir I. i. History
(J. Wiesehofer).
[The Kings of the Persians]
3
King Bahman, son of Isfandiyar, son of Bishtasb, son of Luhrasb,
son of Kaywaji (?), son of Kaymanush. According to another
genealogy, [he was] Ardashir, son of Babak, son of Sasan, son of
Babak, son of Zarar, son of Biha-Afridh, son of the elder Sasan,
son
of Bahman, son of Isfandiyar, son of Bishtasb, son of Luhrasb. 5 [He
arose] in Fars seeking, as he alleged, to avenge the blood of his
paternal cousin Dara, son of Bahman, son of Isfandiyar, on whom
Alexander had made war and had killed two of the latter's chief
commanders. As he said, he wished to recover the royal power [or:
the kingdom] for its rightful holders and for those who had held it
continuously in the previous time of his predecessors and fore-
fathers, before the "Party Kings," and [wished] to gather
it to-
gether again under one head and one monarch. 6
It is mentioned that he was bom in a village ( qarydh ) of the
I§takhr region called TIrudih, situated in the rural district
{rustaq)
5 . On the problems in the Sasanid genealogies, see G.
Morrison, "The Sassanian
Genealogy in Mas'udI," 42-44; R. N. Frye, The
Heritage of Persia, 207-208; idem,
"The Political History of Iran under the
Sasanians." 116-17. The genealogies go
back to personages like Zarar and Biha-Afridh who were
attached (nonhistorically) to the Arsacids, and then back to the legendary
Kayanids, the Achaemenids having by Sasanid times (apart from the Dariuses)
receded into a legendary haze. See Noldeke, trans. 2, nn. 1-3, 3 n. 1.
The question of the nearer descent of Ardashir, whether
Sasan was actually his
grandfather or a more remote ancestor (the jadd of
al-Tabari's text could imply
either of these), or directly connected with the line of
Pabag at all, has aroused
considerable discussion, since the sources, literary and
epigraphic, offer differing
interpretations. Thus, noting the description of
Sas&n as a lord but with no explicit filiation of Pabag as the son of Sasan
in the Ka'ba-yi Zardusht inscription at Naqshi Rustam, R. N. Frye is inclined
to believe that Sasan was a remote ancestor whose name was used for the dynasty
as a whole, just as the Achaemenids took their name from the totally obscure
HaxamaniS/Achaemenes, while noting the epic tradition that, since S 5 san died
just after his son Ardashir's birth, the boy was adopted, following current
Zoroastrian practice, as Pabag's own son. The popular Persian tradition,
exemplified in the Middle Persian romance, the Kdr-namag-i ArdaSir-i Pabagan,
pace the view expressed here by al-Tabari, makes Ardashir the son of Sasdn, the
local ruler Pabag having given his daughter in marriage to Sasan after hearing
of the latter's noble descent from Dara, i.e., the last Achaemenid Darius in
(considered by the Sasanids as the last Kayanid king). See the discussions in
R. N. Frye, "History and Sasanian Inscriptions," 215-16; idem,
"The Political History of Iran under the Sasanians," 116-17; bit,
s.v. ArdaSir I. i. History (Wiesehofer).
6. Again reflecting Sasanid imperial propaganda that
Ardashir restored the unity
of the state as the heir of earlier, pre-Arsacid rulers
whom he now avenged on
Artabanus V.
4
[The Kings of the Persians]
of Khlr 7 in the administrative division ( kurah ) of Istakhr . 8
His
grandfather Sasan was a courageous and mighty warrior whose
courage and military might were such that he fought single-
handed eighty of the strong and valiant men of Istakhr and put
them all to flight. His wife stemmed from one of the royal families
in Fars called the Bazranjin . 9 She was named Rambihisht, and
possessed beauty and perfection. Sasan was the custodian of the
fire temple of Istakhr called that of Anahidh . 10 He was also a
devotee of the chase and of equestrian pursuits ( al-furusiyyah ).
7. This town of Fars (other forms such as Khayr and Khiyar
are found in the
geographers] lay near the southeastern tip of Lake
Bakhtigan in the district of
Niriz, and marked a stage on the Shiraz-Kirman road. See
G. Le Strange, The Lands of the Eastern Caliphate, 289-90; P. Schwarz, Iran im
Mittelalter, 104-105. The location of Tirudih, and the exact form of its name,
remain unclear.
8. In Sasanid times, Stakhr (thus written in Pahlavi
script, stxr) was regarded as
both the religious and political center for the dynasty,
given the origins of the
Sasanids themselves from the district. It lay on the
Pulvar river north of Persepolis, and may have come into prominence after
Alexander the Great's destructions at Persepolis. In Islamic times, it remained
moderately significant as the center of the kurah or administrative district
(see on this term n. 119 below] of the same name but was gradually overshadowed
by the foundation in early Umayyad times of Shiraz, which became the capital
for the whole of Fars. See Noldeke, trans. 3 n. 2; Le Strange, Lands, 275-76; Schwarz,
Iran, 13-16; W. Barthold, An Historical Geography of Iran, 151-53; El 2 , s.v.
Istakhr (M. Streck-G. C. Miles); Eh, s.v. Estakr (A. D. H. Bivar and Mary
Boyce), This tradition identifying Tirudih as Ardashir's birthplace may well
deserve credence; before the Sasanids, the Arsacids had continued to venerate
their original home in northeastern Persia, on the evidence of Isidore of
Charax.
9. The correct form of this name is unclear. Noldeke,
trans. 4 n. 1, compared it
with a mountainous district of western Fars, Bazrang,
mentioned by the Islamic
geographers al-I?takhri and Ibn Hawqal (see Le Strange,
Lands, 171-72; Schwarz,
Iran, 118-19), so that we might possibly have a family
name derived from a place.
The Bazrangis were apparently a family of local
potentates in Fars, acknowledging the Arsacids as their suzerains but in
practice largely autonomous; after the time of Ardashir, however, they
disappear from historical record. See Eh, s.v. Bazrangi (R. N. Frye). Whether
Ardashir really was related to one of these families cannot now be ascertained,
but such a link is by no means improbable; A. von Gutschmid, "Bemerkungen
zu Tabari's Sasanidengeschichte, ubersetzt von Th. Noldeke," 734, was less
skeptical than Noldeke about such a possibility.
10. The Avestan Arodvi Sura Anahita "mighty,
immaculate one of the waters,"
a goddess of fertility, nurturer of crops and herds, and
also of success in battle, MP Ardwisur Anahid, had also become identified with
the Western Iranian Anahiti, apparently the goddess of the planet Venus.
Venerated by the Achaemenids from the time of Artaxerxes II onward, the cult
was popular among the early Sasanids, and Shapur I called his daughter and
queen Adur Anahid, "Fire (and) Anahid," i.e., this was a dvandva name,
from the names of two deities. According to al-Tabari's source, presumably the
Khwaday-namag or "Book of Kings," Ardashir was now laying claim to
custodianship of the fire temple that had grown out of a shrine to
[The Kings of the Persians]
5
Rambihisht provided Sasan with a son, Babak, whose hair, at
the moment he was bom, was already over a span long . 1 1 When he
reached the age of sound judgment, he assumed rule over the
people after his father. Then his son Ardashir was bom to him.
The ruler of I§takhr at that time was a man from the Bazranjin
family called, according to what I have been told from information
going back to Hisham b. Muhammad (i.e., Ibn al-Kalbi ), 12 Juzhir ,
13
Anahid, the beginning of a tradition among the Sasanids
that their founder had
been at once warrior hero, prince, and priest. See
Ndldeke, trans. 4 n. i } Eh, s.v.
Anahid. i. Ardwlsur Anahid (M. Boyce).
11 . A legendary touch, like being bom with a full set of
teeth, presaging future
strength and greatness. See N6ldeke, trans. 4, n. 3.
12. The major early Islamic historian of pre-Islamic
Arabia, including Yemen
and the fringes of the northern and central Arabian
Desert facing the empires of the Byzantines and the Sasanids, and also a prime
authority, as his magnum opus the Jamhaiat al-nasab shows, on Arab tribal
genealogy and history, bom in KOfah ca. 120/737 and died there in 204/819 or
205/821. His interest in pre-Islamic Arabian history seems to have arisen
partly from a desire to elucidate the background of the Qur’an, and partly from
his Kalb! family origins, for the Kalb had played a glorious role in South
Arabian tribal history as the mainstay of the Quda’ah, and then in early
Islamic times had been the principal military backing for the Umayyad caliphs
in Syria. Moreover, his home town of al-Kufah lay close to al-Hirah, in pre-
Islamic times the capital of the Lakhmid kings, whose history Hishim was
especially concerned to elucidate (see, e.g., al-Tabari, I, 821-22, pp. 20-22
below). His interest here was such that he called one of his sons al-Mundhir,
the name so typical of Lakhmid kings that they are often referred to as
al-Manadhirah, and thus himself acquired the kunydh or patronymic of Abu
al-Mundhir.
This interest in the Lakhmids further gave him a desire
to make available to his
contemporaries in early 'Abbasid Iraq the history of the
Lakhmids' suzerains, the
rulers of Persia. This explains why Hisham provided so
much material for al-
Tabari on the Persian monarchs (which al-Tabari, being
himself of Iranian stock,
was probably not averse from using); he wrote a special
monograph, no longer
extant, on the Parthian Arsacids, the Kitab Muluk
al-fawa’if. This material on the
Lakhmids and Sasanids is much greater in quantity and
richer in caliber than the
exiguous material al-Tabari could find on the Ghassanids
of Syria and their
suzerains the Byzantines. Apart from his careful use of
written sources, including
historical traditions and narratives, akhbar, derived
from his father Muhammad, a
noted Qur’anic scholar and exegete, Hisham apparently had
access to some written documents on the Lakhmids still available in al-Hirah
during his own lifetime. He combed local churches and monasteries for their
inscriptions and for documents preserved there. He was especially familiar with
the verses of the poet of the last Lakhmids at al-Hirah, ’Adi b. Zayd (see n. 1
1 6 below), but must have had the whole corpus of pre-Islamic poetry and that
of the interval between the Jahiliyyah and the new Islamic dispensation, the
mukhadram, at his fingertips.
See on Hisham and his father Ibn al-Kalbi, trans. W.
Caskel and G. Strenziok,
Jamhaiat al-nasab, introduction; Fuat Sezgin, GAS, 1 ,
268-7 1; A. A. Duri, The Rise of Historical Writing among the Arabs, 51-52,
146-47; Irfan Shahid, Byzantium
6
[The Kings of the Persians]
and, according to others, Juzhir. This last had a eunuch called
Tira, 14 whom he had appointed castellan ( arjabadh ) 15 of Darabjird.
16 When Ardashir reached the age of seven years, his father
took him to Juzhir, whose seat was at al-Bayda’, 17 made his son
stand before Juzhir, and asked the latter if he would attach the
boy
to Tira as a foster child of his and as the future castellan in
lira's
stead. Juzhir agreed to his request and had the terms of the
request
written out for him in a formal sealed document ( sijill ). 18
Babak
and the Arabs in the Fourth Century, 349-66; EP-, s.v.
al-Kalbi (W. Ataullah).
13. Older forms Gochithr, Gochihr, rendered in Greek
sources as Gosithres "a
former king of the Persians." It means "whose
seed is cattle," i.e., parent of the
cattle, gaoiithra being used in the Avesta as an epithet
of the moon. See Noldeke,
trans. 4 n. 4; F. Justi, Iranisches Namenbuch, 1 10. No
coins from Gochihr (or from any other Bazranjls) are extant, but his historical
existence seems likely.
14. This name stems from such a compound name as Tir- dad
"given, created by
Tir or Mercury." In Greek sources a king of
Characene is named as Tiraios (from
whom coins are known), and it may have been this ruler
who gave his name to the
Nahr Tira or TIrin river or canal of early Islamic
al-Ahwaz (Yaqut, Mu'jam al-
buldan, V, 319? Le Strange, Lands, 241; Schwarz, Iran,
308, 313-15). See Noldeke, trans. 4 n. 5; Justi, Namenbuch, 325, 326-27; P.
Gignoux, Noms propres
sassanides en moyen-perse 6 pigraphique, no. 899.
15 . Noldeke, trans. 5 n. 1, took (h)argabadh to mean
"castellan," but the coexis-
tence of the specific Middle Persian term dizbed, meaning
"commander of a for-
tress," led some scholars subsequently to doubt this
interpretation and suggest a
meaning like "tax collector" for an MP
*hargbed. However, Christensen, L’lran
sous les Sassanides, 107, noted that, at the outset of
the Sasanid state, it was an
office held by the prince Ardashir (I) (see al-Tabari, I,
815, p. 7 below), and in Elr, s.v. Argbed, M.-L. Chaumont opts for the former
meaning, "commander of an arg, " to use the NP term corresponding to
MP * argbed. Both readings of the word are possible. It clearly became a very
prestigious office, and later, al-Tabari, I, 869, p. 104 below, states that it
was close in status to that of the commander-in-chief of the army.
1 6. A town and kurah of eastern Fars, in modem times
having the curtailed form
Darab, corresponding to what in Seljuq and Il-Khanid
times was known as the
lands of the Shabankara’I Kurds. See Yaqut, Buldan, ii,
446; Le Strange, Lands,
288-89; Schwarz, Iran, 92-97; El 2 , s.v. Darabdjird
(D.N. Wilber).
17. Literally, "the white [fortress, town, etc 7
|," a town of Fars lying to the north
of Shiraz and in the Kamflruz district. This region
flourished as far back as Elamite times as that of Anshan (see Elr, s.v. Anshan
[J. Hansmanj), but al-Bayda’ is today little more than a village. See Yaqut,
Buldan, I, 529; Le Strange, Lands, 280; Schwarz, Iran, 16-17, 54; Barthold,
Historical Geography, 153, i6i ; El 2 , s.v. al-Bay<Ja’ (O. Lofgren); Elr,
s.v. Bayza (C. E. Bosworth).
18. Derived from Latin sigillum "seal" and then
in Late Latin and Byzantine
Greek usage applied to the document or scroll to which a
seal had been affixed, this term came into Arabic certainly by Qur’anic times
(cf. Surah XXI, 104). It later acquired various technical legal and
administrative senses. See EP- s.v. Sidjill. 1. Kur’anic and early Arabic usage
(F. C. de Blois).
[The Kings of the Persians]
7
took him along to Tira, who received him handsomely and
adopted him as his own son. When Tira died, Ardashlr took over
his office, and performed the function admirably. A group of
astrologers and diviners informed him that he had been bom under
an auspicious star and that
he would rule the lands (sc., the
whole of Iran). It is related that, after this, Ardashlr behaved in
a
modest and unpretentious manner in pursuance of this forecast,
and continued each day to grow in good deeds and conduct, and
that he saw in a dream an angel sitting by his head who told him
that God was going to give him rulership over the lands, so he was
to prepare for this. When he awoke, he rejoiced at this and felt
within himself power and great strength such as he had never
before known.
The first thing he did was to proceed to a place in the Darabjird
district called Jubanan, 19 and killed a ruler there named Fasin.
20
Then he went along to a place called Kun.s (?) and killed a ruler
there called Manushihr, 21 and after that to a place called L.r.wlr
(?), 22 where he killed a mler there named Dara. 23 In all these
places he appointed persons [as governors] responsible to him. He
then wrote to his father (sc., to Babak) telling him what he had
accomplished, and called upon him to rise up against Juzhir, who
19. Literally, "cowherds," MP * gobdnan , in
this form or the singular Juban, is
the name of several villages in Persia, cf. Yiqut,
Buldan, n, 176 (Jubanan), IV, 487 (Kuban(an)); but most probably here is meant
what was in early Islamic times the town of Jubanan on the northern shore of
Lake Bakhtigan (now, it seems, vanished from the map) and on the
I$takhr-Slrajan-Kirman road. See Noldeke, trans. 6 n. 3, Le Strange, Lands,
278-79; Schwarz, Iran, 109.
20. Thus the reading of the ms. Sprenger 30, an anonymous
chronographical
work (see Introductio, p. LII), i.e., Pisin, Pasln, a
name familiar in the Iranian
national legend, see Justi, Namenbuch, 252-53; but other
mss. have readings that
could be Wds.f.i (see text, n. g), cf. Wasbuhr, etc.
21. This name of a hero in the Iranian national legend
(literally, "from the race
of Manu," in Indian legend, the first man; see Yarshater,
"Iranian National Histo-
ry/' 433-35, and Gignoux, Noms ptopies sassanides, no.
559) is attested on pre-
Sasinid coins, or on coins roughly contemporary with the
advent of Ardashlr to
power, issued by kings of Persis. See Noldeke, trans. p.
6 n. 6.
22. Both Kun.s and Lurwir are unidentified.
23. This ancient name of Achaemenid kings had survived
among local rulers
during the Arsacid period, and one of these may have been
the eponymous founder of Darabjird (according to the Middle Persian geography
used by J. Markwart, ed. G. Messina, in his A Catalogue of the Provincial
Capitals ofEranshahr, 19, by a Dara, son of Dara), since names of towns
composed of a personal name and the ending -gird do not occur before the time
of Alexander the Great. See Noldeke, trans. 6 n. 7.
8
[The Kings of the Persians]
was at al-Bayda’; this Babak did, killing him and seizing his
crown , 24 and then he wrote to Ardawan the Pahlawi, king of the
mountain regions (al-Jibal, i.e., Media) and the adjoining lands ,
25
humbly entreating and requesting from him permission to place
upon his son Sabur's head the crown of Juzhir. Ardawan, however,
wrote back to him in harsh terms informing him that he and his
son Ardashir were to be regarded as rebels, since the two of them
had killed people; but Babak took no notice of this.
Babak died around that time, and Sabur, son of Babak, was invested
with the crown and reigned in his father's place as king 26
He wrote to Ardashir instructing him to proceed to his court, but
Ardashir held back. Accordingly, Sabur grew angry at Ardashir's
recalcitrance; he gathered together troops and set off at the head
of
them to make war on Ardashir. He left Istakhr [and encamped in
the building {bind’) of Khumay 27 on the road to Darabjird, but
part
of the building fell on top of him and killed him. When news of
this reached Ardashir, he proceeded to Istakhr] 28 He found there a
number of his brothers, some of them older than himself. They
24. The account transmitted by al-Tabari seems to magnify
Ardashir's role in
the fighting against Artabanus; it may well have been
Babak and not his son who
took the initiative here. See Noldeke, trans. 7 n. 1.
25. That is, the last Arsacid king, Artabanus IV (in the
older reckoning, Ar-
tabanus V), r. ca. 213-ca. 224. The Greek form Artabanus,
Parthian and MP Ar-
dawan, represents OP *Arta-banu "the glory of
Arta" (i.e., the divine order of the
Avesta, cf. Eh s.v. ArdwahiSt [M. Boyce]). See Noldeke,
trans. 7 n. 2; A. D. H. Bivar, "The Political History of Iran under the
Arsacids," 94-96, 99; Eli, s.v. Artabanus (M.R. Dandamaev, K. Schippmann).
The form Ardawan was taken over by the Arab historians,- see the citations
detailed in al-Mas'udi, Muiuj al-dhahab, ed. Ch. Pellat, VI, Index gineiaux,
137.
26. The name Shabur, MP Shahpuhr, "son of the
king," ultimately going back to
OP * XSayathiya.puthia , was not apparently used before
the Sasanids (see Justi,
Namenbuch, 284-87; Gignoux, Les noms pwpies sassanides,
no. 858). Whether
Shabur was thus named by his father to buttress his right
to succeed to the throne
is uncertain. His reign was long enough for him to mint
coins. In any case, Ar-
dashir's theoretical role as a usurper was subsequently
validated by his succession
on Shabur's accidental death. See Noldeke, trans. 7 n. 3;
Eli, s.v. ArdaSIr I. i.
History (Wiesehofer).
27. Humay, Avestan Humaya, is in the Avesta the daughter
of WIshtaspa, play-
ing a role in later Persian epic tradition somewhat like
that of the Assyrian queen
Semiramis. Early Islamic authors such as al-DInawari,
al-Mas'udi, and Hamza al-
I?fahani attribute to Humay the building of palaces in
the vicinity of Istakhr, in
one of which Shabur now met his death, possibly in an
earthquake. See Noldeke,
trans. 8 n. i ; Justi, Namenbuch, 131-32; M. Mayrhofer,
Die altiianischen Namen,
no. 177.
28. These words are supplied from the ms. Sprenger 30.
[The Kings of the Persians]
9
nevertheless gathered together and brought in the crown and the
royal throne, and then offered them all to Ardashir. Hence he was
crowned and sat down on the throne.
He began his reign with vigorous and incisive measures. He
appointed various persons to diverse offices, and nominated a man
called Abarsam to the position of Chief Minister ( buzurg framadhai
),
lavishing largesse on him and giving him numerous
charges. 29 He appointed a man named Fah.r (?) as Chief Mobadh
[mubadhan mubadh ). 30 He got wind of a plot on the part of his
brothers and some other persons in his entourage to assassinate
him, hence he slew a great number of them. Then news came to
him that the people of Darabjird had risen against him, so he
returned thither and conquered the town after killing a number of
its citizens. He proceeded to Kirman, where there was a king
called Balash. 31 There was a fiercely fought battle, in which -
29. Abarsam is a fully historical figure, attested as a
high-r anking official of
Ardashlr's in Shabur I's Naqsh-i Rustam inscription, in
which the latter monarch
lists those court dignitaries in whose memory Shabur had
set up a pious foundation. He could not have been the chief minister, since
this official for both Ardashir and Shabur is named as a Babag, and his exact
rank and title are uncertain, but he was obviously exalted enough for the late
Sasanid tradition, as transmitted by al- Tabari, to consider him as chief
minister. See Eh, s.v. Abarsam (E. Yarshater). For Abarsam's supposed part in
the preservation and then production at an opportune moment of the prince
Shabur, see al-Tabari, I, 823-25, pp. 24-27 below.
It is, however, an anachronism of al-Tabari's source that
he introduces already
the office of buzurg framadhar, which is not attested
till the early fifth century (see on the office, n. 257 below). Court and
administration cannot have been so neatly organized at this early time; the
highest offices under the Sasanids in their first century of power were
actually those of the (h)argbed (see above, n. 15) and the bidakhsh, a kind of
viceroy, cf. Eh, s.v. BidaxS (W. Sundermann). See Ndldeke, trans. 9 n. 2, and
on the name Abarsam, Justi, Nameabuch, 1, and Gignoux, Noms propres sassanides,
no, 14.
30. This renders MP mowbed mowbedan "supreme
priest," in Syriac the reS
msghuSe; see Ndldeke, trans. 451, Excursus 3. ’Ifie title
comes into usage com-
paratively late in the Sasanid period and is not an early
one. As Ndldeke remarks,
trans. 9 n. 3, the new ruler, whether from personal
conviction or for reasons of
state, showed himself eager to establish the Zoroastrian
clergy in a leading role
under his dynasty.
3 1 . This, or Walash, is the NP form of MP Wardakhsh,
well known in the Greek
forms Vologesos, etc., and it was a frequent name for the
Arsacid kings, later
appearing also in the Sasanid royal line in the shape of
Balash, son of Yazdajird II
(484-88), see, p. 126 below. This Balash of Kirman must
have been a local ruler of the last Arsacids, and he may have been the founder
of the town of Walashgird, on the road connecting Jiruft with Hurmuz, mentioned
by the Islamic geographers
(Yaqut, Buldan, V, 383; Le Strange, Lands, 317-18;
Schwarz, Iran, 248). See
io [The Kings of the Persians]
Ardashlr took part personally, until he captured Balash and seized
control of the city. Ardashlr thereupon appointed as governor over
Kirman one of his sons, also called Ardashlr.
Ruling in the coastlands along the Persian Gulf was a king
called ’b.t.n.b.w.d (Haftanbukht ?), 32 who was accorded divine attributes
and worship. Ardashlr marched against him, killed him
by cutting him in half with his sword, put to death the members of
his entourage, and brought forth from their subterranean store
rooms {matamlr ) 33 extensive treasures that had been piled up
there. He wrote to Mihrak, the king of Abarsas (?) 34 in the
district
of Ardashlr Khurrah, 35 and to a group of his fellow rulers, summoning
them to his obedience. When they refused to submit, he
Noldeke, trans. io n. 2; Eh, s.v. Bala§ (M. L. Chaumont).
In Sasanid times and in early Islamic times up to the
fourth/tenth century, the
shahi-i Kirman, the provincial capital, was what became
the early Islamic city of
SIrajan, in the western part of the province and near the
modem Sa'Idabad. It may
have been this first Sasanid governor, Ardashlr, son of
Ardashlr I, who laid out
what was perhaps a military encampment, rather than a
city, at Weh Ardashlr in
the northeastern part of the province (Hamzah
al-l?fahanl, Ta’rikh, 43), the place
that became in later times Guwashlr or Bardasir,
provincial capital under the
Buyids and, afterward, became the modem city of Kirman.
See Noldeke, trans. 10
n. 3; Le Strange, Lands, 300-301; J. Marquart, EranSahr
nach dei Geogiaphie des
Ps. Moses Xoienac'i, 30; Markwart-Messina, Catalogue of
the Provincial Capitals,
90; Barthold, Historical Geography, 137-38; EP, s.v.
Kirman (A. K. S. Lambton).
32. Thus according to text, n. b. Noldeke, trans. 10 n. 1
renders the reading
’.s.w.w.d of the Sprenger ms. as Astawadh (?). The
spelling Haftanbukht (?) is
probably a misrendering of an Achaemenid term for an
administrative district,
denoting a component part of a province, a term that survived
through Islamic
times as the modem place-name Haftuwan, a village to the
southwest of Khunj, in
the western part of Laristan, in southern Fars.
33. Sing, matmurah, meaning a subterranean chamber,
either natural or man-
made, used essentially for the storage of foodstuffs like
grain (i.e., as a silo) or, as
here, for treasure. The plural form is not infrequently a
toponym in early Islamic
times, as in Byzantine Asia Minor, see al-Tabari, ID,
1104, year 216/831-32, and in general, EP, s.v. Matmura (Ch. Pellat).
34. Thus in Ibn al-Athir, Kamil, I, 382, but regarded by
Noldeke as dubious; the
mss. have various incomprehensible readings, see text, n.
d. For Mihrag, older form Mithrak, see Justi, Namenbuch, 207-208; Gignoux, Noms
propres sassanides, no. 629.
35 . One of the five kurahs or administrative districts
making up the province of
Fars, in which was later situated the Islamic provincial
capital Shiraz. The kurah' s
MP name, "Ardashir's glory," commemorated the
founder of the Sasanid dynasty,
while the original town there of Gur, the Islamic fur and
then FIruzabad, was said
to have been built on the site of Ardashir's decisive
victory over the last Arsacid
Ardawan or Ardabanus IV in ca. a.d. 224. See Noldeke,
trans. 1 1 n. 2 , 446 Excursus 3; Yaqut, Buldan, IV, 283; Le Strange, Lands,
248-49; Schwarz, Iran, 43ff. ; Barthold, Historical Geography, 152—53, 158-59;
EP, s.v. FIruzabad (L. Lockhart).
[The Kings of the Persians]
ii
proceeded against them and killed Mihrak. He then went to Jur; he
founded the city [there] and began the construction of the palace
called al-Tirbal 36 and also of a fire temple.
While he was engaged in these activities, an envoy from Ardawan
[Azdawan, Lazdawan ?) 37
arrived bearing a letter from the
latter. Hence Ardashir assembled the leading men in the state {al-
nas ) 38 for this purpose and read out the document in their presence.
The contents were as follows: "You have presumed beyond
your rank in society, and have brought down on yourself destruction,
O Kurd brought up amongst the tents of the Kurds! 39 Who
gave you leave to assume the crown on your head, and permission
to seize all the territories you have assembled together and whose
rulers and peoples you have subdued? Who ordered you to build
the city which you have founded in the desert of . . . ?" — he
meant fur 40 — "When we allow you to go ahead and construct
it, then build a city in the desert which is ten farsakhs across
and
call it Ram Ardashir!" 41 He went on to inform Ardashir that
he had dispatched the king of al-Ahwaz against him, with orders
to bring back Ardashir to him in bonds. Ardashir replied, "It
is God who has bestowed on me the crown which I have assumed,
who has given me authority over the lands which I have conquered,
and who has aided me against
the mighty potentates
[jababiiab] and kings whom I have slain. As for the city which I
am to build and which I am to name Ram Ardashir, I very much
hope to get my hands on you and then send your head and your
3 6. This appears in the Arabic dictionaries, defined as
"high building, tower"
(see E. W. Lane, Lexicon, 1836c), but must in reality be
a loanword from MP talwar "audience hall, " a synonym of i wan. There
are impressive remains above ground of Ardashir's palace at Gur/Jur, see Eli,
s.v. Architecture, iii. Sasanian (D. Huff), at n, 331 (Plate V), 332.
Concerning the fire temple at Jur, see al-Tabari, 1 , 1067, p. 410 below.
37. Noldeke, text, n. e, preferred the reading of the
Sprenger ms. Lazdawan.
38. Here, as often in premodem Islamic history in all
times and places, al-nas
does not mean "people in general" but "the
people who matter, the people", cf. the
Mamlilk awldd al-nas, sons of amirs and mamluks within
the kalqah unit of the
Mamluk army, i.e., sons of the ruling military caste.
39. A looking-forward to later Islamic times when,
certainly from the ‘Abbasid
period onward, kurd, "shepherd, nomad," is
virtually a synonym for "robber, ban-
dit, brigand."
40. See for Jur, n. 35 above.
41. Literally, "joy of Ardashir." Ardashir's
words here are of course ironic: you
may plan a city, but you won't be able to carry out the
plan! See Noldeke, trans. 12 n. 3.
12 [The Kings of the Persians]
treasuries to the fire temple which I have founded at Ardashlr
Khurrah ." 42
Then Ardashlr headed toward Istakhr, and left Abarsam [as governor]
in Ardashlr Khurrah. Not much time had elapsed before a
letter reached him from Abarsam with the news that the king of
al-Ahwaz had appeared but that he had retreated after being defeated
in battle . 43 Whereupon Ardashlr proceeded to Isbahan, took
its king Shadh Sabur prisoner and then killed him , 44 after which
he returned to Pars, and went forth to give battle to NIrufarr (?),
ruler of al-Ahwaz, marching to Arrajan , 45 Sanbil (?), 46 and Tashan
, 47 dependencies of [the district of] Ram Hurmuz, and then to
Surraq . 48 When he reached these places, he rode on with a group
of
his retainers until he stood on the banks of the Dujayl (here, the
Karun river ), 49 took control of the city [already existing
there], and
founded the [new] city of Suq al-Ahwaz ; 50 then he returned to
Fars
42. Again ironically, Ardashlr asserts that he has no
need of a new city, but will
adorn his existing one with his enemy's head. See
Noldeke, tr. 11 n. 5.
43. This ruler would be the ruler of Elymais, a vassal of
the last Arsacids, the
region of southeastern Khuzistan, with its center at the
modem Tang-i Sarvak;
coins are extant from these petty mlers.
44. Ardashlr is now for the first time moving out of Fars
against neighboring
potentates. Nothing is known of the mlers in Isfahan at
this time; Noldeke, trans.
1 3 n. 1, surmised that Shadh Sabur, literally "joy
of Shabur," should perhaps be read as Shah Sabur, since the name in the
text would be more fittingly that of a town.
45. The name of a city and of the westernmost kmah of
Fars, adjacent to the
border with the province of Ahwaz. Al-Tabari's mention of
it here would be anachronistic in the light of the information in many Arabic
authors that it was founded by the emperor Qubadh (I) (i.e., some
two-and-a-half centuries after Ardashlr's time), but clearly an older town
existed on the site, which Qubadh may have rebuilt. See Yaqut, Buldan, I,
142-44; Ndldeke, trans. 13 n. 2; Le Strange, Lands, 248, 268-69; Schwarz, Iran,
niff.; Barthold, Historical Geography, 164-65; H. Gaube, Die siidpersische
Provinz Arragan/Kuh-GIluyeh, 28-31, 74-76; El 2 , s.v. Arradjan (M. Streck-D.
N. Wilber); Eh, s.v. Arrajan (H. Gaube).
46. Noldeke's preferred reading, n.c, for the text's
s.sar.
47. Tshan or Tasan probably survives today as the ruined
site of Tashun. See
Schwarz, Iran, 344; Gaube, Die siidpersische Provinz
Arragdn/Kiih-Giluyeh, 112,
48. The region of which Dawraq [al-Furs] was the chief
town. See Le Strange,
Lands, 242; Schwarz, Iran, 370-71; Sir Arnold T. Wilson,
The Persian Gulf. An
Historical Sketch from the Earliest Times to the
Beginning of the Twentieth
Century, 186-87; Gaube, Die siidpersische Provinz
Arragan/Kuh-GUuyeh, 22H,
El 2 , s.v. Dawrak |L. Lockhart); Elr, s.v. Dawraq |C. E.
Bosworth).
49. Dujayl, "Little Tigris." See Noldeke,
trans. 13 n. 3; Le Strange, Lands, 232-
34, 245-46; Schwarz, Iran, 296-99, Barthold, Historical
Geography, 189-92; El 2 ,
s.v. Karun (M. Streck-J. Lassner).
50. A city of lower Khuzistan or Ahwaz (the latter an
Arabic broken plural of
Huzi, Khuzi, the name of the Iranian tribe originally
occupying the region), the
[The Kings of the Persians!
13
laden with plunder. He set off from Fars once again, and went back
to al-Ahwaz by the road through Jirih and Kazarun, 51 and then
from al-Ahwaz to Maysan, where he killed a ruler there called
B.n.du (?) and built there Karkh Maysan. 52
Yet again, he set off back to Fars, and dispatched a message to
Ardawan demanding [that he name] a place where the two of them
could fight together. Ardawan replied that he would meet Ardashlr
on a plain called Hurmuzjan
53 at the end of the month of
Mihr. Ardashlr, however, reached the place before the appointed
time in order to take up a [favorable] position on the plain. He
dug
out a ditch to protect himself and his army, and took possession of
a spring there. 54 Ardawan came up against him, and the troops
deployed themselves in battle order. Sabur, Ardashir's son, had
name Ahwaz also being applied to the province's capital,
further defined as the
province's "market" [suq), given the
agricultural and commercial prosperity of the
province. There was probably an Achaemenid settlement on
the site of Suq Ahwaz, which Ardashlr rebuilt and refounded as his own city,
Hurmuz Ardashlr (see al- Tabari, I, 820, p. 16 below), and in Sasanid times it
prospered greatly as the capital of the province of Susiana after the decay of
Susa. See Yaqut, Buldan, 1 , 284-86; Le Strange, Lands, 232-34; Schwarz, Iran,
315-24; EP, s.v. al-Ahwaz (L. Lockhart); Elr, s.v. Ahvaz. x. History (C. E.
Bosworth).
51. These two places, often mentioned together by the
geographers, lay to the
southwest and west, respectively, of Shiraz. See Yaqut,
Buldan, n, 1 3 1, IV, 429-30; Le Strange, Lands, 266-68; Schwarz, Iran, 33, 35;
Barthold, Historical Geography, 162-63; EP, s.v. Kazarun (J. Calmard).
52. The Greek Mesene, MP Meshan, Arabic Maysan, was the
region along the
lowest reaches of the Tigris in Mesopotamia to the east
of the Batiha, or Great
Swamp. Its center was die Seleucid foundation of Charax
Spasinou, with the
province in Arsacid times being known as Characene, with
the subsequent Syriac
name Karkha dha Meshan ( karkha , "fortified
town"), eventually yielding the
Arabic form given by al-Tabari. Ardashlr conquered Characene
in ca. 224, but there seems to be no confirmatory evidence that the rebuilt and
refounded town
of Charax acquired the name Ast(ar)abadh Ardashlr. See
Noldeke, trans. 13 n. 5;
PW, m/2, s.v. Charax, Mesene (Weissbach); Le Strange,
Lands, 43, 8o> Marquart, EranSahr, 40-42; M. J. Morony, Iraq after the
Muslim Conquest, 155-61; W. Eilers, "Iran and Mesopotamia," 487;
Bosworth, "Iran and the Arabs before Islam," 594; EP, s.v. Maysan (M.
Streck-M. Morony); Elr, s.v. Characene and Charax (f. Hansman).
53. Unattested in the Islamic geographers.. SeeN6ldeke,
trans. 14m i ; the name
appears in al-Dinawari's al-Akhbar al-tiwal with an
intrusive d, i.e., Hurmuzdijan
54. The exact location of the battlefield is unknown. It
has been fixed as proba-
bly somewhere near the later Islamic town of Gulpayagan
to the northwest of
Isfahan; the date of the battle was 30 Mihr of Seleucid
era 535/28 April 224. See Elr, s.v. Artabanus (K. Schippmann), at n, 650a.
There remains, nevertheless, the possibility that the encounter took place in
eastern Khuzistan if the name Hurmuzdijan should have some connection with the
town of Ram-Huimuz; the terrain there would certainly be suitable for extensive
cavalry maneuvering.
14
[The Kings of the Persians]
already gone forward in order to shield his father. Fierce fighting
got under way, in the course of which Sabur killed Dadhbundadh , 55
Ardawan's secretary (sc., the writer of the letter) with his
own hand. Ardashlr rushed forward from his battle position to-
ward Ardawan and killed him. There was great slaughter among
Ardawan's troops, and the survivors fled the field. It is said that
Ardashlr dismounted and trampled Ardawan's head with his feet.
On that day of battle, Ardashlr received the title of "Supreme
King" [Shahanshah, literally "King of Kings "). 56
Then he went from there to Hamadhan and conquered it by
force of arms, as also the mountain region (al-fabal), Azerbaijan,
Armenia, and [the region of] al-Mawsil. The he went from al-
Mawsil to Suristan, that is, the Sawad , 57 and took possession of
it
for himself. On the banks of the Tigris, opposite the city of
Ctesiphon (which is the city that forms the eastern part of al-
55. The rendering preferred by Noldeke, text n. a, for
the dar.n.b.dadh of the
text (Sprenger ms., dad.b.n.dar ).
56. Ardashlr commemorated his victory in a rock relief,
the largest surviving
Sasanid one, on a mountainside near his town of Ardashlr
Khurrah. See Eh, s.v.
ArdaSir I. ii. Rock reliefs (H. Luscheyj (with
illustrations).
Ardashir's symbolic investiture with the ancient title of
"King of Kings" is
depicted in a relief at Naqsh-i Rustam, in which the king
receives the diadem of
sovereignty from Ahura Mazda, and in other reliefs
depicting god and king at the
bridge near Ardashir-Khurrah and at Naqsh-i Rajab. See
Georgina Herrmann, The
Iranian Revival 82-88, 90 (illustration); Luschey, loc.
cit. (with illustrations). His
assumption of the title is also noted in the other Arabic
sources on the Sasanids: al- Ya'qubi, Ta’hkh, 1 , 179; al-Dinawari, al-Akhbar
al-tiwal, 43; al-Mas'udi, Muruj, U, 161 = §585. It was from the date of his
victory over Ardawan (see above, n. 54), i.e., the regnal year 223-24, or at
his formal accession to the throne shortly afterwards (probably therefore at
some point between 224 and 226, see Frye, "The Political History of
Iran," 118-19, and n. 68 below) that Ardashlr dated the beginning of his
reign, which extended till his death, most probably in 242 (the chronology of
the early Sasanids is in many places uncertain). See Noldeke, trans. is n. i;
the genealogical table of Sasanid rulers in Frye, The Heritage of Persia, 295
(in which several dates for the early Sasanids need correction), and his list
in "The Political History of Iran under the Sassanians," 178 (again
with some early dates to be corrected); Eh, s.v. ArdaSir I. i. History (J.
Wiesehofer).
57. Noldeke, trans. 15 n. 3, took Suristan to be a
Persian translation of Beth
Aramaye, "land of the Syrians." It could also
denote "the region of the Nahr Sura," this being the name the Arabs
gaye to what was then the eastern branch of the middle Euphrates (now the
river's main channel; see Yaqut, Buldan, HI, 279; Le Strange, Lands, 70;
Marquart, EranSahr, 21; Markwart-Messina, Catalogue of the Provincial Capitals,
103). It is equated with the Sawad, "the dark lands" (con-
trasted, in its vegetation and greenery, with the
dazzling whiteness of the sur-
rounding desert), the irrigated region of Mesopotamia.
See El 2 , s.v. Sawad (C. E. Bosworth).
[The Kings of the Persians]
15
Mada’in), he built a city on the western side, which he called Bih
Ardashlr. He formed this into a province \kmah), adding to it
Bihrasir, al-Rumaqan, Nahr Darqlf, Kutha and Nahr Jawbar, 58 and
appointed local governors ['ummal) over them. Then he went back
from the Sawad to I§takhr, and thence to Sijistan, thence to
Jurjan,
and thence to Abarshahr, 59 Marw, Balkh, and Khwarazm, as far as
the farthest frontiers of Khurasan, after which he returned to
Marw. He killed a large number of people, and despatched their
heads to the fire temple of Anahidh. Then he returned from Marw
to Fars and took up his quarters at Jur. Envoys from the kings of
the Kushan, of Turan, and of Makran, came to him offering their
submission. 60 From Jur, Ardashlr went to al-Bahrayn and laid
siege to its king Sanatruq. The latter was reduced to the extremity
of need, till finally he threw himself down from the walls of the
citadel and perished. Ardashlr returned to al-Mada’in and -
58. For these places, see Noldeke, trans. 16 nn. 3, 4, Le Strange,
Lands, 34, 68-
70; Marquart, EranSahr, 164-65; Morony, Iraq after the Muslim
Conquest, 143H.
As Noldeke observed, tr. 16 n. 4, these administrative arrangements
reflect late
Sasanid administrative geography, not that of Ardashlr's time,
shown by the inclu-
sion of Rumaqan, the settlement of Weh-Andiyog-Khusraw, founded by
Anushar-
wan for the people of Antioch carried off after the Persian
conquest of that city in
540, and called in Arabic al-Rumiyyah. See Fry, "The Political
History of Iran
under the Sasanians," 155; Eli, s.v. "Deportations, ii.
In the Parthian and Sasanian
Periods" (E. Kettenhofen), at Vn, 301a; pp. 157-58 below.
59. That is, the region around Nishapur, the central part
of Khurasan, the prov-
ince to which Ardashlr turned his attention once he had
secured western Persia.
The name Abarshahr probably reflected an old *Apam-xSathi
"country of the
Apamak," Greek Apamoi, the leading tribe of the
Dahae who founded the Parthian empire. For the city of Nishapur and its
foundation, see n. 163 below. See Yaqut, Buldan, I, 65-66; Noldeke, trans. 17
n. 2, 59 n. 3; Le Strange, Lands, 382-88; Marquart, EranSahr, 36, 74-7 5 (his
rendering of Abarshahr as "upper country" is to be rejected);
Markwart-Messina, Catalogue of the Provincial Capitals, 52-53; Barthold,
Historical Geography, 94ff. ; EP-, s.v. Nishapur (E. Honigmann-C. E. Bosworth).
60. These potentates were neighbors of the Sasanids in
what is now northern
Afghanistan and the Sijistan-Baluchistan region. The
demise of the Kushan em-
pire, which had in its heyday straddled the Hindu Kush
and extended over northern India, seems to have taken place ca. 225, and is
probably to be connected with Ardashlr's campaigns against the Kushan Shah,
laconically referred to here. See Noldeke, tr. 17 n. 5; Bivar, "The
History of Eastern Iran," 203. Turan was in early Islamic times a region
of east-central Baluchistan associated with Qu?dar or
Khuzdar, i.e., it lay to the north of the coastal region
of Makran and, as Noldeke
observed, trans. 18 n. r, is not to be confused with
Turan, the name the Iranians
gave to the peoples beyond the Oxus. The Paikuli inscriptions
of some two generations after Ardashlr's time mention the Makuran Shah as a
vassal of the Sasanids but not the Turin Shah. See El 1 - s.v. Turan (V.
Minorsky).
1 6 [The Kings of the Persians]
lished himself there, and he had his son Shabur crowned within
his own lifetime. 61
It is related that there was in a village called Alar, in the
district
of Kujaran, which is one of the rural districts of the coastland of
Ardashir Khurrah, a queen who was accorded the respect and worship
of a divinity and who possessed wealth, treasuries, and soldiers.
Ardashir made war on her priestly custodians ( sadanah ), killed
her, and seized as booty immense wealth and treasures belonging
to her. [It is further related] that he built eight cities: in
Fars, the
city of Ardashir Khurrah, that is, fur, the city of Ram Ardashir,
and
the city of RIw Ardashir; 62 in al-Ahwaz, Hurmuz Ardashir, that is,
Suq al-Ahwaz; in the Sawad, Bih Ardashir, that is, the western side
of al-Mada’in, 63 and Astabadh Ardashir, that is, Karkh Maysan ; in
al-Bahrayn, Fasa (?) Ardashir, i.e the city of al-Khatt; 64 and in
[the
region of] al-Mawsil, Budh Ardashir, that is, Hazzah. 65
61. These movements by Ardashir mark the beginning of
Sasanid attempts to
control the western shores of the Gulf, and we now have
the start of a Persian
political, cultural, and religious penetration into eastern
Arabia that was to continue until the advent there of Islam in the 630s. The
appearance of the Parthian name Sanatruq/Sinatrices, so common among the
Arsacids and their dependents in Adiabene and Commagene, may mean that this
local ruler in Bahrayn was an Arsacid vassal. See Noldeke, trans. 18 n. 3; A.
Siddiqi, Studien iiber die peisischen Fremdworter im klassischen Axabisch,
77-19-, Bosworth, "Iran and the Arabs before Islam," 603-604.
The coronation of Shapur with his father's crown and the
joint rule of father and
son is confirmed by Ardashlr's late coins, which, inter
alia, depict Ardashir and a
youthful king symbolizing the son, and also by rock
reliefs, including one at
Darabgird apparently depicting Shapur, victorious over
the Romans, and wearing
his father's crown. See Eli, s.v. Darab. iii. Rock
Reliefs (Georgina Herrmann).
62. This name later became Reshahr/Rlshahr. Its modem
ruins lie at the southern end of the Bushire peninsula; the name survived at
least until the sixteenth
century in that of the Portuguese fort of
"Reixer." See Noldeke, trans. 19 n. 4;
Schwarz, Iran, 120-21,- Wilson, The Persian Gulf, 73-74;
Barthold, Historical Geography, 164; El 2 , s.v. Bushahr (Bushlr) (L.
Lockhart).
63. That is, the newly refoundecTSeleucia. See J. M.
Fiey, "Topographie chr£tienne de Mahoze," 400, 409-10.
64. Al-Khatt was a term applied by early Islamic
historians and geographers to
the coastlands of eastern Arabia from the head of the
Persian Gulf down to Oman,
without any more precise definition. The particular
settlement of al-Khatt was
said to be held by the 'Abd al-Qays tribe and to be an
entrepot for a famous type of spear, the Khattl, imported from India and sold
to the Bedouins, but it is impossible to locate it firmly. The name would
appear to be old and to be connected with the Chatenia of the classical
geographers. See Noldeke, tr. 20 n. 3; PW, III/2, s.v. Chattenia (D. H.
Muller); Bosworth, "Iran and the Arabs before Islam," 593 - 4 ; El 2
, s.v. al-Khatt (A. Grohmann).
65 . Hazzah, marked today by an entirely Muslim village
Heza to the southwest
[The Kings of the Persians]
17
It is mentioned that, when Ardashlr first came to power, he
wrote to the Party Kings eloquently phrased letters setting forth
his rightful claim to authority over them and summoning them to
obedience. When he came to the end of his life, he set forth his
testament for his successor. 66 All through his career he was the
object of praise and was victorious in war. No military force of
his
was ever put to flight nor was any banner of his ever hurled down.
of Irbil, was the administrative center of a region of
the same name in Adiabene,
the region between the Greater and the Lesser Zab rivers
in northern Mesopotamia (see on it, Elr, s.v. Adiabene [D. Sellwoodj). The town
is frequently mentioned in Nestorian Christian literature as the seat of a
bishopric in the metropolitanate of Irbil (and ca. 1200 a Jacobite bishopric is
mentioned there). Ibn Hawqal in the fourth/tenth century still speaks of the
artl Hazzah and its component rustaqs. See Noldeke, tr. 20 n. 4; M. Canard,
Histoiie des H’amdaaides, 123? Fiey, Assyrie chr6tienne, 1 , 163-67,- Morony,
Iraq after the Muslim Conquest, 132-33. Hamzah al-I$fahani devotes much of his
section on Ardashir in Ta'rfkh, 42-44, to the many cities the emperor founded
and his many fire temples and other buildings. Al- though a zealous adherent of
Zoroastrianism, Ardashir seems to have been tolerant of the Christian
communities within his realm, although it was only toward 230 that what might
be called a catholic Christianity, with a defined dogma, evolved with a proper
ecclesiastical hierarchy, at least as far as the Tigris. See J. Labourt, Le
Christianisme dans l’empiie perse sous la dynastie sassanide, 224-632, 10-17;
M.-L. Chaumont, "Les Sassanides et la Christianisme de l'Empire iranien au
IQ e sifecle de notre fere," 167-68.
66. This is a reference to what was in Islamic times
known as the 'ahd Ardashir,
in fact a good example of the "Mirrors for
Princes" genre, listed by Ibn al-Nadim in his Fihrist, 377-78, trans.
Bayard Dodge, The Fihrist of al-Nadim. A Tenth-
Century Survey of Muslim Culture, n, 740, as the Kitab
'Ahd Ardashir Babakan
ila ibnihi Sabrir and described as a translation from
Pahlavi, Whether any material
from the time of Ardashir is actually contained in it is
unknown, but it is more
likely that material ostensibly from Ardashir was imputed
to him later. The text
and a translation of it, at that time still in
manuscript, were given by Mario
Grignaschi in his "Quelques specimens de la
littferature sassanide conservfee dans les bibliothfeques d'Istanbul,"
46-90, and the work has been subsequently edited aid published by Ihsan 'Abbas,
'Ahd Ardashir, Beirut 1967. A related text is the A'in-i Ardashir, a collection
of aphorisms and advice on statecraft, also edited and translated by Grignaschi
in op, cit., 91-133. Also relevant here is mention of the so-called Letter of
Tansar, known subsequently to the Islamic world through an Arabic translation,
probably by Ibn al-Muqaffa' from a lost Pahlavi original, but now known
substantially in a New Persian version. It purports to be the work of Ardashir's
Chief Priest, Tosar or Tansar; it adjures a local prince of Tabaristan to
submit to the Sasanid ruler and, in general, justifies Sasanid rule and
political
conduct. Although it is generally accepted that the
Letter in its existing form dates
substantially from the time of Khusraw AnQsharwan, i.e.,
the sixth century, it may well have a core going back to the third century. See
EP, s.v. Tansar, Kitab (F. C. de Blois). See also for a recent consideration of
all three of these texts as part of the movement for translating works from the
Pahlavi into Arabic, and their place in the subsequent development of Islamic
political and social thinking, Louise Marlow, Hierarchy and Egalitarianism in
Islamic Thought, 72-88.
1 8 (The Kings of the Persians]
He reduced to submission 67 and humiliated all the rulers of the
lands around his own kingdom, and conquered the lands totally.
He divided up the land into provinces, laid out cities, established
the various ranks and offices in the state, and exerted himself in
multiplying the fertility and flourishing of the land. His reign
lasted, from the time when he killed Ardawan till he himself
perished, fourteen years, but according to others, fourteen years
and ten months. 68
There was related to me a narrative going back to Hisham b.
Muhammad (i.e., Ibn al-Kalbi) that states: 69 Ardashir moved -
67. wa-athkana fi al-ard, echoing Qur’an, VEI, 68/67.
68. Ardashir I reigned from spring 224, the date his
victory over Ardawan took
place, or 226 (see n. 56 above) to 240 as sole ruler, and
then for two more years till his death as cornier with his son Shapur. There
has, in fact, been much discussion about the chronology of Ardashir's last
years and the exact date of his death; this latter event should probably be
placed, in Wiesehofer's estimation (see below), in early 242, most likely in
February of that year. Ardashir's name appears on his coins as ’ARTHSTR. See,
on his coins, Furdoonjee D. I. Paruck, Sasanian Coins, 51-52, 305-16] 413-16,
Plates I-ffl, Table I; R. Gobi, Sasanian Numismatics, 42, Tables I-Ia, Plates
1-2; D. Sellwood, P. Whitting, and R. Williams, An Introduction to Sasanian
Coins, 21, 73-78; Hodge Mehdi Malek, "A Survey of Research on Sasanian
Numismatics," 232-33.
The Arabic sources on the rise of the Sasanids and
Ardashir's reign include Ibn
Qutaybah, Ma'arif, 653-54; al-Ya’qubi, Ta’rikh, 1 , 179
(very brief); al-Dinawari, al- Akhbar al-pwdl, 42-45 (Ardashir's rise to power
and defeat of Ardawan's son
Farrukhan, the extension of his authority over outlying
provinces and the story of
the clandestine birth and upbringing of his son Sabur
(I), see below, al-Tabari, I,
823-25); Hamzah al-Isfahanl, Ta'rikh, 42-44 (Ardashir's
rise and consolidation of
power, his new cities and his building operations); al-Mas‘udi,
Mura], II, 148, 15 1- 63 - §§ 573, 576-88 (his defining of the various ranks in
the Persian social, military, and religious structures, his emphasis on court
ceremonial, his urban foundations and building works, and his aphorisms on statecraft
and monarchical power, as set forth in the Kar-namag {-f ArdaSir-i Pabagan ],
on which see n. 5 above); idem, Tanbih, 98-100, trans. B. Carra de Vaux, Le
livre de Tavertissement et de la revision, 141-44; and Ibn al-Athir, Kamil, I,
380-84. Among Persian sources, see al-Tabari, Persian abridged trans. Bal'ami,
trans. H. Zotenberg, Chronique de Abou-Diafar-Mo'hammed-ben-Djarir-ben-Yezid
Tabari, 1 , 527-28, H, 66-75.
For studies on the reign of Ardashir in general, see e.g.,
Christensen, Sassanides,
86-96; Frye, The Heritage of Persia, 207-21; idem,
"The Political History of Iran
under the Sasanians," 118-25, 178; Bit, s.v. ArdaSir
I. i. History (J. Wiesehofer).
Noldeke, trans. 21 n. 4, thought that the picture of the first
Sasanid emperor as an
exemplary ruler, while not without some basis, was
exaggerated. Ardashir can
nevertheless be accounted a firm and successful ruler who
brought unity to the
Persian lands after the chaotic conditions of the late
Arsacid period. It is probably
true that he extirpated the Arsacid royal family within
Persia (though not in
Armenia, see n. 84 below), but he conciliated and took
into his service many of the great Parthian military and administrative families,
thus providing some element of continuity within the state.
69. The change to Ibn al-Kalbi's narrative, with material
emanating from the
[The Kings of the Persians]
19
forward at the head of an army of the men of Fars seeking to gain
military and political ascendancy over Iraq. He encountered there
Baba, the king of the Aramaeans, and he also encountered Ardawan,
the king of the Ardawanls . 70 Hisham explains: The Aramaeans
are the Nabataeans (al-Anbdt) of the Sawad, and the Ardawanls
are the Nabataeans of Syria . 71 He goes on to relate: Each
one of these two groups used to fight with each other over the
possession of power, but then they came together and agreed to
fight Ardashlr. So the two of them fought against Ardashlr, each
assisting the other (or: going forth in separate groups,
alternately,
mutasdnidayn ) 72 one of them would fight one day, and the other
would fight on another day. When it was Baba's day for combat,
Ardashlr was unable to withstand him, but when it was A rdawan's
day for combat, the latter was unable to withstand Ardashir.
So when Ardashlr realized that, he made a peace agreement
with Baba, on the basis that Baba would let Ardashlr alone and
leave the latter to fight it out with Ardawan, while Ardashlr, for
his part, would leave Baba in control of his own territories and
all
Arab milieu of al-Hlrah, brings with it more poetic and
anecdotal elements into the story (seen here immediately in the story of the
warfare between Ardashlr and his two opponents Ardawan and Baba) as compared
with the more sober, straightforward material of the Persian national
historical tradition going back to the Xwaday-namag. See Ndldeke, trans. 22 n.
2.
70. The "Aramaeans" [al-Aramaniyyu n) can
hardly refer to the whole nation of
Aramaic-speaking peoples of the Syro-Mesopotamian region,
those in Islamic
times called al-Nabat/al-Anba$ (see n. 71 below).
Ndldeke, loc. cit., thought that in this context the term appears to refer to
the people of Beth Aramaye or Lower Iraq, with the king Mba being the
unidentified Baba, son of Bandina, described by al- Mas'udl, Muruj, n, 161 - §
585, as ruler of (the forerunner of) Qa$r Ibn Hubayrah (which in early Islamic
times lay between Baghdad and al-Kufah, see EP, s.v. Ka$r Ibn Hubayra (J.
Lassner)). As for the Ardawanls, these were not of course an ethnic or national
group at all, but the partisans and troops of king Ardawan.
71. The term Nabaf, pi. Anbaf, was especially applied in
early Islamic times,
often with a contemptuous tinge, to the indigenous,
Aramaic-speaking cultivators
of the Sawad of Iraq as compared with the Bedouin Arab
pastoralists. By then, little was remembered or known of the proto-Arab
Nabataeans of northwestern Arabia, modem Jordan, and southern Syria, the Naba$
al-Sham of the Muslims. There was much confusion in the Arab historians
concerning the ancient peoples who had inhabited Mesopotamia, with all of these
— Sumerians, Akkadians, Assyrians, etc. — tending to be lumped together as
Chaldaeans, al-Kaldaniyyun. See EP, s.v. Nabaf. 2. The Nabaf al-'Irak (T.
Fahd). The false distinction between the Ardawanls - the Nabataeans of Syria,
and die Aramaniyyun - the Nabataeans of Iraq, appears also in IJamzah
al-l$fahanl, Ta’rikh, 8$.
72. See for this term, Lane, Lexicon, 1443b, 1444b, and
Dozy, Supplement, I,
691-92.
20
[The Kings of the Persians]
within them. In this way, Ardashir was free to combat Ardawan
alone; he speedily killed him and conquered all his possessions
and dependencies. He also compelled Baba to give obedience [to
him]. Thus Ardashir took firm control of the realm of Iraq; its
rulers became subject to him; and he finally brought into submission
all the people there who had resisted him, thereby compelling
them to to do what he wished and what was in accordance with
his plans, however distasteful though it was to them.
[The History of al-Hirah]
[Hisham b. Muhammad continues:] When Ardashir conquered
Iraq and seized power there, a large part of the Tanukh (group of
tribes ) 73 disliked the prospect of remaining in his kingdom and
becoming his subjects. Hence those of them belonging to the tribes
of Quda'ah who had come with Malik and 'Amr, the two sons of
Fahm, together with Malik b. Zuhayr and others, went forth and
eventually joined with those of Quda'ah already in Syria . 74 Now
there was a group of the Arabs who were guilty of committing
73. This important tribal confederation, accounted as
South Arabian in genealogy when they were in Iraq, and said to have spread out
from the southern part of
the Arabian peninsula toward the fringes of Iraq and
Syria, was certainly an ancient one, apparently referred to by Ptolemy as the
Thanouitai. Their history in the peninsula is very shadowy, but they are
attested on the fringes of the Fertile
Crescent by the third century a.d. and, as al-Tabari
relates, they became a signifi-
cant population element in al-Hirah and Mesopotamia as
"Arabs of the Marches"
(i.e., of the Sasanid empire, 'Arab al-Dahiyah ), and
seem to have had some kinship connection with the ruling Lakhmids of al-Hirah.
It was in these places that some at least of the Tanukh acquired Christianity,
which they retained well into the Islamic period. See G. Rothstein, Die
Dynastie dei Lahmiden in al-Hira, 18-40, 134-38; I. Shahid, Byzantium and the
Arabs in the Fourth Century, 360-62,
366ff., 4 1 8ff .; El 1 - s.v. Tanukh (H. Kindermann);
EP, s.v. Tanukh (I. Shahid); and see the next note.
74. Quda'ah were an old group of tribes, whose components
included Bali,
Juhaynah, Kalb, Khawlan, Salih, Tanukh, 'Udhrah, etc. The
genealogists were
uncertain whether they belonged to the North or South
Arabs; there are indications that, in the Umayyad period, the Quda'ah of central
Syria may have changed their affiliation, for military and political reasons,
from Ma'add, the North Arabs, to Qahtan, the South Arabs (see W. Robertson
Smith, Kinship and Marriage in Early Arabia, 246-53; M. J. Kister and M.
Plessner, "Notes on Caskel's Gamharat annasab," 56-58; G. R. Hawting,
The First Dynasty of Islam, The Umayyad Caliphate AD 661-7 so, 36). The Tanukh
of Quda'ah were certainly installed in northern Syria and northern Jazirah
during the eighth and ninth centuries, still Christian in faith and considering
themselves Qahtanis. See Ibn al-Kalbl-Caskel-Strenziok, famharat al-nasab, I,
tables 274, 279, II, 73-76, 470; EP, s.v. Kuda'a (M. J. Kister).
[The Kings of the Persians]
21
various misdeeds among their own people , 75 or who were becoming
reduced by hardship in their daily life to extremities, so that
they were moving into the agricultural lands ( rif ) of Iraq and
settling
at al-HIrah . 76 [The population of al-HIrah] thus comprised
three elements. The first element was that of the Tanukh, who
dwelled in shelters and tents of hair and skins on the western
banks of the Euphrates, between al-HIrah and al-Anbar and beyond . 77
The second element were the
'Ibad ("devotees"), that is,
those who had [originally] settled in al-HIrah and built themselves
permanent houses there . 78 The third element were the A^laf
7 5 . That is, had brought down upon their heads blood
feuds. See Noldeke, trans.
24 n. r.
76. This was the great city, strategically situated on
the borderland between the
cultivated lands of the Sawad of Mesopotamia and the
northeastern fringes of the
Arabian Desert; its ruins (first noted by B. Meissner,
Von Babylon nacb den Ruinen von Hira und Huamaq, Deutsche Orientgesellschaft
Sendschriften 2, 1899, Leipzig 1901) can be seen today to the southeast of
al-Na)af. It owed its rise, as the most important city of the Arabs for three
centuries, to the Lakhmids and was always closely associated with that dynasty,
with a peak of splendor under al-Mundhir in b. al- Nu'man II (r. 504-54), the
appointee of Qubadh and Khusraw Anusharwan (see al- Tabari, I, 899-900, pp.
159, 161 below). The decline of the city came with the end of the Lakhmids,
when in 602 Khusraw Abarwez deposed and killed al-Nu'man in b. al- Mundhir IV
(see text, 1 , 1026-28, below) and entrusted the city to Persian nominee
governors, and then with the city's surrender in 12/633 to the Muslim general Khalid
b. al- Walid (see al-Tabari, 1 , 2019). It continued to exist, however, for at
least four more
centimes, but was gradually eclipsed by the nearby, newly
founded mi$r or armed
camp of al-Kufah. See Yaqut, Bvdddn, H, 328-31; Noldeke,
trans. 25 n. i; Rothstein, Lahmiden, 12-40; Le Strange, Lands, 75-76; Siddiqi,
Studien iibei die persischen Fremdvmrtei, 76-77; Eilers, "Iran and
Mesopotamia," 487-88; Bosworth, "Iran and the Arabs before
Islam," 597; EP, s.v. al-HIra (I. Shahid).
The etymology of the name al-HIrah has traditionaUy been
connected with Syr-
iac berta, "enclosure, " but Shahid has argued
that an etymology from the languages of the Arabian peninsula, with the sense
of "military encampment," is more likely, especially since we have in
Sabaic byrt, bit - "encampment," and a verb bn, "to encamp"
(see for these, A. F. L. Beeston et al., Sabaic Dictionary, 74; Joan C. Biella,
Dictionary of Old South Arabic, Sabaean Dialect, 175). Shahid propones that we
should accordingly consider Syriac berta as a loanword from the Arabian
peninsula, not vice versa. See his Byzantium and the Arabs in the Fourth
Century, 490-98.
77. These dwellers in shelters and (permanent?) tents
must have represented a
transitional way of life between those of the pure nomadic
Bedouins and the housedwelling 'Ibad. See Noldeke, trans. 24 n. 3.
Anbar (Persian, "storehouse,"
"granary") was an ancient town of central Iraq, at
a crossing-point of the Euphrates and further
strategically important as the ap-
proach from the west to Ctesiphon-al-Mada’in and, later,
to Baghdad. Its value had led Shabur I to rebuild it in early Sasanid times and
to rename it Firuz-Shapur. See Yaqut, Buldan, 1 , 257-58; PW, 1/2, s.v. Ambara
(F. C. Andreas); Le Strange, Lands, 65-66; A. Musil, The Middle Euphrates,
353-57; EP, s.v. al-Anbar (M. Streck and A. A. Duri); Elr, s.v. Anbar (M.
Morony).
22
[The Kings of the Persians]
("confederates"), who had joined with the people of
al-Hirah and
settled among them but who belonged neither to the tent-dwelling
Tanukh nor the 'Ibad, who had both submitted to Ardashlr. 79
Al-Hirah and al-Anbar were both built in the time of Bukht
Nassar (Nebuchadnezzar), but al-Hirah fell into ruins when its
population migrated to al-Anbar at the time of Bukht Nassar's
death. In this way, al-Anbar flourished for 550 years, until al-
Hirah revived in the time of 'Amr b. 'Adi, when the latter took up
his residence there. Al-Hirah accordingly flourished for 530-odd
years, until al-Kufah was founded and [the people of] Islam took
up residence there. The complete extent of 'Amr b. 'Adi's tenure of
power was 1 1 8 years, of which ninety -five fell within the time
of
Ardawan and the "Party Kings" and twenty-three years
within the
time of the Persian kings, comprising fourteen years and ten
months of Ardashir son of Babak's reign and eight years and two
months in his son Sabur's reign. 80
78. The Arab Christian 'Ibad, "devotees," of
al-Hirah represented the culturally
most advanced Arabs of their time, even though their
Lakhmid rulers remained
generally pagan, at times fiercely so. The last Lakhmid
king, al-Nu'man EH, may
have been the first Christian ruler since the time of
Imru’ al-Qays I al-Bad’ (see al- Tabari, I, 834, p. 44 below). Modem
archaeological investigations, from an Oxford expedition in 1931 to the work of
the Japanese Archaeological Expedition to Iraq in the 1970s and 1980s, have
uncovered the sites of many Christian churches both at the site of al-Hirah
itself and in the surrounding district; see the details given in Erica C. D.
Hunter, "Syriac Inscriptions from al Hira," 66-67, and nn. 2, 4-5; and
also J. S. Trimingham, Christianity among the Arabs in Pre-Islamic Times, 197
and n. 114.
Early Arab traditions state that the Arabic alphabet,
having evolved
among the literate scribes of al-Hirah, was carried
thence to the Arabian interior
and Mecca (but note the doubts of G. Endress, "Die
arabische Schrift," 169). Cer-
tainly, the Lakhmid kings were great patrons of the
Bedouin poets who flocked to
their court, but the city itself also produced several
noted poets, headed by the
celebrated 'Adi b. Zayd (see al-Tabari, I, 1016-24, pp.
339-51, below, and n. ri6,
below). See Rothstein, Lahmiden, 18-28; Bosworth, Iran
and the Arabs before
Islam, 597-99; and for al-Hirah as a literary center, R.
Blachfcre's section "La podsie k la cour des Lahmides de Hira," in
his Histoire dela literature arabe, n, 293-301.
79. These must have been Bedouins sedentarized within the
city; see Rothstein,
Lahmiden, i8ff., and Bosworth. "Iran and the Arabs
before Islam," 599. The
Lakhmid kings' policy of balancing rival tribal groups
within Arabia against each
other, one of divide and rule, is discussed in F. McG.
Donner, The Early Islamic
Conquests, 45-48.
80. 'Amr b. 'Adi, the father of the Imru’ al-Qays I
al-Bad’, "king of the Arabs, " of
the Namarah inscription ( as this has customarily been
read), lived toward the end of the third century and in the early part of the
fourth century; he was regarded as the father of the dynasty, but cannot have
ruled for such a span of years. See al-Tabari, I, 834-35/ P- 44 below; Noldeke,
trans. 25 n. i; Rothstein, Lahmiden, soff,
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