Kavad I

Kavad I was crowned in 488 to replace his unpopular uncle Balash, inheriting an empire where royal authority had badly eroded. He tried to reorganize through sweeping reforms, allying with the Mazdakite preacher Mazdak in a social revolution that undercut the nobility and clergy. The move - and his execution of the powerful king-maker Sukhra - got him deposed and locked in the Castle of Oblivion. With help from his sister and an officer named Siyawush, he fled east to the Hephthalites, returned with their army, and retook the throne in 498/9. Broke and denied aid by Byzantine emperor Anastasius I, Kavad launched the Anastasian War, seizing Amida after a three-month siege; the two empires made peace in 506. He also fought a long war against his former Hephthalite allies, reclaiming Khorasan by 513. The Iberian War with Byzantium erupted in 528 over succession and territory; though his forces lost at Dara and Satala, the conflict stayed deadlocked. Kavad died of illness in 531 while his army besieged Martyropolis, leaving his son Khosrow I an empire rebuilt to rival Byzantium.