The Achaemenid Empire

Abstract

Abstract The Achaemenid (Persian) Empire was the largest of all ancient Near Eastern “world empires,” spanning from Egypt to Central Asia and the Indus region. Its formation began after 550 B.C.E. when the petty king Cyrus of Anshan/Fars in southwestern Iran and his son Cambyses conquered the mighty Medes and the empires of Lydia, Babylonia, and Egypt. These territories were incorporated into the new “state.” For more than two hundred years, the Achaemenids faced no serious opponents. Only the conquests of Alexander the Great, between 334 and 323 B.C.E., terminated Achaemenid rule over Asia. Even then, the prevalent Persian models of governing and administration did not come to an end but heavily influenced later empire building by Alexander, the Seleucids, and the Maury’s in India.

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