1.
Taq Bostan
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This example of Sassanid art is located 5 km from the city center of Kermanshah. It is located in the heart of the Zagros mountains, where it has endured almost 1,700 years of wind, originally, several sources were visible next to and below the reliefs and arches, some of which are now covered. Sources next to the reliefs still feed a large basin in front of the rock, the site has been turned into an archaeological park and a series of late Sasanian and Islamic column capitals have been brought together. The carvings, some of the finest and best-preserved examples of Persian sculpture under the Sassanids, include representations of the investitures of Ardashir II, Sassanid kings chose a beautiful setting for their rock reliefs along an historic Silk Road caravan route waypoint and campground. The reliefs are adjacent a sacred springs that empty into a reflecting pool at the base of a mountain cliff. Taq owsa and its rock relief are one of the 30 surviving Sassanid relics of the Zagros mountains. According to Arthur Pope, the founder of Iranian art and archeology Institute in the USA, art was characteristic of the Iranian people, the Taq-e Bostan complex comprise a rock relief standing on its own and several more reliefs associated with two rock cut arches. They illustrate the investiture ceremonies of Ardashir II, Shapur II, Shapur III and they also depict the hunting scenes of Khosrau II. The first Taq owsa or Taq bostan relief, and apparently the oldest, is a relief of the crowning ceremony of Ardashir II by his predecessor Shapur II or Ahura Mazda. There may be a mixture of the iconography of both identities. The two main figures are standing on the fallen Roman emperor Julianus Apostata, Ardashir played an important role in his defeat during the reign of Shapur II. Exceptional within Sasanian art is the fact that this is a portrait, Ardashir II was installed as interim ruler, awaiting the coming of age of the royal heir Shapur III. The fourth figure is the god Mithra who holds a barsum in his hands and stands on a lotus flower and he is the protector of oaths and is witness to this pact. Local beliefs and Persian folk tale interpreted the scene as the victory of the first Sasanian kings on Artabanus IV, the Mithra figure became the visual inspiration for representations of the prophet Zoroaster. Relief panel measured on 15.08.07 is approx, the smaller arch or iwan has on the upper part of the back wall two Pahlavi inscriptions identifying two royal figures as Shapur II and his son Shapur III. They are shown facing each other, the archs vestibule measures 6 x 5 x 3.6 meters. It has been suggested as having been built during the reign of Shapur III, however, the royal crown of Shapur III does not agree with those on his coins and is closer to that of his predecessor Ardashir II. It has been argued that the texts represent an usurpation of Ardashirs relief by Shapur III
2.
Khosrow II
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Khosrow II, entitled Aparvēz, also Khusraw Parvēz, was the last great king of the Sasanian Empire, reigning from 590 to 628. He was the son of Hormizd IV and the grandson of Khosrow I and he was the last king of Persia to have a lengthy reign before the Muslim conquest of Iran, which began five years after his death by execution. The Byzantines also regained the True Cross, which Khosrow had captured following his conquest of the Levant during the same 602–628 war. Khosrow and Shirin tells the story of his love for the Aramean or Roman princess Shirin, Khosrow is first mentioned in the 580s, when was at Partaw, the capital of Caucasian Albania. During his stay there, he served as the governor of the kingdom, furthermore, Khosrow II also served as the governor of Arbela around this period. According to a legend, Khosrow had a shabestan in which over 3,000 concubines resided, Khosrow was raised to the throne by his two uncles Vistahm and Vinduyih, who were the leaders of a palace coup that deposed, blinded and killed Hormizd IV. Furthermore, Persia was required to cease intervening in the affairs of Iberia and Armenia, after some time, Khosrow along with the Byzantine commander of the south, Comentiolus, invaded Mesopotamia. During this invasion, Nisibis and Martyropolis quickly defected to them, during the same period, Khosrow, feeling disrespected by Comentiolus, convinced Maurice to replace the latter with Narses as the commander of the south. Khosrow and Narses then penetrated deeper into Bahrams territory, seizing Dara and then Mardin on February, shortly after this, Khosrow sent one of his Iranian supporters, Mahbodh, to capture Ctesiphon, which he managed to accomplish. Meanwhile, Khosrows two uncles and John Mystacon, conquered northern Adurbadagan, and went further south in the region, where they defeated Bahram at Blarathon, however, Khosrow managed to deal with him by either having him assassinated or convince the Turks to execute him. Peace with the Byzantines was then officially concluded, for his aid, Maurice received much of Persian Armenia and western Georgia, and received the abolition of the subsidies which had formerly been paid to the Sasanians. Soon, however, Khosrow changed his intentions, trying to disassociate himself from his fathers murder, the Sasanian monarchs traditional mistrust of over-powerful magnates and Khosrows personal resentment of Vinduyihs patronising manner certainly contributed to this decision. Vinduyih was soon put to death, according to a Syriac source captured while trying to flee to his brother in the East, at the news of his brothers murder, Vistahm rose in open revolt. According to Dinawari, Vistahm sent a letter to Khosrow announcing his claim to the throne through his Parthian heritage, indeed, I am more deserving on account of my descent from Darius, son of Darius, who fought Alexander. You Sasanians deceitfully gained superiority over us and usurped our right and your ancestor Sasan was no more than a shepherd. Vistahms revolt, like Bahramss shortly before, found support and spread quickly, local magnates as well as the remnants of Bahram Chobins armies flocked to him, especially after he married Bahrams sister Gordiya. He even campaigned in the east, where he subdued two Hephthalite princes of Transoxiana, Shaug and Pariowk, the date of Vistahms uprising is uncertain. From his coinage, it is known that his rebellion lasted for seven years, the commonly accepted dates are ca
3.
Anahita
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Aredvi Sura Anahita is Ardwisur Anahid or Nahid in Middle- and Modern Persian, Anahit or Anaheed in Armenian. The Greek and Roman historians of classical antiquity refer to her either as Anaïtis or identified her with one of the divinities from their own pantheons,270 Anahita, a silicaceous S-type asteroid is named after her. Only Arədevī is specific to the divinity and it might have been derived from Arya devi The words sūra and anāhīta are generic Avestan language adjectives, and respectively mean mighty and pure. Both adjectives also appear as epithets of other divinities or divine concepts such as Haoma, both adjectives are also attested in Vedic Sanskrit. In its old Iranian form *Harahvatī, her name was given to the region, rich in rivers and it might have been derived from the Goddess Sarasvati. In the Persian texts of the Sassanid and later eras, Arədvī Sūra Anāhīta appears as Ardwisur Anāhīd, the evidence suggest a western Iranian origin of Anāhīta. She shares characteristics with Mat Zemlya in Slavic mythology and it was moreover the association with the planet Venus, it seems, which led Herodotus to record that the learnt to sacrifice to the heavenly goddess from the Assyrians and Arabians. Ishtar also apparently gave Aredvi Sura Anahita the epithet Banu, the Lady and it is completely unknown in the texts of the Avesta, but evident in Sassanid-era middle Persian inscriptions and in a middle Persian Zend translation of Yasna 68.13. Also in Zoroastrian texts from the post-conquest epoch, the divinity is referred to as Anahid the Lady, Ardwisur the Lady, according to Boyce, it is probable that there was once a Perso–Elamite divinity by the name of *Anahiti. It is then likely that it was this divinity that was an analogue of Ishtar, and that it is this divinity with which Aredvi Sura Anahita was conflated. The cosmological qualities of the river are alluded to in Yasht 5, but properly developed only in the Bundahishn. In both texts, Aredvi Sura Anahita is not only a divinity, but also the source of the world river and the world river itself. This source is at the top of the world mountain Hara Berezaiti, High Hara, around which the sky revolves and that is at the center of Airyanem Vaejah, the first of the lands created by Mazda. The water, warm and clear, flows through a hundred thousand golden channels towards Mount Hugar, on the summit of that mountain is Lake Urvis, the Turmoil, into which the waters flow, becoming quite purified and exiting through another golden channel. Another portion runs down to Vourukasha, the sea upon which the earth rests. In yet other chapters, the text equates the two, as in Ardwisur who is Anahid, the father and mother of the Waters and this legend of the river that descends from Mount Hara appears to have remained a part of living observance for many generations. A Greek inscription from Roman times found in Asia Minor reads the great goddess Anaïtis of high Hara, on Greek coins of the imperial epoch, she is spoken of as Anaïtis of the sacred water. Aredvi Sura Anahita is principally addressed in Yasht 5, also known as the Aban Yasht, Yasna 65 is the third of the hymns recited at the Ab-Zohr, the offering to the waters that accompanies the culminating rites of the Yasna service
4.
Crescent
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A crescent shape is a symbol or emblem used to represent the lunar phase in the first quarter, or by extension a symbol representing the Moon itself. It is used as the symbol for the Moon. It was also the emblem of Diana-Artemis, and hence represented virginity, in Roman Catholic Marian veneration, it is associated with the Virgin Mary. From its use as roof finial in Ottoman era mosques, it has become associated with Islam. The crescent symbol is used to represent the Moon, not necessarily in a particular lunar phase. When used to represent a waxing or waning lunar phase, crescent or increscent refers to the waxing first quarter, the crescent symbol was long used as a symbol of the Moon in astrology, and by extension of Silver in alchemy. The astrological use of the symbol is attested in early Greek papyri containing horoscopes, in the 2nd-century Bianchinis planisphere, the personification of the Moon is shown with a crescent attached to her headdress. Its ancient association with Ishtar/Astarte and Diana is preserved in the Moon representing the female principle, as such, it belongs to the class of figures known as lune in planar geometry. The tapering towards the points of intersection of the two arcs are known as the horns of the crescent, the word crescent is derived etymologically from the present participle of the Latin verb crescere to grow, technically denoting the waxing moon. Unicode encodes a crescent at U+263D and a decrescent at U+263E, the Miscellaneous Symbols and Pictographs block provides variants with faces, FIRST QUARTER MOON WITH FACE at U+1F31B and LAST QUARTER MOON WITH FACE at U+1F31C. The crescent shape is used to represent the Moon, and the Moon deity Nanna/Sin from an early time, visible in Akkadian cylinder seals as early as 2300 BC. The crescent was used in the iconography of the Ancient Near East and was used transplanted by the Phoenicians in the 8th century BC as far as Carthage in modern Tunisia. The crescent and star also appears on coins of South Arabia. The combination of star and crescent also arises in the Ancient Near East, representing the Moon and Ishtar and it was inherited both in Sassanian and Hellenistic iconography. In the iconography of the Hellenistic period, the crescent became the symbol of Artemis-Diana, numerous depictions show Artemis-Diana wearing the crescent Moon as part of her headdress. The related symbol of the star and crescent was the emblem of the Mithradates dynasty in the Kingdom of Pontus and was used as the emblem of Byzantium. The crescent remained in use as an emblem in Sassanid Persia, in the Crusades it came to be associated with the Orient and was widely used in Crusader seals and coins. It was used as a charge by the later 13th century
5.
Moon
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The Moon is an astronomical body that orbits planet Earth, being Earths only permanent natural satellite. It is the fifth-largest natural satellite in the Solar System, following Jupiters satellite Io, the Moon is second-densest satellite among those whose densities are known. The average distance of the Moon from the Earth is 384,400 km, the Moon is thought to have formed about 4.51 billion years ago, not long after Earth. It is the second-brightest regularly visible celestial object in Earths sky, after the Sun and its surface is actually dark, although compared to the night sky it appears very bright, with a reflectance just slightly higher than that of worn asphalt. Its prominence in the sky and its cycle of phases have made the Moon an important cultural influence since ancient times on language, calendars, art. The Moons gravitational influence produces the ocean tides, body tides, and this matching of apparent visual size will not continue in the far future. The Moons linear distance from Earth is currently increasing at a rate of 3.82 ±0.07 centimetres per year, since the Apollo 17 mission in 1972, the Moon has been visited only by uncrewed spacecraft. The usual English proper name for Earths natural satellite is the Moon, the noun moon is derived from moone, which developed from mone, which is derived from Old English mōna, which ultimately stems from Proto-Germanic *mǣnōn, like all Germanic language cognates. Occasionally, the name Luna is used, in literature, especially science fiction, Luna is used to distinguish it from other moons, while in poetry, the name has been used to denote personification of our moon. The principal modern English adjective pertaining to the Moon is lunar, a less common adjective is selenic, derived from the Ancient Greek Selene, from which is derived the prefix seleno-. Both the Greek Selene and the Roman goddess Diana were alternatively called Cynthia, the names Luna, Cynthia, and Selene are reflected in terminology for lunar orbits in words such as apolune, pericynthion, and selenocentric. The name Diana is connected to dies meaning day, several mechanisms have been proposed for the Moons formation 4.51 billion years ago, and some 60 million years after the origin of the Solar System. These hypotheses also cannot account for the angular momentum of the Earth–Moon system. This hypothesis, although not perfect, perhaps best explains the evidence, eighteen months prior to an October 1984 conference on lunar origins, Bill Hartmann, Roger Phillips, and Jeff Taylor challenged fellow lunar scientists, You have eighteen months. Go back to your Apollo data, go back to computer, do whatever you have to. Dont come to our conference unless you have something to say about the Moons birth, at the 1984 conference at Kona, Hawaii, the giant impact hypothesis emerged as the most popular. Afterward there were only two groups, the giant impact camp and the agnostics. Giant impacts are thought to have been common in the early Solar System, computer simulations of a giant impact have produced results that are consistent with the mass of the lunar core and the present angular momentum of the Earth–Moon system
6.
Zoroastrianism
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Ascribed to the teachings of the Iranian prophet Zoroaster, it exalts a deity of wisdom, Ahura Mazda, as its Supreme Being. Zoroastrianism was suppressed from the 7th century onwards following the Muslim conquest of Persia of 633-654, recent estimates place the current number of Zoroastrians at around 2.6 million, with most living in India and in Iran. Besides the Zoroastrian diaspora, the older Mithraic faith Yazdânism is still practised amongst Kurds, the religious philosophy of Zoroaster divided the early Iranian gods of Proto-Indo-Iranian tradition. The most important texts of the religion are those of the Avesta, in Zoroastrianism, the creator Ahura Mazda, through the Spenta Mainyu is an all-good father of Asha, in opposition to Druj and no evil originates from him. He and his works are evident to humanity through the six primary Amesha Spentas, Spenta Mainyu adjoined unto truth oppose the Spirits opposite, Angra Mainyu and its forces born of Akəm Manah. In Zoroastrianism, the purpose in life is to be among those who renew the world. to make the progress towards perfection. Its basic maxims include, Humata, Hukhta, Huvarshta, which mean, Good Thoughts, Good Words, there is only one path and that is the path of Truth. Do the right thing because it is the thing to do. The full name by which Zoroaster addressed the deity is, Ahura, The Lord Creator and he proclaimed that there is only one God, the singularly creative and sustaining force of the Universe. He also stated that human beings are given a right of choice, Zoroasters teachings focused on responsibility, and did not introduce a devil per se. The contesting force to Ahura Mazda was called Angra Mainyu, or angry spirit, post-Zoroastrian scripture introduced the concept of Ahriman, the Devil, which was effectively a personification of Angra Mainyu. The name Zoroaster is a Greek rendering of the name Zarathustra and he is known as Zartosht and Zardosht in Persian and Zaratosht in Gujarati. The Zoroastrian name of the religion is Mazdayasna, which combines Mazda- with the Avestan language word yasna, meaning worship, in English, an adherent of the faith is commonly called a Zoroastrian or a Zarathustrian. An older expression still used today is Behdin, meaning The best Religion | Beh < Middle Persian Weh + Din < Middle Persian dēn < Avestan Daēnā. In Zoroastrian liturgy the term is used as a title for an individual who has formally inducted into the religion in a Navjote ceremony. The term Mazdaism /ˈmæzdə. ɪzəm/ is a typical 19th century construct, taking Mazda- from the name Ahura Mazda, the March 2001 draft edition of the Oxford English Dictionary also records an alternate form, Mazdeism, perhaps derived from the French Mazdéisme, which first appeared in 1871. In older English sources, the terms Gheber and Gueber were used to refer to Zoroastrians, however, Zoroastrian philosophy is identified as having been known to Italian Renaissance Europe through an image of Zoroaster in Raphaels School of Athens by Giorgio Vasari in 1550. The Oxford English Dictionary records use of the term Zoroastrianism in 1874 in Archibald Sayces Principles of Comparative Philology, Zoroastrians believe that there is one universal, transcendent, supreme god, Ahura Mazda, or the Wise Lord
