About the tenth Achaemenid king; Ardeshir II

Ardeshir II

Ardeshir II He was the eldest son of Darius and the tenth Achaemenid king who ruled Iran for 16 years. When he reached the age of 30, he took over the government and during this time he became famous among many countries because of his extraordinary memory.

An abstract of Ardeshir II's biography:

Full name: Achaemenid Ardeshir II

Coronation: 404 BC

Previous: Darius II

Successor: Ardeshir III

Died: 358 BC

Burial place: Persepolis

Biography of Ardeshir II

Biography of Ardeshir II:

Ardashir II is the tenth Achaemenid king who is mentioned in the Achaemenid inscriptions under the pronunciation of “Ardekhashathr”. This name is considered one of the old and praised Iranian names. Adarshir literally means “one whose kingdom is based on truth and justice”. According to the report that comes from Georgios Sinklos, the Parthian dynasty claims that he is a descendant of Arshak or Ardashir II, and Schmitt also accepted this issue, because the name of Artakhshahrkan is referred to the royal taxan in Nesa city master.

Before the reign of Ardeshir II:

During the time of Darius II, the main power was in the hands of his wife Proshat. Dariush had several children from his wife Proshat, the eldest of whom is Ardeshir, Ostan and Okzats were the rest of Dariush's sons. Amestris was the daughter of Darius.

Ardeshir's real name was Arshak, but according to what Dinon says, he was called Noarces. In his childhood, he had an aggressive and severe nature, while Ardeshir was very gentle and kind and rarely faced anger and rage. He married one of the Stathirs, the daughter of Hindrans II, one of the Persian elders, on the orders of his parents. On the other hand, Statira's brother married Ardeshir Amestris' sister. After some time passed, he fell in love with his sister Roxana and hated Amestris so that he planned to kill her. Of course, this plan was revealed and Tritochemes was killed by Odiastes, one of his influencers, who was deceived by Darius's promises. The son of Odias, whose name was Mehrdad, killed his father and captured the city of Zaris, and then surrendered it to the son of Tritukmes.

Darius suppressed this rebellion and Purushat buried Tritokmes' mother and two brothers and sisters alive, and then cut Roxana to pieces.

Coins of the era of Ardeshir II

The king tells Proshat to do the same with Statira, Ardashir's wife, but Ardashir satisfies his parents with begging and tears, in this regard, Proshat is affected and Dariush surrenders and allows his wife Ardashir to stay with him. . Of course, Dariush warns Proshat that one day he will regret this.

Proshat loved Cyrus more than Ardeshir and wanted him to become king. When Darius fell ill, Cyrus took over the rule of the Asian coast and was invited to the court. Cyrus hoped to succeed his father with his mother's middle stepfather. Prushat gave reasons for carrying out his plan, according to which Xerxes had already ascended to the throne with the help of Demaratus' guidance.

Purushat announced to the king that you were an ordinary person when Ardashir was born, but Cyrus was born during your reign. Of course, this argument did not convince the king. Rather, he announced that Arshak is his successor and called him Ardeshir. On the other hand, Cyrus was assigned to the leadership of Lady and the general command of the royal forces in all the coasts of Asia Minor. This was the only defiance that Darius had from his wife.

A few days after the death of Darius, that is, in 404 BC, when about 20 years had passed since his reign, Ardeshir came to Pasargad to perform the coronation rituals there through Mobdan. In Pasargad, there was a temple belonging to the goddess of war, which is likely to be the temple of Nabaru Anahita. Each of the Iranian kings who sat on the throne had to enter this temple and take off their clothes, then put on the clothes that Cyrus the Great wore before his reign, to remove his pride, and eat dried figs. They chewed the leaves of the huma plant and drank a drink made of vinegar and milk. About the rest of the customs, only the priests had information. When Ardashir was about to perform religious rites, Tissaphernes informed him that Cyrus was planning to kill him. To confirm this news, he brought to Ardashir a priest who was Cyrus's mentor in his childhood and was upset because he did not reach the throne. . He testified that Cyrus has this intention.

Images instead of Ardeshir II

Historians have stated that the priest Cyrus was arrested based on this charge. Others have stated that they entered the temple together with the priest to hide Cyrus and kill Ardashir, these people were also arrested.

Cyrus' death sentence is issued by Ardeshir, and when this news reaches Proshat, he rushes to his son, hugs him, puts his neck on his neck, and hugs his body in such a way that the executioner He can't hit him. After this, the queen screamed, screamed and begged so much that Ardashir Shah pardoned Cyrus and canceled his death sentence. After that, Cyrus goes to Lydia and prepares for the rebellion.

Early reign of Ardeshir II:

There was a natural slowness in the Shah's temperament, which the people of Iran interpret as gentleness. Ardeshir was jealous of the name and behavior of Ardeshir I, nicknamed the long-handed, and wanted to behave like him, for this reason, he had time to sit on the throne of the moral and behavioral virtues of Ardeshir I. All people could come to him to plead.

He gave rewards that were excellent and based on people's merit. Regarding the punishments, he did not do more than the balance and reduced all the punishments, this made people know him unlike other kings who killed people for the smallest mistake.

He accepted gifts with good manners and accepted the smallest gift with joy. To reward more than it should have offered. When Omizus brought him a very big and beautiful pomegranate and Ardashir said: “By Mitra, if they give him the government of a small province, he can quickly make this city big and famous.”

Early reign of Ardeshir II in Persepolis

Events during the reign of Ardeshir II:

The reign of this king was full of endless political conspiracies and a harem filled with jealousy and ambitions, so that some sources appear like Plutarch's writings. In the eyes of the Persians, the king's behavior was mixed with a kind of decency, although the gentleness and kindness that was attributed to his behavior followed the extreme cruelty that Ardashir III showed in his behavior. In any case, one cannot expect this temperament to end the last days of his life with bitterness and despair despite his strength and strength.

The legacy and antiquities of Ardeshir II:

There are three inscriptions left in Susa from Ardashir II, the first of which is related to the restored palace of Darius, the second one is related to the pillar base, and the third one is engraved on the buildings. A small part of the ancient Persian text is written on a stone tablet. An Elamite text and two Akkadian texts have also been found from Susa.

There are more evidences of the Shah's construction activities along with the inscriptions that exist mainly in this field, found in several inscriptions in Hamadan. It should be noted that Ardeshir prayed for Mitra and Anahita like Ahuramazda. This is the same as what Brussus states. So that during the reign of Ardashir II, idols (especially Anahit) were installed throughout the empire for worship.

Burial place of Ardeshir II

Death and succession of Ardeshir II:

If it is possible to be sure about the existing traditions, it is written: Ardeshir had 115 children and most of them died during their father's lifetime. In the same way, only 4 sons are left from him who were from Statira I and their names are Dariush, Ariaspe, Vakhos or Ardashir III and another son named Arsham (Arsam). Shah had a lot of love for Arsham.

The narrative that Plutarch announces about the succession of Ardashir II has too much romanticism and tells a clichéd story. However, not all of them can be considered lies like Ctesias's writings.

The reign of Ardashir II seemed to be coming to an end more than others in the opinion of fifty-year-old Darius. Finally, in the last year of Ardashir II, he led a group of courtiers to reach the emperorship and planned to kill his father. Ardeshir was informed about this exploration by a eunuch.

Ardeshir saw that he could not deny this because his life was in danger. Their plan was to enter the king's dormitory at night and kill him. Ardeshir ordered to open a door behind his bed and cover it with a curtain.

At the appointed time, the conspirators came to the dormitory. Recognizing them, Ardeshir went out and called the guards. After the Kankashians were arrested, by the order of the king, a court of judges of the Royal Society was formed and prosecutors were selected for this task. Ardeshir ordered the clerks of the court to write down the verdict of the judges and bring it to him.

Everyone voted to kill the prince and Darius was executed accordingly. After this incident, Ariasep was chosen to succeed Ardeshir. People loved him because of his good manners and kind behavior. After that, Ikhus, through one of the courtiers, conveyed to Ariasep that Ardeshir had become pessimistic towards him and was planning to execute him, which caused Arasep to commit suicide out of fear of execution. His death was impressive for Ardeshir, also his other son Arsham or Erivrat was killed at the instigation of Akhos.

After 45 years of reign, Ardashir II died in 358 BC at the age of 77 and was succeeded by his son Ardashir III.

compilation: Cover biographical section