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Located 40 km as the crow flies south of Pasargadae, Persepolis was built on the eastern side of a lower but larger plain than Pasargadae at 1600 m above sea level. The most impressive part of the site is the huge stone terrace supporting numerous columned buildings (Figures 15.4 and 70.2), visible from far away. At 6 km northward, four royal tombs are carved into a cliff. Both places were known by travelers sporadically between the fourteenth and sixteenth century, and visited by almost all travelers from the seventeenth century until the first archeologists at the turn of the twentieth century. The terrace was largely excavated before World War II by an expedition of the University of Chicago, directed by Ernst Herzfeld between 1931 and 1934, then Erich F. Schmidt between 1935 and 1939. After the war, Iranian teams continued investigations at the foot of the terrace and on the top of Kuh‐i Rahmat mountain, while architectural remains scattered in the plain were cleared out by salvage excavations, undertaken with the help of Italian restorers (1965–1979). Since 2002, the reactivation of the Persepolis Pasargadae Research Foundation has revived the restoration and protection of monuments and the exploration of the plain. Geomagnetic surveys by an Iranian–French expedition (2005–2008) provided fresh information on less visible remains, and from 2008 an Iranian–Italian mission commenced a series of soundings west of the terrace. Since 2011 this mission has undertaken excavation on a small mound which corresponds to a monumental gate. Built of mudbrick walls resting on baked bricks, the gate offers a plan (presumably measuring 39.07 × 29.06 m), very similar to the Ishtar Gate in Babylon; moreover, it is decorated with panels of glazed relief bricks similar in style and iconography to pre‐Achaemenid Babylonian walls (bull, monster called mushkhusshu). The gate should date between Cyrus' conquest of Babylon (539 BCE) and Darius' early reign, an early date confirmed by a piece of inscription prior to the Achaemenid Elamite language of the later period at Persepolis (Askari Chaverdi et al. 2017). Such a discovery supposes the presence of other royal constructions nearby, as it is in Pasargadae.

Figure 15.4 Persepolis, aerial view of terrace from north‐northeast.

Source: Reproduced by permission of the Joint Iran–France Mission at Persepolis; photography B.N. Chagny.

Persepolis, the royal residence and center of the satrapy of Persia, was to be a major population center that can be seen according to the semi‐concentric circles: first the Royal Quarter, whose central point is the terrace; around this area the city within 4–6 km to Naqsh‐i Rustam north via the west and to the south. Beyond this half‐circle, the plain of Persepolis was developed to sustain the permanent population of the city and the thousands of people to be accommodated during the stays of the great king (family, court, guards, scribes, etc.). Benefiting from rather good natural resources, the plain was developed during the Achaemenid period, as evinced by hydraulic works more than by secondary towns or settlements, which have not been much located.

The Royal Quarter is not restricted to the famous terrace, 8–14 m high covering 12 ha and supporting some 20 buildings. It includes two other areas, one to the south, at the plain level, the so‐called Southern Quarter with stone buildings, covering nearly 10 ha (Mousavi 2012: pp. 26–41), and one to the east, the steep slope of the Kuh‐i Rahmat mountain overlooking the terrace and crowned by a line of mudbrick fortifications with towers (Figure 70.2). Protection on the west side of the terrace is less visible, a wall running from north to south, parallel to the retaining wall of the terrace. The “third enclosure” mentioned by Diod. Sic. XVII (71, 4–6) remains to be found (Mousavi 1992). Altogether the Royal Quarter covered almost 30 ha, it is only part of Parsa (Old Persian) “[the City] Persia” or “of Persians,” since Parsa is also the name given to the country of Persia itself.

Since Schmidt's excavations (1953, 1957, 1970) the terrace and monuments have been described at length. It should be noted that the names of the various buildings are those given by archeologists and rarely those specified in the inscriptions, except hadiš, “seat,” or “residence,” which probably means residential building. Tačara is more uncertain, perhaps “house.” The most impressive building, not named in the inscriptions, is commonly called Apadana, by reference to a very similar structure in Susa which is so called in an inscription. Other names are descriptive, such as Hall of 100 Columns, east of the Apadana, with the main hall broader than this but without portico, or Hall of 32 Columns, Central Building. The term Harem is without any ground, while Treasury, storehouse, refers to the plans of rooms, and objects, often luxurious, found in many of them, including stone mortars, most of which are inscribed in Aramaic and sometimes mention “treasurers.”

The present‐day remains represent Persepolis terrace as Alexander left it after he put fire to it in 330. Only a small part in the southwest quarter was repaired or maintained in the late fourth or third centuries. At Darius' time most of the terrace was empty. He built the terrace itself, a task of several years, by cutting into the mountain, keeping the natural rock in places and reusing the extracted blocks to build the retaining wall in cyclopean masonry. The original access was on the south side, next to which Darius had engraved four different inscriptions, two in Old Persian (DPd‐e),¹ one in Elamite (DPf) which mentions the construction of the terrace and some buildings, and one in Babylonian (DPg) mentioning people who contributed to the construction.

Then Darius built the Apadana and his palace almost attached to it, which is the best preserved monument of Persepolis (Jacobs 1997). He erected the Treasury, the plan for which changed several times. These buildings take up the tradition of the pillared halls of Pasargadae but expanding them and changing them into a more complex layout. The central columned halls are usually square instead of the rectangular plan of Pasargadae. Unlike the Mesopotamian compact architecture of the palaces, the Persepolis buildings are separated from each other but not distant as they are in Pasargadae; each of most of them is built on a platform 1–2.60 m high. The Apadana is the most grandiose expression of the Achaemenid architecture: a square building of 110 m a side on a 2.60 m high podium. The columned hall, 53 m a side, counts six rows of six fluted columns resting on a square base and supporting a composite capital topped by two adorsed bull protomae. None of them is complete, raising the question of the direction of the protomae. The traditional reconstruction showing the lateral side of the bull in the porticoes (Krefter 1971: Beilage 3–4), as they are on the facade of the royal tombs, may be an artistic convention; a front position is quite plausible (Seidl 2003). The latter supported cedar beams from Lebanon. On three sides, the main hall is surrounded by columned porticoes with two rows of six columns resting on bell‐shaped bases. The south side consists of a series of small rooms with a main corridor in the middle leading to Darius' palace. The porticoes are flanked by corner towers which contain several rooms at ground level and probably an upper story and a staircase to reach the roof. In the northeast and southwest corners of the audience hall, foundation deposits were discovered beneath the walls: two sheets of gold and silver bearing a trilingual text (DPh), together with gold, silver, and copper coins. The north and east porticoes are approached by stairways composed of four symmetrically arranged flights of steps. Their facades are covered with reliefs at eye level. Both stairways bear the same kind of figures. The central panel originally represented the king sitting on his throne giving audience to an official. Probably under Xerxes, both reliefs were removed to the Treasury and replaced by a series of guards. One side of the staircase is decorated with files of guards, followed by court members. The other side shows 23 tribute bearing delegations (cf. Chapter 94 Statuary and Relief).

The plan of Darius' palace is the archetype for the later buildings of his successors: a single portico flanked by guardrooms, a square hypostyle hall, with symmetrical series of rooms on the lateral sides and other rooms at the rear side. Xerxes and Artaxerxes would extend this layout for their own palaces.

The fortifications on the north and east sides of the terrace were built during Darius' reign and probably completed later. In two small rooms of the north fortifications, thousands of inscribed clay tablets, administrative documents, were discovered in 1933 (see Chapter 7 Elamite Sources). The remote location of these archives (Persepolis Fortification Tablets covering Darius' reign between 509 and 494 BCE) is still puzzling (Hallock 1969; Henkelman 2008).

The only visible architecture today at Persepolis is made of stone, but the buildings were made of clay, mudbricks, and baked bricks for the walls (5 m thick in the Apadana). Actually stone is limited to the column bases, door frames, actual and blind windows, staircases, and wall reliefs. Stone column shafts and capitals are restricted to the Apadana, the Hall of 100 Columns and All Nations Gate. The other columned buildings are equipped with wood poles coated with plaster and painted. Stone was extracted from quarries nearby, one being immediately north of the terrace, others located on a slope near Naqsh‐i Rustam or at 5–10 km from the terrace. The most distant quarry, more than 30 km northwest of the terrace, provided a better quality used for sculpture.

Almost nothing was completed at the death of Darius in 486 BCE. That situation raises two questions. One concerns the location of official audiences and meetings during most of his reign; the other one is the type of buildings where the king and the court lived. Even in later periods, only some buildings on the terrace are really adapted to accommodate the king and his family and the court, namely a large part of the so‐called Harem, which was not built until Xerxes, and, according to some hypotheses, the southern side of the Apadana where apartments could have been located on an upper story (Huff 2010 and other articles by Huff quoted there).

Xerxes completed his father's major buildings, erected the “All Countries” Gate to the north, and added his hadiš, today poorly preserved, in the south. He, or maybe his son, Artaxerxes I, began the Hall of 100 Columns and the smaller Hall of 32 Columns. Artaxerxes also built his own palace, to the southwest. The following kings were less active, but they may have enlarged or altered buildings, or removed pieces of them without signing their work with an inscription. Artaxerxes III (359–338 BCE) is the latest known builder for a staircase at the palace H and another one to the west of the palace of Darius (on function of the terrace, cf. Chapter 70 The Residences).

The terrace and the royal necropolis of Naqsh‐i Rustam belong to the same project. As shown by the remains of stone architecture scattered west and north of the terrace, and the results of archeological surveys since 2000, the whole area between the two sites must be considered as Parsa that extended over some 20 km² (Tilia 1978: pp. 73–91). The spatial organization of this vast area consists of discrete concentrations of artifacts or structures, likely corresponding to different social classes. An elite – or royal? – residential area about 3 km west of the terrace covers dozens of acres. It consists of low and small tepes separated from each other by several hundred meters. Blocks of hewn stone, and in one case a mural of glazed bricks, are still visible on many of them. These mounds probably correspond to large mudbrick buildings, surrounded by gardens. Such elite areas probably also existed north and northwest and perhaps in the south. Clearly separated from these areas are other large patches marked by pottery sherds on the surface, without visible traces of architecture. They should be the living quarters and workshops of more mundane people, and barracks of numerous workers employed for the construction of the royal buildings. One of these patches is particularly noticeable about 1 km west of the terrace. The location of the encampment of the guard is not localized but should rather consist of tents. The geomagnetic survey shows some anomalies corresponding to ditches and maybe some walls which are the flimsy remains of these settlements. Altogether, in the vast area between the terrace and the necropolis, the non‐built spaces were the majority. However, they may correspond to managed landscape with orchards, large gardens, or parks.

The plain of Persepolis extends over some 100 km from north to south and 30 km at its greatest extension in the central part. In the southern half, the soil is today very salty, as it was in the past, according to analyses. It contrasts with the central part near the terrace and the northern one most intensively occupied from the Neolithic to the late second millennium BCE. After a gap of several centuries, the plain is again developed during the Achaemenid period and later.

Soil quality and irrigation possibilities make the plain a fertile region, which has negative consequences. Modern mechanized agricultural development provoked the disappearance of many witnesses of the ancient occupation. A multiperiod survey of this plain in 1968–1969 showed a rather low ratio of Achaemenid settlements, generally small in size (Sumner 1986). According to a survey conducted 40 years later, nearly half of these few settlements have been destroyed (Boucharlat et al. 2012). The best evidence of the Achaemenid and post‐Achaemenid occupation consists of irrigation canals, the largest of which measured several kilometers, dams of earth and rough stone, and sometimes structures made of cut stone. Here and there isolated stone architectural elements have been reported, drums or column bases, but they have not been found in place. Some are unfinished, witnessing activity traces of transport between the quarries and Persepolis.

The image of Persepolis city offered by archeology does not contradict the description by Diod. Sic. (XVII.70, 3–5), which mentions the mansions that the army of Alexander plundered before reaching the terrace. However, the image of the occupation of the plain is quite poor in comparison with the agriculture and craft activities evidenced by the Persepolis Fortification Tablets (see Chapter 62 Persia). The latter mention these places as estates and a few cities, which could explain the apparent lack of important archeological remains in the plain.

In southern Fars, occupation of the Achaemenid period was observed in a few places corresponding to elite buildings. Farmeshgān, 60 km south of Shiraz (Figure 70.1), a group of four stone platforms almost juxtaposed, measuring between 6.50 m and 10 m a side, is one example. Very little is known of this unexcavated site, but fragments of bas‐reliefs were found on the surface, a spear‐holder guard, rosettes, and a high relief of a lion. The use of the toothed chisel for working the stone indicates Darius I's time or later.

Near Fasa, 170 km southeast of Shiraz and near Darab, some stone bell‐shaped bases of Persepolis type and ceramic material have been found which point to important Achaemenid occupations (Hansman 1975). The whole southern region to the Persian Gulf suffers from a hot and dry climate, creating an arid environment. Sparsely populated before the Achaemenid period, the region is more densely occupied from the early centuries CE on. The settlements are no longer concentrated along the perennial streams but extend higher on the slopes. In my opinion, this change is due to the introduction of a new irrigation technique, the underground water draining galleries. Very likely since the late Iron Age these shallow galleries were subterranean derivations from streams but did not tap the deeper water table. For the Achaemenid period we know only of galleries in Egypt tapping permanent water resources (Wuttmann 2001). This famous technique, called qanāt or karīz, permitted the occupation of more semi‐arid and arid areas. However, despite Polybius X. 28, it is not yet clear whether the qanat technique was actually used in Iran and particularly in Fars as early as the Achaemenid period (Boucharlat 2001, 2017).

Human occupation is restricted to oases, such as the Borazjān at 70 km from Bushehr on the Persian Gulf shore. Royal stone buildings were found in different places today embedded within palm groves (Zehbari 2020). One of these palaces was excavated in 1970 southwest of the modern city. A hypostyle hall of 18 m in length at Sang‐i Siah consists of two rows of six column bases, two‐stepped square plinths, the lower made of a black and a white stone, the upper with white stone topped by a black torus. They are similar in color and size to those of Palace S of Pasargadae (a square of 1.10 m and 1.16 m, respectively). The hall is surrounded by four porticoes with two rows of bases; the eastern portico with 14 bases extends beyond the hall as at Palace P at Pasargadae. Another pillared building with one similar columned portico was excavated in 2005 at Bardak Siah, 12 km northwest of Borazjan, with bicolored stone bases. The rectangular hall exhibits four rows of six bases. In these palaces, there is no evidence of stone column shafts. In the latter an inscribed fragment in Babylonian and a fragment of bas‐relief showing the head and shoulder of a king under an umbrella with a servant were found. On one hand the column bases recall those of Pasargadae buildings, on the other hand the sculpture is reminiscent of Darius' reliefs at Persepolis. These constructions could have been begun by Cyrus and completed in Darius' time.