"Three Neglected Sources of Sasanian History in the Reign of Khusraw Anushirvan" by Michael Richard Jackson Bonner. Newly put out by Studia Irania (Peeters Publishers), this book is mainly an historiographical study of three important (but neglected) sources of Iranian history in the sixth century. Readers of this forum will be glad to know that Armenia features prominently in this study. And for a fuller historical picture, Armenian sources were consulted: the histories of Sebeos, Eghishe, and Movses Daskhurantsi served as reliable touchstones for evaluating later, and more doubtful, Persian and Arabic sources of Sasanian history. Here is the official blurb: This cahier deals with the criticism of three sources: Dinawari's al-Akhbar al-Tiwal, the so-called Sirat Anusharwan, and Firdawsi's Shahnama. The need to examine these sources arises from a re-evaluation of Nöldeke's Khuday-Nama hypothesis; a case is built for the independence and utility of those three sources; and four test cases follow, in which the sources are put to work on issues of central importance in the history of sixth-century Iran. The conclusion is a narrative integrating the findings of the test cases into the broad picture of Sasanian history. It's a short study (only 116 pages), directed mainly at scholars - but it may be of some interest to the public in general. Copies are available here for 22 euros. For more information on the author, see: www.jacksonbonner.com
