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Formation and expansion

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Further information: Battle of the Persian Border, Persian Revolt, Battle of Pteria, Battle of Opis, Battle of Pelusium (525 BC), Achaemenid invasion of the Indus Valley, and European Scythian campaign of Darius I
Map of the expansion process of Achaemenid territories

Cyrus the Great and Cambyses

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Cyrus revolted against the Median Empire in 553 BC, and in 550 BC succeeded in defeating the Medes, capturing Astyages and taking the Median capital city of Ecbatana.[1][2][3] Once in control of Ecbatana, Cyrus styled himself as the successor to Astyages and assumed control of the entire empire.[4] By inheriting Astyages' empire, he also inherited the territorial conflicts the Medes had had with both Lydia and the Neo-Babylonian Empire.[5]

King Croesus of Lydia sought to take advantage of the new international situation by advancing into what had previously been Median territory in Asia Minor.[6][7] Cyrus led a counterattack which not only fought off Croesus' armies, but also led to the capture of Sardis and the fall of the Lydian Kingdom in 546 BC.[8][9][a] Cyrus placed Pactyes in charge of collecting tribute in Lydia and left, but once Cyrus had left Pactyes instigated a rebellion against Cyrus.[9][10][11] Cyrus sent the Median general Mazares to deal with the rebellion, and Pactyes was captured. Mazares, and after his death Harpagus, set about reducing all the cities which had taken part in the rebellion. The subjugation of Lydia took about four years in total.[12]

When power in Ecbatana changed hands from the Medes to the Persians, many tributaries to the Median Empire believed their situation had changed and revolted against Cyrus.[13] This forced Cyrus to fight wars against Bactria and the nomadic Saka in Central Asia.[14] During these wars, Cyrus established several garrison towns in Central Asia, including the Cyropolis.[15]

Cyrus the Great is said in the Bible to have liberated the Hebrew captives in Babylon to resettle and rebuild Jerusalem, earning him an honored place in Judaism.

Nothing is known of Persian-Babylonian relations between 547 BC and 539 BC, but it is likely that there were hostilities between the two empires for several years leading up to the war of 540-539 BC and the Fall of Babylon.[16] In October 539 BC, Cyrus won a battle against the Babylonians at Opis, then took Sippar without a fight before finally capturing the city of Babylon on 12 October, where the Babylonian king Nabonidus was taken prisoner.[17][16][18] Upon taking control of the city, Cyrus depicted himself in propaganda as restoring the divine order which had been disrupted by Nabonidus, who had promoted the cult of Sin rather than Marduk,[19][20][21] and he also portrayed himself as restoring the heritage of the Neo-Assyrian Empire by comparing himself to the Assyrian king Ashurbanipal.[22][23][21] The Hebrew Bible also unreservedly praises Cyrus for his actions in the conquest of Babylon, referring to him as Yahweh's anointed.[24][25] He is credited with rescuing the people of Judah from their exile and with authorizing the reconstruction of much of Jerusalem, including the Second Temple.[24][26]

The tomb of Cyrus the Great, founder of the Achaemenid Empire

In 530 BC, Cyrus died while on a military expedition against the Massagetae in Central Asia. He was succeeded by his eldest son Cambyses II, while his younger son Bardiya[b] received a large territory in Central Asia.[29][30] By 525 BC, Cambyses had successfully subjugated Phoenicia and Cyprus and was making preparations to invade Egypt with the newly created Persian navy.[31][32] The great Pharaoh Amasis II had died in 526 BC and had been succeeded by Psamtik III, resulting in the defection of key Egyptian allies to the Persians.[32] Psamtik positioned his army at Pelusium in the Nile Delta. He was soundly defeated by the Persians in the Battle of Pelusium before fleeing to Memphis, where the Persians defeated him and took him prisoner.[32][33]

Herodotus depicts Cambyses as openly antagonistic to the Egyptian people and their gods, cults, temples and priests, in particular stressing the murder of the sacred bull Apis.[34] He says that these actions led to a madness that caused him to kill his brother Bardiya (who Herodotus says was killed in secret),[35] his own sister-wife[36] and Croesus of Lydia.[37] He then concludes that Cambyses completely lost his mind,[38] and all later classical authors repeat the themes of Cambyses' impiety and madness. However, this is based on spurious information, as the epitath of Apis from 524 BC shows that Cambyses participated in the funeral rites of Apis styling himself as pharaoh.[39]

Following the conquest of Egypt, the Libyans and the Greeks of Cyrene and Barca in Libya surrendered to Cambyses and sent tribute without a fight.[32][33] Cambyses then planned invasions of Carthage, the oasis of Ammon and Ethiopia.[40] Herodotus claims that the naval invasion of Carthage was cancelled because the Phoenicians, who made up a large part of Cambyses' fleet, refused to take up arms against their own people,[41] but modern historians doubt whether an invasion of Carthage was ever planned at all.[32] However, Cambyses dedicated his efforts to the other two campaigns, aiming to improve the Empire's strategic position in Africa by conquering the Kingdom of Meroë and taking strategic positions in the western oases. To this end, he established a garrison at Elephantine consisting mainly of Jewish soldiers, who remained stationed at Elephantine throughout Cambyses' reign.[32] The invasions of Ammon and Ethiopia themselves were failures. Herodotus claims that the invasion of Ethiopia was a failure due to the madness of Cambyses and the lack of supplies for his men,[42] but archaeological evidence suggests that the expedition was not a failure, and a fortress at the Second Cataract of the Nile, on the border between Egypt and Kush, remained in use throughout the Achaemenid period.[32][43]

Bardiya and Darius the Great

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The events surrounding Cambyses' death and Bardiya's succession are greatly debated as there are many conflicting accounts.[28] According to Herodotus, as Bardiya's assassination had been committed in secret, the majority of Persians still believed him to be alive. This allowed two Magi to rise up against Cambyses, with one of them sitting on the throne able to impersonate Bardiya because of their remarkable physical resemblance and shared name (Smerdis in Herodotus' accounts[b]).[44] Ctesias writes that when Cambyses had Bardiya killed he immediately put the magus Sphendadates in his place as satrap of Bactria due to a remarkable physical resemblance.[45] Two of Cambyses' confidants then conspired to usurp Cambyses and put Sphendadates on the throne under the guise of Bardiya.[46] According to the Behistun Inscription, written by the following king Darius the Great, a magus named Gaumata impersonated Bardiya and incited a revolution in Persia.[27] Whatever the exact circumstances of the revolt, Cambyses heard news of it in the summer of 522 BC and began to return from Egypt, but he was wounded in the thigh in Syria and died of gangrene, so Bardiya's impersonator became king.[47][c] The account of Darius is the earliest, and although the later historians all agree on the key details of the story, that a magus impersonated Bardiya and took the throne, this may have been a story created by Darius to justify his own usurpation.[49] Iranologist Pierre Briant hypothesises that Bardiya was not killed by Cambyses, but waited until his death in the summer of 522 BC to claim his legitimate right to the throne as he was then the only male descendant of the royal family. Briant says that although the hypothesis of a deception by Darius is generally accepted today, "nothing has been established with certainty at the present time, given the available evidence".[50]

After six months on the throne, Bardiya (or his impersonator) was killed by Darius and six other members of the Persian nobility in a palace coup in September 522 BC.[51] As no member of the royal family was alive after this coup, Darius became the new king despite not being an immediate relative of the royal family. Darius claimed that he had a right to the throne through his ancestry from Achaemenes, who he presents as Teispes' father.[52][53][54]

Ever since the Macedonian king Amyntas I surrendered his country to the Persians in about 512–511, Macedonians and Persians were strangers no more as well. Subjugation of Macedonia was part of Persian military operations initiated by Darius the Great (521–486) in 513 – after immense preparations – a huge Achaemenid army invaded the Balkans and tried to defeat the European Scythians roaming to the north of the Danube river.[55] Darius' army subjugated several Thracian peoples, and virtually all other regions that touch the European part of the Black Sea, such as parts of nowadays Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine, and Russia, before it returned to Asia Minor.[55][56] Darius left in Europe one of his commanders named Megabazus whose task was to accomplish conquests in the Balkans.[55] The Persian troops subjugated gold-rich Thrace, the coastal Greek cities, as well as defeating and conquering the powerful Paeonians.[55][57][58] Finally, Megabazus sent envoys to Amyntas, demanding acceptance of Persian domination, which the Macedonians did. The Balkans provided many soldiers for the multi-ethnic Achaemenid army. Many of the Macedonian and Persian elite intermarried, such as the Persian official Bubares who married Amyntas' daughter, Gygaea. Family ties the Macedonian rulers Amyntas and Alexander enjoyed with Bubares ensured them good relations with the Persian kings Darius and Xerxes I. The Persian invasion led indirectly to Macedonia's rise in power and Persia had some common interests in the Balkans; with Persian aid, the Macedonians stood to gain much at the expense of some Balkan tribes such as the Paeonians and Greeks. All in all, the Macedonians were "willing and useful Persian allies. Macedonian soldiers fought against Athens and Sparta in Xerxes' army.[55] The Persians referred to both Greeks and Macedonians as Yauna ("Ionians", their term for "Greeks"), and to Macedonians specifically as Yaunã Takabara or "Greeks with hats that look like shields", possibly referring to the Macedonian kausia hat.[59]

The Persian queen Atossa, Daughter of Cyrus the Great, sister-wife of Cambyses II, Darius the Great's wife, and mother of Xerxes I

By the 5th century BC the Kings of Persia were either ruling over or had subordinated territories encompassing not just all of the Persian Plateau and all of the territories formerly held by the Assyrian Empire (Mesopotamia, the Levant, Cyprus and Egypt), but beyond this all of Anatolia and Armenia, as well as the Southern Caucasus and parts of the North Caucasus, Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, all of Bulgaria, Paeonia, Thrace and Macedonia to the north and west, most of the Black Sea coastal regions, parts of Central Asia as far as the Aral Sea, the Oxus and Jaxartes to the north and north-east, the Hindu Kush and the western Indus basin (corresponding to modern Afghanistan and Pakistan) to the far east, parts of northern Arabia to the south, and parts of northern Libya to the south-west, and parts of Oman, China, and the UAE.[60][61][62][63][64][65][66]

Notes

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  1. ^ The chronology of the reign of Cyrus is uncertain, and these events are alternatively dated in 542–541 BC.[5]
  2. ^ a b Bardiya is referred to by a variety of names in Greek sources, including Smerdis, Tanyoxarces, Tanoxares, Mergis and Mardos. The earliest account to mention him is the Behistun Inscription, which has his name as Bardiya.[27][28]
  3. ^ Sources differ on the circumstances of Cambyses' death. According to Darius the Great in the Behistun Inscription, he died of natural causes.[27] According to Herodotus, he died after accidentally wounding himself in the thigh.[48] The true cause of death remains uncertain.[30]

References

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  1. ^ Nabonidus Cylinder I.8-II.25
  2. ^ Nabonidus Chronicle II.1-4
  3. ^ Briant 2002, p. 31.
  4. ^ Briant 2002, p. 33.
  5. ^ a b Briant 2002, p. 34.
  6. ^ Herodotus, Histories I.72, I.73
  7. ^ Briant 2002, p. 35.
  8. ^ Briant 2002, p. 36.
  9. ^ a b Brosius 2006, p. 11.
  10. ^ Briant 2002, p. 37.
  11. ^ Herodotus, Histories I.154
  12. ^ Briant 2002, pp. 37–38.
  13. ^ Justin, Epitome I.7
  14. ^ Briant 2002, p. 39.
  15. ^ Briant 2002, p. 40.
  16. ^ a b Briant 2002, pp. 41–43.
  17. ^ Nabonidus Chronicle III.12-16
  18. ^ Brosius 2006, pp. 11–12.
  19. ^ Cyrus Cylinder 23-35
  20. ^ Kuhrt 1983, pp. 85–86.
  21. ^ a b Briant 2002, pp. 43–44.
  22. ^ Cyrus Cylinder 43
  23. ^ Kuhrt 1983, pp. 88–89.
  24. ^ a b Briant 2002, p. 46.
  25. ^ Isaiah 41:2–4; 45:1–3
  26. ^ Ezra 6:2–5
  27. ^ a b c Behistun Inscription 11
  28. ^ a b Briant 2002, p. 98.
  29. ^ Briant 2002, pp. 49–50.
  30. ^ a b Brosius 2006, p. 13.
  31. ^ Wallinga 1984, pp. 406–409.
  32. ^ a b c d e f g Briant 2002, pp. 52–55.
  33. ^ a b Herodotus, Histories III.11, III.13
  34. ^ Herodotus, Histories III.29
  35. ^ Herodotus, Histories III.30
  36. ^ Herodotus, Histories III.31
  37. ^ Herodotus, Histories III.36
  38. ^ Herodotus, Histories III.38
  39. ^ Briant 2002, pp. 55–57.
  40. ^ Herodotus, Histories III.17
  41. ^ Herodotus, Histories III.19
  42. ^ Herodotus, Histories III.25
  43. ^ Heidorn 1992, pp. 147–150.
  44. ^ Herodotus, Histories III.61
  45. ^ Ctesias, Persica 11
  46. ^ Ctesias, Persica 15
  47. ^ Briant 2002, p. 61.
  48. ^ Herodotus, Histories III.64
  49. ^ Briant 2002, pp. 100–101.
  50. ^ Briant 2002, pp. 101–103.
  51. ^ Brosius 2006, pp. 15–16.
  52. ^ Behistun Inscription 1-3
  53. ^ Briant 2002, pp. 110–111.
  54. ^ Brosius 2006, p. 17.
  55. ^ a b c d e Joseph Roisman,Ian WorthingtonA Companion to Ancient Macedonia. pp. 342–45. John Wiley & Sons, 2011 ISBN 1-4443-5163-X
  56. ^ The Oxford Classical Dictionary by Simon Hornblower and Antony Spawforth,ISBN 0-19-860641-9, p. 1515, "The Thracians were subdued by the Persians by 516"
  57. ^ "Persian influence on Greece (2)". Retrieved 17 December 2014.
  58. ^ Howe & Reames 2008, p. 239.
  59. ^ Johannes Engels, "Ch. 5: Macedonians and Greeks", In: Roisman and Worthington, "A companion to Ancient Macedonia", p. 87. Oxford Press, 2010.
  60. ^ http://www.livius.org/maa-mam/maka/maka.html
  61. ^ Behistun Inscription
  62. ^ "DĀḠESTĀN". Retrieved 29 December 2014.
  63. ^ Suny, Ronald Grigor (1994). The Making of the Georgian Nation. ISBN 978-0-253-20915-3. Retrieved 29 December 2014.
  64. ^ Ramirez-Faria, Carlos (2007). Concise Encyclopedia Of World History. Atlantic Publishers & Dist. p. 6. ISBN 978-81-269-0775-5. Retrieved October 7, 2012.
  65. ^ Kuhrt 2013, p. 2.
  66. ^ O'Brien, Patrick (2002). Concise Atlas of World History. Oxford University Press. p. 43. ISBN 978-0-19-521921-0. Retrieved October 7, 2012.
    Curtis, John E.; Tallis, Nigel (2005). Forgotten Empire: The World of Ancient Persia. University of California Press. p. 47. ISBN 978-0-520-24731-4.
    Facts On File, Incorporated (2009). Encyclopedia of the Peoples of Africa and the Middle East. Infobase Publishing. p. 60. ISBN 978-1-4381-2676-0. Retrieved October 7, 2012.
    Parker, Grant (2008). The Making of Roman India. Cambridge University Press. p. 13. ISBN 978-0-521-85834-2. Retrieved October 7, 2012.
    Thapar, Romila (2004). Early India: From the Origins to AD 1300. University of California Press. p. 157. ISBN 978-0-520-24225-8. Retrieved October 7, 2012.

Sources

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  • Briant, Pierre (2002). From Cyrus to Alexander: A History of the Persian Empire. Pennsylvania State University Press. ISBN 978-1-57506-031-6.
  • Brosius, Maria (2006). The Persians. Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-32089-4.
  • Cook, John Manuel (2006). The Persian Empire. Barnes & Noble. ISBN 978-1-56619-115-9.
  • Dandamaev, M. A. (1989). A Political History of the Achaemenid Empire. BRILL. ISBN 978-90-04-09172-6.
  • Heidorn, Lisa Ann (1992). The Fortress of Dorginarti and Lower Nubia during the Seventh to Fifth Centuries B.C. (PhD). University of Chicago.
  • Kosmin, Paul J. (2014). The Land of the Elephant Kings: Space, Territory, and Ideology in Seleucid Empire. Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0-674-72882-0.
  • Kuhrt, Amélie (1983). "The Cyrus Cylinder and Achaemenid Imperial Policy". Journal for the Study of the Old Testament. 8 (25): 83–97. doi:10.1177/030908928300802507.
  • Kuhrt, Amélie (2013). The Persian Empire: A Corpus of Sources from the Achaemenid Period. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-136-01694-3.
  • Howe, Timothy; Reames, Jeanne (2008). Macedonian Legacies: Studies in Ancient Macedonian History and Culture in Honor of Eugene N. Borza. Regina Books. ISBN 978-1-930053-56-4.
  • Olmstead, Albert T. (1948). History of the Persian Empire. University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0-226-62777-9.
  • Tavernier, Jan (2007). Iranica in the Achaeamenid Period (ca. 550-330 B.C.): Lexicon of Old Iranian Proper Names and Loanwords, Attested in Non-Iranian Texts. Peeters Publishers. ISBN 978-90-429-1833-7.
  • Wallinga, Herman (1984). "The Ionian Revolt". Mnemosyne. 37 (3/4): 401–437. doi:10.1163/156852584X00619.
  • Wiesehöfer, Josef (2001). Ancient Persia. Translated by Azodi, Azizeh. I.B. Tauris. ISBN 978-1-86064-675-1.
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