Chosroid dynasty

The Chosroids were a branch of the Mihranid princely family, one of the Seven Great Houses of Iran, who were distantly related to the Sasanians, and whose two other branches were soon placed on the thrones of Gogarene and Gardman, the two Caucasian principalities where the three nations – Armenians, Albanians, and Georgians – commingled.[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8]

According to the Georgian Chronicles, the first Chosroid king Mirian III (Mihran) (ruled 284–361 AD) was installed, through his marriage to an Iberian princess Abeshura (daughter of the last Georgian Arsacid king Aspacures I), on the throne of Iberia by his father whom the Georgian chronicles refer to as "Chosroes", Great King of Iran.[9] Another medieval Georgian chronicle, Conversion of Kartli, is at odds with the tradition of Life of the Kings of the Georgian Chronicles and identifies Mirian as the son of King Lev, successor of King Aspacures I. Lev is unattested elsewhere.[10]

The ascendance of the Mihranid lines to the thrones of Caucasia was, in fact, a manifestation of the victory of the Sassanids over what remained in the region of the Arsacid dynasty of Parthia whose Armenian branch was now in decline and the Georgian one had already been extinct.[11]

As an Iranian vassal king, Mirian III (ruled 284–361), the founder of the Chosroid dynasty, participated in the Sassanid war against the Roman Empire. However, in the Peace of Nisibis of 298, Rome was acknowledged its suzerainty over eastern Georgia, but recognized Mirian as the king of Iberia. Mirian quickly adapted to the change in the political fabric of Caucasia, and established close ties with Rome.[12] This association was further enhanced after the female Christian missionary, Nino, converted Mirian, his wife Nana and household into Christianity in or around 337. However, the Sassanids continued to vie with Rome for influence over Iberia, and succeeded in temporarily deposing Mirian's Romanophile successor, Sauromaces II,[13] in favor of the pro-Iranian Aspacures II in 361. The Roman emperor Valens intervened and restored Sauromaces to the throne in 370, although Aspacures’ son and successor, Mihrdat III (r. 365–380), was permitted to retain control of the eastern part of the kingdom.[14] However, by 380, the Sassanids had successfully reasserted their claims by reuniting Iberia under the authority of Aspacures III of Iberia (r. 380–394) and began to extract tribute from the country. The Romans evidently admitted the loss of Iberia in the aftermath of the 387 Treaty of Acilisene with Iran. The growth of Iranian influence in eastern Georgia, including the promotion of Zoroastrianism, was resisted by the Christian church and a part of the nobility, the invention of the Georgian alphabet, a crucial instrument in the propagation of Christian learning, being the most important cultural legacy of this struggle.[15] The Chosroid kings of Iberia, albeit Christian, remained generally loyal to their Iranian suzerains until Vakhang I Gorgasali (r. 447–522), perhaps the most popular Chosroid king of Iberia traditionally credited also with the foundation of Georgia’s modern-day capital Tbilisi, reversed his political orientation in 482, bringing his state and church more into line with current Byzantine policy. He then led, in alliance with the Armenian prince Vardan Mamikonian, an open revolt against the Sassanids and continued a desperate, but eventually unsuccessful, struggle until the end of his life.[16]

After Vakhtang I's death in 522, the family went in decline and exercised only a limited authority over Iberia, the government being effectively run by the Tbilisi-based Iranian viceroy through the compromise with local princes. When Bacurius III of Iberia died in 580, the Sassanids seized opportunity to abolish the monarchy, without much resistance from the Iberian aristocracy. Dispossessed of the crown, heirs of Vakhtang I remained in their mountain fortresses – the senior Chosroid branch in the province of Kakheti, and the minor one, the Guaramids, in Klarjeti and Javakheti. A member of the latter branch, Guaram I (r. 588–590), revolted, in 588, from the Sassanid rule and pledged his loyalty the Byzantine emperor Maurice, being bestowed with the high Byzantine dignity of curopalates. He succeeded in restoring the autonomy of Iberia in the form of a presiding principate, a rearrangement that was accepted by Iran in the peace of 591, which divided Iberia between Byzantium and Iran at Tbilisi.[17] Guaram's son and successor, Stephanus I (r. 590–627), transferred his allegiance to the Sassanids and reunited Iberia, eventually drawing a vigorous response from the Byzantine emperor Heraclius (610–641), who, in alliance with the Khazars, campaigned in Iberia and captured Tbilisi after an uneasy siege in 627. Heraclius I had Stephanus flayed alive and gave his office to the pro-Byzantine Chosroid prince Adarnase I of Kakheti (r. 627–637/42).[18]

Reinstated by Heraclius, the Chosroid dynasty were persistent in their pro-Byzantine line, but Stephanus II (637/642–c. 650) was forced to recognize himself a tributary to the Arab Caliphate which would eventually become a dominant regional power. Following the death of Adarnase II (r. c. 650–684), the rival Guaramid branch, with Guaram II (684–c. 693), regained power, and the elder Chosroid branch again withdrew into their appanages in Kakheti, where it produced a notable member, Archil, a saint of the Georgian Orthodox Church, martyred at the hands of the Arabs in 786. Upon Archil’s death, his elder son Iovane (died c. 799) evacuated to the Byzantine-dominated region of Egrisi (Lazica) in western Georgia, while his younger son Juansher (r. 786–c. 807) remained in Kakheti and married Latavri, daughter of Prince Adarnase of Erusheti-Artani, the forefather of the Georgian Bagratid dynasty.[19]

The main Chosroid branch outlived its younger Guaramid line, extinct since 786, by two decades. With Juansher’s death in c. 807, it too died out. The Chosroid possessions in Kakheti were taken over by the local noble families who formed a succession of chorepiscopi down to the 11th century, while the Guaramid estates passed to their relatives from the Bagratid dynasty.[20]

• Guaramid dynasty
• Juansheriani

• Bardakjian, Kevork; La Porta, Sergio (2014). The Armenian Apocalyptic Tradition: A Comparative Perspective. BRILL. ISBN 978-9004270268.
• Yarshater, Ehsan, ed., The Cambridge History of Iran, Volume 3: The Seleucid, Parthian and Sasanid Periods (1983), Cambridge University Press, ISBN 978-0521200929.
• Charles Allen Burney, David Marshall Lang. (1971). The peoples of the hills: ancient Ararat and Caucasus. Weidenfeld and Nicolson (original from the University of Michigan).
• Hussey, Joan M., ed. (1966). "The Cambridge Medieval History. Vol. IV, The Byzantine Empire". Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
• Lenski, Noel (2003). Failure of Empire: Valens and the Roman State in the Fourth Century A.D. University of California Press. ISBN 978-0520928534.
• Pourshariati, Parvaneh (2008). Decline and fall of the Sasanian empire: the Sasanian-Parthian confederacy and the Arab conquest of Iran. I.B. Tauris. p. 44. ISBN 978-1845116453.
• Rapp, Stephen H. (2003). Studies in Medieval Georgian Historiography: Early Texts and Eurasian Contexts. Peeters Publishers. ISBN 978-9042913189.