Aspad Gushnasp ( fa, اسپد گشنسپ), known as Gousdanaspa in

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...

sources, was an

Iranian Iranian may refer to: * Iran, a sovereign state * Iranian peoples, the speakers of the Iranian languages. The term Iranic peoples is also used for this term to distinguish the pan ethnic term from Iranian, used for the people of Iran * Iranian lan ...

commander (''

hazarbed ''Hazārbed'' (Middle Persian: ḥčʾlpt, or ''hazarbadh'', literally "the commander of thousand"), also known as ''hazaruft''/''hazaraft'' (Middle Persian: hz’lwpt; possibly the older/original form), was a Sasanian office which initially functi ...

'') of the

Sasanian The Sasanian () or Sassanid Empire, officially known as the Empire of Iranians (, ) and also referred to by historians as the Neo-Persian Empire, was the last Iranian empire before the early Muslim conquests of the 7th-8th centuries AD. Named ...

royal guard A royal guard is a group of military bodyguards, soldiers or armed retainers responsible for the protection of a royal person, such as the emperor or empress, king or queen, or prince or princess. They often are an elite unit of the regular arm ...

, who played a key role in the overthrow of the last great Sasanian king (

shah Shah (; fa, شاه, , ) is a royal title that was historically used by the leading figures of Iranian monarchies.Yarshater, EhsaPersia or Iran, Persian or Farsi, ''Iranian Studies'', vol. XXII no. 1 (1989) It was also used by a variety of ...

)

Khosrow II Khosrow II (spelled Chosroes II in classical sources; pal, 𐭧𐭥𐭮𐭫𐭥𐭣𐭩, Husrō), also known as Khosrow Parviz (New Persian: , "Khosrow the Victorious"), is considered to be the last great Sasanian king (shah) of Iran, ruling fr ...

() and the enthronement of the latter's son, Kavad II Sheroe.

Biography

Aspad Gushnasp was native of

Gor Gor () is the fictional setting for a series of sword and planet novels written by philosophy professor John Lange, writing as John Norman. The setting was first described in the 1966 novel ''Tarnsman of Gor''. The series is inspired by science f ...

, a city in the district of

Ardashir-Khwarrah Ardashir-Khwarrah (Middle Persian: ''Arđaxšēr-Xwarra'', meaning "glory of Ardashir") was one of the four (later five) administrative divisions of the Sasanian province of Pars. The other administrative divisions were Shapur-Khwarrah, Istakhr an ...

in the

Pars Pars may refer to: * Fars Province of Iran, also known as Pars Province * Pars (Sasanian province), a province roughly corresponding to the present-day Fars, 224–651 * ''Pars'', for ''Persia'' or ''Iran'', in the Persian language * Pars News A ...

province. He was reportedly a foster brother of Sheroe. There are various versions of his name and title in several sources; his name is given as Asfad Jushnas by

al-Tabari ( ar, أبو جعفر محمد بن جرير بن يزيد الطبري), more commonly known as al-Ṭabarī (), was a Muslim historian and scholar from Amol, Tabaristan. Among the most prominent figures of the Islamic Golden Age, al-Tabari ...

, and was the "head of an army division"; his name is given as Astad Kushnash by

Ali ibn al-Athir Abū al-Ḥasan ʿAlī ibn Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad ash-Shaybānī, better known as ʿAlī ʿIzz ad-Din (Arabic), Dīn Ibn al-Athīr al-Jazarī ( ar, علي عز الدین بن الاثیر الجزري) lived 1160–1233) was an Arab people, ...

; Yazdan Jushnas by

Dinavari Abū Ḥanīfa Aḥmad ibn Dāwūd Dīnawarī ( fa, ابوحنيفه دينوری; died 895) was a Persian Islamic Golden Age polymath, astronomer, agriculturist, botanist, metallurgist, geographer, mathematician, and historian. Life Dinawa ...

, who states that he was "chief of secretaries"; Asfad Jushnas by

Bal'ami Abu Ali Muhammad Bal'ami ( fa, ابو علی محمد, d. 992-997 CE), also called Amirak Bal'ami () and Bal'ami-i Kuchak (, "Bal'ami the Younger"), was a 10th-century Persian historian, writer, and vizier to the Samanids. He was from the influen ...

, who calls him one of the ''mehtarān-e dabīrān'' ("chief secretaries"); Asfad Gushnasb by

al-Tha'alibi Al-Tha'alibi (961–1038), was a writer famous for his anthologies and collections of epigrams. As a writer of prose and verse in his own right, distinction between his and the work of others is sometimes lacking, as was the practice of writ ...

; Gousdanaspa in Byzantine sources, where he is often described as the leader or ''

'' of the Sasanian army, which seems more probable. What Aspad Gushnasp was called in his own day was ''Aspād-gušnasp'', a

Middle Persian Middle Persian or Pahlavi, also known by its endonym Pārsīk or Pārsīg () in its later form, is a Western Middle Iranian language which became the literary language of the Sasanian Empire. For some time after the Sasanian collapse, Middle Per ...

name. The origins of the name is obscure, it is most probably not derived from the

Parthian Parthian may be: Historical * A demonym "of Parthia", a region of north-eastern of Greater Iran * Parthian Empire (247 BC – 224 AD) * Parthian language, a now-extinct Middle Iranian language * Parthian shot, an archery skill famously employed by ...

''aspād'' ("army"). The office of ''hazarbed'' was given to reliable men, due to being the leader of the royal guard who protected the shah, and controlled the entrance of the shahs palace. This proved beneficial for Sheroe's plan to overthrow his father. On the night of 25 February, the night-watch of the Sasanian capital of

Ctesiphon Ctesiphon ( ; Middle Persian: 𐭲𐭩𐭮𐭯𐭥𐭭 ''tyspwn'' or ''tysfwn''; fa, تیسفون; grc-gre, Κτησιφῶν, ; syr, ܩܛܝܣܦܘܢThomas A. Carlson et al., “Ctesiphon — ܩܛܝܣܦܘܢ ” in The Syriac Gazetteer last modi ...

, which would usually shout the name of the reigning shah, shouted the name of Sheroe instead, which indicated a ''

coup d'état A coup d'état (; French for 'stroke of state'), also known as a coup or overthrow, is a seizure and removal of a government and its powers. Typically, it is an illegal seizure of power by a political faction, politician, cult, rebel group, m ...

'' was taking place. Sheroe, with Aspad Gushnasp leading his army, captured Ctesiphon and imprisoned Khosrow II in the house of a certain Mehr-Sepand (also spelled Maraspand). Sheroe, who had now assumed the dynastic name of Kavad II, then ordered Aspad Gushnasp to lead the charge of accusations against the deposed shah. Khosrow, however, dismissed all accusations one by one. Aspad Gushnasp was also later the main negotiator of the peace terms with the Byzantine emperor

Heraclius Heraclius ( grc-gre, Ἡράκλειος, Hērákleios; c. 575 – 11 February 641), was List of Byzantine emperors, Eastern Roman emperor from 610 to 641. His rise to power began in 608, when he and his father, Heraclius the Elder, the Exa ...

. A few months later, a devastating plague swept through the western Sasanian provinces, killing half of its population including Kavad II. He was succeeded by his eight year old son

Ardashir III Ardashir III ( pal, 𐭠𐭥𐭲𐭧𐭱𐭲𐭥, Ardašir; 62127 April 630) was the Sasanian King of Kings () of Iran from 6 September 628 to 27 April 630. Name ''Ardashir'' is the Middle Persian form of the Old Persian ''Ṛtaxšira'' (also s ...

, whilst Aspad Gushnasp was replaced by the powerful aristocrat

Piruz Khosrow Piruz Khosrow (Middle Persian: ''Pērōz Khusraw''), also known as Piruzan or Firuzan, was a powerful Persian aristocrat who was the leader of the ''Parsig'' (Persian) faction that controlled much of the affairs of the Sasanian Empire during the S ...

as ''hazarbed''. Aspad Gushnasp's fate after that is unknown.

References

Sources

* * * * * Generals of Kavad II Year of birth unknown 7th-century deaths 7th-century Iranian people People from Firuzabad, Fars {{s-end