Cambridge Ancient Hi.. - Index of

CHAPTER 22a
THE SASANID MONARCHY
ze � ev rubin
i. romans and sasanids
A chapter dealing with Iranian feudalism in a distinguished series dedicated
to The Rise and Fall of the Roman World bears the title Iran, Rome’s Greatest
Enemy. This title is more than merely a justification for the inclusion of a
chapter on Iran in a series whose subject is Roman history. It also reflects
a host of fears and prejudices fostered for long centuries in the Roman
world, since the trauma of Crassus’ defeat by the Parthians at Carrhae. Not
even extended periods of decline and internal disarray within the Parthian
monarchy, in the course of which it was repeatedly invaded by the Roman
army, could dispel the myth of the uncompromising threat posed by Iran
to the Roman order. The replacement of the Parthian Arsacid dynasty by
a new vigorous one, based in Fars, namely the Sasanid dynasty, at a time
when the Roman empire itself was facing one of its severest crises, only
aggravated its inhabitants’ deeply rooted fear of Iran. Ancient writers in the
Roman oikoumene passed on this attitude to modern western scholars. 1
It is the Sasanid bogeyman which has left a deep imprint in modern
historiography. The Sasanid state is widely regarded as a much more centralized
and effective political entity than its Parthian counterpart, with a far
better army. The great pretensions and aspirations of its monarchs are
believed to have been fed by the fervour of religious fanaticism, inspired
by the Zoroastrian priesthood, which is commonly depicted as a well organized
state church. No wonder that such a state posed the gravest threat to
its greatest rival – the other great power of late antiquity. 2 Each of these
accepted beliefs raises a multitude of problems, and a fundamental revision
is called for. Only a few of the more salient points can be dealt with in the
present brief survey.
The Sasanid empire embraced two distinct geographical areas, the very
fertile lowlands of Mesopotamia and the Iranian uplands, which were separated
from each other by the mighty Zagros chain that stretched from the
1 Widengren (1976). In general, see the contributions in Yar-Shater (1983); also Schippmann (1990),
Herrmann (1977), Christensen (1944). There are detailed bibliographic essays in Wiesehöfer (1996)
282–300. 2 Howard-Johnston (1995); Lee (1993) 15–25.
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