Newsletters > Newsletter 4
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New Website
Roshan Grant
Sasanika Workshop
ISIS in LA
Lecture Series
New Publications
Obituary |
Sasanika is dedicated to the promotion of research and study on the history of the Sasanian dynasty. It is the aim of Sasanika: Late Antique Near East Project to bring to light the importance of the Sasanian civilization in the context of late antique and world history. Although most of our team members volunteer their time to maintain the site, the production of high-quality articles and the support of research projects require funding. It is through the generosity of Sasanian enthusiasts and those interested in the history of pre-Islamic Iran that Sasanika thrives. Please consider joining us.
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During the past year we have been working on overhauling our old website and making it an improved and user friendly website. Marcie Hauge at the School of Humanities and Social Science at the UC Irvine along with Haleh Emrani and Khodadad Rezakhani have been the main people behind this project. Sara Mashayekh and Alan Farahani have provided new content for the website. We wish to thank them for their time and effort.
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We are pleased to announce that the Roshan Cultural Heritage Institute has provided a three year grant to Sasanika in order to carry out its publication, both electronic, as well as printed books and occasional papers. The grant will also enable us to solicit articles from international scholars outside of the United States. |
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On February 26, 2010 a workshop was convened at UC Irvine addressing the issue of Late Antiquity and Iran. The invited guest was Parvaneh Pourshariati of Ohio State University. Other participants included Touraj Daryaee (UC Irvine); Michael Morony (UCLA); Thomas Sizgorich (UC Irvine); and Jennifer Rose (Stanford University). These talks were followed by a round-table discussion which included Gregory Areshian (UCLA); Kevin Van Bladel (USC), and Khodadad Rezakhani (UCLA/LSE) among others who were present.
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In May 2010 papers were delivered by Sasanika members at the ISIS Conference in Los Angeles. The panels and papers dealing with the Sasanian world included a pre-organized panel by Sasanika entitled: Myth, Epic, and Kinship in Iranian Antiquity and was chaired by Touraj Daryaee, University of California, Irvine.
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Professor Prods Oktor Skjærvø, Agha Khan Professor in Iranian at Harvard University was invited to UC Irvine to give two lectures on Sasanian Iran:
- The Decipherment of the Sasanian Inscriptions and Cracking the Cuneiform Code
- The 3rd-century Sasanian High Priest Kerdir and His Defense of The Faith
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As part of Sasanika’s publication projects, two series, entitled the Sasanika Series and the Sasanika Monograph Series have been launched. The third volume in these series, Andrea Gariboldi’s Sasanian Coinage and History: The Civic Numismatic Collection of Milan, has recently been released. There are also a number of articles published as Sasanika Occasional Papers and on-line articles under the e-Sasanika series.
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Ze’ev Rubin, Professor of ancient history at the University of Tel Aviv passed away. He was the foremost expert in Sasanian historiography and had written some of the most important articles on the fiscal reforms of Khusro I, Sasanian Military and Roman-Sasanian relations. What stood out the most was Rubin’s kindness to his colleagues and students. A warm and helpful scholar, he was universally loved and will be sorely missed. |
On February 26, 2010 a workshop was convened at UC Irvine addressing the issue of Late Antiquity and Iran. The invited guest was Parvaneh Pourshariati of Ohio State University. Other participants included Touraj Daryaee (UC Irvine); Michael Morony (UCLA); Thomas Sizgorich (UC Irvine); and Jennifer Rose (Stanford University). These talks were followed by a round-table discussion which included Gregory Areshian (UCLA); Kevin Van Bladel (USC), and Khodadad Rezakhani (UCLA/LSE) among others who were present. The roundtable was made possible through the generosity of Dr. Keyvan Safdari and Haleh Emrani and the Howard C. Baskerville Chair in the History of Iran and the Persianate World. The Dr. Samuel M. Jordan Center for Persian Studies and Culture was the sponsor of the roundtable. The proceedings of the roundtable was recorded and will be available as a podcast on the new and improved Sasanika website.
 Morony, Sizgorich, Emrani, Pourshariati, Daryaee, Farahani, Rezakhani
In May 2010 papers were delivered by Sasanika members at the ISIS Conference in Los Angeles. The panels and papers dealing with the Sasanian world included a pre-organized panel by Sasanika entitled: Myth, Epic, and Kinship in Iranian Antiquity and was chaired by Touraj Daryaee, University of California, Irvine. The panelists and papers were: Matthew Canepa (University of Minnesota), “Iranian Kingship in Global Context and as a Global Commodity between Alexander and Islam,” Khodadad Rezakhani (UCLA) “Prosopography of the Late Sasanian Empire: Sasanian Elite After the Reforms,” and Sara Mashayekh (University of California, Irvine), “Ancestry and the Myth of Royal Origins: the Sasanian Royal Identity as Reflected in Karnamag-i Ardaxshir-i Pabagan.”
 Canepa Rezakhani Mashayekh
Haleh Emrani (UCLA) also presented a paper entitled “Family Law in the Religious Communities of the Late Sasanian Empire: Indicator of Social Change and Continuity.” Another organized panel was entitled Debate, Dialect, Magic and Discourse in Late Antique Iran and was chaired by Touraj Daryaee, University of California, Irvine. The presenters and papers were: Charles G. Häberl (Rutgers, State University of New Jersey)
“Aramaic Incantation Bowls and Late Sasanian Mesopotamia,” Kevin van Bladel, (University of Southern California) “Arabic Testimonies Concerning Western Iranian Dialects,” Yuhan S.-D. Vevaina (Harvard University) “The Zoroastrian Communities’ Response to Islam: Text, Debates and Interaction,” and Samuel Secunda (Hebrew University) “Talmudic and Middle Persian Texts in Late Antiquity: Common Challenges and Discourse.”
Professor Prods Oktor Skjærvø, Agha Khan Professor in Iranian at Harvard University was invited to UC Irvine to give two lectures on Sasanian Iran. On June 2 and 3, 2010 Professor Skjærvø spoke on the decipherment of Sasanian inscriptions and on the following day he gave a lecture on the Zoroastrian priest Kerdir who lived in the third century CE and who made a journey to the heaven. Prof. Skjærvø also visited the Center for Persian Studies and provided suggestions to improve the Sasanika program.
 Vahidi, Rose, Mousavi, Skjærvø, Daryaee, Vevaina
The third volume of Sasanika books was published in form of Andrea Gariboldi’s Sasanian Coinage and History: The Civic Numismatic Collection of Milan,Mazda Publishers, 2010. This book provides an historical review, as well as outline of the criteria considered in the study of the collection, before embarking upon a study of Sasanian numismatics and art history. One of the central points of analysis is the question of the royal crowns. Sasanian crowns, unique to each king, were influenced by both the tradition of the Fratarakas, the local rulers of Persis, and the Parthians. They eventually developed to a typical Sasanian “decorated cap”, surmounted by a high “korymbos”. Specific iconographic representations such as diadems with long ribbons, as well as astral representations in form of dotted rims related to Zoroastrianism are also studied in the volume. Technical matters such as coin weight standards and the study of mints are further considered. Particular attention is paid to the forging of an Iranian identity, observable from the coins and evidenced by the exclusive use of the Pahlavi script. The publication was made possible through a grant from the Adel Aali Foundation.
The fourth volume of the Sasanika book series will belong to Negin Miri’s Historical Geography of Fars, Mazda Publisher, 2011. The contents of the book are: I. Sources; II) Administrative Geography; III) Historical Geography and IV) Settlements and Communication Networks. The publication is made possible through a grant from the Roshan Cultural Heritage Institute.
Through a three year grant from the Roshan Cultural Heritage Foundation, Sasanika will be able to publish both in print and electronically articles related to the late antique Iranian world. We are glad to announce the publication of the first two volumes under the auspices of the Samuel Jordan Center for Persian Studies & Culture. The first volume was by M. Morony (UCLA) and the second volume by T. Greenwood (St Andrew) on the Sasanians in the context of late antique history and the importance of Armenian
sources for the period.
The new e-sasanika articles include Gail M. Taylor’s The Physicians of Jundishapur (e-sasanika 11) which is a study of the historiography of the Jundishapur medical center, and Touraj Daryaee and Keyvan Safdari’s Spāhbed Bullae: The Barakat Collection (e-sasanika 12). The Barakat gallery was kind enough to supply the photographs to publish this important collection of bulla belonging to various Sasanian generals. E-Sasanika 13 will be Matteo Compareti’s The State of Research on Sasanian Painting. |
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