Persia from the Earliest Period to the Arab

HISTORY OF PERSIA. 1$!
their exclusion from the higher offices of the state,
which the Arsacidae jealously maintained for their
own families and immediate followers ;
while they may
also have felt that a nation, who had given to the world
a Cyrus and a Darius, deserved some special preeminence.
The Parthians could have had no inherent
claim to the exclusive rule of Western Asia, and must,
therefore, always have maintained their position by the
mere force of arms : on the other hand, the Magi,
as representing the faith of Zoroaster, would have
had but little influence in Parthia, even if they had
not been repressed by the strong arm of the civil
power.
Again, the effect of the battle of Nisibis, though
one of victory to the Arsacidae, must really have
been a source of weakness to them, or Artabanus
would have at once followed it up by the destruc-
tion of Macrinus' army rather than by the cession of
Mesopotamia to the Romans. It is further noteworthy
that Moses of Chorene remarks that, at the
same time, two princes of the house of Arsaces, who
dwelt in Bactria, were at feud with the reigning
monarch.
It has been supposed by
some that the Ardashir
who raised the standard of revolt was himself a Ma-
gus, and therefore directly bound to exert himself to
the utmost in the defence of his own faith. On the
other hand, Herodian asserts that he was at the
time the tributary ruler of Persis. The earlier
writers as Gibbon, and Malcolm, have taken the former
view, Professor Rawlinson the latter. Perhaps all
that is really certain on this subject is, that he was