Hormizd-Ardashir, better known by his dynastic name of Hormizd I, was the third Sasanian King of Kings (shahanshah) of Iran, who ruled from May 270 to June 271. He was the third-born son of Shapur I, under whom he was governor-king of Armenia, and also took part in his father's wars against the Roman Empire. Hormizd I's brief time as ruler of Iran was largely uneventful. He built the city of Hormizd-Ardashir, which remains a major city today in Iran. He promoted the Zoroastrian priest Kartir to the rank of chief priest (mowbed) and gave the Manichaean prophet Mani permission to continue his preaching.
Hormizd II was king (shah) of the Sasanian Empire. He ruled for six years and five months, from 303 to 309. He was a son and successor of Narseh.
Yazdegerd III was the last Sasanian King of Kings of Iran from 632 to 651. His father was Shahriyar and his grandfather was Khosrow II.
Bahram IV, was the Sasanian King of Kings of Iran from 388 to 399. He was likely the son and successor of Shapur III.
Bahram V, also known as Bahram Gur, was the Sasanian King of Kings (shahanshah) from 420 to 438.
The Lakhmid Kingdom, also referred to in Arabic as al-Manādhirah or Banu Lakhm was an Arab kingdom in Southern Iraq and Eastern Arabia, with al-Hirah as their capital, from the late 3rd century to 602 AD/CE. The state was ruled by the Lakhmid dynasty and were generally but intermittently the allies and clients of the Sasanian Empire, and participant in the Roman–Persian Wars. While the term "Lakhmids" has also been applied to the ruling dynasty, more recent scholarship prefers to refer to the latter as the Naṣrids.
Artabanus IV, also known as Ardavan IV (Parthian:𐭓𐭕𐭐𐭍), incorrectly known in older scholarship as Artabanus V, was the last ruler of the Parthian Empire from c. 213 to 224. He was the younger son of Vologases V, who died in 208.
Pabag was an Iranian prince who ruled Istakhr, the capital of Pars, from 205 or 206 until his death sometime between 207 and 210. He was the father, stepfather, grandfather, or father-in-law of Ardashir I, the founder of the Sasanian Empire. He was succeeded by his eldest son, Shapur.
Azarmidokht was Sasanian queen (banbishn) of Iran from 630 to 631. She was the daughter of king (shah) Khosrow II. She was the second Sasanian queen; her sister Boran ruled before and after her. Azarmidokht came to power in Iran after her cousin Shapur-i Shahrvaraz was deposed by the Parsig faction, led by Piruz Khosrow, who helped Azarmidokht ascend the throne. Her rule was marked by an attempt of a nobleman and commander Farrukh Hormizd to marry her and come to power. After the queen's refusal, he declared himself an anti-king. Azarmidokht had him killed as a result of a successful plot. She was, however, killed herself shortly afterwards by Rostam Farrokhzad in retaliation for his father's death. She was succeeded by Boran.
The House of Karen, also known as Karen-Pahlav, was one of the Seven Great Houses of Iran during the rule of Parthian and Sasanian Empires. The seat of the dynasty was at Nahavand, about 65 km south of Ecbatana. Members of the House of Karen were of notable rank in the administrative structure of the Sassanian empire in multiple periods of its four-century-long history.
Tabaristan or Tabarestan, was a mountainous region located on the Caspian coast of northern Iran. It corresponded to the present-day province of Mazandaran, which became the predominant name of the area from the 11th-century onwards.
The Pishdadian dynasty is a mythical line of primordial kings featured in Zoroastrian belief and Persian mythology. They are presented in legend as originally rulers of the world but whose realm was eventually limited to Ērānshahr or Greater Iran. Although there are scattered references to them in the Zoroastrian scriptures—the Avesta—and later Pahlavi literature, it is through the 11th-century Iranian national epic, the Shahnameh, that the canonical form of their legends is known. From the 9th century, Muslim writers, notably Tabari, re-told many of the Pishdadian legends in prose histories and other works. The Pishdadian kings and the stories relating to them have no basis in historical fact, however.
Khosrow III was a Sasanian rival claimant who briefly ruled a part of Khorasan for a few months in 630.
The Sasanian civil war of 589–591 was a conflict that broke out in 589, due to the great deal of dissatisfaction among the nobles towards the rule of Hormizd IV. The civil war lasted until 591, ending with the overthrow of the Mihranid usurper Bahram Chobin and the restoration of the Sasanian family as the rulers of Iran.
Farrukh Hormizd or Farrokh Hormizd, also known as Hormizd V, was an Iranian prince, who was one of the leading figures in Sasanian Iran in the early 7th-century. He served as the military commander (spahbed) of northern Iran. He later came in conflict with the Iranian nobility, "dividing the resources of the country". He was later killed by Siyavakhsh in a palace plot on the orders of Azarmidokht after he proposed to her in an attempt to usurp the Sasanian throne. He had two children, Rostam Farrokhzad and Farrukhzad.
Abarsas was an ancient district in present-day southern Iran. It is first mentioned in the early 3rd-century as part of the fief of the Parthian dynast Mihrak. In 222, his fief was conquered by the Sasanian king Ardashir I, who two years later had it incorporated into the administrative division of Ardashir-Khwarrah.
Mihrak was a Parthian dynast, who was the ruler of Abarsas and Jahrom in the early 3rd-century. He was the son of Anoshagzatan, and belonged to a family which traced their descent back to the Kayanids. He was defeated and killed in ca. 222 during a clash with the first Sasanian king Ardashir I. Mihrak had a daughter named Gurdzad, who later married Ardashir's son Shapur and bore him Hormizd.
Manucihr was an Iranian dynast of an unknown place called Konus in the Pars Province. He was killed in the 200s by the Persian prince Ardashir I, who would later establish the Sasanian Empire.
Pars was a Sasanian province in Late Antiquity, which almost corresponded to the present-day province of Fars. The province bordered Khuzestan in the west, Kirman in the east, Spahan in the north, and Mazun in the south.
Gordiya was an influential Iranian noblewoman from the House of Mihran, who was first the sister-wife of the distinguished military leader Bahram Chobin, then the wife of the Ispahbudhan dynast Vistahm, and ultimately the wife of the last prominent Sasanian emperor, Khosrow II.
