END
OF ZOROASTRIAN RULE IN IRAN
End
of Zoroastrian Rule of Iran :
The rich trade routes the Aryans had created from the dawn of time
were unique and like no other on this earth. The main trunk routes
all ran through Iran Shahr, the traditional Iranian-Aryan lands,
and they provided handsome revenues for the rulers of the land.
The Arabs sought this prize and made all the lands of the ancient
Persian empire from the borders of China to North Africa their target.
First though they would need to take the heartland of Iran. They
would use their religion as a political doctrine to impose and maintain
control and loyalty to their central government, the caliphate.
The Sassanian dynasty was in disarray and wrought with internal
strife. The people of Iran were in turmoil and the Arabs took full
advantage.
In
636 CE, the Arab engaged and defeated the Persian army in the battle
of Qadisiyyah (now in South-Central Iraq). This event brought to
an end Zoroastrian rule west of the Zagros mountains in Iranian
Iraq. Next, in 642, the Arab armies crossed the Zagros mountains
and invaded the Iranian plateau, the heartland of Iran, and defeated
the Persian armies in the battle of Nahavand (near Hamadan). By
649 CE, Zoroastrian rule in Iran / Persia had effectively come to
an end.
The
last Zoroastrian dynasty to rule Iranian was the Sassanian dynasty
(c.224 - c.649 CE) and the last of that dynasty's king was Yezdegird
III (r. 633-649 CE).
Last Stands & Flight from Iran
Battles in the East :
In the face of the advancing Arab armies that sought their heads,
Persian royalty fled eastward and the royal queen and princess were
trapped and killed in Yazd. Yezdegird himself fled to Merv where
he was murdered in Merv 651 or 652 CE.
Kaikhusrou,
a younger member of the Sassanian royal family together with a number
of other family members and other followers, fled to Sistan, the
legendary home of Sam, Zal and Rustam.
In
an Arabic book Futuh-ul-Buldan by Ahmad Ibn Yahya Ibn Jabir Al Biladuri,
a ninth century CE writer who died c 892, the author tell us about
Zoroastrians who took a stand against the advancing Arabs at Hormuz
on the southern Iranian coast. The Zoroastrians were over-powered
and fled by sea to Makran, the coast of Baluchistan to the east
of Hormuz. The text reads :
"He
(Mujasa bin Masood) conquered Jeraft (Jiroft, Kerman) and having
proceeded to Kerman (city), subjugated the city and made for Kafs
(Hormozgan) where a number of Persians, who had emigrated, opposed
him by at Hormuz (the port of Kerman). So he fought with and gained
victory over them and many people of Kerman fled away by sea. Some
of them joined the Persians at Makran and some went to Sagistan
(Sistan)." (cf. Translation from the Arabic by Rustam Meheraban
Aga as quoted in an article The Kissah-e-Sanjan by Dr. Jivanji Modi
in the Journal of the Iranian Association Vol. VII, No. 3. June
1918.)
When
the Arabs under Al-Rabi bin Ziyad had crossed the desert between
Kerman and Sistan-Baluchistan, they attacked a district called Zalik,
overcame determined resistance and plundered it's city on the feast
of Mehergan.
Then
they advanced towards Zarang (called Zaranj by the Arabs, a city
that is now the capital of Afghanistan's south-eastern Nimruz province
that is turn was part of old Sistan).
Zaranj
/ zarang border area with Iran
On the way the set upon the village of Rught whose inhabitants came
out and fought a great battle inflicting heavy losses on the Arabs.
Rabi, however, regrouped his forces and eventually overpowered the
defenders. Then Rabi attacked Shirwad killing a large numbers of
people. Finally, Rabi turned his forces on Zarang whose inhabitants
led by Aparviz (Parviz?), the marzban of Zarang, resisted the Arab
armies fiercely until the eventually succumbed. The story goes
that when the Arab commander summoned the marzban to discuss the
terms of conquest, he sat on the corpse of a dead defender.
The terms included 1,000 slaves each with a golden goblet. Even
after their defeat, the inhabitant's of Zarang mounted an insurgency
and Rabi had to stay on in Zarang. Two years after their defeat,
the inhabitants of Zarang rose up in open revolt and drove out the
Muslim garrison. The Arab governor of Kerman, sent out yet another
Muslim force to regain Zarang for the second time. They succeeded
in 661 and also captured Zabol, a major city in the north of Sistan.
However, Arab control of Zarang would, as we shall see, be challenged
again.
There
is some further history of the Zoroastrian resistance to be gleamed
from two Chinese histories known as the Old and New Book of Tang,
as well as a purported diary written by Piruz's son Narseh / Narsieh
(reported at CIAS is an article Pirooz in China by Henry Wong. The
diary was written in formal and aristocratic old Chinese.
Persians in China?
The Old Book of Tang was compiled by Liu Xu between 941 and 945
during the reign of Emperor Chudi. Xu's edition was revised during
the Song Dynasty (960-1279) and the revision came to be known as
New Book of Tang. The Tang Dynasty (618-907) ruled China during
the time of the Arab invasion of Iran and the following critical
centuries. The two books do differ on some key aspects of how and
who in The Sassanian royal family the Chinese assisted in resisting
the advance of the Arab armies.
According
to The Old Book of the Tang, in around 661 CE, Yazdegird III's son
Piruz / Pirooz / Peroz / Firooz / Pinyin (Chinese) appealed to the
Chinese court for help resisting the Arabs.
According
to Wong citing Narsieh's diary, upon the death of his father Yezdegird
III, Piruz wrote a letter to his sister - who was the wife of the
Chinese emperor - requesting Chinese assistance which was slow in
coming. With the Arab armies in sight, Piruz could no longer wait.
Together with other Persian nobility, their families and accompanying
soldiers, they decided to cross the Pamirs and arrived in China
in the 660s CE. In the Chinese capital, he found long-established
Persian, Sogdian, and Bactrian merchant communities who had settled
in China. Escorted into the Chinese emperor's presence, Piruz prostrated
before the emperor who embraced him and kissed him on the cheeks.
The emperor reassured Piruz saying, "You've come a long way.
Have no more fears. For you are my brother and this is your new
home." With tears in his eyes, Piruz knelt and thanked the
emperor. The emperor permitted Piruz and the Persians to settle
in 38 villages and rebuild their communities. They were also allowed
to set up a royal court in exile.
China c 700 CE
Piruz learned Kung Fu (martial arts) and became a general in the
emperor's court. The Chinese had by this time established garrisons
(apparently financed by Piruz) in what is today Tajikistan, eastern
Afghanistan and parts of Uzbekistan and these eastern Iranian-Aryan
lands became part of China for a while and contained the Arab advance.
Returning
to The Old Book of the Tang, the Chinese made Piruz Commander of
the Western Flank and eventually assisted Piruz in resisting the
Arabs by giving him a battalion with which Piruz liberated Zarang
in Sistan from the Arabs. It is not without significance that the
present population of Zarang (Zaranj) consists of 44% Balochis,
34% Pashtuns and 22% Tajiks. From Zarang, Piruz governed what remained
of Iranian-Aryan lands thirty years till his death in 709.
Wong's
tells us in his translation of the Narsieh diary, that when Piruz
was ailing, with his entire exiled court and the Chinese emperor
in attendance, he requested a simple funeral. His request made the
ailing Piruz turned to the west and said, "I have done what
I could for my homeland (Persia) and I have no regrets." Turning
to the east he said, "I am grateful to China, my new homeland."
Then he turned towards the Persians and said, "Contribute your
talents and devote them to the emperor. We are now Chinese."
With those words said, he passed from this life. At his funeral,
a magnificent stallion was led to gallop around the regent's body
33 times - that being the number of his military victories over
the Arabs. For Prince Piruz had spent the last years of his life
fighting the Arab invaders of Aryan lands.
Piruz's
son Narsieh married a princess of the Tang Imperial Family and his
descendants adopted the Tang Imperial Family Name Li. Narsieh's
daughters and sons all married into Chinese royalty and aristocracy
as did all the Persian nobility exiled in China. And so ended the
Sassanian Dynasty.
The Last Sassanian Resistor :
In 728 CE, a descendant of Yezdegird III named Khosro was mentioned
fighting alongside Sogdians and Turks against the Islamic forces
besieging Bokhara. This is, possibly, the last reference
to any direct descendant of Yezdegird.
The
fleeing Zoroastrians made their last stands against the Arabs in
several places including Khorasan, Sistan and Hormuz. In these regions,
insurrections and revolts against the Arabs continued for about
a century. In these, their last stands, Persian patriots and Zoroastrians
either died, were taken prisoner, finally submitted or fled further
east into India and China.
While their names are lost to history and they remain unknown, their
spirit lives through these words. Aidun bad.
Source
:
http://www.heritageinstitute.com/
zoroastrianism/history/fightflight.htm