Sasanians and their Ancestors
by Touraj Daryaee
Abstract: Daryaee contends that Sasanian views of the past were not borne of historical ignorance of the Achaemenids and their achievements but rather the products of a conscious decision to turn away from this towards a constructed Iranian history dominated by the fictive Kayanid dynasty. He suggest that this was a means of avoiding touching on biblical or Graeco-Roman conceptions of the ‘ancient’ past. Instead, Daryaee argues, the Sasanian worldview was heavily influenced by the geopolitical vision contained in sacred Persian texts, in which the rulers of Rome, Persia and China descended from quarrelling brothers destined to be reunited under the Shahanshah.
Conference Paper in Proceedings of the 5th Conference of the Soceitas Iranologica Europæa, held in Ravenna, 6-11 October 2003: Vol. 1, Ancient & Middle Iranian Studies. Edited by Antonio Panaino & Andrea Piras. Mimesis, Milano 2006.
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