Rostam

Rostam is born to Rudaba and Zāl of the marzban lineage of Sistan; his birth is described as unusually difficult because of the child's extraordinary size. According to the tradition as preserved in sources summarized from the Shahnameh, Zāl summons the Simurgh, which instructs him how to perform a rostamzad (described in later summaries as a Caesarean section), an intervention that saves both mother and child and marks Rostam's origin as aided by a beneficent supernatural being.

Narrative and iconographic summaries emphasize a few emblematic items rather than a single standardized portrait: Rostam rides the legendary stallion Rakhsh and is repeatedly associated with a special battle-suit called Babr-e Bayan; earlier attestations and scholarly discussion also link him with a panther- or leopard-skin garment (zīn-i palang). Accounts stress his exceptional physicality from birth (a very large infant) and extraordinary strength demonstrated in youth and adulthood (for example striking down a maddened white elephant). Later iconographic readings also associate him with simurgh imagery in origin scenes.

Rostam's chief attributes are extraordinary martial prowess and leadership within the Kayanian royal service: he undertakes epic quests (the Haft Khan/Seven Labours), leads armies as a king-maker and general, rescues the over-confident Kay Kāvus from the Divs of Mazandaran, tames and rides Rakhsh, and performs prodigious feats in single combat (including slaying a maddened white elephant). While essentially a human hero, his narrative is entangled with the supernatural—he receives aid from the Simurgh at his birth and fights supernatural foes (Divs)—and his deeds function as cultural exemplars rather than literal claims of divinity.