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The First Persian Empire

The first Persians appear in history as a nomadic people called the Parsu (or Parsuash, or Parsumash). Initially they were occasionally subject to the Assyrians or the Medes. An Assyrian inscription from the time of King Sennacherib (705 BC–681 BC) mentions that the Assyrian king repelled a raid by the Parsu.

It is believed that when the Medes fell to the Scythians the Persians migrated south into what is now southern Iran from their former territory in the viscinity of Lake Urmia, (Chichast to the Persians) a salt lake in what is present-day Iranian Azarbaijan.

Achaemenes (Haxāmaniš) ["Friendly in Nature"], which is Hellenised as Αχαιμενης, is the eponymous ancestor of the royal house of the first Persian Empire, the Achaemenids. The evidence for the existence of Achaemenes is limited and he is probably a legend created by Darius I to legitimize his rule through a common ancestor between himself and Cyrus I.

The old Graeco-European version of the story states that Achaemenes was succeeded by his son Teispes, who would lead the Persians to conquer and settle in the city of Anshan, modern Tepe Malyan or Tal-e Malyan, in the Zagros mountains of the Fars province of Iran. His great-grandson was Cyrus II, who conquered the Medes and established the Persian Empire. However, Teispes is never referred to as a son of Achaemenes in Old Persian texts, but as "an Achaemenid". The name therefore may have just identified the family.

When the Elamite kingdom was permanently destroyed by the Assyrian ruler Ashurbanipal in 640 BC the Persians established themselves as independent rulers of kingdom of Anshan. Although they continued to use Elamite as an official language for quite some time after this, the new dynasts spoke Persian, an Indo-Iranian tongue.

In 559 BC, Cyrus (in Old Persian Koroush or Khorvash) succeeded his father Cambyses the Elder as King of Anshan. He apparently also soon managed to succeed Arsames to the throne of Persia though the latter was still living. Like his predecessors before him, Cyrus initially had to recognize Median overlordship.

The Greek historian Herodotus gives in his Histories a detailed description of the rise to power of Cyrus according to the best sources available to him. The story resembles other legendary accounts of abandoned noble children such as Romulus and Oedipus.

Cyrus was said to be part-Persian and part Mede and his overlord was his own grandfather Astyages who had conquered all Assyrian kingdoms apart from Babylonia. After the birth of Cyrus, Astyages had a dream that his Magi interpreted as a sign of an eventual overthrow by his grandson. He then ordered his steward Harpagus to kill the infant Cyrus. Harpagus, morally unable to kill a newborn, summoned a herdsman of the king named Mithridates and ordered him to dispose of the child. Troubled by this command, Mithridates confided in his wife Cyno. Cyno, who had recently given birth to a stillborn baby, told her husband to expose their dead child to the elements while they took Cyrus to raise as their own. Mithridates then presented the stillborn to Harpagus as proof that the task had been accomplished. Many years later, when Astyages discovered that his grandson was still alive, he ordered that the son of Harpagus be beheaded and served to his father on a dinner platter. Harpagus, seeking vengeance, convinced Cyrus, who by then was living with his noble, biological parents, to rally the Persian people to revolt (c. 554 BC–553 BC). Between 550 BC–549 BC, with the help of Harpagus, Cyrus led the Persians and his armies to capture Ecbatana, and effectively conquered Media.

What is unquestioned is that Cyrus rallied the Persians together, and in 550 BC defeated the forces of Astyages, who was then captured by his own nobles and turned over to the triumphant Cyrus, now Shah of a unified Persian kingdom.

The next war Cyrus fought was against Croesus of Lydia. Croesus had been allied through marriage to Astyages. It is said that the Lydian king asked the oracle of Delphi what would happen if he fought Cyrus, and was told "If Croesus crossed the [river] Halys, a great empire shall be brought down". He went forth confident of success and fought an undecided battle near the Halys in central Anatolia.

Cyrus, however, showed great skill and initiative when he changed the rules of warfare. At the time armies would disband for winter. Croesus did so. Cyrus did not, instead attacking and capturing the Lydian capital of Sardis and with it King Croesus. Croesus thus destroyed his own empire, as Cyrus annexed Lydia. In the Nabonidus Chronicle it is said that Cyrus "marched against the country Lydia, killed its king (Croesus), took his possessions, put there a garrison of his own." However, it should be noted that the cuneiform word that is thought to represent "Lydia" is damaged, and its interpretation is doubtful. The Greek sources suggest Cyrus kept Croesus as an advisor who served Cyrus well and later served Cyrus's son Cambyses.

In October of 539 BC, Cyrus defeated Nabonidus at Opis and occupied Babylon. According to the Babylonian inscription, this was probably a bloodless victory. Cyrus assumed the titles of 'king of Babylon, king of Sumer and Akkad, king of the four sides of the world'. This was appropriate, as the Persian Empire now extended from Asia Minor and Judea to the Indus Valley, covering all of the Fertile Crescent in what was the greatest empire ever seen at the time.

Cyrus organized the empire into provincial administrations called satrapies. The administrators of these provinces, called satraps, had considerable independence from the emperor, and from many parts of the realm Cyrus demanded no more than tribute and conscripts.

Upon his taking of Babylon, Cyrus issued a declaration, inscribed on a clay barrel known as the Cyrus Cylinder, and containing an account of his victories and merciful acts, as well as a documentation of his royal lineage. It was discovered in 1879 in Babylon, and today is kept in the British Museum. Although the cylinder reflects a long tradition in Mesopotamia where, from as early as the third millennium BC, kings such as Urukagina began their reigns with declarations of reforms, the cylinder of Cyrus is widely referred to as the "first charter of human rights". In 1971, the UN translated it into all of its official languages. The cylinder decrees the normal themes of Persian rule: religious tolerance, abolishment of slavery, freedom of choice of profession and expansion of empire.

By pursuing a policy of generosity instead of repression, and by favoring local religions, he was able to make his new subjects into enthusiastic supporters. One example is recorded in the Hebrew Bible's Book of Ezra, where a remnant of the Jewish population returned to the Promised Land from Babylon, following an edict from Cyrus to rebuild the Temple.

As a result of Cyrus' policies, the Jews honored him as a dignified and righteous king. He is the only Gentile to be designated as a messiah (divinely-appointed king) in the Tanakh. Koresh (Hebrew for Cyrus) is a common name for streets in Israel and is a relatively common Israeli family name.

According to Herodotus, Cyrus met his death in a battle with the Massagetae, a tribe from the southern deserts of Kharesm and Kizilhoum. The queen of the Massagetae, Tomyris, prevailed after Cyrus had previously defeated Tomyris' son Spargapises. The Massagetae were related to the Scythians in their dress and mode of living; they fought on horseback and on foot. Ctesias reports only that Cyrus met his death in the year 529 BC, while warring against tribes north-east of the headwaters of the Tigris. He was buried in the town of Pasargadae. Both Strabo and Arrian give descriptions of his tomb, based on reports of men who saw it at the time of Alexander the Great's invasion.

Cyrus' son, Cambyses II, annexed Egypt, leading the Persian Empire to reach its greatest extent under Darius I. He built the famous Royal Road by improving ancient trade routes, thereby connecting far reaches of the empire, and moved the administration center from Fars itself to Susa, near Babylon and closer to the center of the realm. He also led conquering armies into the Indus River valley and into Thrace in Europe. His invasion of Greece was halted at the Battle of Marathon. His son Xerxes I also tried to subdue the Greeks, but unfortunately his army was defeated at the Battle of Plataea in 479 BC.

The later years of the Achaemenid dynasty were marked by decay and decadence. Persia, the greatest empire of the time, collapsed in only eight years when it fell under the attack of a young Macedonian king named Alexander.

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