Archaeology Odyssey

This is not unprecedented: In the trilingual inscription at the rock of Bisitun, carved around 521 B.C. and telling of Darius’s victories in seizing control of the empire, the Elamite text was carved first.

The earliest scientific excavations at Persepolis, conducted by the German archaeologists Ernst Herzfeld (1931–1934) and Erich Schmidt (1934–1939), were sponsored by the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago.

One of the Hittite vassal kingdoms was almost certainly Troy (called “Ilios” and “Troia” by Homer and “Wilusa” by the Hittites). See the following articles in Archaeology Odyssey: “Greeks vs. Hittites: Why Troy is Troy and the Trojan War Is Real” (interview with Wolf-Dietrich Niemeier), July/August 2002; and “Is Homer Historical?” (interview with Gregory Nagy), May/June 2004.

As we know from Achaemenid texts, the ancient Persians called the city “Parsa,” which referred to both a district (what is now the province of Fars), and to its royal residence, Persepolis. Consequently, the Greek “Persia” (from “Parsa”), used to refer to the entire country, is a misnomer.

See Harrison Eiteljorg, “Antiquity’s High Holy Place: The Athenian Acropolis,” Archaeology Odyssey, November/December 2004.

The earliest Zoroastrian scriptures, collectively known as the Avesta, consist of hymns attributed to a prophet named Zoroaster, who may have lived in the sixth century B.C.

Darius also took other measures to secure his legitimacy, such as marrying Cyrus’s daughters Atossa and Artystone (Herodotus, History 3.88). This ensured that all later Achaemenid kings—indeed all the kings who ruled the Persian empire save Darius himself—could trace their bloodline directly to Cyrus the Great.

See “Deciphering Darius” (an excerpt from Henry Creswicke Rawlinson on the Bisitun Inscription), Past Perfect, Archaeology Odyssey, September/October 2005.