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IRANIAN HISTORY: PARTHIAN EMPIRE
Arsacid Chronology in Traditional History
By: Prof. A. Shapur Shahbazi
The Parthian rule
lasted 474 years, longer than any dynastic period in Iranian history.
Throughout this period, the Arsacid era (q.v.) and the Seleucid era which
preceded it by 64 years, were both in use, and so it would have been easy
to recall that the Ctesiphon accession of Ardeshir I occurred in the 538th
year of the Seleucid era and in the 474th year of the Arsacid era. Yet
post-Sasanian sources give various figures for the duration of the Arsacid
rule, which may be divided into the following categories. l: 200 and (200
odd) years (Great Iranian Bundahisn, Codex DH, p. 109 lines, 1011 [Tehran,
1971], TD, p. 207, lines I-2 [Tehran, 1971], TD, p. 240, lines 4-5;
Ferdowsi: "sal-i dovist (some two hundred years)" (96h-nama VII,
p. 116); both may be for 203 years, see A. Sh. Shahabazi, "The
'Traditional Date of Zoroaster' Explained," BSOAS 40, 1977, p. 27 n.
19. 2: 266 years, with variants (Sdh-nama-ye Abu Mansuri apud Biruni, The
Chronology, p. 117; Tabari. I, pp. 706 and 813; Mas'udi, Tanbih, p.97;
Bal'ami, Tarik, p.874; Moqaddasi, III, p. 155); this frequently recorded
tradition was the official Sasanian reckoning, as Mas'udi says (see
below), and is found also in Agathias (270 years: History 4.24) who used
Sasanian royal chroniclers (ibid., 4.30.2-5). 3: 284 years, with slight
variants (Mas'udi, Tanbih, p. 96; Indian Bundahishn 34.9). 4: 400 years,
with variants (Bal'ami, Tdrik, p.874; Ndma-ye Tansar, ed. M. Minovi,
Tehran, 1311 g./ 1932, p. 43; Mojmal al-tawdrik, p. 59 [411 years];
Moqaddasi, loc. cit.). 5: 523 years, with variants (Tabari, 1, 813, hence
Bal'ami, Tdrik, p.874; Abul Faraj Zanjani and Biruni, The Chronology, p. I
19).
The last category is
of non-Iranian origin, as Tabari specifies, being clearly based on Syrian
sources using the Seleucid era: Alexander was usually claimed as the
initiator of the Seleucid era (hence the era of Alexander), and was
assigned a reign of 14 years (Shahbazi, op. cit., pp. 27ff.); since
Ardeshir’s Ctesiphon coronation occurred "538 years after
Alexander" (Agathias 4.24), one subtracted his reign from this number
and obtained (537-14 = ) 523 years for his successors, the Petty Kings (Pahl.
kadag-xwaddy, Ar.-NPers. moluk al-tawd'ef). The fourth category is a rough
estimate by historians unconvinced of the authenticity of the official
reckoning. The third group is a re-adjustment of the figure 266 in a
scholastic version (Shahbazi, op. cit., p. 30). The first two categories
are, however, based on sound historical-albeit unauthentic- traditions.
Mas'udi (Tanbih, pp. 97f.) and Biruni (cited by S. H. Taqizadeh, BSOS 9,
1937, p. 125) have noted the great difference of opinion between the
Iranians and other nations concerning the post-Alexander chronology, and
they have accused Ardeshir of having distorted the facts. "One of the
state and religious secrets of the Iranians” says Mas'udi, is that
Zoroaster foretold that his religion would be disturbed 300 years after
him but the religion and empire would be stricken by a calamity at the end
of his millennium. Now Ardeshir appeared when only two centuries of the
millennium were left, and fearing the approach of the calamity, he
"reduced almost by half the 500-year period separating him from
Alexander, counting from the petty kings only some rulers with a total
reign of 260 years and ignoring the rest... And so the chronology was thus
officially fixed, and published" (Tanbih, p.98). H. Lewy ("The
Genesis of the Faulty Persian Chronology," JAOS 64, 1944, pp.
1977ff.), S. H. Taqizadeh ("The Era of Zoroaster”,JRAS, 1947, pp.
33ff.) and W. B. Henning (Zoroaster: Politician or Witch-doctor?, Oxford,
1951, pp. 37ff.) have explained this "secret" more convincingly:
under the Sasanians the Seleucid era had come to be identified as the era
of Zoroaster, and Alexander had been placed 258 years after Zoroaster; the
appearance of Ardeshir in the 538th year of the Seleucid era was then
re-interpreted as his rise in the 538th year of the millennium of
Zoroaster; of these 538 years, 258 separated Zoroaster from Alexander and
14 belonged to the latter; so (538-258 + 14 = ) 266 years were left for
the Parthian period. The Sasanian measure was taken, then. not because the
Parthian period was to be reduced, but because the widely used Seleucid
era had to be Zoroastrianized.
The first category-the importance of which is evidenced by its attestation in two major Iranian sources-has so far remained unexplained. But it is clearly based on the re-interpretation of the Arsacid era (q.v.) as the epochal year of the millennium of Zoroaster: Ardeshir’s Ctesiphon coronation was in the (247 + 227 = ) 474th year of the Arsacid era; allowing 258 years for the interval between Zoroaster and Alexander, and assigning 14 years to the latter, one obtained (474258 + 14 = ) 202 years for the Parthian period. This Zoroastrianization of the Arsacid era must have been the work of the Parthian families who resented the Sasanian re-interpretation of the Seleucid era as the "era of Zoroaster," so they countered claiming that their era had been initiated by Zoroaster. In this way they sanctified their dynastic symbol at the expense of sharply reducing the period of their rulership.
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Source/Extracted From: Encyclopaedia Iranica
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Page Keywords: Parthians, Arsacids, Ashkanians, Ashakanids, Pahlavas
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"History is the Light on the Path to Future" |
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Encyclopaedia Iranica
The British Institute of Persian Studies "Persepolis Reconstructed"
The British Museum
The Royal Asiatic Society
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