Jemshíd

Family: Irán · Role: son of Tahúmers · First appears: Tahúmers

After Tahúmers’s thirty-year reign, the monarchy passed to his son Jemshíd. In his time, armor and silk garments were made, and he established settled habitations where his people farmed. He also commanded the construction of a splendid palace and named the first day of the year Nú-rúz, holding a royal feast on it. His government was said to have lasted seven hundred years, during which his subjects suffered neither death nor disease; then his pride drew divine punishment, and he fell from imperial rule into degradation and misery.

In the Story of Mirtás-Tází, and his Son Zohák, Jemshíd resisted Zohák’s efforts but was defeated and became a wanderer, eventually taking refuge in Zábulistán. There he met Gúreng’s daughter, whom a sorceress had foretold would marry him. After revealing his identity and misfortunes to her, he married her according to her country’s customs. Gúreng planned to betray him and send him bound to Zohák, but Jemshíd fled after learning that the king’s vizirs meant to secure him. Zohák’s envoy captured him and sent him to Zohák, who had him bound between planks and sawed in two. News of his death reached Zábulistán; Jemshíd had two sisters, Shahrnáz and Arnawáz.