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Piero della Francesca

Battle between Heraclius and Khosrau
1460
Fresco
747 x 329 cm (24' 6.09" x 10' 9.53")

Khosrau II (Khosrow II, Chosroes II, or Xosrov II in classical sources, sometimes called Parvez, "the Ever Victorious" – in Persian: خسرو پرویز) was the twenty-second Sassanid King of Persia, reigning from 590 to 628.

Following the Khazar invasion of Transcaucasia in 627, Heraclius the Byzantine Emperor defeated the Persian army at the Battle of Nineveh and advanced towards Ctesiphon. Khosrau II fled from his favourite residence, Dastgerd (near Baghdad), without offering resistance. Meanwhile, some of the Persian grandees freed his eldest son Kavadh II (he ruled briefly in 628), whom Khosrau II had imprisoned, and proclaimed him King on the night of 23–4 February, 628.[6] Four days afterwards, Khosrau II was murdered in his palace. Meanwhile, Heraclius returned in triumph to Constantinople and in 629 the True Cross was returned to him and Egypt evacuated, while the Persian empire, from the apparent greatness which it had reached ten years ago, sank into hopeless anarchy.

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Piero della Francesca

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