The Rise of Persia

Cyrus the Great was the first person, who took responsibility for the expansion of the Achaemenid Persian Empire. In order to maintain orders in these areas, he utilized a strategy of religious and cultural toleration. Further, Darius the Great expanded the empire of Cyrus the Great and introduced many standard reforms such as currency, satraps and provincial governors to regulate the smaller regions of his empire. 

Darius the Great also constructed the brand new capital city called "Persepolis'' with the rich wealth and power of his empire. After the conquest of Alexander The Great, the fall of the Achaemenid Empire started. This article will give ancient persia, Political developments, religious toleration and maintenance, economic reforms and all other highlights of the Rise of Persia are given here. 

Rise of the Achaemenid Persian Empire

In 559 BCE, Cyrus the Great became the leader of Persia, who was the great-great-grandson of the first Persian king, Achaemenes. So, historians started to call the empire of Cyrus the Achaemenid Persian Empire. Initially, Persia was a median empire with a small tributary state, which was under the control of Cyrus’s grandfather Astyages. 

In order to maintain protection and a level of independence, Persia has paid the Medes.  For an unknown reason, Cyrus got into conflict with his grandfather and initiated a rebellion, which was succeeded in 550 BCE. In order to celebrate the victory over Astyages, Cyrus built a city on the battle site and named the site ‘Pasargadae’. Initially, people from Persia did not accept Cyrus as a new ruler. So, he decided to expand his territory, by acquiring land from small rulers and solidifying his power. Later, he earned the title of "Cyrus the Great."

Religious Toleration and Maintaining Local Traditions

Cyrus conquered many small territories as he was a successful military commander. After conquering a region, Cyrus will leave some good economic orders and tribute revenues to manage the population. Through his economic reforms, all those regions will continue functioning economically without any interruption. This also reduced the chance of rising rebels against him from the conquered lands. In the ancient days, the common practice followed in Mesopotamia was to relocate conquered populations to a new area. Rulers believed that this practice would cause less danger to the ruling power and create political and cultural unity. But, Cyrus reversed the practice of Jews by relocating the Babylonians to Israel and established a tributary state. This action may show generosity but here, Cyrus ensured the loyalty of Jewish. Through this, he continued a general policy of tolerance. 

Political Developments

Cyrus the Great is the son of Cambyses II, who also made huge contributions to the rise of Persia by conquering Egypt. After acquiring Egypt, Cambyses II gave control to his brother to take care of it. In 522 BCE, Cambyses died and general Darius took over the control. Although Darius looked over the charge it was distantly related to Cambyses II.  Darius also faced huge challenges while on the Persian throne. People from various regions entered into chaos and rebels started against the Achaemenid rule. 

Later, Darius emerged as the individual ruler of Persia and suppressed the region rebels and also supported the growth of the Persian empire. While ruling he also tried to find a reason for the initial challenges and reorganized the empire by dividing it into satrapies, or provinces. For that, Darius appointed satrap, a political governor and a military commander for each satrapy. The satrapy with military and political power prevented regional leaders from becoming powerful. Darius also appointed satrap, who was loyal to him. Darius also utilized religion to justify his power and also said that the Zoroastrian god, Ahura Mazda, appointed him to rule the world.

He took control over the appointment of satraps and demonstrated that he was the ruler of a diverse empire and took the title of Shahanshah, king of kings. This action also eliminated favouritism among the group or region within the empire.

Economic Reforms

For the first time, Darius introduced a daric, which is a standard gold currency. The introduction of standard currency encouraged more economic activities and transactions within the empire. As everyone easily accepts currencies, the transportation and exchange of goods and services are made simple. Darius also collected the taxes and tributes in the form of coins other than goods and services. So, the Persian kingdom became even wealthier. 

Darius managed well to weather and expanded his territories. Also, he constructed an impressive new imperial capital, whose name is Parsa. Which means the city of the Persians in Greek.  Darius designed the entire city with artistic and architectural styles throughout the empire. He also built various mountainous regions with an excellent defence force. 

The city of Persepolis was located in a place, which is difficult to access and projected the art and grandeur. According to Persian history, Achaemenids have several capital cities in terms of accessibility and economic potential. People from the Persian civilization followed three languages, they are Elamite, Babylonian, and Old Persian.  The cities of Ecbatana and Babylon have  Behistun Inscriptions along roadsides. Darius also worked on new construction and repairing many existing cities. He also worked on some ambitious projects, like digging a canal between the Red Sea and the Nile river. This simplified the trading. All his work improved and increased the wealth with imperial expansion.

From the city of Sardis in the west to Susa in the east, Darius constructed a royal road, which will cover the major Darius reign.  He also created a spy network to watch over the rebellion signs in the satraps. The royal road allowed for speedy transfer of information using messengers and horses. This road made transport easier and also helped traders for safe and efficient transportation. 

Fall of Achaemenid Power

In 499 BCE, The red dots on the coast near Sardis started rebels against the Achaemenid rule. This especially started from the Greek city-states in Ionia, which is the western region of modern-day Turkey.  The Battle of Marathon defeated Darius’s army in 490 BCE. Even though the Persian ruler Darius’s son, Xerxes became more successful from 480 and 479 BCE, he subsequently faced many failures in the Greeks. 

Further, Greeks defeated Xerxes’s and prohibited the expansion of Achaemenid. In Persian history, the Achaemenid kings raised taxes and continued interfering in Greece in both economic and political strategies. As expansion ended, Many regional rulers attempted to escape from Achaemenid control. Meanwhile, partiality among the regions arose from the fall of the empire. In 330 BCE,  the Persian king, Darius III was killed by one of his generals. 

Later, Alexander of Macedon acquired the Persian empire in 334 BCE. Further, he left the officials and institutions of the cities and tried to capture and manage a massive empire. After the death of Alexander, the fall of Achaemenid power started. 

Conclusion

This article gave you complete information from the rise of Persia to the fall of Persia. Here, the complete Persian history with new inventions and implementations of the Persian rulers are given in detail. For Greeks, they were the people who invaded their territories but there is no decline in that this international military power was also considered as protectors who used to protect the rights of the people even of the area which was conquered by them.