KHOSRII, Kos-riV (Ay. Husrarnh, having good renown). (1) The name of a legendary King of Persia. known as Kai Khosru. See KAIANIAN. ( 2 ) The name of the Sassanian King of Persia commonly called KIIOSRIJ I. or, more accurately, Khusrau. Surnamed Ann shirvan (the noble soul), and known to Byzan tine history as Chosroes I., he was the third son of Kobad. or Kavadh, King of Persia, and was the greatest monarch of the Sassanian dynasty. In A.D. 531 Khosru mounted the throne, accord ing to the terms of his father's will. The young King is said to have put to death his elder broth er, who had been excluded from the succession, and had therefore conspired against him. In 540 Khosru reopened the standing feud between the Persians and the Byzantines, and hostilities continued for twenty years. Although the Persians leaped an abundant harvest of glory, the other results were unimportant. On the accession of Justin 11., the Persian ambassadors were igno miniously treated, and the Greeks took possession of Armenia. Khosru, justly indignant, again declared war in 570. and took Darn, the eastern bulwark of the Greek Empire, but was terribly defeated at Melitenc (577) by Justinian, grand nephew of the Emperor of that name. The vic
to•ious Greek was in his turn totally routed in Armenia. Khosru did not live to see the end of the contest, as he died in 579. Ills government, though despotic and occasionally' oppressive, was marked by a firmness and energy rarely seen among Orientals. Early in his reign he divided the country into the four provinces of Assyria, Media, Persia, and Bactriana, administering the government of each by a viceroy. Agriculture, commerce, and science were encouraged, ravaged provinces were repeopled from his conquests. and wasted cities rebuilt. Ilis memory was long cherished by the Persians, and many a story of the stern justice of Khosru is still current among them. During his reign Persia stretched from the Red Sea to the Indus. and from the Arabian Sea far into Central Asia. In addition to the histories of the period. such as Rawlinson. Eduard Meyer, and others, consult Justi, in Grundriss der ironischen Philologie, trod. ii. ( Strassburg, 1896).