Rashidun
The Fall of Ctesiphon
The Sasanian capital and the great arch of Khosrow taken, al-Mada'in, 16-21 AH
16-21 AH / 637-642 CE
Educational historical reconstructionWhere
Ctesiphon (al-Mada'in), on the Tigris south of later Baghdad, Iraq
33.0908, 44.5808 · View on OpenStreetMap
Background
The fall of the Sasanian imperial capital at Ctesiphon, known to the Arabs as al-Mada'in, "the cities," for the cluster of settlements on both banks of the Tigris south of the later site of Baghdad, was the symbolic end of the Persian empire that had ruled Iran and Iraq for four centuries. The principal Sunni accounts are in al-Tabari's Tarikh, al-Baladhuri's Futuh al-Buldan, al-Dinawari's al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, and Ibn al-Athir's al-Kamil, with the topography in Yaqut's Mu'jam al-Buldan. After the decisive defeat of the Sasanian field army at al-Qadisiyya, conventionally dated to 15-16 AH (636-637 CE), the Muslim army under Sa'd ibn Abi Waqqas (radiyallahu 'anhu) advanced on the capital. The emperor Yazdegerd III withdrew eastward with his court, abandoning Ctesiphon, and the city with its great palace fell to the Muslims around 16 AH (637 CE). The booty of al-Mada'in became proverbial in the tradition: the immense jewelled royal carpet, the "Spring of Khosrow" (Bahar-i Kisra), was divided among the soldiers, and the spoils were sent in their fifth to the caliph 'Umar ibn al-Khattab (RA) in Madinah. The towering brick audience-hall of the palace, the Taq Kasra, the iwan of Khosrow, with the widest single-span unreinforced brick vault of antiquity, was left standing and survives in part to this day. Ctesiphon's fall did not end the war at once: Sasanian resistance continued until the "Victory of Victories" (Fath al-Futuh) at Nahavand, conventionally 21 AH (642 CE), after which organised imperial resistance in the Iranian plateau collapsed and Yazdegerd III became a fugitive, to be killed near Marw in 31 AH (651 CE). This scene depicts the aftermath at the great arch, the emptied imperial hall, the inventory of the spoils, the extinguished fire-altars of the Zoroastrian state, across the years 16-21 AH in which the oldest of the two great empires bordering Arabia passed away.
What you see
A single colossal pointed-vault hall of bare baked brick opens toward the river, the Taq Kasra, the audience-iwan of the Sasanian palace, the largest single-span unreinforced brick vault of the ancient world. Its sheer scale and its plain brick fabric mark Sasanian imperial Persia, not Roman stone nor Arab mud brick.
A broad, swift river runs past the palace front on a flat alluvial plain, the Tigris, below the later site of Baghdad. The twin-city sprawl on both banks is al-Mada'in, "the cities," the Arabic name for the Sasanian capital complex of Ctesiphon and its neighbours.
The great hall stands open and emptied, its hangings stripped and its court fled. The scene is the aftermath of capture: the imperial residence taken, the Sasanian emperor Yazdegerd III withdrawn eastward, the throne-city in the hands of the Muslim army.
The famous spoils of the palace are being inventoried, among them, the tradition recounts, the vast jewelled royal carpet known as the "Spring of Khosrow" (Bahar-i Kisra), cut into shares; the booty of al-Mada'in is one of the most celebrated of the early conquests.
Fire-altars and the apparatus of the Zoroastrian state cult, now extinguished, mark this as the heart of imperial Persia, the religious-political centre of the Sasanian world, not a Byzantine Christian or an Arabian city.
The light is the dusty gold of the Iraqi river-plain. The capture of the capital followed the decisive battle of al-Qadisiyya and opened the years (16-21 AH) in which Sasanian resistance collapsed, the "Victory of Victories" at Nahavand sealing the end of the empire in Iran.
Primary sources
al-Tabari, Tarikh al-Rusul wa-al-Muluk (10th c.): The principal connected narrative of al-Qadisiyya, the advance on al-Mada'in, the flight of Yazdegerd III, and the division of the spoils including the great carpet. The Sunni gatekeeper of the conquest reports.
al-Baladhuri, Futuh al-Buldan (9th c.): Early Sunni conquest history. Independent summary of the fall of al-Mada'in and the settlement of Iraq; a check on al-Tabari's fuller account.
Further reading & cross-references
al-Dinawari, al-Akhbar al-Tiwal (9th c.): Early historical compendium with strong coverage of Iranian affairs. Used as a cross-reference for the Sasanian collapse, the role of Yazdegerd III, and the sequence from Qadisiyya to Nahavand.
Yaqut al-Hamawi, Mu'jam al-Buldan (13th c.): Standard Sunni geographical dictionary. Used for al-Mada'in / Ctesiphon, the position on the Tigris relative to Baghdad, and the descriptions of the White Palace and the Taq.
Standing fabric of the Taq Kasra at Ctesiphon (extant): The great brick iwan still stands (in part; one flank collapsed in modern times and has been partly restored) at Salman Pak south of Baghdad. The primary material constraint on the reconstruction, bare baked brick, pointed parabolic vault, no Roman stone orders, no later Islamic dome or minaret.
Michael Morony, Iraq after the Muslim Conquest (1984); Hugh Kennedy, The Great Arab Conquests (2007): Modern non-confessional academic syntheses. Used for the strategic and administrative framing of the fall of Ctesiphon and the transition of Iraq from Sasanian to Muslim rule.
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