Note 2 — Chapter II · The Zoroastrians in Persia

The Persian nation was singularly maltreated.2 The national unity was broken. Each province accommodated itself in the best way it could to the régime imposed by circumstances and by the inclinations of local chiefs. From that time the boundaries of the ancient kingdom underwent changes from century to century. In the tenth century, Taher, governor of Khorassan, threw off the heavy yoke of the Caliphs of Bagdad, and established, in his province, the authority of the Taherides. After them came the Saffarides, the Samanides and all those foreign dynasties that divided the sovereignty amongst themselves, such as the Ghaznevides, the Seldjoukides, &c.; finally there came, with all its calamities, the torrent of invasions to which succeeded the reigns of the Sophis, and of those dynasties, cruel and grasping, which have succeeded each other on the throne of Persia without doing anything for the true welfare of the people.