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In the western part of the plateau of Iran, which extends from the

Suleiman Mountains to the plains of Mesopotamia, were the

Medes. On the southern border of the same plateau, along the Persian Gulf, were the Persians. Both were offshoots of the Aryan family, and had migrated westward from the region of the upper Oxus, from Bactria, the original seat of their religion.

RELIGION.—The ancient religion of the Iranians, including the Medes and Persians, was reduced to a system by the Bactrian sage, Zoroaster (or Zarathustra), who, in the absence of authentic knowledge respecting him, may be conjecturally placed at about 1000 B.C. The Zendavesta, the sacred book of the Parsees, the adherents of this religion, is composed of parts belonging to very different dates. It is the fragment of a more extensive literature no longer extant. The Bactrian religion differed from that of their Sanskrit-speaking kindred on the Indus, in being a form of dualism. It grew out of a belief in good demons or spirits, and in evil spirits, making up two hosts perpetually in conflict with each other. At the head of the host of good spirits, in the Zoroastrian creed, was Ormuzd, the creator, and the god of light; at the head of the evil host, was Ahriman, the god of darkness. The one made the world good, the other laid in it all that is evil. The one is disposed to bless man, the other to do him harm. The conflict of virtue and vice in man is a contest for control on the part of these antagonistic powers. In order to keep off the spirits of evil, one must avoid what is morally or ceremonially unclean. He who lived pure, went up at death to the spirits of light. The evil soul departed to consort with evil spirits in the region of darkness. Mithra, the sun-god in the Zoroastrian system, is the equal, though the creature, of Ormuzd. Mithra is the conqueror of darkness, and so the enemy of falsehood. The Medes and Persians were fire-worshipers. To the good spirits, they ascribed life, the fruitful earth, the refreshing waters, fountains and rivers, the tilled ground, pastures and trees, the lustrous metals, also truth and the pure deed. To the evil spirits belonged darkness, disease, death, the desert, cold, filth, sin, and falsehood. The animals were divided between the two realms. All that live in holes, all that hurt the trees and the crops, rats and mice, reptiles of all sorts, turtles, lizards, vermin, and noxious insects, were hateful creatures of Ahriman. To kill any of these was a merit. The dog was held sacred; as was also the cock, who announces the break of day. In the system of worship, sacrifices were less prominent than in India. Prayers, and the iteration of prayers, were of great moment.

THE MAGI.—The Zoroastrian religion was not the same at all times and in every place. The primitive Iranian emigrants were monotheistic in their tendencies. In their western abodes, they came into contact with worshipers of the elements—fire, air, earth, and water. It is thought by many scholars, that the Magian system, with its more defined dualism and sacerdotal sway, was ingrafted on the native religion of the Iranians through the influence of tribes with whom they mingled in Media. The Magi, according to one account, were charged by Darius with corrupting the Zoroastrian faith and worship. Whatever may have been their origin, they became the leaders in worship, and privy-counselors to the sovereign. They were likewise astrologers, and interpreters of dreams. They were not so distinct a class as the priests in India. A hereditary order, they might still bring new members into their ranks. From the Medes, they were introduced among the Persians.

PERSIAN RELIGIOUS CUSTOMS.—Peculiar customs existed among the Medes in disposing of the dead. They were not to be cast into the fire or the water, or buried in the earth, for this would bring pollution to what was sacred; but their bodies were to be exposed in the high rocks, where the beasts and birds could devour them. Sacrifices were offered on hill-tops. Salutations of homage were made to the rising sun. On some occasions, boys were buried alive, as an offering to the divinities. In early times, there were no images of the gods. As far as they were introduced in later times, it was through the influence of surrounding nations. In the supremacy and the final victory, which, in the later form of Zoroastrianism, were accorded to Ormuzd, there was again an approach to monotheism. Hostility to deception of all sorts, and thus to stealing, was a Persian trait. Herodotus says that the Persians taught their children to ride, to shoot the bow, and to speak the truth. To prize the pursuits of agriculture and horticulture, was a part of their religion. They allowed a plurality of wives, and concubines with them; but there was one wife to whom precedence belonged. Voluntary celibacy in man or woman was counted a flagrant sin.

HISTORY.—The first authentic notice that we have of the MEDES shows them under Assyrian power. This is in the time of Shalmaneser II., 840 B.C. Their rise is coincident with the fall of Assyria. Phraortes (647–625 B.C.) began the Median struggle for independence; although the name of Deioces is given by Herodotus as a previous king, and the builder of Ecbatana the capital. It was reserved for Cyaxares (625–585 B.C.), having delivered his land from the Scythian marauders (p. 47), to complete, in conjunction with the Babylonian king, Nabopolassar, the work of breaking down the Assyrian empire (p. 48). He brought under his rule the Bactrians, and the Persians about Pasargadæ and Persepolis, and made the Halys, dividing Asia Minor, the limit of his kingdom. His effeminate son, Astyages, lost what his father had won. The Persian branch of the Iranians gained the supremacy. Cyrus, the leader of the Persian revolt, by whom Astyages was defeated, is described as related to him; but this story, as well as the account of his being rescued from death and brought up among shepherds, is probably a fiction.

CYRUS.—In the sixth century B.C., this famous ruler and conqueror became the founder of an empire which comprised nearly all the civilized nations of Asia. During his reign of thirty years (559–530 B.C.), he annexed to his kingdom the two principal states, LYDIA and BABYLON. The king of Lydia was Croesus, whose story, embellished with romantic details, was long familiar as a signal example of the mutations of fortune. Doomed to be burned after the capture of Sardis, his capital, he was heard, just when the fire was to be kindled, to say something about Solon. In answer to the inquiry of Cyrus, whose curiosity was excited, he related how that Grecian sage, after beholding his treasures, had refused to call him the most fortunate of men, on the ground that "no man can be called happy before his death," because none can tell what disasters may befall him. Cyrus, according to the narrative, touched by the tale, delivered Croesus from death, and thereafter bestowed on him honor and confidence.

There is another form of the tradition, which is deemed by some more probable. Croesus is said to have stood on a pyre, intending to offer himself in the flames, to propitiate the god Sandon, that his people might be saved from destruction; but he was prevented, it is said, by unfavorable auguries.

The subjection of the Greek colonies on the Asia-Minor coast followed upon the subjugation of Lydia. From these colonies, the Phocoeans went forth, and founded Elea in Lower Italy, and Massilia (Marseilles) in Gaul. The Asian Greek cities were each allowed its own municipal rulers, but paid tribute to the Persian master. The conquest of Babylon (538 B.C.), as it opened the way for the return to Jerusalem of the Jewish exiles, enabled Cyrus to establish a friendly people in Judaea, as a help in fortifying his sway in Syria, and in opening a path to Egypt. But in 529 he lost his life in a war which he was waging against the Massagetae, a tribe on the Caspian, allied in blood to the Scythians.

There was a tradition that the barbarian queen, Tomyris, enraged that Cyrus had overcome her son by deceit, dipped the slain king's head in a skin-bag of blood, exclaiming, "Drink thy fill of blood, of which thou couldst not have enough in thy lifetime!"

CAMBYSES.—The successor of Cyrus, a man not less warlike than he, but more violent in his passions, reigned but seven years (529–522 B.C.). His most conspicuous achievement was the conquest of EGYPT. One ground or pretext of his hostility, according to the tale of Herodotus, was the fact that Amasis, the predecessor of Psammeticus III., not daring to refuse the demand of his daughter as a wife, to be second in rank to the Persian queen, had fraudulently sent, either to Cambyses, or, before his time, to Cyrus, Nitetis, the daughter of the king who preceded him, Apries. Defeated at Pelusium, and compelled to yield up Memphis after a siege, it is said that Psammeticus, the Psammenitus of Herodotus, the unfortunate successor of the powerful Pharaohs, was obliged to look on the spectacle of his daughters in the garb of working-women, bearing water, and to see his sons, with the principal young nobles, ordered to execution. But this tale lacks confirmation. His cruelties were probably of a later date, and were provoked by the chagrin he felt, and the satisfaction manifested by the people, at the failure of great expeditions which he sent southward for the conquest of Meroe, and westward against the Oasis of Ammon. His armies perished in the Lybian deserts. Even the story of his stabbing the sacred steer (Apis), after these events, although it may be true, is not sanctioned by the Egyptian inscriptions. His attack upon Ammon probably arose, in part at least, from a desire to possess himself of whatever lay between Egypt and the Carthaginian territory. But the Phoenician sailors who manned his fleet refused to sail against their brethren in Carthage. Cambyses assumed the title and character of an Egyptian sovereign. The story of his madness is an invention of the Egyptian priests.

DARIUS (521–485 B.C.).—For a short time, a pretender, a Magian, who called himself Smerdis, and professed to be the brother of Cambyses, usurped the throne. Cambyses is said to have put an end to his own life. After a reign of seven months, during which he kept himself for the most part hidden from view, Smerdis was destroyed by a rising of the leading Persian families. Darius, the son of Hystaspes, of the royal race of the Achaemenidae, succeeded. He married Atossa, the daughter of Cyrus. The countries which composed an Oriental empire were so loosely held together that the death of a despot or the change of a dynasty was very likely to call forth a general insurrection. Darius showed his military prowess in conquering anew various countries, including Babylon, which had revolted. He made Arabia tributary, and spread the bounds of his vast empire as far as India and in North Africa. A mighty expedition which he organized against the Scythians on the Lower Danube failed of the results that were hoped from it. The barbarians wasted their own fields, filled up their wells, drove off their cattle, and fled as the army of Darius advanced. He returned, however, with the bulk of his army intact, although with a loss of prestige, and enrolled "the Scyths beyond the sea" among the subjects of his empire. His armies conquered the tribes of Thrace, so that he pushed his boundaries to the frontiers of Macedonia. The rebellion of the Greek cities on the Asia-Minor coast he suppressed, and harshly avenged. Of his further conflicts with the Greeks on the mainland, more is to be said hereafter. He had built Persepolis, but his principal seat of government appears to have been Susa. He did a great work in organizing his imperial system. The division into satrapies—large districts, each under a satrap, or viceroy—was a part of this work. He thus introduced a more efficient and methodical administration into his empire—an empire four times as large as the empire of Assyria, which it had swallowed up.

GOVERNMENT.—Persia proper corresponded nearly to the modern province of Farsistan or Fars. The Persian Empire stretched from east to west for a distance of about three thousand miles, and was from five hundred to fifteen hundred miles in width. It was more than half as large as modern Europe. It comprised not less than two millions of square miles. Its population under Darius may have been seventy or eighty millions. He brought in uniformity of administration. In each satrapy, besides the satrap himself, who was a despot within his own dominion, there was at first a commander of the troops, and a secretary, whose business it was to make reports to the GREAT KING. These three officers were really watchmen over one another. It was through spies ("eyes" and "ears") of the king that he was kept informed of what was taking place in every part of the empire. At length it was found necessary to give the satraps the command of the troops, which took away one important check upon their power. There was a regular system of taxation, but to this were added extraordinary and oppressive levies. Darius introduced a uniform coinage. The name of the coin, "daric," is probably not derived from his name, however. Notwithstanding the government by satraps, local laws and usages were left, to a large extent, undisturbed. Great roads, and postal communication for the exclusive use of the government, connected the capital with the distant provinces. In this point the Persians set an example which was followed by the Romans. From Susa to Sardis, a distance of about seventeen hundred English miles, stretched a road, along which, at proper intervals, were caravansaries, and over which the fleet couriers of the king rode in six or seven days. The king was an absolute lord and master, who disposed of the lives and property of his subjects without restraint. To him the most servile homage was paid. He lived mostly in seclusion in his palace. On great occasions he sat at banquet with his nobles. His throne was made of gold, silver, and ivory. All who approached him kissed the earth. His ordinary dress was probably of the richest silk. He took his meals mostly by himself. His fare was made up of the choicest delicacies. His seraglio, guarded by eunuchs, contained a multitude of inmates, brought together by his arbitrary command, over whom, in a certain way, the queen-mother presided. His chief diversions were playing at dice within doors, and hunting without. Paradises, or parks, walled in, planted with trees and shrubbery, and furnished with refreshing fountains and streams, were his hunting-ground. Such inclosures were the delight of all Persians. In war he was attended with various officers in close attendance on his person—the stool-bearer, the bow-bearer, etc. In peace, there was another set, among whom was "the parasol-bearer,"—for to be sheltered by the parasol was an exclusive privilege of the king—the fan-bearer, etc. There were certain privileged families—six besides the royal clan of the Achæmenidæ, the chiefs of all of which were his counselors, and from whom he was bound to choose his legitimate wives. When the monarch traveled, even on military expeditions, he was accompanied by the whole varied apparatus of luxury which ministered to his pleasures in the court—costly furniture, a vast retinue of attendants, of inmates of the harem, etc.

ARMY AND NAVY.—The arms of the footman were a sword, a spear, and a bow. Persian bowmen were skillful. Persian cavalry, both heavy and light, were their most effective arm. The military leaders depended on the celerity of their horsemen and the weight of their numbers. It is doubtful whether they employed military engines. They were not wholly ignorant of strategy. Their troops were marshaled by nations, each in its own costume, the commander of the whole being in the center of the line of battle. The body-guard of the king was "the Immortals," a body of ten thousand picked footmen, the number being always kept intact. The enemies of the Persians, except in the case of rebels, were not treated with inhumanity. In this regard the Persians are in marked contrast with the Semitic ferocity of the Assyrians. Their navies were drawn from the subject-peoples. The trireme, with its projecting prow shod with iron, and its crew of two hundred men, was the principal, but not the only vessel used in sea-fights.

LITERATURE AND ART.—A Persian youth was ordinarily taught to read, but there was little intellectual culture. Boys were trained in athletic exercises. It was a discipline in hardy and temperate habits. Etiquette, in all ranks of the people, was highly esteemed. The Persians, as a nation, were bright-minded, and not deficient in fancy and imagination. But they contributed little to science. Their religious ideas were an heirloom from remote ancestors. The celebrated Persian poet, Firdousí, lived in the tenth century of our era. His great poem, the Shahnameh, or Book of Kings, is a storehouse of ancient traditions. It is probable that the ancient poetry of the Persians, like this production, was of moderate merit. Of the Persian architecture and sculpture, we derive our knowledge from the massive ruins of Persepolis, which was burned by Alexander the Great, and from the remains of other cities. They had learned from Assyria and Babylon, but they display no high degree of artistic talent. They were not an intellectual people: they were soldiers and rulers.

LITERATURE—Works mentioned on pp 16, 42; Encycl. Brit., Art. Persia; Vaux, Persia from the Monuments (1876); Nöldeke, Aufsdtze zur persischen Geschichte (1887); Justi, Geschichte trans (1900); Markham, General Sketch of the History of Persia (1874).