Haftvād

Haftvād[1] (Persian: هفتواد) is a legendary character whose story appears alongside accounts of the rise of Ardashir I, the founder of the Sassanid dynasty of Persia, in the third century C.E.

One day, as Haftvād's daughter takes a break from spinning to eat lunch on the mountainside with her fellow spinners, she spies an apple on the ground.

After returning to his home to wreak vengeance on the enemy who destroyed his palace, Ardashir musters another army and sets off to attack Haftvād once again.

Ardashir and his companions send up a smoke signal, and their army joins them and takes control of the city, defeating Haftvād's forces.

The late Iranian Studies Professor Shapur Shahbazi noted Haftvād's connection to history: "Despite these legendary elements, the story is clearly woven around a historical base, namely, Ardashir's effort to conquer the Persian coastland and the neighboring regions of Makran and Kerman, and the heavy local resistance that he had to overcome.

The maritime trade must have made these regions wealthy, and it is quite possible […] that a local industry for making silk had developed on the Persian Gulf, and its patrons had jealously guarded its secret and amassed great wealth in their strongholds.

The entire episode rests on the rationalization of an historical event: on the shore of the Persian Gulf, a mighty pirate, probably influenced by an Indian Nāga cult, had earned the enmity of Zoroastrian priests […] and Ardashir vanquished him with great difficulty.

"[4] The story of Haftvād appears in the Book of the Deeds of Ardashir, a mythological tale written in the Sassanid period and used by Ferdowsi as a source in writing the Shahnameh.

[4] A more abbreviated reference to the story exists in History of the Prophets and Kings, a monumental work by the famous 9th-century Persian historian Muhammad ibn Jarir al-Tabari.