- Cambyses II[a] (d. 522 BC), son of Cyrus the Great (r. 559–530 BC), ruled the Achaemenid Empire. Cambyses' grandfather was Cambyses I, king of Anshan. Following Cyrus the Great's conquest of the Near East and Central Asia, Cambyses II further expanded the empire into Egypt during the Late Period by defeating the Egyptian Pharaoh Psamtik III during the battle of Pelusium in 525 BC. After the Egyptian campaign and the truce with Libya, Cambyses invaded the Kingdom of Kush (located in what is now the Sudan) but with little success.Though numerous scholars link Cambyses to the Sanskrit tribal name Kamboja there are also a few scholars who suggest an Elamite origin of the name.[12][13] Jean Przyluski had sought to find an Austric (Kol or Munda) affinity for Kamboja. Friedrich von Spiegel,[15] Sten Konow,[16] Ernst Herzfeld,[17] James Hope Moulton,[18] Wojciech Skalmowski and some other scholars[21] think that Kambūjiya is adjectival form of the Sanskrit tribal name Kamboja.
- https://www.quora.com/What-was-the-most-profitable-lie-ever-told-in-history As far as the primary sources are concerned, Cyrus the Great (r. 559–530 BC) had two sons: Cambyses (r. 530–522 BC) and Bardiya. The former succeeded him as King of Kings, while the latter was given governorship over the eastern provinces. Fearful of opposition, Cambyses had his brother assassinated, but kept it a secret. Then he undertook the campaign that ended up bringing Egypt into the Persian fold. While Cambyses was in Egypt, he started acting cruelly and erratically: suspected everyone, disrespected the local traditions and the sort. Then a rebellion broke out back in Persia led by a magus (Zoroastrian priest) named Gaumata. The man claimed to be Bardiya, and the people, ignorant of the latter’s death, flocked to his banner. It also helped that he took short-term populist measures such as tax cuts.Cambyses rushed home to quell the revolt, but died on the journey. His death was listed as an accident or even a suicide out of desperation for the usurpation. Gaumata got to rule as Bardiya and even took over the latter’s harem. Almost nobody suspected he was an impostor, because on top of everything else he also bore an uncanny physical resemblance to the dead prince.
- 高加米拉戰役 The Battle of Gaugamela (/ˌɡɔːɡəˈmiːlə/; Greek: Γαυγάμηλα), also called the Battle of Arbela (Greek: Ἄρβηλα), was the decisive battle of Alexander the Great's invasion of the Persian Achaemenid Empire. In 331 BC Alexander's army of the Hellenic League met the Persian army of Darius III near Gaugamela, close to the modern city of Dohuk in Iraqi Kurdistan. Though heavily outnumbered, Alexander emerged victorious due to his army's superior tactics and his deft employment of light infantry. It was a decisive victory for the Hellenic League and led to the fall of the Achaemenid Empire.In November 333 BC Darius III had lost the Battle of Issus, resulting in the capture of his wife, his mother and his two daughters, Stateira II and Drypetis. Darius had retreated to Babylon, where he regrouped his remaining army. The victory at Issus had given Alexander control of southern Asia Minor. Following a victory at the Siege of Tyre (332 BC), which lasted from January to July, Alexander controlled the Levant. After his victory at Gaza Persian troop counts were low and the Persian satrap of Egypt, Mazaeus, peacefully surrendered to Alexander.
- https://www.quora.com/Why-didnt-the-Persians-utilize-the-immortals-during-the-invasion-by-the-Macedonian-forces ???what are immortals????
The Parthian Empire (/ˈpɑːrθiən/; 247 BC – 224 AD), also known as the Arsacid Empire (/ˈɑːrsəsɪd/), was a major Iranian political and cultural power in ancient Iran and Iraq. Its latter name comes from Arsaces I of Parthia who, as leader of the Parni tribe, founded it in the mid-3rd century BC when he conquered the region of Parthia in Iran's northeast, then a satrapy (province) in rebellion against the Seleucid Empire. Mithridates I of Parthia (r. c. 171–138 BC) greatly expanded the empire by seizing Media and Mesopotamia from the Seleucids. At its height, the Parthian Empire stretched from the northern reaches of the Euphrates, in what is now central-eastern Turkey, to eastern Iran. The empire, located on the Silk Road trade route between the Roman Empire in the Mediterranean Basin and the Han Empire of China, became a center of trade and commerce.
The Parthians largely adopted the art, architecture, religious beliefs, and royal insignia of their culturally heterogeneous empire, which encompassed Persian, Hellenistic, and regional cultures. For about the first half of its existence, the Arsacid court adopted elements of Greek culture, though it eventually saw a gradual revival of Iranian traditions. The Arsacid rulers were titled the "King of Kings", as a claim to be the heirs to the Achaemenid Empire; indeed, they accepted many local kings as vassals where the Achaemenids would have had centrally appointed, albeit largely autonomous, satraps. The court did appoint a small number of satraps, largely outside Iran, but these satrapies were smaller and less powerful than the Achaemenid potentates. With the expansion of Arsacid power, the seat of central government shifted from Nisa to Ctesiphon along the Tigris (south of modern Baghdad, Iraq), although several other sites also served as capitals.
- [m&p] Parthian empire was replaced in ad224 by that of the sassanids from west persia (claimed descent from great dynasty of cyrus and darius). Sassanian empire lasted for 4 centuries, in which it was almost constantly at war with rival great power in the west. Shapar i, the 2nd sassanid ruler, took the title of king of kings of iran and non-iran.
- https://www.quora.com/Why-was-the-Parthian-empire-so-powerful
- people
The Saffarid dynasty (Persian: سلسله صفاریان) was a Muslim Persianate dynasty from Sistan that ruled over parts of eastern Iran, with its capital at Zaranj (a city now in southwestern Afghanistan). Khorasan, Afghanistan and Balochistan from 861 to 1003.[5] The dynasty, of Persian origin, was founded by Ya'qub bin Laith as-Saffar, born in 840 in a small town called Karnin (Qarnin), which was located east of Zaranj and west of Bost, in what is now Afghanistan - a native of Sistan and a local ayyar, who worked as a coppersmith (ṣaffār) before becoming awarlord. He seized control of the Sistan region and began conquering most of Iran and Afghanistan, as well as parts of Pakistan, Tajikestan and Uzbekistan.
The Safavid dynasty (/sɑːˈfɑːwiːd/ Persian:سلسلهٔ صفويان; Azerbaijani: Səfəvilər sülaləsi,صفويلر سولالهسى) was one of the most significant ruling dynasties of Persia(modern Iran) after the fall of the Sasanian Empire - following the Muslim conquest of Persia in the seventh century A.D., and "is often considered the beginning of modern Persian history". The Safavid shahs ruled over one of the so-called gunpowder empires, and they ruled one of the greatest Persian empires after the Muslim conquest of Persia and established the Twelver school of Shi'a Islam as the official religion of their empire, marking one of the most important turning points in Muslim history. The Safavid dynasty had its origin in theSafaviyya Sufi order, which was established in the city of Ardabil in theAzerbaijan region. It was of mixed ancestry (Kurdish and Azerbaijani, which included intermarriages with Georgian, Circassian, and Pontic Greek dignitaries). From their base in Ardabil, the Safavids established control over parts ofGreater Iran and reasserted the Iranian identity of the region, thus becoming the first native dynasty since the Sasanian Empire to establish a unified Iranian state.[30]The Safavids ruled from 1501 to 1722 (experiencing a brief restoration from 1729 to 1736) and, at their height, they controlled all of modern Iran, Azerbaijan,Bahrain and Armenia, most of Georgia, theNorth Caucasus, Iraq, Kuwait andAfghanistan, as well as parts of Turkey,Syria, Pakistan, Turkmenistan andUzbekistan. Despite their demise in 1736, the legacy that they left behind was the revival of Persia as an economic stronghold between East and West, the establishment of an efficient state and bureaucracybased upon "checks and balances", their architectural innovations and their patronage for fine arts. The Safavids have also left their mark down to the present era by spreading Shi'a Islam in Iran, as well as major parts of the Caucasus, Anatolia, andMesopotamia.
The Qajar dynasty (Persian: سلسله قاجار Selsele-ye Qājār; also romanised asGhajar, Kadjar, Qachar etc.; Azerbaijani:قاجارلار Qacarlar) was an Iranian[6] royal dynasty of Turkic origin, specifically from the Qajar tribe, which ruled Persia (Iran) from 1785 to 1925. The state ruled by the dynasty was officially known as the Sublime State of Iran (Persian: دولت علیّه ایران Dowlat-e Elliye ye Irān). The Qajar family took full control of Iran in 1794, deposing Lotf 'Ali Khan, the last of the Zand dynasty, and re-asserted Iranian sovereignty over large parts of the Caucasus and Central Asia. In 1796, Mohammad Khan Qajar seizedMashhad with ease,[14] putting an end to the Afsharid dynasty, and Mohammad Khan was formally crowned as shah after his punitive campaign against Iran's Georgian subjects. In the Caucasus, the Qajar dynasty permanently lost many of Iran's integral areas to the Russiansover the course of the 19th century, comprising modern-day Georgia, Dagestan,Azerbaijan, and Armenia.
巴列維王朝 The Pahlavi dynasty (Persian: دودمان پهلوی) was the last ruling house of the Imperial State of Iran from 1925 until 1979, when the Persian monarchy was overthrown and abolished as a result of the Iranian Revolution. The dynasty was founded by Reza Shah Pahlavi in 1925, a former brigadier-general of the Persian Cossack Brigade, whose reign lasted until 1941 when he was forced to abdicate by the Allies after the Anglo-Soviet invasion of Iran. He was succeeded by his son, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the last Shah of Iran. The Pahlavis came to power after Ahmad Shah Qajar, the last Qajar ruler of Iran, proved unable to stop British and Soviet encroachment on Iranian sovereignty, had his position extremely weakened by a military coup, and was removed from power by the parliament while in France. The Iranian parliament, known as the Majlis, convening as a Constituent Assembly on 12 December 1925, deposed the young Ahmad Shah Qajar, and declared Reza Khan the new King (Shah) of Imperial State of Persia. In 1935, Reza Shah asked foreign delegates to use the endonym Iran in formal correspondence and the official name the Imperial State of Iran was adopted.Following the coup d'état in 1953 supported by United Kingdom and the United States, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi's rule became more autocratic and was aligned with the Western Bloc during the Cold War . Faced with growing public discontent and popular rebellion throughout 1978 and after declaring surrender and officially resigning, the second Pahlavi went into exile with his family in January 1979, sparking a series of events that quickly led to the end of the state and the beginning of the Islamic Republic of Iran on 11 February 1979.
- An Shigao (安世高; Wade–Giles: An Shih-kao, Korean: An Sego, Japanese: An Seikō) (fl. c. 148-180 CE) was an early Buddhist missionary to China, and the earliest known translator of Indian Buddhist texts into Chinese. According to legend, he was a prince of Parthia, nicknamed the "Parthian Marquess", who renounced his claim to the royal throne of Parthia in order to serve as a Buddhist missionary monk in China.
The Sasanian Empire (/səˈsɑːnɪən/ or/səˈseɪnɪən/), also known as Sassanian,Sasanid, Sassanid or Neo-Persian Empire), known to its inhabitants asĒrānshahr in Middle Persian language, was the last Iranian empire before the rise of Islam, ruled by and named after theSasanian dynasty from 224 to 651.[2][12]The Sasanian Empire, which succeeded the Parthian Empire, was recognized as one of the leading world powers alongside its neighboring arch rival the Roman-Byzantine Empire, for a period of more than 400 years. The Sasanian Empire was founded byArdashir I, after the fall of the Parthian Empire and the defeat of the last Arsacid king, Artabanus V. At its greatest extent, the Sasanian Empire encompassed all of today's Iran, Iraq, Eastern Arabia (Bahrain,Kuwait, Oman, Qatif, Qatar, UAE), theLevant (Syria, Palestine, Lebanon, Israel,Jordan), the Caucasus (Armenia, Georgia,Azerbaijan, Dagestan, South Ossetia,Abkhazia), Egypt, large parts of Turkey, much of Central Asia (Afghanistan,Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan),Yemen and Pakistan. According to a legend, the vexilloid of the Sasanian Empire was the Derafsh Kaviani. The Sasanian Empire during Late Antiquityis considered to have been one of Iran's most important and influential historical periods, and constituted the last great Iranian empire before the Muslim conquestand the adoption of Islam. In many ways, the Sasanian period witnessed the peak of ancient Iranian civilization. Persia influenced Roman culture considerably during the Sasanian period. The Sasanians' cultural influence extended far beyond the empire's territorial borders, reaching as far as Western Europe, Africa, China and India. It played a prominent role in the formation of bothEuropean and Asian medieval art. Much of what later became known as Islamic culture in art, architecture, music and other subject matter was transferred from the Sasanians throughout the Muslim world.
- translated the anapanasati sutra in 148AD in ancient chang'an
- Khosrow I (also known as Chosroes I and Kisrā in classical sources; 501–579, most commonly known in Persian as Anushiruwān (Persian: انوشيروان, "the immortal soul";[2] also known as Anushiruwan the Just (انوشيروان دادگر, Anushiruwān-e Dādgar)), was the twenty-second Shahanshah of the Sasanian Empire from 531 to 579. He succeeded his father Kavadh I, and became one its most celebrated emperors. His name becoming, outside of Iran and like that of Caesar in the history of Rome, a designation of the Sasanian kings. He laid the foundations for many cities and opulent palaces, and oversaw the repair of trade roads as well as the building of numerous bridges and dams. He also introduced a rational system of taxation, based upon a survey of landed possessions, which his father had begun, and tried to increase the welfare and the revenues of his empire. Arts and the sciences flourished in Persia under his reign and the Sasanian Empire reached its peak of glory and prosperity. It was also under his reign that chess was introduced from India, and the famous book of Kalilah and Dimnah was translated.His reign is furthermore marked by the numerous wars fought against the Sassanid's neighboring archrivals, the Byzantine Empire, as part of the already centuries-long lastingByzantine-Persian Wars. The most important wars of which were the Lazic War which was fought over Colchis (western Georgia-Abkhazia) and the Byzantine–Sasanian War of 572–591.
- kiv bracelet of chosroes (with two Simorgh or Senmurv(royal symbol of sasanian empire), linked to islam)
- The Seven Parthian clans, also known as the Seven Great Houses of Iran, or Seven (Great) Houses, were seven feudal aristocracies of Parthian origin, who were allied with the Sasanian court. Only two of the seven - the House of Suren and the House of Karen - are actually attested in sources date-able to the Parthian period. During Sasanian times, the seven feudal houses played a significant role at the Sasanian court. Bahram Chobin, a famed military commander of Hormizd IV (r. 579–590), was from the House of Mihran.
- trade goods from tang dynasty
- chinese stem bowl/cup originally inspired by sassanian persian silverware
- https://www.quora.com/How-did-the-Romans-view-fall-of-the-Parthians-and-rise-of-the-Sassanians Herodian’s Roman History, which provides this account of the Parthians’ destruction
The Saffarid dynasty (Persian: سلسله صفاریان) was a Muslim Persianate dynasty from Sistan that ruled over parts of eastern Iran, with its capital at Zaranj (a city now in southwestern Afghanistan). Khorasan, Afghanistan and Balochistan from 861 to 1003.[5] The dynasty, of Persian origin, was founded by Ya'qub bin Laith as-Saffar, born in 840 in a small town called Karnin (Qarnin), which was located east of Zaranj and west of Bost, in what is now Afghanistan - a native of Sistan and a local ayyar, who worked as a coppersmith (ṣaffār) before becoming awarlord. He seized control of the Sistan region and began conquering most of Iran and Afghanistan, as well as parts of Pakistan, Tajikestan and Uzbekistan.
The Safavid dynasty (/sɑːˈfɑːwiːd/ Persian:سلسلهٔ صفويان; Azerbaijani: Səfəvilər sülaləsi,صفويلر سولالهسى) was one of the most significant ruling dynasties of Persia(modern Iran) after the fall of the Sasanian Empire - following the Muslim conquest of Persia in the seventh century A.D., and "is often considered the beginning of modern Persian history". The Safavid shahs ruled over one of the so-called gunpowder empires, and they ruled one of the greatest Persian empires after the Muslim conquest of Persia and established the Twelver school of Shi'a Islam as the official religion of their empire, marking one of the most important turning points in Muslim history. The Safavid dynasty had its origin in theSafaviyya Sufi order, which was established in the city of Ardabil in theAzerbaijan region. It was of mixed ancestry (Kurdish and Azerbaijani, which included intermarriages with Georgian, Circassian, and Pontic Greek dignitaries). From their base in Ardabil, the Safavids established control over parts ofGreater Iran and reasserted the Iranian identity of the region, thus becoming the first native dynasty since the Sasanian Empire to establish a unified Iranian state.[30]The Safavids ruled from 1501 to 1722 (experiencing a brief restoration from 1729 to 1736) and, at their height, they controlled all of modern Iran, Azerbaijan,Bahrain and Armenia, most of Georgia, theNorth Caucasus, Iraq, Kuwait andAfghanistan, as well as parts of Turkey,Syria, Pakistan, Turkmenistan andUzbekistan. Despite their demise in 1736, the legacy that they left behind was the revival of Persia as an economic stronghold between East and West, the establishment of an efficient state and bureaucracybased upon "checks and balances", their architectural innovations and their patronage for fine arts. The Safavids have also left their mark down to the present era by spreading Shi'a Islam in Iran, as well as major parts of the Caucasus, Anatolia, andMesopotamia.
- japan
- the original design of shikami choju-mon nishiki (brocade with biting lions, birds, and miscellaneous animal pattern) is from the coat-of-arms kept at kodai-ji temple, kyoto, japan which is said to have been worn by hideoyoshi toyotomi. The fabric used is a silk tapestry and was made in persia during the safavid dynasty. The pattern of hunting lion is peculiar to the scythian in siberia, the outlines enclosing each motif are of the mohammedan culture in the medieval ages, and the design of the peacock is influenced by the indian culture. The weaving technique is considered to have been brought from china, and the persian braid threads are used in the original. https://www.tatsumuraarttextiles.com
The Qajar dynasty (Persian: سلسله قاجار Selsele-ye Qājār; also romanised asGhajar, Kadjar, Qachar etc.; Azerbaijani:قاجارلار Qacarlar) was an Iranian[6] royal dynasty of Turkic origin, specifically from the Qajar tribe, which ruled Persia (Iran) from 1785 to 1925. The state ruled by the dynasty was officially known as the Sublime State of Iran (Persian: دولت علیّه ایران Dowlat-e Elliye ye Irān). The Qajar family took full control of Iran in 1794, deposing Lotf 'Ali Khan, the last of the Zand dynasty, and re-asserted Iranian sovereignty over large parts of the Caucasus and Central Asia. In 1796, Mohammad Khan Qajar seizedMashhad with ease,[14] putting an end to the Afsharid dynasty, and Mohammad Khan was formally crowned as shah after his punitive campaign against Iran's Georgian subjects. In the Caucasus, the Qajar dynasty permanently lost many of Iran's integral areas to the Russiansover the course of the 19th century, comprising modern-day Georgia, Dagestan,Azerbaijan, and Armenia.
巴列維王朝 The Pahlavi dynasty (Persian: دودمان پهلوی) was the last ruling house of the Imperial State of Iran from 1925 until 1979, when the Persian monarchy was overthrown and abolished as a result of the Iranian Revolution. The dynasty was founded by Reza Shah Pahlavi in 1925, a former brigadier-general of the Persian Cossack Brigade, whose reign lasted until 1941 when he was forced to abdicate by the Allies after the Anglo-Soviet invasion of Iran. He was succeeded by his son, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the last Shah of Iran. The Pahlavis came to power after Ahmad Shah Qajar, the last Qajar ruler of Iran, proved unable to stop British and Soviet encroachment on Iranian sovereignty, had his position extremely weakened by a military coup, and was removed from power by the parliament while in France. The Iranian parliament, known as the Majlis, convening as a Constituent Assembly on 12 December 1925, deposed the young Ahmad Shah Qajar, and declared Reza Khan the new King (Shah) of Imperial State of Persia. In 1935, Reza Shah asked foreign delegates to use the endonym Iran in formal correspondence and the official name the Imperial State of Iran was adopted.Following the coup d'état in 1953 supported by United Kingdom and the United States, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi's rule became more autocratic and was aligned with the Western Bloc during the Cold War . Faced with growing public discontent and popular rebellion throughout 1978 and after declaring surrender and officially resigning, the second Pahlavi went into exile with his family in January 1979, sparking a series of events that quickly led to the end of the state and the beginning of the Islamic Republic of Iran on 11 February 1979.
- Reza Shah Pahlavi (Persian: رضا شاه پهلوی; pronounced [reˈzɑː ˈʃɑːhe pæhlæˈviː]; 15 March 1878 – 26 July 1944), commonly known as Reza Shah, was the Shah of Iran from 15 December 1925 until he was forced to abdicate by the Anglo-Soviet invasion of Iran on 16 September 1941.His legacy remains controversial to this day. His defenders assert that he was an essential modernizing force for Iran (whose international prominence had sharply declined during Qajar rule), while his detractors assert that his reign was often despotic, with his failure to modernize Iran's large peasant population eventually sowing the seeds for the Iranian Revolution nearly four decades later, which ended 2,500 years of Persian monarchy.[3][4] Moreover, his insistence on ethnic nationalism and cultural unitarism, along with forced detribalization and sedentarization, resulted in the suppression of several ethnic and social groups. Albeit he was himself of Mazandarani descent, his government carried out an extensive policy of Persianization trying to create a single, united and largely homogeneous nation, similar to Atatürk's policy of Turkification.
- !? Like his son after him, his life in exile was short. After Great Britain and the Soviet Union invaded and occupied Iran on 25 August 1941, the British offered to keep his family in power if Reza Shah agreed to a life of exile. Reza Shah abdicated and the British forces quickly took him and his children to Mauritius,[94] then to Durban, thence Johannesburg, South Africa, where according to his British captors, he died on 26 July 1944 of a heart ailment about which he had been complaining for many years. His personal doctor had boosted the King's morale in exile by telling him that he was suffering from chronic indigestion and not heart ailment. He lived on a diet of plain rice and boiled chicken in the last years of his life.[95] He was sixty-six years old at the time of his death. After his death, his body was carried to Egypt, where it was embalmed and kept at the royal Al Rifa'i Mosque in Cairo, (also the future burial place of his son, the exiled Mohammad Reza Pahlavi).[95] In May 1950, the remains were flown back to Iran,[96] where the embalming was removed, and buried in a mausoleum built in his honor in the town of Ray, in the southern suburbs of the capital, Tehran. Satellite map The Iranian parliament (Majlis) later designated the title "the Great" to be added to his name. On 14 January 1979, shortly before the Iranian Revolution, the remains were moved back to Egypt and buried in the Al Rifa'i Mosque in Cairo.[95] However, in a recent documentary "From Tehran to Cairo," his daughter-in-law, Empress Farah claimed that the remains of the late Reza Shah remain in the town of Ray.
- Princess Noor Pahlavi of Iran (Persian: شاهدخت نور پهلوی, born 3 April 1992) is an American socialite, model, and real estate businesswoman. She is the oldest child of Reza Pahlavi, Crown Prince of Iran and Yasmine Etemad-Amini. Born in exile after her family escaped from Iran due to the revolution, she was the first immediate family member of the Pahlavi dynasty to be born outside of Iran.
- 伊朗一名在菲律賓馬尼拉參選洲際小姐的選美佳麗，聲稱疑因在台上揮舞伊朗巴列維王朝的旗幟和末代王太子禮薩．巴列維的照片，而遭到迫害。她在本月十七日由阿聯酋杜拜飛返馬尼拉時被拒入境，已滯留機場約兩周，她直稱若回伊朗會被殺死。菲律賓移民局稱國際刑警組織已向她發出「紅色通緝令」，但未有交代申請的國家。https://orientaldaily.on.cc/cnt/china_world/20191031/00180_018.html
- Farah Pahlavi (Persian: فرح پهلوی, née Farah Diba Persian: فرح دیبا; born 14 October 1938) is the widow of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and the former shahbanu (empress) of Iran.Farah was born into a prosperous family, whose fortunes were diminished after her father's early death. While studying architecture in Paris, she was introduced to the Shah at the Iranian Embassy, and they were married in December 1959. The Shah's first two marriages had not produced a son, necessary for the succession, so there was great rejoicing at the birth of Crown Prince Reza the following October. Farah was then free to pursue interests other than domestic duties, though she was not allowed a political role. She worked for many charities, and founded Iran's first American-style university, enabling more women to become students. She also facilitated the buying-back of Iranian antiquities from museums abroad.Farah Diba was born on 14 October 1938 in Tehran to an upper-class family. Born as Farah Diba, she was the only child of Captain Sohrab Diba (1899–1948) and his wife, Farideh Ghotbi (1920–2000). Farah's father's family is of Iranian Azerbaijani origin. In her memoir, the former Shahbanu writes that her father's family were natives of Iranian Azerbaijan while her mother's family were of Gilak origin, from Lahijan on the Iranian coast of the Caspian Sea.Through her father, Farah came from a relatively affluent background. In the late 19th century her grandfather had been an accomplished diplomat, serving as the Persian Ambassador to the Romanov Court in St. Petersburg, Russia. Her own father was an officer in the Imperial Iranian Armed Forces and a graduate of the prestigious French Military Academy at St. Cyr.
