The Persian Empire

by Kia, Mehrdad;

  Further Reading

  Daryaee, Touraj. Sasanian Persia: The Rise and Fall of an Empire. London: I. B. Tauris, 2013.

  Frye, R. N. “The Political History of Iran under the Sasanians.” In The Cambridge History of Iran, Vol. 3(I), edited by Ehsan Yarshater, 116–180. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983.

  Frye, Richard Nelson. The History of Ancient Iran. München: C. H. Beck’sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1984.

  Tabari. Tarikh-e Tabari, Vol. 2. Translated from Arabic into Persian by Abol Qassem Payandeh. Tehran: Asatir Publications, 1984.

  Khosrow I Anushiravan

  A king of the Sasanian Empire who ruled from 531 to 579 CE. Khosrow I Anushiravan is recognized as a monarch who reformed the fiscal, administrative, and military institutions of his empire. He also suppressed the popular Mazdakite movement, which demanded radical social and economic reforms. Khosrow I has been praised for defeating the Roman Empire and reestablishing the Sasanian state as the dominant power in southwest Asia. His reign was characterized by major achievements in the fields of arts, architecture, sciences, and scholarship. In recognition of his accomplishments, Khosrow I was bestowed with the title Anōshiravan (New Persian: Anushiravan), meaning “the immortal soul,” and “Dadgar,” meaning “the just.”

  No reliable historical information exists regarding the early life of Khosrow before he ascended the Sasanian throne. His father was the Sasanian monarch Kavad I. The identity of his mother is unknown. One legendary account claims that his mother was a peasant girl whom Kavad married in Abarshahr (western Khorasan) in present-day northeastern Iran after he had been deposed from the throne and while he was fleeing his kingdom to seek refuge with the Hephthalites (Tabari: 6.641). This legend about the humble origins of the king may have been designed to generate popularity and foster an emotional bond between the king of kings and his subjects.

  Khosrow was not the oldest son of his father but was favored as the successor to the throne by the Persian nobility and the Zoroastrian religious hierarchy because of his ardent opposition to the Mazdakite movement. The religious leader Mazdak advocated fundamental social and economic reforms. Mazdak’s ideas were opposed by the Persian nobility, which viewed them as a direct threat to their long-established privileges. One source claims that Khosrow was designated by his father, Kavad I, as the heir to the Sasanian throne. Another historian maintains that after the death of Kavad, his oldest son, Kavus, attempted to succeed his father. Kavus was, however, opposed by the Persian nobility and the Zoroastrian high priest who identified him as a supporter of Mazdak. Khosrow, on the other hand, was viewed as a defender of status quo and an ardent opponent of the Mazdakite movement. Thus, with the support of the empire’s ruling elite, Khosrow defeated his brother and ascended the throne.

  The new king inherited an empire bruised and battered by a sharp decline in state revenue, court intrigues, nomadic invasions from the north and east, and Roman incursions from the west. The new king, who confronted numerous internal challenges, ended the war with the Romans and signed a peace treaty with Emperor Justinian. The Persians agreed to withdraw from Lazica (present-day Georgia) in return for the Romans evacuating those parts of Armenia that had been historically ruled by the Sasanians. The Romans also agreed to pay the Persian monarch 11,000 pounds of gold in return for his commitment to defend the mountain passes in the Caucasus region. Having secured a temporary truce with the Romans, Khosrow switched his focus to the internal challenges confronting his empire, particularly the Mazdakite movement, which had commenced during the reign of his father, Kavad I. Mazdak was a follower of a reform movement within Zoroastrianism that preached peace and justice and opposed violence and bloodshed. According to his interpretation of Zoroastrianism, the triumph of good over evil required the human soul to strive for compassion, brotherhood, and equality and to refrain from wickedness, malice, competition, and conflict, as represented by greed and the drive to accumulate property. According to Mazdak, the source of evil and suffering in the world was the human fixation with satisfying self-centered desires without any regard for the hardships and needs of fellow human beings. To liberate the human soul from the forces of evil and to create a just and peaceful society free of competition and violence, human beings had to abandon greed and selfishness and share the existing resources of their society.

  Mazdak and his ideas were initially welcomed by Khosrow’s father, Kavad I. The reform-minded monarch intended to use the popular movement to curtail the power and influence of the Persian nobility and the Zoroastrian priesthood. The Persian nobility, however, responded by deposing and imprisoning Kavad in 496 CE. Kavad escaped prison and found refuge with the Hephthalites, among whom he had lived as a hostage after his father’s defeat. In 499, Kavad raised an army with support from the Hephthalites and regained his throne. Kavad returned to power, but he realized that his authority would not be fully secure unless he appeased the Persian nobility and the Zoroastrian religious establishment, which supported Khosrow, the king’s younger son.

  Khosrow unleashed a campaign of terror against Mazdak and his supporters. The religious leader was denounced, detained, and executed. The murder of Mazdak, who had gained popularity among the masses, was followed by a campaign of repression. Thousands of Mazdakites were imprisoned, and many were executed. The movement was forced underground, but it did not die. Despite the harsh repression it suffered at the hands of the Sasanian state, the Mazdakite movement survived and enjoyed a revival after the fall of the Sasanian dynasty and the introduction of Islam in 651. Mazdakite movements resurfaced in northeastern Iran (i.e., Khorasan and Transoxiana) as well as in northwestern Iran (i.e., Azerbaijan), gaining popular support from the masses in the eighth century as well as the ninth century.

  Khosrow’s suppression of the Mazdakite movement made him popular among members of the Persian nobility and the Zoroastrian religious establishment. But Khosrow’s strategy was not limited to repression. Adopting a carrot-and-stick approach, Khosrow also adopted an ambitious reform program that aimed at curtailing the power of the Persian nobility and increasing the power of the central government. To accomplish this, Khosrow strengthened the Persian army and expanded the size of the Sasanian bureaucracy, thereby bolstering his position vis-à-vis the provincial power centers and the large landowning families. The first and perhaps the most important of these reforms was restructuring the archaic tax system of the empire. In the traditional system, taxes were levied on the yield of land. Therefore, from year to year the amount of the tax varied. Khosrow abolished the system based on yearly variation and replaced it with a fixed sum. The Sasanian king also reorganized the administrative structure of his empire. He established a governmental system based on a council of ministers, or divan, headed by a prime minister. For much of Khosrow’s reign, the wise and capable chief minister Bozorg Mihr played a central role in running a well-oiled and highly efficient bureaucracy for his royal master. Khosrow also empowered the lower gentry or the dihgans (dihqans) and reduced the power of the great feudal families who enjoyed enormous influence in the royal court. This did not mean, however, that he attacked the power and privileges of the dominant economic classes. In fact, both Sasanian and Islamic sources emphasize that Khosrow defended and protected the division of the Iranian society into four distinct social estates, namely priests, warriors, government officials, and the members of the fourth estate, which incorporated peasants, artisans, and merchants (Minovi: 57). He intended to reverse the process of internal decline and save the traditional power structure from further decay and disintegration by introducing badly needed reforms.

  An important institution reorganized by Khosrow was the Sasanian army. To centralize the decision-making process under the Sasanian monarch, the post of the supreme commander in chief (erān espahbad or arteshtārān sālār) was abolished and replaced by four commanders, or spahbads, responsible for the security of the eastern, western, northern, and southern regions of the empire (Tabari: 2.646). Each commander report
ed directly to the Sasanian king. In addition, he appointed commanders of the frontiers or margraves (marzbāns), who also received their orders directly from the Sasanian monarch. To boost the confidence of his forces, Khosrow improved the quality of their mounts and weapons. He also built defensive walls. One wall erected on the southeastern coast of the Caspian Sea was designed to defend his northeastern borders from incursions of nomadic tribes from the Central Asian steppes. Another wall at the town of Darband (Derbent) on the western shores of the Caspian in present-day Shirvan (Republic of Daghestan) was intended to block the attacks by the Khazars and Turkic as well as Hunic tribes using the Caucasus as a corridor to penetrate Sasanian-held territory.

  With his military reorganization completed, Khosrow embarked on a campaign to recover the territories lost by his grandfather, Peroz, and his father, Kavad. Under Justinian I (r. 527–565 CE), the Byzantine Empire adopted an aggressive policy vis-à-vis the Sasanian state, building fortifications in Mesopotamia and annexing Armenia. Justinian also tried to persuade the Arab Lakhmid king of Hira, a traditional ally of the Sasanians, to ally himself with the emperor and revolt against the authority of the Persian king. The historian Procopius also wrote that the Byzantine emperor established contacts with the “Huns” and encouraged them “to invade the land of the Persians and to do extensive damage to the country thereabout” (Procopius: II.i.14).

  PERSIAN AND BYZANTINE INTELLIGENCE GATHERING

  Both the Persian Sasanian and Byzantine Empires relied on a wide and highly developed network of spies and intelligence officers. Among the reforms he introduced, the Sasanian monarch Khosrow II Anushiravan (r. 531–579 CE) expanded his spy network and raised their salaries. In his The Secret History, Procopius focused on the critical issue of how the Byzantine and Persian Sasanian Empires each gathered information and organized their intelligence officers. Procopius criticized the Byzantine emperor Justinian for refusing to pay for intelligence. Without an effective intelligence apparatus, the Byzantines were at a severe disadvantage. The well-paid Sasanian intelligence officers provided their rulers with vital information, while Justinian’s “folly was the cause of many mistakes,” leaving the Byzantines “completely in the dark as to the whereabouts of the Persian Emperor and his army.”

  Source: Procopius, The Secret History, translated by G. A. Williamson and Peter Sarris (London: Penguin, 2007), 120–122.

  Khosrow responded by declaring war on Justinian and marching his army against Syria. In 540 CE, Khosrow crossed the Euphrates and attacked and captured Antioch in present-day southern Turkey. The city was plundered, and a large segment of its population was forced to resettle in the Sasanian capital of Ctesiphon. The Romans responded by attacking northern Mesopotamia and Armenia. The conflict between the two empires dragged on for several years before Khosrow and Justinian agreed to a truce. The emperor agreed to pay Khosrow 2,000 pounds of gold, and in return the Persian monarch released the Roman soldiers and officers who had been captured by Sasanian forces. Khosrow also managed to secure his rule over Lazica, a vassal kingdom on the eastern shores of the Black Sea, whose territory corresponded with the present-day Republic of Georgia and parts of northeastern Turkey. Their truce, however, proved to be short-lived. Khosrow accused Justinian of violating the agreement when he attacked Lazica. Once again, conflict erupted between the two empires. As in the past, Mesopotamia and Armenia were devastated as armies clashed. The wars between the two powers forced the Arab kingdoms of the region to take sides with the Lakhmids remaining loyal to the Sasanian king and the Ghassanids allying themselves with Justinian. When the war finally ended the Persian Sasanians had triumphed, forcing the Byzantine emperor to pay 400 pounds of gold annually. According to a new peace treaty, which was signed in 562, the Sasanians agreed to guard and protect the Caucasus region from the invading Huns, Alans, and other nomadic groups who posed a direct threat to the eastern frontiers of the Byzantine Empire. The emperor promised not to violate the peace agreement by sending his armies against Persian-held possessions in Mesopotamia and the Caucasus.

  Though he was preoccupied for much of his reign with his wars against the Byzantine state in the west, Khosrow also was actively involved in expanding Persian power and influence elsewhere. It was during Khosrow’s reign that Sasanian forces conquered Yemen in the southwestern corner of the Arabian Peninsula. The conquest of Yemen allowed the Sasanians to impose their supremacy over the sea routes linking the Red Sea to the Indian Ocean. In the northeast, the principal target of the Sasanian monarch was the Hephthalite Empire. The Hephthalites had defeated and humiliated Sasanian armies in the second half of the fifth century CE, killing Khosrow’s grandfather, Peroz, on the battlefield and holding his father, Kavad, as a hostage. Khosrow was well aware that the northern Hephthalites based in Sogdiana, or the territory lying between the Oxus River (Amu Darya) and Jaxartes (Syr Darya), were under pressure from the Turk state, which had created a vast empire extending from Mongolia to the Aral Sea. This provided an opportunity for Khosrow to enter into an alliance with the Turks. In a series of campaigns from 560 to 563, the rejuvenated Sasanian forces defeated the Hephthalites and put an end to their rule. The Persian monarch achieved this victory with significant support and assistance from the Turk Empire, which had imposed its political and military domination over much of Central Asia. The emperor of the Western Turk Empire, Ishtemi (553–?), attacked from the north, capturing Chach (present-day Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan), crossing the Syr Darya, and defeating the main Hephthalite army near Bokhara in present-day Uzbekistan, forcing it to retreat southward. The Sasanian army, however, had occupied the region south of the Oxus River (Amu Darya), and the Hephthalites did not have any other alternative but to accept Sasanian suzerainty. Squeezed between the Turk Empire to the north and the Sasanian state to the south, the Hephthalite Empire disintegrated after nearly 100 years of dominating the southern regions of Central Asia along with the territory corresponding with present-day Afghanistan, Pakistan, and northwestern India. According to Tabari, the defeat and collapse of the Hephthalite state allowed the Sasanians to recover Tokharestan (formerly Bactria) in northern Afghanistan, Kabulestan in central Afghanistan, Zabolestan in eastern Iran, and Gandhara in present-day northwestern Pakistan (Tabari: 2.646).

  Throughout his reign, Khosrow I acted as a great patron of arts and sciences. He exhibited a genuine interest in philosophical and religious issues. In 529 CE, the Academy of Athens, “which had been the world’s greatest center for philosophical inquiry for a thousand years,” was shut down by the Byzantine emperor Justinian as part of his “imperial ban against pagan education” (Rosen: 236). Khosrow seized on this opportunity and recruited seven members of the academy’s faculty “to re-create the academy at the Sassanid capital of Ctesiphon, there to translate the works of Plato and his successors into Persian” (Rosen: 236). Though Byzantine historians such as Agathias expressed hostility and disdain for the Sasanian monarch and his philosophical sophistication, other sources praised Khosrow I for his wisdom and prudence. John of Ephesus wrote that Khosrow “was a prudent and wise man, and all his lifetime took pains to collect the religious books of all creeds, and read and studied them, that he might learn which were true and wise and which were foolish” (Rosen: 251). He also wrote that Khosrow “esteemed the Christian Bible above other books calling it true and wise above any other religion” (Rosen: 251).

  Khosrow I also expanded and strengthened the prestigious medical school at Gondishapur, which emerged as one of the world’s most important centers of learning, training, and research in late antiquity. Located in Iran’s southwestern province of Khuzestan, the city of Gondishapur was founded by the Persian Sasanian monarch Shapur I. During the reign of Shapur II, the city emerged as one of the most prosperous urban centers of the Sasanian Empire. Shapur built a medical center in the city that included a major library. During the reign of Khosrow, a hospital was added to the medical complex. At this hospital, Greek, Indian, and Persian physicians atten
ded to the needs of the sick. Meanwhile, the medical school offered courses in medicine, anatomy, mathematics, geometry, astronomy, philosophy, and theology. Students and trainees were required to pass an examination before graduating from the school. It has been suggested that Khosrow sent the eminent physician Borzuye to India to study Indian sciences and healing techniques and recruit Indian physicians to teach at the medical school in Gondishapur. Borzuye returned from India with a large collection of scientific books, which were translated into Middle Persian. Borzuye also brought back the game of chess and numerous herbal plants from his trip to India.

  Historians of the Islamic era celebrated Khosrow as the greatest of all Persian kings, crediting him with building numerous bridges, roads, dams, etc. His most impressive accomplishment was the magnificent palace he built at the city of Ctesiphon near Baghdad in present-day southern Iraq. The palace and its gigantic arch, known as Taq-e Kasra or the Archway of Khosrow, is a monument to the brilliance of Sasanian architects and engineers who designed one of the most impressive structures of the world during late antiquity. Taq-e Kasra, built with baked bricks, stands 93 feet (28.4 meters) high and 84 feet (25.5 meters) wide. It was the largest single-span vault of unreinforced brick in the world. The city of Ctesiphon was sacked by Arab Muslims after they attacked the Persian Sasanian Empire in 636 CE. The palace of Khosrow was looted and destroyed by the invading Arabs. The grandeur of Khosrow’s court, the brilliance of his policies, and his commitment to fairness and justice, however, survived in numerous stories and fables, providing a model of benevolent and efficient administration for future dynasties, including the Abbasids, the Ottomans, and the Safavids.

  See also: K&Q, Sasanian: Hormozd IV; Kavad I; Peoples: Sasanian Empire; Prophets: Mazdak; Primary Documents: Document 34