Eduard Meyer

“ But Persis lies too far off from the centre of the Asiatic world to be the seat of government. Like Arabia and similar countries, it could exercise a great momentary influence in history and produce a sudden change throughout the world; but afterwards it would sink into local insignificance. So the Persian kings fixed their residence at Susa, which is always considered as the capital of the empire (therefore Aeschylus wrongly considers it as a Persian town and places the tomb of Darius here) . ”

“ DARIUS (Pers. Dārayavaush; Old Test. Daryavesh) , the name of three Persian kings.
1. Darius the Great, the son of Hystaspes (q.v.) . The principal source for his history is his own inscriptions, especially the great inscription of Behistun (q.v.) , in which he relates how he gained the crown and put down the rebellions. In modern times his veracity has often been doubted, but without any sufficient reason; the whole tenor of his words shows that we can rely upon his account. ”

“ The left wing of the Persians under Tissaphernes avoided a serious conflict with the Greeks; Cyrus in the centre threw himself upon Artaxerxes, but was slain in a desperate struggle. Afterwards Artaxerxes pretended to have killed the rebel himself, with the result that Parysatis took cruel vengeance upon the slayer of her favourite son. The Persian troops dared not attack the Greeks, but decoyed them into the interior, beyond the Tigris, and tried to annihilate them by treachery. But after their commanders had been taken prisoners the Greeks forced their way to the Black Sea. ”

“ In Persis the traditions of the Achaemenian empire had always been alive, as the name of Ardashir himself shows, and with them the national religion of Zoroaster. Ardashir, who was a zealous worshipper of Ahuramazda and in intimate connexion with the magian priests, established the orthodox Zoroastrian creed as the official religion of his new kingdom, persecuted the infidels, and tried to restore the old Persian empire, which under the Achaemenids had extended over the whole of Asia from the Aegean Sea to the Indus. ”

“ For a short time they wielded great power; a great Greek empire seemed to have arisen far in the East. But this empire was torn by internal dissensions and continual usurpations. When Demetrius advanced far into India one of his generals, Eucratides, made himself king of Bactria, and soon in every province there arose new usurpers, who proclaimed themselves kings and fought one against the other. Most of them we know only by their coins, a great many of which are found in Afghanistan and India. ”

“ Probably they were chieftains of a nomadic Median tribe in the desert, the Manda, mentioned by Sargon; for the Babylonian king Nabonidus designates the Medians and their kings always as Manda. The origin and history of the Median Empire is quite obscure, as we possess, almost no contemporary information, and not a single monument or inscription from Media itself. Our principal source is Herodotus, who wrongly makes Deioces the first king and uniter of the whole nation, and dates their independence from c. 710—i.e. from the time when the Assyrian supremacy was at its height. ”

“ But Tissaphernes was unwilling to take action and tried to achieve his aim by astute and often perfidious negotiations; Alcibiades persuaded him that Persia’s best policy was to keep the balance between Athens and Sparta, and rivalry with his neighbour Pharnabazus of Hellespontic Phrygia still further lessened his energy. When, therefore, in 408 the king decided to support Sparta strenuously, Tissaphernes was removed from the generalship and limited to the satrapy of Caria, whereas Lydia and the conduct of the war were entrusted to Cyrus the Younger. ”

“ Her favourite son was Cyrus the Younger, whom she assisted as far as possible in his attempt to gain the throne. But when he was slain at Cunaxa (401) she nevertheless gained absolute dominion over the victorious Artaxerxes II. She was the evil genius of his reign. By a series of intrigues she was able to inflict the most atrocious punishment on all those who had taken part in the death of Cyrus. ”

“ OSROES (also Osdroes or Chosroes) , the Greek form of the Persian name Khosrau (see Chosroes) . The form Osroes is generally used for a Parthian king who from his coins appears to have reigned from about A.D. 106-129, as successor of his brother Pacorus. But during all this time another king, Vologaeses II. (77-147) maintained himself in a part of the kingdom. Osroes occupied Armenia, and placed Exedares, a son of Pacorus, and afterwards his brother Parthamasiris on the throne. This encroachment on the Roman sphere led to the Parthian war of Trajan. ”

“ In 363 the emperor Julian, at the head of a strong army, advanced to Ctesiphon, but was killed. His successor Jovian was defeated and made an ignominious peace, by which the districts on the Tigris and Nisibis were ceded to the Persians, and the Romans promised to interfere no more in Armenia. In the rock-sculptures near the town Shapur in Persis (Stolze, Persépolis, pl. 141) the great success is represented; under the hoofs of the king's horse lies the body of an enemy, probably Julian, and a suppliant Roman, the emperor Jovian, asks for peace. ”

“ About his reign we know little, as the narrative of Herodotus, which makes Cyrus the grandson of Astyages by his daughter Mandane, is merely a legend; the figure of Harpagus, who as general of the Median army betrays the king to Cyrus, alone seems to contain an historical element, as Harpagus and his family afterwards obtained a high position in the Persian empire. From the inscriptions of Nabonidus we learn that Cyrus, king of Anshan (Susiana) , began war against him in 553 B.C.; in 550, when Astyages marched against Cyrus, his troops rebelled, and he was taken prisoner. ”

“ The principal ruins of the town of Pasargadae at Murghab are a great terrace like that of Persepolis, and the remainders of three buildings, on which the building inscription of Cyrus, “I Cyrus the king the Achaemenid” (sc. “have built this”) , occurs five times in Persian, Susian and Babylonian. They were built of bricks, with a foundation of stones and stone door-cases, like the palaces at Persepolis; and on these fragments of a procession of tribute-bearers and the figure of a winged demon (wrongly considered as a portrait of Cyrus) are preserved. ”

“ Cyrus had 10,400 Greek hoplites and 2500 peltasts, and besides an Asiatic army under the command of Ariaeus, for which Xenophon gives the absurd number of 100,000 men; the army of Artaxerxes he puts down at 900,000. These numbers only show that he, although an eyewitness, has no idea of large numbers; in reality the army of Cyrus may at the very utmost have consisted of 30,000, that of Artaxerxes of 40,000 men. Cyrus saw that the decision depended on the fate of the king; he therefore wanted Clearchus, the commander of the Greeks, to take the centre against Artaxerxes. ”

“ IRAN, the great plateau between the plain of the Tigris in the west and the valley of the Indus in the east, the Caspian Sea and the Turanian desert in the north, and the Persian Gulf and the Indian Ocean in the south, surrounded on all sides by high mountain ranges with a great salt desert in the centre. ”

“ CYAXARES (Pers. Uvakhshatra) , king of Media, reigned according to Herodotus (i. 107) forty years, about 624–584 B.C. That he was the real founder of the Median empire is proved by the fact that in Darius’s time a Median usurper, Fravartish, pretended to be his offspring (Behistun inscr. 2. 43) ; but about his history we know very little. ”

“ Subsequently Greek mercenaries became indispensable not only to the king but also to the satraps, who thereby gained the means for attempting successful rebellions, into which they were provoked by the weakness of the king, and by the continuous intrigues between the Persian magnates. The reign is, therefore, a continuous succession of rebellions. Egypt soon revolted anew and could not be subdued again. When in 399 war broke out between Sparta and Persia, the Persian troops in Asia Minor were quite unable to resist the Spartan armies. ”

“ Atropatene is that country of western Asia which was least of all influenced by Hellenism; there exists not even a single coin of its rulers. But the opinion of modern authors—that it had been a special refuge of Zoroastrianism—is based upon a wrong etymology of the name (which is falsely explained as “country of fire-worship”) , and has no foundation whatever. There can be no doubt that the kings adhered to the Persian religion; but it is not probable that it was deeply rooted among their subjects, especially among the non-Aryan tribes. ”