Shahrbaraz

Shahrbaraz (Persian: شهربراز‎‎) or Shahrvaraz (Middle Persian: Šahrwarāz) (died 9 June 630) was king of the Sasanian Empire from 27 April 629 to 9 June 630. He usurped the throne from Ardashir III, and was killed by Sasanian nobles after forty days. Before usurping the Sasanian throne he was a general (spahbed) under Khosrau II (590–628). He is furthermore noted for his important role during the climactic Byzantine–Sasanian War of 602–628, and the events that followed afterwards. His name Shahrbaraz is actually an honorific title, and means "the Boar of the Empire", attesting to his dexterity in military command and his warlike person, as the boar was the animal associated with the Zoroastrian Izad Vahram, the epitome of victory.

Shahrbaraz belonged to the House of Mihran, one of the Seven Parthian clans; he was the son of a certain Ardashir. During Shahrbaraz's later life, he joined the Sasanian army, where he rose to high offices, and was appointed as spahbed of Nēmrōz. He was married to the sister of the Sasanian king Khosrau II, Mirhran, with whom Shahrbaraz had one boy named Shapur-i Shahrvaraz. Shahrbaraz also had another son named Niketas the Persian, who may be from the same woman or from another.

Shahrbaraz is first mentioned when Khosrau II started the last and most devastating of the Byzantine–Sasanian wars, which was going to last 26 years. Khosrau II, along with Shahrbaraz and his other best generals, conquered Dara and Edessa in 604, and in the north, the Byzantines were driven back to the old, pre-591 frontier before Khosrau II gave them most of Sasanian Armenia, parts of Mesopotamia and western half of the Kingdom of Iberia. After reconquering lost territory, Khosrau II withdrew from the battlefield and handed military operations to his best generals. Shahrbaraz was one of them. In 610, Heraclius, an Armenian of probable Arsacid descent, revolted against the Byzantine Emperor Phocas and killed him, crowning himself as Emperor of the Byzantine Empire. After becoming Byzantine Emperor, he prepared a major counter-attack against the Sasanians outside Antioch in 613, but was decisively defeated by Shahrbaraz, who inflicted heavy losses on the Byzantine army and then captured the city, giving the Sasanians naval access to the Mediterranean sea.