Khosrau is one of the great enemies of Rome who is often forgotten, standing in the shadow of the likes of Hannibal, Vercingetorix, and Arminius. He ruled over an empire to rival the likes of Rome, led his people to grand heights, and dealt Rome defeat after defeat. His domain was the Sassanid Empire, located in modern-day Iran and further afield. Khosrau remains one of my favourite historical figures, and that is why his depiction is shown as my profile image.
During our story today, the Western Roman Empire has fallen, and the Eastern portion (which I will be referring to as the Byzantines) was ruled by Justinian I. Khosrau ruled over the Byzantine rivals, the Sassanids, and had been given the title “Anushiruwan” which meant “the Immortal Soul”. He led a military campaign against the Byzantines in 540, marching through the Byzantine East and extorting gold from the cities he came upon.
When Khosrau and his army came upon a town, they would accept bribes to just leave the town alone. The city of Antioch would not pay him a bribe, and resolved to fight. Khosrau took the city and took the population as prisoners of war. He then destroyed the city and marched off. Khosrau’s campaign continued but for the purposes of the story, we’ll skip that.
Khosrau made sure to take a swim in the waters of the Mediterranean Sea, like the Persian rulers of old. This was meant to insult the Byzantines, with a sort of “I can do what I want” gesture.
When Khosrau got back to Sassanid territory after exacting massive amounts of gold and tribute from the Byzantines, he had a new city built. This city was an exact copy of Antioch, somewhere in the region of Ctesiphon, the Sassanid capital. Khosrau had taken exact notes on the layout of Antioch, and so was able to copy it to the last house. He settled the Byzantine prisoners of war in this new city. He named it “Weh Antiok Khusrau” which translates to “Khosrau’s Better Antioch”. This was an obvious slap in the face to the Byzantine Emperor Justinian. The message was clear: “Your gold chooses me, your people choose me, even your cities choose me”.
One story says that Khosrau asked a resident of this new city if he liked it there. The resident responded that he did, though he missed the tree that used to stand outside his house. Apparently, when the resident woke up the next day, a tree had been planted out front of his house.
Weh Antiok Khusrau fell to the Arabs with the rest of the Sassanid Empire years later, and it’s exact location is unknown today.
History for Today 