The Last Empire of Iran

"This handbook is a history of the Sasanian dynasty : the rulers of the last Iranian empire before the Arab conquests in the seventh century. Sasanian Iran (220s to AD 651) was the foremost power between Rome and the nomadic world of Inner Asia in Late Antiquity. The book covers the main features of Sasanian political and military history in the form of a narrative derived from the primary sources and the best modern scholarship. Apart from literary histories, this book brings together a great deal of archaeological and sigillographic evidence which has only recently come to light. The narrative is intended to be a clear and thorough presentation of the history of Iran in Late Antiquity without emphasis on scholarly debates or historiographical problems. But the book ranges widely throughout the lands ruled by the Sasanian dynasty, as well as those within the Iranian diplomatic and military field of view. The Caucasus, Inner Asia, China, the Arabian Peninsula, the Persian Gulf, the Indian Ocean, and the Roman empire loom large in the book. Iran emerges in the resultant narrative as far more diplomatically and militarily capable than is often assumed, and as the only state which Rome acknowledged first as an equal and at length as a superior."--taken from back cover.