Mirian III
Mirian III ( Georgian მირიან III ) was a king of Iberia in the Caucasus from the Chosroids dynasty and a contemporary of the Roman emperor Constantine the Great .
According to Georgian sources from the early Middle Ages, Mirian was the first Christian king of Iberia. He was converted by the missionary Nino from Cappadocia . It is said that Mirian established Christianity as the state religion. Therefore he is venerated as a saint by the Georgian Apostle Church .
The traditional chronicles give Mirian's reign with 268-345, while the researcher Cyril Toumanoff gives 284-361; however, such a long reign is hardly likely. Mirian was known to the late ancient Roman historian Ammianus Marcellinus and also appears in Armenian sources from the Middle Ages.
Surname
The name Mirian is the Georgian form of the Iranian name Mihran . Other spellings in the Georgian sources are Mirean and Mirvan. Ammianus Marcellinus calls the king Meribanes in his works . In the Armenian sources from the 8th century the king is called Mihran. Since there were two kings of the same name before Mirian, the III. given as an ordinal number. Mirian does not appear in medieval sources as Mirian III, but simply as Mirian.
Origin of the dynasty
According to the medieval Georgian chronicle the lives of kings was Mirian a Persian prince, the daughter of the last Arsacid was married King Aspacur I. called Abeschura. After Aspacur's death, Mirian was installed as King of Iberia by his father, who appears in the sources as Chosroes Great King of Iran. This happened during the Sassanid rule in Iran; it is believed that the author of The Life of Kings assumed a relationship between Mirian and the Sassanids. Sassanid kings named Chosroes / Khosrow but emerge until much later (in the 6th and 7th centuries), so either the Georgian annals with the name of the Father Mirian wrong or the name of Chosroes as a general term that for King used was . Cyril Toumanoff assumed that the Chosroids were a branch of the noble Mihranids. These were one of the great seven families of Iran and distantly related to the Sassanids. The Georgian historian Giorgi Melikishvili, however, doubts the Iranian origin of the chosroids and sees them as a local dynasty that invented an exotic royal origin to increase their prestige. Another medieval work called The Conversion of Kartlien differs from The Life of Kings and claims that Mirian was the son of Lev. This lev does not appear in any other sources.
Domination
The Life of Kings gives a detailed account of Mirian's reign. As an Iranian vassal king he took part in the Sassanid war against Rome and was interested in the conquest of Armenia. In addition to these facts, things are also mentioned that must have been invented. Mirian is said to have been a candidate for the Iranian throne, who ruled Colchis and Albania and worked as far south as Syria. In the peace of Nisibis in 298 Rome got sovereignty over Armenia and Iberia, but Mirian remained king. Mirian quickly adapted to the new balance of power and built close ties to Rome. This bond was strengthened by his conversion to Christianity. Nevertheless, according to Ammianus Marcellinus, Emperor Constantius II is said to have sent embassies with many gifts to the kings Arsakes II of Armenia and Meribanes (i.e. Mirian III) of Iberia in 361 in order to secure their help against the Persians.
Conversion to Christianity
It is believed that Mirian became a Christian in 334 and that Christianity became Iberia's state religion in 337. He was one of the first kings to convert to Christianity. Legend has it that Mirian, who was a staunch pagan, was on the hunt when darkness fell on him and he was virtually blind. But the light did not return until Mirian had prayed to Nino's God. He later asked for an audience with Nino and soon after converted to Christianity. His second wife, Nana, also became a Christian.
His move fueled the growth of the central royal government. He confiscated the property of the pagan temples and distributed them to the nobles and the church. The sources report on the strong propagation of Christianity by the nobility and the church and the strong resistance of the mountain peoples. The Roman historian Rufinus of Aquileia reports that Mirian asked Emperor Constantine the Great to send priests. Constantine then sent priests and holy relics to Iberia. The Georgian sources report on the construction of the Svetitskhoveli Cathedral in Mtskheta at the behest of King Mirian and his pilgrimage to Jerusalem shortly before his death . According to tradition, Mirian III. and his wife Nana are buried in the Samtavro Church in Mtskheta, where their graves are still today.
family
The Georgian sources report two wives. The first wife, Princess Abeshura, who was a descendant of the Arsacids of Iberia and the Parnawasids , but, according to Toumanoff, died childless in 292 when Mirian was 15 years old. With her death, the last of the Parnawasids died. Mirian later married Nana, a daughter of Oligotos from Pontos . Together they had two sons named Rew and Varaz Bakur, also known as Aspacur II, and a daughter who was married to King Peroz of the Mihranid dynasty of Gogarene.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b David Marshall Lang (1956), Lives and legends of the Georgian saints , pp. 13-39. London: Allen & Unwin
- ↑ a b Archpriest Zakaria Machitadze (2006), "The Feast of the robe of our Lord, the Myrrh-streaming and Life-giving Pillar, Equals-to-the-Apostles King Mirian and Queen Nana, and Saints Sidonia and Abiatar (4th century) “ ( Memento of the original from March 6, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , in The Lives of the Georgian Saints on www.pravoslavie.ru
- ↑ a b c d Stephen H. Rapp (2003), Studies In Medieval Georgian Historiography: Early Texts And Eurasian Contexts , pp. 293–295. Peeters Publishers, ISBN 90-429-1318-5
- ↑ a b c Cyril Toumanoff (1967), Studies in Christian Caucasian History , pp. 83-84, 377. Georgetown University Press
- ^ Ronald Grigor Suny (1994): The Making of the Georgian Nation , p. 15. Indiana University Press, ISBN 0-253-20915-3 .
- ^ Noel Emmanuel Lenski: Failure of empire: Valens and the Roman state in the fourth century AD , p. 157. University of California Press 2002, ISBN 0-520-23332-8
- ↑ Ammian 21.6.
- ↑ a b Robert W. Thomson (1996), rewriting Caucasian History , p 83-90. Oxford University Press , ISBN 0-19-826373-2
- ^ Amidon, Philip R. (1997), The church history of Rufinus of Aquileia, books 10 and 11 , p. 48. Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-511031-5
- ^ Cyril Toumanoff: Chronology of the Early Kings of Iberia. Published in Traditio 25, pp. 21-23, 1969
| predecessor | Office | successor |
|---|---|---|
| Aspacures I. |
King of Iberia 284–361 |
Saurmag II. |
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Mirian III |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | first Iberian king from the Chosroids dynasty |
| DATE OF BIRTH | 3rd century |
| DATE OF DEATH | 4th century |