HORMIZD or HORMIZDAS, the name of five kings of the Sassanid dynasty (see PERSIA: Ancient History). The name is another form of Ahuramazda or Ormuzd (Ormazd), which under the Sassanids became a common personal name ; strictly it is an abbreviation of Hormuzd-dad, "given by Ormuzd." I . HORMIZD I. (reigned 272-273) son of Shapur I., under whom he was governor of Khorasan, appears in his wars against Rome. In the Persian tradition of the history of Ardashir I., preserved in a Pahlavi text (Noldeke, Geschichte des Artachsir I. Papakan), he is the son of a daughter of Mithrak, a Persian dynast, whose family Ardashir had extirpated because the magians had predicted that from his blood would come the restorer of the empire of Iran. Only this daughter is preserved by a peasant; Shapur marries her, and her son Hormizd is afterwards acknowl edged by Ardashir. In this legend, partially preserved also in Tabari, the great conquests of Shapur are transferred to Hormizd.
II., son of Narseh, reigned from 302 to 309. Of his reign nothing is known. After his death his son Adarnases was killed by the grandees; another son, Hormizd, was kept a prisoner, and the throne reserved for the infant of a concubine of Hormizd II. Hormizd escaped from prison and found refuge at the court of Constantine the Great. In 363 he served in the army of Julian against Persia ; his son, with the same name, became consul in 366.
III., son of Yazdegerd I., succeeded his father in 457. He had continually to fight with his brothers and with the Ephthalites in Bactria, and was killed by Peroz in 459.
IV., son of Chosroes I., reigned 578-590. Some characteristic stories are told of him by Tabari (Noldeke, Ge schichte d. Perser and Araber unter den Sasaniden). Hormizd protected the common people and introduced a severe discipline in his army and court. When the priests demanded a persecution of the Christians, he declined on the ground that the throne and the government could only be safe if it gained the goodwill of both concurring religions. Consequently he raised a strong oppo sition in the ruling classes. From his father he had inherited a war against the Byzantine empire and against the Turks in the east, and negotiations of peace had just begun with the emperor Tiberius, but Hormizd haughtily declined to cede anything of the conquests of his father. Therefore the accounts given of him by the Byzantine authors, Theophylact, Simocatta (iii. 16 ff.), Men ander Protector and John of Ephesus (vi. 22), are far from favourable. In 588 his general, Bahram Chobin, defeated the Turks, but in the next year was beaten by the Romans; and when the king superseded him he rebelled with his army. This was the signal for a general insurrection. The magnates deposed Hormizd and proclaimed his son Chosroes II. king. In the war which now followed between Bahram Chobin and Chosroes II. Hormizd was killed by some partisans of his son (59o).
V. was one of the many pretenders, who rose after the murder of Chosroes II. (628). He maintained himself about two years (631, 632) in the district of Nisibis. (ED. M.)
