Document Type : Original Article
Abstract
No revolutionary movement in Iranian Late Antiquity has attracted as much attention as the fascinating and enigmatic Mazdakite uprising of the late fifth century. The scholarly consensus about these has it that 1) they engaged in ibāḥat al-nisā, sharing of wives; 2) advocated the sharing of property and 3) that their past time was wine imbibing and merrymaking. I shall argue here that, as Shaki correctly suspected but did not pursue the topic, the description of the Mazdakite in our primary sources (the Letter of Tansar, Ibn Qutayba, Ṭabarī, Dīnkard, Shahrestānī), actually follows the praxis of the ʿayyārs, chivalrous men and women who practiced celibacy, lived together in communes of men and women, usually in underground cities, and drank wine as part of their sacral ritual. The detractors of the Mazdakites heaped on these accusations that distorted their realities, realities that on a populist level, and in times of crisis of the late fifth century might have in fact devolved into a distortion of the praxis of genuine Mithraists as well. That they continued, appropriate to their praxis, in the form of Khurramdīn movements is also part of their story. That they were launched as collaborators of the Parthian Mehrānids (notice the name), against the Parthian Kārenids who were suffocating the young Kavād during the last decade of the fifth century is also part of their fascinating history.
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