Mazdak and Late Antique 'Socialism'

C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM 37 [37–55] part one * BEGINNINGS C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM 38 [37–55] C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM 39 [37–55] EGALITARIANISM 1 Mazdak and Late Antique ‘Socialism’ touraj daryaee During the reign of Kawād I (AD 498–531), king of Ērānšahr (Realm of the Iranians), a Zoroastrian priest by the name of Mazdak, son of Bāmdād, appears in some sources whose rulings about property and ownership have been deemed proto-socialist. According to sources in Middle Persian of the late Sasanian Empire (A D 224–651), Mazdak promoted the sharing of women and property. Mazdak’s socialist message called for the creation of an egalitarian system of the distribution of wealth during a time of famine and political turmoil. The lower classes appear to have favoured Mazdak’s beliefs, and he claimed his rulings were based on his interpretation of the Zoroastrian holy text, the Avesta. The reason for Mazdak’s ruling was to provide aid to the hungry and the naked, but, more importantly, he also wanted to make substantial social and economic changes in an otherwise stratified Iranian society.1 With Mazdak and the backing of the king, a social and economic revolution took place in the Sasanian Empire, which empowered the state at the cost of the nobility, and enabled the kings of Iran to rule for another two centuries. If we take Mazdak as a historical personage,2 it appears that he enjoyed the support of a major segment of the population: those who were destitute (a condition mainly caused by a recent famine and economic hardship). Mazdak specifically had the support of those who were simply the poor (driyōš / Eng. Derwish). Mazdak and his followers were able to instigate a social revolution that broke the power of the great noble houses (wuzurgān), stripping away their wealth and property and, in some cases, abducting female members of the aristocratic houses. The redistribution of wealth, land, and women was made 1 T. Daryaee, Sasanian Persia: The Rise and Fall of an Empire (London: I. B. Tauris, 2013), pp. 86–8. Unless otherwise noted, all non-English terms are from Middle Persian. 2 H. Gaube, ‘Mazdak: historical reality or invention?’, Studia Iranica 11 (1982), pp. 111–22, has suggested that he did not exist. However, even if Mazdak did not exist, the movement named after him did, and it brought changes to Iranian society. C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM 40 [37–55] touraj daryaee possible through Mazdak’s interpretation (zand) of the Avesta. There is no doubt that Kawād I supported the movement, or at least allowed it to take hold throughout the Sasanian Empire. The consequences of the Mazdakite movement for Iranian society and that of modern Iran and Iraq were long-lasting. It created fundamental changes in Iranian societal structure, and furthered egalitarian and anti-state movements in the early Islamic world until the tenth century A D.3 The Mazdakite movement became a focal point both for Soviet social historians of antiquity4 and for twentieth-century leftists and revolutionaries in Iran. In late antiquity (AD 200–700), the ideal Zoroastrian social order, according to the Avesta,5 was imposed on Iranian society by the Sasanians and the nobility. The classes (pēšag) of the social order included the priests (āsrōnān), the warriors (artēštārān), husbandmen (wāstaryōšān), farmers (dahı̄gān), and artisans (hutuxšān).6 This meant that a large segment of the population who were not attached to any of these classes were left out, mainly the landless peasants, the poor, and what we may call the underclass. In Middle Persian literature, the poor are divided into two groups: those who sometimes merit help, collectively known as the driyōšān; and those termed the insolent and rowdy poor, known as the škōhān.7 While Sasanian wisdom literature in Middle Persian, specifically the Dēnkard VI (Acts of Religion), provides much encouragement in helping the mendicant poor as an act of piety,8 at the same time there were severe punishments meted out in order to keep the insolent poor and the underclass in check. For example, stealing or being insolent to those of the upper classes or the state resulted in branding (drōš),9 beating, or amputation of hands,10 and imprisonment. In extreme cases, people became ‘deserving of death’ (margarzān).11 3 The two important studies that cover the entire Mazdak episode and its consequence are E. Yarshater, ‘Mazdakism’, in E. Yarshater (ed.), The Cambridge History of Iran, vol. III, Part 2 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), pp. 991–1024; and A. Gariboldi, Il regno di Xusraw dall’anima immortale. Riforme economiche e rivolte sociali nell’Iran sasanide del VI secolo (Bologna: Mimesis, 2009). 4 P. Ognibene and A. Gariboldi, Conflitti sociali e movimenti politico-religiosi nell’Iran tardo antico. Contributi della storiografia sovietica nel periodo 1920–1950 (Bologna: Mimesis, 2004). 5 E. Benveniste, ‘Les classes sociales dans la tradition avestique’, Journal Asiatique 221 (1932), pp. 117–34; E. Benveniste, ‘Traditions indo-iraniennes sur les classes sociales’, Journal Asiatique 230 (1938), pp. 529–49. 6 Daryaee, Sasanian Persia, pp. 42–8. 7 Ibid., p. 57. 8 The Wisdom of the Sasanian Sages (Dēnkard VI) by Aturpāt-i Ēmētān, trans. S. Shaked (Boulder: Westview Press, 1979). 9 Daryaee, Sasanian Persia, p. 57. 10 H. Chacha, Gajastak Abālish [00000 00000] (Bombay: Fort Printing Press, 1936), p. 42. 11 Those guilty of capital offences became ‘deserving of the death penalty’. See A. Perikhanian, Book of a Thousand Judgements [Farraxvmart i Vahraman]: A Sasanian Law Book (Costa Mesa, CA: Mazda Publishers, 1997), p. 372. 40 C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM 41 [37–55] Mazdak and Late Antique ‘Socialism’ From the third to the fifth century AD, the political and economic structure of the Sasanian Empire was such that those of the noble houses who owned vast land-holdings supported the King of Kings of Ērānšahr by providing payments, in terms of either cash or commodities and men, to the state during times of war and peace. No doubt this system was part of an earlier order that had existed under the preceding dynasty, namely that of the Arsacid/Parthian Empire (BC 247–A D 224). Even the number of these noble houses, namely seven, is a vestige of an older tradition in Iranian history. During the time of Darius I (BC 522– 490), the ‘Seven πρῶτοι [First]’ were noble families who had banded together.12 The names of these noble houses of old who held large landed estates are recorded as Surēn, Kāren, Zig, Mehrān, Spahbad, Spandiād, and Nahābad.13 However, in time, through the emergence of the bureaucratic class (dabı̄rān) as well as other administrative changes, the Sasanian world moved towards a centralized empire, as opposed to that of its Arsacid predecessor.14 Furthermore, the great noble houses directly controlled the revenues from their estates, which did not allow the state to collect its dues properly. One of the ways in which, from the very beginning, the Sasanians attempted to bring important economic regions under their control was to establish royal cities.15 These cities are known in Middle Persian as dastgerd, which means ‘built by hand’ (Gr. κτίσμα).16 They numbered in the dozens, with the names of the Sasanian kings attached to them, and had both economic and military purposes.17 These cities were part of early plans to control the economy, as well as other efforts towards centralization, by the Sasanian Empire. The early list of cities established by the first two kings of the Sasanian Empire, their incursions into Syria, Anatolia, and later the Caucasus, and the resettlement of 12 P. Briant, From Cyrus to Alexander: A History of the Persian Empire (Warsaw, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2002), pp. 128–9. 13 A. Christensen, L’Iran sous les Sassanides (Copenhagen and Paris: Levin & Munksgaard and P. Geuthner, 1944), pp. 103–4; A. S. Shahbazi, ‘Haft’, in E. Yarshater (ed.), Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. X I, Part 5 (2002), pp. 511–15. 14 R. N. Frye, ‘Feudalism in Sasanian and Early Islamic Iran’, in Jahiliyya and Islamic Studies in Honour of M. J. Kister (Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 10) (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 1987), p. 18. 15 R. Gyselen, ‘Economy. IV. In the Sasanian Period’, in Yarshater (ed.), Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. VIII, Part 1 (1997), pp. 104–7. 16 P. Gignoux, ‘Dastgerd’, in Yarshater (ed.), Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. V I I, Part 1 (1994), pp. 105–6; W. Skalmowski, ‘On Middle Iranian DSTKRT(Y)’, in W. Skalmowski and A. van Tongerloo (eds.), Medioiranica: Proceedings of the International Colloquium Organized by the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven from the 21st to the 23rd of May 1990 (Leuven: Peeters, 1993), p. 159. 17 Most of the cities are mentioned in R. Gyselen, La Géographie administrative de l’empire sassanide. Les témoignages épigraphiques en moyen-perse (Bures-sur-Yvette: Groupe pour l’étude de la civilisation du Moyen-Orient, 2019). 41 Darband Trapezus Partaw Ani Amida Khujand Samarkand Marw Ganzak Nisibis Callinicum Chach Paykent Amul Artaxata Van Edessa Daras Antioch Gorganj Gorgan Amul Panjkent Termez Talikan Balkh Nishapur Kumish Hulwan Emesa Jerusalem Gayy Ctesiphon (Mahoza) Susa Al-Hira Ram-Hormizd Hormizd-Ardashir Ubulla Bishapur Istakhr Rev-Ardašir Siraf Herat Kabul Ghazni Purushapura Taksila Bust Zarang Weh-Ardashir Rakhwad Multan Darabgird Hatta Yathrib (Medina) Mazun Sasanian Empire and Its Neighbours ca. 550 Macca Roman Empire Kingdom of Aksum Najran Aksum San’a Alkhan Alhan Kingdom Eastern Alkhan? Sasanian Empire Core Sasanian Territories Hephthalite Sasanian Conquest of Himyar Hephthalite Domains Hephthalite Expansion after 484 Nezak Nezak Shah Domains Nezak Expansion into Kabul 0 500 Map 1.1 The Sasanian Empire and its neighbours c. 550 C E. 00000 00000 00000 00000 1000 km [37–55] Babylon Qayen 42 Alexandria Kirmishin C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM T’bilisi Constantinople C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM 43 [37–55] Mazdak and Late Antique ‘Socialism’ skilled labour forces in these cities, many of whom were Christian and under the direct control of the crown, were signs of the Sasanian Empire’s goals and aspirations. However, the noble houses stifled the state’s complete control over their affairs. This fact is significant, as agriculture was the most important means of wealth for the Sasanian state. Records show that small land-holders were allowed to have subsistence living from their own labour and to have one wife, while obeying the nobility in all aspects of life.18 In the fifth century A D, the Sasanians faced a new threat that would change many of the political, social, and economic realities of the empire. Kawād I came to power as a result of his father’s death in a battle near Balkh in AD 484. From the fourth century, there had been a steady movement of people from central and inner Asia towards the Iranian plateau. In the fifth century, the Hephthalites had encroached onto Sasanian territory. King Pērōz had an army prepared to face them, but he was killed in battle, and many of his retinue, along with his son Kawād, were captured. As a result, the Hephthalites not only annexed an important part of the eastern territories of the Sasanian Empire and captured its royal mint, but they also exacted a heavy tribute from the Sasanians.19 The income that had previously come from the Silk Road trade in the East also withered away. In a sense this Eastern defeat, coupled with the existing social and climatic situation, caused severe pressures on the empire. From then onwards, the Hephthalites were also able to influence imperial policy, suggesting that the Sasanian Empire was on its knees and at its weakest since its establishment in the third century A D. The events of the next decade are somewhat unclear and full of controversy, as Kawād I came to the throne and was then deposed, and was then again brought back to the throne. For some unknown reason, Kawād I was removed from his first and brief short reign (A D 488–96), and Walāxš was placed on the throne by the nobility.20 It is quite possible that Kawād I was removed because he had the support of the Hephthalites. However, a certain noble named Sukhrā, along with a group of other nobles, was responsible for bringing him back to power.21 It is during the second period of Kawād I’s rule (AD 498–531) that Mazdak, with his views and policies, 18 M. Shaki, ‘Class System III. In the Parthian and Sasanian periods’, in Yarshater (ed.), Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. V, Part 6 (1992), pp. 652–8. 19 K. Rezakhani, Reorienting the Sasanians: Eastern Iran in Late Antiquity (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2017), p. 128. 20 T. Daryaee, ‘Coins of Hukay: Sasanian Ideology and Political Competition in the Fifth Century CE’, in T. Daryaee and M. Compareti (eds.), Studi sulla Persia sasanide e suoi rapport con le Civiltà attigue (Bologna: Casa Editrice Persiani, 2019), p. 25. 21 Rezakhani, Reorienting the Sasanians, pp. 132–3. 43 C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM 44 [37–55] touraj daryaee became important.22 In order to understand the reasons for the reforms, which have been deemed socialistic, we need to understand the gravity of the situation in the Iranian plateau during the late fifth to early sixth centuries. While the rigidity of class structure in Sasanian society has already been discussed, less is known about the environment’s effects on the Sasanians. Thankfully, there is now more robust research. Historians, as well as Middle Persian encyclopedic texts (Mojmal), have recorded that there was a period of drought followed by famine during the time that Mazdak appeared: ‘There was much famine and Mazdak b. Bāmdād, was the Chief Mowbed, and he brought the religion of Mazdak.’23 Thus, the famine must have been caused by a drought, which the Zoroastrian encyclopedic texts mention took place during the time of Kawād I’s father, Pērōz (Bundahišn 33.22): ‘During the rule of Pērōz, son of Yazdgerd there was no rain [wārān nē būd] for seven years, and harm and serious difficulty came to people.’24 These observations by primary sources are supported by a recent study of soil samples and related scientific data, which indicate that, of the eight episodes of high aeolian input that coincided with dry or drought conditions, one occurred during the middle of the Sasanian period.25 This fact, combined with the loss of trade on what has come to be called the Silk Road, which was now in the hand of the Hephthalites, along with the monetary shortage due to the large indemnity paid, brought the survival of the empire into question. As has been discussed, from this moment there was a significant shift towards the west by the Sasanians, who invested heavily in Mesopotamia, and deported the population from Syria in order to resettle them in the western part of the empire, perhaps to offset the losses in the east.26 However, this was not sufficient to save the Sasanians from the quagmire in which they found themselves. A more substantial change was needed to make sure that the Sasanian Empire survived, but in a stronger and more resilient fashion. It is in this light that we must view the gravity of Kawād I’s situation as the ruler of an empire in dire straits in the fifth century A D. Mazdak, as a Zoroastrian priest whose dictums could legitimize a total restructuring of the Sasanian 22 P. Crone, ‘Kavād’s heresy and Mazdak’s revolt’, Iran 29 (1991), pp. 21–42. 23 M. Bahār, Mojmal at-Tawārı̄kh wa’l-Qisas [00000 00000 00000] (Tehran: n.p., 1939), p. 73. 24 T. Daryaee, ‘Historiography in Late Antique Iran’, in Ali Ansari (ed.), Perceptions of Iran: History, Myths and Nationalism from Medieval Persia to the Islamic Republic (London: I. B. Tauris, 2014), p. 72. 25 A. Sharifi et al., ‘Abrupt climate variability since the last deglaciation based on a high-resolution, multi-proxy peat record from NW Iran: the hand that rocked the cradle of civilization?’, Quaternary Science Reviews 123 (2015), pp. 225–7. 26 Rezakhani, Reorienting the Sasanians, p. 231. 44 C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM 45 [37–55] Mazdak and Late Antique ‘Socialism’ Fig. 1.1 Silver coin of Kawād I, who ruled during the time of Mazdak (Private collection.) Empire, aided the king’s actions. Mazdak, son of Bāmdād, is generally claimed by Zoroastrian Middle Persian sources to have been an arch-heretic whose interpretation of sacred scripture brought havoc to Ērānšahr. His followers came to be known as zandı̄gs who, according to hostile sources, were trying to remedy the ills of the time by reinterpreting the sacred teachings. The zandı̄gs would change the social and religious history of the Near East in the following centuries, and survived in various forms and sects in the Islamic period.27 Still, their immediate effect on the Sasanian Empire was important and decisive in many ways. The new pro-Mazdakite and anti-Roman policy of Kawād I succeeded, with the backing of the Hephthalites, against some of the aristocracy and antiHephthalite faction.28 The questions are: how did the Mazdakites relate to society, and how did they interact with the state? The Poor and the Underclass In all of this havoc, the poor, whose number must have been large, were most affected, and they played a role in the uprising. In the fourth 27 For the successive movements inspired by the Mazdakites in the Islamic period, see P. Crone, The Nativist Prophets of Early Islamic Iran: Rural Revolt and Local Zoroastrianism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012). 28 J. Wiesehöfer, ‘Kawad, Khusro and the Mazdakites: A New Proposal’, in P. Gignoux et al. (eds.), Trésors d’Orient. Mélanges offerts à Rika Gyselen (Paris: Cahiers de Studia Iranica, 2009), p. 401. 45 C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM 46 [37–55] touraj daryaee century AD, Ammianus Marcellinus provides an interesting reference in regard to the slaves and the poor of Sasanian society, in which the upper class had powers such as ‘claiming the power of life and death over slaves and commons’.29 The term ‘plebeii obscuri’, used by Ammianus in this regard, has been suggested by Jairus Banaji to stand for the driyōšān. For Banaji, the driyōšān stand for the mass of commoners who were to become a kind of social group, from which the Mazdakites drew their ranks.30 In the Zoroastrian text Dēnkard V I, there are a number of passages which appear to be portraying a tension existing between the poor (driyōš) and the wealthy or the rich (tawānı̄g). For example (Dēnkard 147): ‘They held this too: If the poor (driyōšān) set right this one thing, the contempt of wealthy people of high standing/wealthy (tawānı̄gān), in a century not one of them will go to hell.’31 From such passages, one gets the sense that due to certain events the driyōšān’s contempt for the wealthy or upper class (tar-menišnı̄h ı̄ andar mehān tawānı̄gān) was further manifested. Hence the dichotomy of driyōš–tawānı̄g (poor–wealthy), which is apparent not only in Dēnkard VI but also in other Middle Persian texts, which exhibit social or class conflict in one form or another. Outside the moralistic text of the Dēnkard VI, in the genre of Middle Persian apocalyptic literature, the dichotomy of poor–wealthy manifests itself more forcefully and outside the niceties of respect for the poor. Historians studying these texts have usually paid attention to historical events and characters, such as Alexander the Great’s conquest and the Arab Muslim conquest, and the early Islamic movements of the Siyāh-Jāmagān and SorkhJāmagān (Bābak Khorramdēn movement). It is these events that call for the evoking of the end of times and the chaos and commotion that are involved with it. This end of time, or eschaton, is imagined as a time of disorder, and the Jāmāsp-Nāmag (00000 00000) states (Jāmāsp Nāmag 16.7): ‘In this time, the spiritual ones [tawāngarān] consider the poor [driyōš] to be fortunate, but truly the poor are not fortunate.’32 As Bruce Lincoln has keenly observed regarding the social and cosmic confusion of the apocalyptic age, the place of the lower social classes – that is, the poor (driyōš) – is only then considered as 29 Ammianus Marcellinus, History, vol. I, books 14–19, trans. J. C. Rolfe (Loeb Classical Library 300) (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1950), pp. 392–3. 30 J. Banaji, ‘Late Antique Aristocracies: The Case of Iran’, in J. Banaji, Exploring the Economy of Late Antiquity: Selected Essays (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016), pp. 170–1. 31 The Wisdom of the Sasanian Sages, p. 61. 32 B. Lincoln, ‘The earth becomes flat: a study of apocalyptic imagery’, Comparative Studies in Society and History 25, 1 (1983), pp. 145–6; D. Agostini, Ayādgār ı̄ Jāmāspı̄g [00000 00000]. Un texte eschatologique Zoroastrien (Rome: Biblica et Orientalia, 2013), p. 76. 46 C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM 47 [37–55] Mazdak and Late Antique ‘Socialism’ fortunate (farrox dārēnd).33 In terms of social confusion in Sasanian Iran, of course, one can only first be reminded of the Mazdakite revolt. While most scholars dealing with these texts have paid attention to the theme of national liberation, the apocalyptic texts partly describe social revolution and class struggle as well. Thus, the theme of these Middle Persian texts revolves not only around the issue of the conquered and the conquerors, but also that of class antagonisms.34 In regard to King Kawād I and Mazdak, an important Persian text (Mojmal) states: During the time of Qobād [Kawād], Mazdak was made manifest . . . and said: ‘In wealth and women, whatever there is, it must be distributed equally, and no one is superior to another, and a people became his followers, and the poor [darwišān] and the illiterate [johal] were very much agreeable with this religion . . . till Nowšı̄rwān brought Hormizd Āfrı̄d and Mehr Ādūr Parsı̄ and several other mowbeds from Pārs [and] invalidated [that religion] with proof.35 This is one of the few places that the driyōšān are mentioned as such: in Islamic tradition other terminology is usually used. For example, in another unique passage on Mazdak, he is mentioned as having achieved the support of the poor specifically.36 In the Middle Persian commentary on the Avesta from the Sasanian period (3.41 A–B), one reads: For, the Mazdayasnian (Zoroastrian) religion, O Spitama Zarthushtra (Zoroaster), throws away the (judicial) sentence for the man who (has done) the confession (of faith) [the (judicial) sentence to which he has to be given]; (the Mazdayasnian religion) throws away the punishment [they know that stealing is not allowed, but they consider that ‘when I steal from the rich (tawānı̄gān) and give it to the poor (driyōšān), it will be a good deed for me’].37 This Robin Hood attitude in the Sasanian period may be connected first and foremost with the Mazdakites, who are generally accused of taking from the rich. Here in the legal parlance of the Avesta, the gloss by the Sasanian Zoroastrian priests demonstrates tension because of wealth disparity between the wealthy and the poor. 33 Lincoln, ‘The earth becomes flat’, p. 147. 34 Ibid., p. 152. 35 Bahār, Mojmal ut-Tawārı̄kh, p. 75. 36 M. Shaki, ‘The social doctrine of Mazdak in the light of Middle Persian evidence’, Archív Orientální 46, 4 (1978), p. 305 37 M. Moazami, Wrestling with the Demons of the Pahlavi Widēwdād: Transcription, Translation, and Commentary (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2014), p. 93. 47 C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM 48 [37–55] touraj daryaee Khosrow I: The ‘Great’ Reformer After the death of Kawād I, two of his sons, namely Kawūs from the north, backed by the Mazdakites,38 and Khosrow, supported by the Hephthalites, came to blows. Khosrow was victorious in this battle, while Mazdak and his followers were defeated. With the coming of Khosrow Anušı̄rwān (A D 531– 79), severe measures were taken to put down the Mazdakites. The great Persian epic, the Shahnāmeh (Book of Kings) by Ferdowsı̄, gives a vivid description of Mazdak, his career, and his ultimate fate after a debate between the Zoroastrian priests and him at court. Justice was meted out to Mazdak in the following manner: Then Cosroe [Khosrow] had a high gallows set up from which dangled a braided noose, and he had the unfortunate heretic hung alive, with his head downwards, and he killed him with a shower of arrows. If you have a healthy intellect, do not follow in Mazdak’s footsteps! And so the nobles became secure in their possessions, and women, and children, and their rich treasures.39 The theme of chaos brought by Mazdak and the reordering of the society by Khosrow I as the epitome of the just king is a hallmark of Iranian history. By the time of Khosrow I’s reign, there had been a decade or two of what can be termed as social revolution, and in some ways a levelling of Sasanian society had taken place. The state had allowed for the granaries to be sacked, mostly those belonging to the well-to-do, while women had been taken from the noble houses and married off to those of lower classes. This also meant the breaking of the backs of the seven great noble houses, as well as the lesser nobility (āzādān). The accusation by the anti-Mazdakites of the alleged sharing of women by the Mazdakites needs some attention. The issue of women at this time had more to do with a reproductive inequality caused by the Zoroastrian legal tradition, which allowed for multiple wives and concubines, depending on one’s wealth and status. While statistics are lacking, we do know that the wealthiest King of Kings may have had up to 15,000 wives and concubines,40 while the poor and downtrodden would have been without a wife. Hence, it was only the nobility and priests who could afford and, according to Zoroastrian law, engage in polygamy.41 One should also note that women 38 Gariboldi, Il regno di Xusraw, pp. 112–13. 39 A. Bausani, Religion in Iran: From Zoroaster to Baha’ullah, trans. J. M. Marchesi (New York: Bibliotheca Persica Press, 2000), p. 100. 40 W. Scheidel, ‘Sex and Empire: A Darwinian Perspective’, in I. Morris and W. Scheidel (eds.), The Dynamics of Ancient Empires: State Power from Assyria to Byzantium (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), p. 278. 41 Perikhanian, Book of a Thousand Judgements, pt 2, p. 1. 48 C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM 49 [37–55] Mazdak and Late Antique ‘Socialism’ slaves (bandag) who were non-Iranian (an-ēr), while having legal status, were the property of their owners who were obviously well-to-do. According to Zoroastrian law, the dowry or security for a wife was in the amount of 2,000 drahms (silver coins weighing 4.15 grams), or more than 8 kilograms of silver. There were also temporary marriages which carried their own dowries, and therefore were out of the reach of the poor.42 Hence, Mazdak’s ruling was an attempt to remedy this inequality in marriage by introducing a new interpretation of Zoroastrian law.43 While there was a redistribution of women at the time of Kawād I, it appears that Khosrow I re-established the old order and attempted to set boundaries for marriage and class. One can suggest that it is for this reason that, in Zoroastrian law, the legal term xwarāyēn – women who have left the house without sanction of the pater familias – is mentioned in many law cases, as are men who are classified as adulterers or sine manu mariti (gādār).44 That is, this late Sasanian legal classification is a result of Mazdak and Mazdakite actions regarding women. This fact becomes more apparent when we read that, within the offence of adultery, a distinction is made between habitual offence, which is those who commit adultery on a regular basis, and those who committed adultery just once, or more probably were forced into it. In the legal rulings of the late Sasanian period, the latter offenders, that is the women, do not lose their status, while the former do.45 This interpretation of the law probably allowed for women abducted by the Mazdakites to return to their homes and not lose their status. This was a new way of remedying Mazdak’s legal ruling, which had caused the sharing of women. Re-establishing Economic Order and Foundations for the Poor It appears that with Kawād I and his son, Khosrow I, there was a move towards monetization of the economy, where taxes were measured by the new type of coinage, with mint marks and exact administrative location. This monetization appears to have taken place both to facilitate transactions in the marketplace (wāzār) and to tax the new smaller land-owners, who had 42 M. Shaki, ‘Family Law in Zoroastrianism’, in Yarshater (ed.), Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. IX, Part 2 (1999), pp. 184–96. 43 Crone, ‘Kavād’s heresy and Mazdak’s revolt’, p. 25; Scheidel, ‘Sex and Empire’, p. 280. 44 Perikhanian, Book of a Thousand Judgements, sections 24, 8, 9; 33, 1; 83, 8; A13, 5; A14, 3. 45 Ibid., sections 24, 7–10. 49 C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM 50 [37–55] touraj daryaee replaced the large land-owners.46 The money taken from the Mazdakites was redistributed to the people, and some care was given to the poor. It is only in this social context that the creation of the office of the ‘Protector of the Poor and the Judge [driyōšān jaddagōw ud dādwar]’ makes sense. This office and its seal were created in the following manner, according to the Sasanian law book Book of a Thousand Judgements (Mādayān ı̄ Hazār Dādestān 93, 4–9): The official seal [muhr] of mowbeds [offices] and finance officials was first introduced at the order of Kawād son of Pērōz, and the official seals of judges under Khusrow son of Kawād. When the seal of the mowbed of Pārs was cut, the mowbed was inscribed [on its legend] as being not according to [his] mowbed, but was inscribed according to the title of ‘Protector of the Driyōšān’.47 So far fifteen toponyms48 have been found, mainly in the western part of the empire. The sudden manifestation of this office during the rule of Kawād I, and then more robustly under Khosrow I, no doubt was a result of the Mazdakite revolt.49 In a sense, the state began to take control of the affairs of the poor through an organized system.50 The holder of this office most likely acted as a sort of carrot-and-stick officer, who could aid (ayyār) the driyōš by acting legally in their defence, but could also exact judgement in their case.51 Either way, there appears to have been a system of control or maintenance that was placed on the driyōšān after the Mazdakite revolt. One can suggest, at least for now, that the praise of the driyōšān in the Middle Persian Andarz literature is specifically the result of the post-Mazdakite revolt, and the reason for which the mendicant poor were placed on a spiritual pedestal. However, as the apocalyptic text of the Jāmāsp Nāmag suggests, the disruption of class order and the power of the driyōšān over the upper classes can only be seen as part of a society in turmoil. 46 R. Göbl, ‘Aufbau der Münzprägung’, in F. Altheim and R. Stiehl (eds.), Ein Asiatischer Staat. Feudalismus unter den Sasaniden und ihren Nachbarn (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1954), pp. 117–18. 47 Perikhanian, Book of a Thousand Judgements, pp. 214–15. 48 Gyselen, Géographie administrative, p. 266. 49 W. Sundermann, ‘Neue Erkenntnisse über die mazdakitische Soziallehre’, Das Altertum 34, 3 (1988), pp. 183–8. 50 W. Sundermann, ‘Commendatio pauperum. Eine Angabe der sassanidischen politisch-didaktischen Literatur zur gesellschaftlichen Struktur Irans’, Altorientalische Forschungen 167, 4 (1976), pp. 167–8. 51 J. de Menasce, ‘Le protecteur des pauvres dans l’Iran Sassanide’, in Mélanges Henri Massé (Tehran: n.p., 1963), pp. 282–7. 50 C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM 51 [37–55] Mazdak and Late Antique ‘Socialism’ The Effects of the Mazdakite Revolt It seems that Mazdak’s dictums in the form of commentaries on Zoroastrian law (zand) allowed the masses and the downtrodden to revolt, and King Kawād I allowed this uprising to go on so that he would be able to weaken the great noble houses and the existing order, which hindered reform. Once the noble houses were enfeebled and the Zoroastrian religious hierarchy had become powerless in their stance against Mazdak, the king was able to make major changes and restructure the Sasanian Empire. For this chapter, the most important aspect of the revolt was the redistribution of land to what has been called the landed gentry or small land-holders (dehqāns), who managed local affairs and collected taxes from the peasants on behalf of the state. In turn, the dehqāns were to continue cultivating land as an important part of their duty, while having more wealth than a simple peasant.52 Their status is mentioned in many Zoroastrian texts as standing beside the nobility, while promoting the traditional culture of the empire. The association of the dehqāns with both Kawād I and Khosrow I in the fifth and sixth centuries is pervasive in Perso-Arabic sources. From the time of King Wahrām Gūr to Kawād I and to Khosrow I, all either are said to have mothers from dehqān lineage, or have sayings about the care of the dehqāns.53 The dehqāns then became a stabilizing source for the state, and they cared for the existing culture and tradition of Sasanian Iran. Ferdowsı̄, the famous writer, was indeed a dehqān who recognized the end of the existing order at hand and put into rhyme the history of Iran’s past for posterity. The Modern Study of Mazdak as a Socialist It is was with Theodor Nöldeke’s translation in 1879 of Tabarı̄’s history that substantial attention was given to Mazdak. Nöldeke was the first to discuss Mazdak’s movement in relation to socialism.54 In 1906 Edward G. Browne, in another influential work on the literary history of Iran, mentioned Mazdakism in passing as a community when speaking of the famous Iranian statesman and bureaucrat Nizām ul-Mulk (1018–92) during the Seljuk period.55 No doubt 52 A. Tafazzolı̄, Sasanian Society (New York: Bibliotheca Persica Press, 2000), p. 40. 53 Ibid., pp. 41–3. 54 T. Nöldeke, Geschichte der Perser und Araber zur Zeit der Sasaniden aus der arabischen Chronik des Tabari. Übersetzt und mit ausführlichen Erläuterungen und Ergänzungen Versehn (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1879), p. 459. 55 E. G. Browne, A Literary History of Persia, vol. I (London: Psychology Press, 1906; reprint 1988), p. 214. 51 C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM 52 [37–55] touraj daryaee Nizām ul-Mulk, who probably had access to a book on Mazdak (Mazdaknāmag),56 provided lessons from history for the ruler of his time, teaching how to deal with heresies and adversaries of the Seljuk state.57 This was followed by a small work by the Iranist Otto G. von Wesendonk, who was one of the first scholars to see the Mazdakite movement as a revolution from above, rather than a mass revolt.58 But among Persian circles in Iran Mazdak was also a figure of interest because of two works. The first, perhaps the first academic study of Mazdak, titled ‘Bolshevism in Ancient Iran’, was written by Mohammad-Ali Jamalzadeh in 1920.59 Obviously, the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia in 1917 had made its impact on Iran and Iranians, although Jamalzadeh was writing in Berlin, a place equally impacted by Vladimir Lenin and Russia. However, it was Arthur Christensen’s short book on the reign of Kawād I (1925) that popularized the notion that Mazdak, the Zoroastrian priest of the late fifth to early sixth centuries, had been a ‘communist’.60 The book was translated from French into Persian in the late 1920s, but with the coup of Mohammad Reza Shah in 1921 and his coronation in 1925, the anti-leftist sentiment of the government did not even allow the book to have its title printed in Persian and, although it has been continuously republished in Iran ever since, the term ‘communism’ has been deleted from its title.61 One may suggest that Christensen himself, belonging to a middle-class family in Denmark and working as a teacher and journalist, was keenly interested in class politics and so became an early scholar of Iran in order to research such issues.62 The peasant revolt of antiquity had left its mark on European orientalists, as they were also seeing similar revolts in their own time.63 Thus the interest in Mazdak became intense, especially after the Russian Revolution. The famous Russian orientalist Vasilii Barthold had written his first piece in St 56 Important details are provided on Mazdak which could only have come from the now lost text of Mazdak-nāmag. See Nizām ul-Mulk, Siyar al-mulūk [00000 00000], ed. M. Este’lamı̄ (Tehran: Negār Publishers, 2011), pp. 257–73. 57 S. J. Tabatabai, The History of Iranian Political Thought (Tehran: Mēnu-ye Kherad Publisher, 2015), p. 172. 58 O. G. von Wesendonk, ‘Die Mazdakiten. Eine kommunistisch-religiöse Bewegung im Sassanidenreich’, Der Neue Orient 6 (1919), pp. 35–41. 59 M.-A. Jamalzadeh, ‘Bolševism dar Irān-e qadim’ [Bolshevism 00000 Iran 00000], Kāveh 38 (1920), pp. 5–10. 60 A. Christensen, Le règne du roi Kawadh I et le communisme mazdakite (Copenhagen: Host & Son, 1925). 61 A. Birshak, ‘Preface’, in The Reign of Qobad and the Appearance of Mazdak (Tehran: Tahūrı̄, 1995), pp. 7–8. 62 J. Asmussen, ‘Christensen, Arthur Emanuel’, in Yarshater (ed.), Encyclopaedia Iranica, vol. V, Part 5 (1991), pp. 521–3. 63 H. Yilmaz, National Identities in Soviet Historiography: The Rise of Nations under Stalin (London and New York: Routledge, 2015), p. 39. 52 C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM 53 [37–55] Mazdak and Late Antique ‘Socialism’ Petersburg on social movements in Iran,64 and would make an important contribution on Mazdak for the Great Soviet Encyclopedia.65 Three other scholars from the communist sphere must be mentioned, as they had a significant impact on the historiography of Mazdak as an alleged socialist. The first is Nina Viktorovna Pigulevskaia, whose several works contributed to the study of late antique Iranian society and economy,66 and more specifically that of Mazdak.67 Ilia Pavlovich Petrushevskii also contributed significantly to the social history of Iran, Mazdak, and early Islam.68 Otakar Klíma was a Czech scholar who wrote two major books on Mazdak, presenting him not just as a revolutionary who brought social change, but also as the subject of damnatio memoriae in the Sasanian historiographical tradition.69 The works of these three authors were also translated into Persian, which engendered a political movement during the Pahlavi regime (1925–79) based around Mazdak and his name. In the minds of the intellectuals of the time, Mazdak appeared as a socialist whose aspirations for Iran in late antiquity had been the same as those of the contemporary left. Even in Algeria, Mazdak was considered a revolutionary.70 Hence, Mazdak became known as a socialist or communist among the Iranian intelligentsia, and his stories could be used 64 All of the works of Soviet bloc scholarship on Mazdak that follow have been gathered by Ognibene and Gariboldi, Conflitti sociali e movimenti politico-religiosi; and V. Barthold, ‘K istorii krestianskikh dvzhenii v Persii’ [On the History of Peasant Movements in Persia], in Iz dalekogo i blizkogo proshlogo. Sbornik etiudokh iz vseobshchei istorii v chest 50-letiia nauchnoi zhizni [In the Distant and Near Past: Collection of Sketches from World History in Honour of the Fiftieth Anniversary of Scientific Life] (Petrograd and Moscow: N. I. Kareea Moskava, 1923), pp. 54–62. 65 V. Barthold, ‘K voprosu o feodalizme v Irane’ [On the Issue of Feudalism in Iran], Novyi Vostok [New East] 28 (1930), pp. 108–16. 66 N. V. Pigulevskaia, ‘K voprosu o podatnoi reforme Chosroia Anushirvana’ [On the Issue of Khosroy Anushirvan’s Tax Reform], Vestnik Drevnei Istorii [Herald of Ancient History] 1 (1937), pp. 143–54. 67 N. V. Pigulevskaia, ‘Mazdakitskoe dvizhenie’ [The Mazdakite Movement], Izvestiia Akademii Nauk SSSR, seriia istorii i filosofii [News of the USSR Academy of Sciences, History and Philosophy Series] 4 (1944), pp. 171–81; N. V. Pigulevskaia, ‘Ideia ravenstva v uchenii mazdakitov’ [The Idea of Equality in Mazdakite Teachings], in Iz istorii sotsial’no-politicheskikh idei. Sbornik statei k semidesiatiletiiu akademika V [From the History of Socio-Political Ideas: A Collection of Articles Dedicated to the Seventieth Anniversary of Academician V] (Moscow: Volgina, 1955), pp. 97–101. 68 I. P. Petrushevskii, ‘K istorii mazdakitov v epokhu gospodstva islama’ [From the History of the Mazdakites in the Era of Islamic Domination], Narody Afriki i Azii [The Peoples of Africa and Asia] 5 (1970), pp. 71–81. 69 O. Klíma, Mazdak. Geschichte einer sozialen Bewegung im Sassanidischen Persien (Prague: Československe Akademie Ved., 1957), and more importantly his Beiträge zur Geschichte des Mazdakismus (Prague: Československe Akademie Ved., 1977). 70 D. Ide, ‘Who’s Afraid of Mazdak? Prophetic Egalitarianism, Islamism, and Socialism’, Hampton Institute (2016), www.hamptonthink.org/read/whos-afraid-of-mazdakprophetic-egalitarianism-islamism-and-socialism. 53 C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM 54 [37–55] touraj daryaee for their own struggle. It is interesting that the debates around social movements and peasants’ rights in Iran in the 1960s coincided with Reza Shah’s White Revolution, which was an attempt to break the power of the large landowners and redistribute land to the landless Dehghāns, a term which by now meant not a member of the landed gentry but a landless peasant. The White Revolution from the top was meant to annul any chances of a Red Revolution from below71 – the king himself could break the power of the land-owning elite in Iran. Needless to say, the endeavour was a failure, and the landless peasants and the poor poured into shanty towns around the major cities. In 1979 they staged another revolution, around another religious cleric. Conclusion How should we contextualize Mazdak and his beliefs? What really happened in late antique Iran?72 Was Mazdak a revolutionary priest who started a social movement under the guise of a religious interpretation of the Avesta, or did the king use this priest to force through reforms in the name of Zoroastrianism?73 Was Mazdak a powerful confidant, what is known in Middle Persian as a counsellor (andarzgar), who manipulated King Kawād I so that the poor and downtrodden could have their way? Or was it simply a religious–scholastic reinterpretation of laws relating to marriage and property that brought a proto-socialist movement to the fore, which then stayed alive in various religious movements during the Islamic period?74 No doubt any movement in late antiquity tended to take place against a religious background.75 Hence, Mazdak should be seen as someone whose religious power allowed for his dictums to be taken seriously by the masses, as well as by the king. Otherwise, the Mazdakite movement would have not gathered such force, nor would it have had a lasting effect on Iranian and Near Eastern society. The question is whether his ideas were inspired by 71 E. Abrahamian, A History of Modern Iran (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018), p. 134. 72 All the possible answers have been posited by the excellent chapter by G. Gnoli, ‘Nuovi studi sul Mazdakismo’, in Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei (ed.), La Persia e Bisanzio. Atti dei convegni Lincei 201 (Rome: Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, 2004), pp. 439–56. 73 Daryaee, Sasanian Persia, p. 29. 74 G. H. Sadighi, Les mouvements religieux iraniens au II e et au I II e siècle de l’hégire (Paris: Les Presses Modernes, 1938); Crone, ‘Kavād’s heresy and Mazdak’s revolt’. 75 Z. Rubin, ‘Mass Movements in Late Antiquity’, in I. Malkin and Z. Rubinsohn (eds.), Leaders and Masses in the Roman World: Studies in Honor of Zvi Yavetz (Mnemosyne supplement 139) (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 1995), pp. 187–91. 54 C:/ITOOLS/WMS/CUP-NEW/37465140/WORKINGFOLDER/VANDER-VOL-1-RG/9781108481342C01.3D 21.2.2022 4:16PM 55 [37–55] Mazdak and Late Antique ‘Socialism’ gnostic and earlier religious ideas of a man by the same name,76 or was this Mazdak’s new interpretation (zand) of Zoroastrian law? All of these are real possibilities. However, after a century of scholarship, because of the nature of primary sources on the Sasanian period, specifically their being a product of post-Sasanian periods, it is still difficult to sift fact from fiction and come to a decisive conclusion. Since most sources are mainly compilations from a later period, they tend to present a confusing timeline and details. But what can be said with some certainty is that, in the aftermath of the Mazdakite movement, there were robust economic and military reforms, which in turn allowed for some social reform. These reforms in turn reduced the societal pressures that had brought danger to the well-being of the Sasanian state. The reforms brought new societal allies for the Sasanian Empire, not simply the nobility who at one time considered themselves the upper crust of Ērānšahr, but also smaller land-owners (dehqāns) and tribal groups who entered the military and brought new modes of state solidarity. The reforms also brought a more equitable form of taxation77 and, most importantly for the Sasanian Empire, a firm grasp on its territory as a centralized state of late antiquity. Mazdak may have become a story of the past, but his influence allowed for major changes, and the man in the flesh became a case study for statecraft in Medieval Persian Fürstenspiegel. Further Reading de Blois, François, ‘A New Look at Mazdak’, in Teresa Bernheimer and Adam Silverstein (eds.), Late Antiquity: Eastern Perspectives (Exeter: E. J. W. Gibb Memorial Trust, 2012), pp. 13–24. Crone, Patricia, ‘Zoroastrian communism’, Comparative Studies in Society and History 36, 3 (July 1994), pp. 447–62. Daryaee, Touraj, Sasanian Persia: The Rise and Fall of an Empire (London: I. B. Tauris, 2013). Shaki, Mansour, ‘The social doctrine of Mazdak in the light of Middle Persian evidence’, Archív Orientální 46, 4 (1978), pp. 289–306. Yarshater, Ehsan, ‘Mazdakism’, in The Cambridge History of Iran, vol. III, The Seleucid, Parthian and Sasanian periods, Part 2 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), pp. 991–1024. 76 F. de Blois, ‘Mazdak the Ancient and Mazdak the Last: further remarks on the history and religious typology of Mazdakism’, Studia Iranica 53 (2015), pp. 141–53. 77 Gariboldi, Il regno di Xusraw, pp. 34–5. 55