684 ANNUAL EEPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1913. 



Persia/ restored the power and the religion ^ of the people of the 

 Iranian race. From that time the Parthian nobility was humbled 

 in its turn, and that of ancient times again acquired all its preroga- 

 tives. The Arsacides and their congeners disappeared, some took 

 refuge in Armenia,^ in Georgia,* among the Aghuanks,^ and 

 in other countries where some princes of their famil3^*' still reigned. 

 As to the majority of the Parthian tribe, it became absorbed in the 

 Iranian mass and left no traces. 



The Persian seigniors were, one after another, called to the highest 

 duties of the State ; they reconstituted the council of nobles, who, in 

 many instances, attained the throne. All the satraps, all the high 

 officials, were Persians, and the principalities, reduced to obedience, 

 ceased to issue money. In this restoration of the Iranian power the 

 Sassanian sovereigns were encouraged by Archa?median traditions. 



The Arab invasion followed, which modified only the religion, 

 having no effect on other institutions of the country. The Persians 

 became Mussulmans without making any great resistance. The Ule- 

 mas were substituted for the Mazdean priests, and among the seig- 

 niors hereditary rights were transmitted as in the past, while some 

 of the important feudatories of old set up their principalities in the 

 realm. The Ispehbeds of Thaberistan (Mazanderan) coined money 

 of the type of Chrosoes II but with Mussulman legends.'' 



The only effect of the invasion of the Turks in the north of Persia 

 was to drive out the Iranians who dwelt there and to substitute the 

 regime of the Begs for that of the Khans and the Aghas; but it 

 affected only the open regions in the northern territories, the moun- 

 tain country remaining Iranian.^ The south and the center of Persia 



1 At the close of the reign of Mithrldates IV, numerous competitors for the throne arose 

 in all the Provinces of the Arsacid^, of which the power, greatly weakened by their wars 

 against the Romans and against the barbarian peoples of the east, became diminished 

 from day to day. 



2 The Mazdean religion was preserved pure throughout the principality of Perside 

 whence came the Sassanian dynasty. 



8 The Arsacid dynasty of Armenia, notwithstanding its numerous quarrels with Rome, 

 succeeded in maintaining itself for a long time after the fall of the Arsacidse in Persia. 

 Cf. Moise de Khordm, Patkanian (Hist, de I'ArmSnie), etc. 



* Transcaucasia was then divided into a great number of small States, which In turn 

 passed to the Romans and the Parthians ; an Arsacid branch had been established In 

 Georgia. 



* Cf. Patkanian, Hist, armen. 



"One Arsacid branch I'uled over the Kouchans and the Thetals (Bactria and Caboul), 

 another over the Massagetes and the Ephina (Leponos of Tacitus), to the north of 

 Caucasus ; the Kingdom of Sacast&ne and of the Indus appear also to have been founded 

 by a branch of the Arsacid family. 



'' These princes ruled at Thaberistan (country of hatchets, otherwise called wood- 

 choppers), forest region of Mazanderan situated between the plain of Ashraf and the 

 district of Tun^kaboun, comprising the cities of Barfrush, Sari, and Amol, and limited 

 to the south by the mountains of Elburz. This principality had completely disappeared in 

 the Middle Ages and to-day there remains scarcely the memory of it in the country that 

 included it. 



* All Mazanderan, Ghilan, and Talish remained in the possession of peoples speaking 

 Iranian dialects. Cf. J. de Morgan, Mission scientlf. en Perse, 1889-1891, V^ partle. 

 fitudes linguistiques. 



