Yazdegerd I

Tabari, Balʿami and Yaʿqubi call him a suspicious, selfish tyrant who belittled the nobles and shed much blood. His epithets are al-athim (“the Sinner”, in Tabari), bazahgar (in the Shahnameh) and dabhr (“outcast”, from Middle Persian dīpahr, prison). But Christian sources speak of “the good and clement King Yazdegerd” who every day did good to the poor, and Procopius calls him renowned for nobility of character.

Nöldeke and Iranica (Shahbazi) say the Sasanian-based verdict reflects the feelings of the priests and nobles. They hated his peaceful policy, religious tolerance and attempt to curb their power. Even the native tradition cannot hide that he began his reign with mildness and justice. So both labels come from interested parties: one from his enemies, the other from those who gained from him.

In the priests’ eyes the “sin” was tolerance of other faiths. A king who gave freedom to Christians and Jews became a sinner in the official history. Freedom of conscience then was not a right but the king’s gift, and the next king could take it back.

Marutha, bishop and Roman envoy, won Yazdegerd’s trust. The king’s decree let Christians worship openly and rebuild churches, and in 410 the Council of Seleucia organized the Church of Iran. Yazdegerd used the Catholicos as mediator with his brother, ruler of Fars, and sent another Catholicos as envoy to Theodosius. But in his last year he ordered a persecution.

Iranica explains the change by provocations from some Christians: destroying fire temples, stealing property deeds and disobeying royal orders. Van Rompay sees the cause in high-ranking Persians who converted and would not recant. Both are scholarly readings, and the primary sources are mostly ecclesiastical.

Here two liberties collided: the Christians’ freedom of religion and other people’s property. Destroying a fire temple was an attack on others’ property; persecuting a whole community for the acts of a few punished people who had done nothing. Religious freedom does not last without respect for property and individual punishment.

Procopius writes that Arcadius, fearing plots at court and the Persians, named Yazdegerd in his will as guardian of his infant son Theodosius. Yazdegerd accepted and kept the peace with Rome to the end. Theophanes adds that Yazdegerd sent the child a tutor named Antiochus.

Agathias, only a few decades after Procopius, says the story is widely told but that he found it in no document except Procopius. What surprises him most is that Procopius praises Arcadius for it. Iranica accepts the story. So we mark it disputed here: it may be true, but it has a single source.

If the story is true, an old enemy kept a trust that no court could enforce. Reputation did the work of law without any law to guarantee it.

Iranian tradition says Yazdegerd was killed in Hyrcania by a horse that rose from a spring and vanished into it. Moses Khorenatsʿi says he died of illness. Procopius, too, says disease took him from the world.

Nöldeke takes the story as a myth made by the nobles, who probably murdered the hated king in remote Hyrcania themselves. Iranica says the struggle for the throne that broke out right after his death confirms this reading.

The legend of “God’s angel” turns a killing into heaven’s will. When a ruler’s killing is credited to God, no one has to answer for it.