Iran in World History

Parthians, Sasanians, and 
Sogdians (247 bce–651 ce)
O
n November 14, 55 bce, the Roman general Marcus Crassus 
set out for the East at the head of a large army. His objec-
tive was to crush the Parthian Empire in Iran and thus bring 
the lucrative Silk Road trade under Roman control. An ambitious man 
recently returned from Julius Caesar’s successful campaigns in Gaul, 
Crassus refused to listen to critics such as Cicero who pointed out that 
Parthia was ostensibly an ally bound to Rome by a treaty.
Crassus’s hubris would result in catastrophe for Rome: on May 6, 
53 bce, his army of 100,000 was utterly routed by the Parthians at 
Carrhae (modern Harran in southeastern Turkey), surrounded by a 
skilled cavalry who rained arrows on the enemy even as they feigned 
retreat—the so-called Parthian shot. As the first-century Greco-Roman 
historian Plutarch relates, “the Parthians shot as they fled, and next 
to the Scythians, they do this most effectively; and it is a very clever 
thing to seek safety while still fighting, and to take away the shame of 
flight.”
1
The Battle of Carrhae introduced the Romans to a new and 
alien form of warfare, that of the Central Asian steppes, for which 
they were most ill-prepared. The Parthians were master archers and 
horsemen, descended from the nomadic Parni tribe who had begun to 
establish independent control over the northeastern Seleucid satrapy 
of Parthava two centuries earlier. For them, hit-and-run tactics were 
a way of life.
Originating as a breakaway Seleucid state, the Parthians—or 
Arsacids, to use their dynastic name—had maintained many Hellenistic 
traditions. They continued to use Greek for their coinage, where 
they referred to themselves as “philhellenes” (lovers of Greek civili-
zation). At the same time, the Arsacid house claimed descent from 
the Achaemenids, adopting the royal Persian title “King of kings” 

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from them. The Parthian administration was highly decentralized, 
however, and their strength ultimately depended on the contin-
ued support of seven powerful families who controlled the various 
provinces.
In keeping with this light-handed approach, the Arsacids’ policy 
toward their subjects was largely one of non-interference (in religious 
and cultural matters, for example), as long as taxes were paid and re-
bellions avoided. Their own religious inclinations are not clear and may 
have been highly diverse. A number of important individual Parthians 
seem to have had an attachment to the cult of Mithra, which is not 
surprising given the ancient Indo-Iranian deity’s association with the 
warrior class. Mithraism spread westward to the Roman army through 
culturally mixed border regions such as Dura-Europos in eastern Syria 
and became hugely popular among Roman soldiers stationed as far 
away as northern England where the remains of a Mithra temple can 
still be seen today.
Remains of a Mithra temple (Mithraeum) rest in Carrawburgh, Northumberland, 
England near Hadrian’s Wall on the Scottish border. Roman soldiers built over 
five hundred temples to the Iranian god Mithra all across the Roman Empire 
from the first through the early fifth centuries. 
Photo by Camilla Brandt

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Mithra is also represented among a group of colossal statues at
Mt. Nemrud in southeastern Anatolia, built by an Armenian king of 
the Commagene dynasty during the first century bce. The Commagene 
kingdom vacillated between the Parthian and Roman empires, cast into 
the unfortunate position of buffer zone between the two. Sometimes 
nominally independent, sometimes under the sway of Rome, Armenia 
was often as not a Parthian province, ruled by Parthian governors; even 
ethnically Armenian officials often had Parthian names. Iranian civi-
lization heavily influenced Armenian culture, notably in religion and 
ritual. The chief Armenian god in pre-Christian times was Aramazd 
(the Zoroastrian Ahura Mazda), and the Armenians revered Anahita 
and Mithra as well.
Apart from Mithraism and Zoroastrianism, non-Iranian religions 
such as Buddhism, Judaism, and Christianity underwent much of their 
early development during Arsacid rule. Buddhism flourished in the 
lands of the Kushan Empire to the east (what is now Pakistan) and 
spread from there into Bactria and thence eastward along the Silk Road 
to China. Early Christians, persecuted as an illegal sect in the Roman 
Empire, found safe haven in the Parthian lands, where they established 
hundreds of churches and more than twenty bishoprics. Jews were fully 
integrated into Iranian society by that point, having been a part of it for 
several centuries; many were active in trade.
Mutual influences between all these traditions were a product of 
the Parthian Empire’s multiculturalism and tolerance. A good example 
of such influence is the idea of an impending apocalypse, which first 
appears in the form of a Judeo-Greek text claiming to be an ancient 
Persian prophecy. This work, the 
Oracles of Hystaspes
, was the basis 
of the Christian Book of Revelation.
The Parthians themselves left no texts to speak of, apart from 
their coinage. This lack makes it extremely difficult to piece together a 
meaningful picture of their society. Some later literary works appear to 
derive from Parthian-era stories, though it is hard to know how much 
has been added or changed. The epic romance 
Vis and Ramin
, versi-
fied into New Persian by Fakhr al-din Gorgani during the mid-eleventh 
century, was apparently a well-known tale in the former Parthian lands 
of northeastern Iran which had been Gorgani’s home.
The Parthian society evoked in Gorgani’s poem would have 
appeared strange and exotic even in his time, a thousand years later. 
The freedom and assertiveness of the female characters, particularly the 
heroine, Vis, are striking. She is not unique in this respect, as is clear 

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from the words and actions of other female characters—for example, 
her nurse who gives her the following advice:
The well-born women of the world delight
In marrying a courtier or a knight,
And some, who have a husband, also see
A special friend who’s sworn to secrecy;
She loves her husband, and embraces him,
And then her happy friend replaces him.
2
The Parthian oral tradition was presumably the basis of what 
Roman critics labeled the “Asiatic” style—characterized by hyperbole 
and jewel/flower metaphors—which became popular in the Greek 
and Latin literature of late antiquity. Gorgani’s version of the Vis and 
Ramin story, transmitted to the West by traders, provided the basis for 
the medieval French romance Tristan and Iseult.
The Romans’ humiliating setback at Carrhae put an end to their 
dreams of direct access to China. Parthia’s control over the Silk Road trade 
network enriched the empire and established its role as one of the major 
world powers of the early Common Era. By this time the Romans and the 
Chinese were well aware of each other’s civilizations and eager to engage 
in trade for commodities. The Parthians, firmly entrenched between the 
two, were ideally situated to reap the benefits of this commerce.