Beate Dignas & Engelbert Winter - Kaveh Farrokh

234 8 Emperor and King of Kings
Artabanos, revealed a secret to Ardaˇsīr. According to her words, the wise
men and astrologers had warned Artabanos that a new king would rule
and that someone who would take flight within the next three days would
acquire greatness, power and victory over Artabanos. Upon hearing this
Ardaˇsīr took flight together with the girl. Immediately Artabanos and his
men pursued them. Travellers told Artabanos on his way that a ram would
follow Ardaˇsīr. When he asked his chief Magian how to interpret this, the
latter responded, ‘This is the majesty of rule; it has not reached him yet but
we have to rush. It is possible that we will be able to get hold of him before it
will have reached him.’ On the following day Artabanos and his horsemen
were informed by a caravan that they had seen someone on horseback
together with a ram. Now the chief Magian told Artabanos, ‘May you be
immortal. The majesty ...has reached Ardaˇsīr; there is no way to get hold
of him now.’ After that Artabanos turned back and sent out a large army to
march against Ardaˇsīr. After extensive fighting Ardaˇsīr, who possessed ‘the
radiance of the royal majesty’, was victorious and killed Artabanos.
The ‘radiance of the royal majesty’, the xvarna, 12 which in this case was
symbolised by the ram, is thus closely linked with the royal family. Apparently,
only the one who was able to get hold of the xvarna, who literally
possessed this ‘royal radiance’, was called to be king. It becomes clear that
the question of legitimacy was central to the confrontations with the last
Arsacid ruler, Artabanos IV. Possession of the ‘unreal’ xvarna gave entitlement
to kingship and also provided the factual power to aquire the throne.
Moreover, there were certain prerequisites for a legitimate rule, namely to
be a descendant of the Sasanian dynasty and to enjoy a special relationship
with the supreme god. Several rock-cut reliefs depict Ardaˇsīr’s investiture
as ‘King of kings’ by Ahura Mazda, the supreme Zoroastrian god. 13
On the rock-cut relief at Firuzabad Ardaˇsīr I is reaching for a diadem,
which Ahura Mazda is handing to him as a symbol of his power (fig. 17). The
gesture indicates that rule is transferred from the god to the king. Ardaˇsīr’s
inscriptions also reveal a desire to legitimise his rule by divine approval. In a
trilingual inscription from Naqˇs-i Rustam we read, ‘This is the image of his
Zoroastrian majesty, Ardaˇsīr, the King of kings of Eran, whose descent is
from the gods, the son of his majesty, the king Papak.’ 14 ‘Ardaˇsīr’s efforts to
present himself as a god-related and devout Mazda-worshipper, and as the
possessor of the divinely given xvarrah, his claim to legitimacy as a worthy
scion of the Iranian (mythical) kings, his successful propaganda against
the rightfulness of the Parthians and their proper place in the sequence of
12 On the motif of the xvarna (xvarrah) and its importance for the Sasanian monarchy see Wiesehöfer
2001: 176.
13 On the rock-reliefs of Ardaˇsīr see Girshman 1962: 122–34. 14 Translation Huyse.