Sassanid Empire

>What was their culture like?
Bizarre if not alien to us.
Smiths were of low rank and seen as dirty because they used the holy element of fire for profane work, ritual incest was a thing but also high moral standarts and a lot of freedoms for women in contrast to creative torture and executions as a means of punishment such as getting trampled by elephants.
They had friendly relations with india and china but loathed christians.
>Do modern Iranians see it in a positive light?
I guess only the few Zoroastrians that are left and maybe some of the liberal upperclass in the cities.
Most Iranians see it as a time of infedility and paganism rightfully ended by Islam.

>Why did Zoroastrians accept Muslim rule so easily?

Their priests were killed, their people decimated and their practizes forbidden and teir faith taxed high while the collectors were allowed to mock and abuse them as far as I know.

What's that thing the Savar Framandar is holding? A crossbow?

>loathed Christians
Uhm I'm pretty sure they didn't do that and there's was plenty of Christians in the empire.

It's the Osprey interpretation of a persian device that allowed them to loose several arrows in one shot. Romans mention it but don't describe how it worked.

Yes the "they loathed christians" thing is a meme. They "loathed" the romans because 1) they believed that roman asia, being part of the realm of Iraj belonged to his descendants the iranians and 2) they felt threatened by the romans just as the romans felt threatened by them, if not more.

When Constantine converted to christianity, christians became obvious targets. When nestorianism became considered heretic by the calcedonian romans, the persian monarch became protector of the nestorians and content of having them in the realm (the zoroastrian priests had a very different opinion though). Nestorianism was very extended in the empire by it's end.

And then there's that guy called Kartir who was a high priest and favourite of several weak monarchs, and boasts about killing smiting "Jews, Sramans (Buddhists), Brahmins, Nasoreans (Orthodox Christians), (Gnostic) Christians, Maktak (Baptisers), and Zandiks (Manichaeans)" and destroying idols. The zoroastrian priesthood of the period proved to be capable of getting pretty mental when kings gave them full rein.

Would you say it's accurate that they loathed the Roman state religion then? Iirc they did nasty things to churches in areas the conquered

>Their priests were killed, their people decimated and their practizes forbidden and teir faith taxed high while the collectors were allowed to mock and abuse them as far as I know.

This is true to an extent, but greatly exaggerated by Shia scholars/Iranian nationalists who wanted to paint Abu Bakr/Omar in a bad light

The fact of the matter is is that Iran did not become majority Muslim until well after the conquests, so clearly it wasn't comparable to Jews under Nazi Europe or anything.

The fact of the matter is, especially in this time period, is that joe blow was not as involved in politics as he is today. Usually they didn't give a fuck, they were too busy trying to make ends meet.

t.self hating Persian

What nasty things? The nastier thing I can think of was capturing the holy cross. The rest was not specifically against the conquered christians but just against a defeated people. They tried to get the monophysites of Egypt an Syria to their side.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babak_Khorramdin
Rest in peace Babak

I'm more partial to the Parthians

(You)

>Can we talk about the Sassanid Empire?
Sure.
>What was their culture like?
More or less similar to modern Persian culture ignoring the changes going from Zoroastrian to Islamic. Devout worship to the King and higher ranking nobles and grandees, freemen were allowed to have whatever jobs or professions they were skilled to undertake, we know that Sassanid merchants frequently used advertising of their products with colorful fabrics, dyes, and writings similar to what we'd find today in a normal supermarket, the general empire's opinion though was that others should be subservient to them.
>What was their system like?
A highly centralized and autocratic government headed by the Great King, King of Kings, with a viceroy as their second, crown princes and other male members of the King's family serving as ambassadors, governors, generals and other administrative or military roles. They were far more militaristic and aggressive then their Arsacid or Achaemenid forebearers, and yes they are heavily similar to feudalistic Europe: jousting was a common spectator sport that the Sassanids and Arsacids before them frequently held tournaments for, as well as unmounted combat on foot.
>How influential was it?
It was Rome and Byzantine's equal politically, economically, and militarily. Very heavily influential.
>Why did the Arabs conquer it so easily?
Why did the Arabs conqueror so much of Southern and Southwestern Europe so easily? And define easily. Because the Arabs spent roughly two decades fighting the weakened and exhausted Sassanids who had just concluded only a few years earlier a nearly 30 year long war of mutual destruction with the Byzantine/Eastern Roman Empire. And the year before the Arab invasion suffered a plague and flooding in their agricultural heartlands in Iraq that knocked off nearly half their population. And several areas in Iran and parts of Greater Iran held out for centuries without being conquered.

>Do modern Iranians see it in a positive light?
Yes, modern Iranians and Persians in particular are actually more familiar with the Parthian Empire of the Arsacid dynasty and the Persian Empire of the Sassanid dynasty then they are with the Achaemenid's Persian Empire. Its memory survived its destruction thanks to many educated Persians who carried the works and records of the Sassanids in their stories and books, as well as many of their monuments and cities developing into their modern successors today.

Modern Persian culture is drawn from the Sassanids, not the Achaemenids after all but they love both quite a lot from what I know.

>ritual incest
WHY WASNT I BORN IN THOSE TIMES

Its not incest because there's no taboo. Incest can only exist as a concept if its forbidden, which Sassanid culture did the opposite of though its nowhere near prevalent as you guys want to believe it was.

>Most Iranians see it as a time of infidelity and paganism rightfully ended by Islam.
>Most Iranians
Citation required.