Sassanid, Samanid, Saffarid, Safavid oh my! So many Persian/Iranian dynasty names seem to start with Sa- and then follow a similar pattern of consonants and vowels throughout. Why is this so?

by Gildedsapphire7

Then there are ones that break the pattern, notably the Achaemenids and the Qajars, off the top of my head. Also why are so many called the -ids?

SanctusChristophorus

The -id ending is from Greek -ιδης (-ides), which denotes 'son of', and by extension 'descendant of'. Therefore Sassanid means the descendants of Sassan (the founder of the dynasty); Samanid, descendants of Saman, etc.

As for the sa- element of the names, I'm not sure. I think it could be an indo-iranian prefix meaning 'good' or 'well', but I'm not certain about that since indo-iranian linguistics isn't my field of expertise.