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Maka (satrapy)
Maka ( peo, 𐎶𐎣 ''Maka-'') was a satrapy (province) of the Achaemenid Empire and later a satrapy of the Parthian and Sassanian empires (known as Mazun), corresponding to Greek Gedrosia, in the barren coastal areas of modern Pakistan and Iranian Baluchistan. Alternatively, it may have corresponded to modern day Bahrain, Qatar, and United Arab Emirates, plus the northern half of Oman (see Magan). Maka was already a part of the Achaemenid Empire before Darius the Great came to power in 522 BC - it is mentioned in the Behistun inscription that it was already there when he inherited the throne. It is possible (because Cambyses and Smerdis are not known to have been there) that it was conquered by Cyrus the Great in 542 BC. He is known to have campaigned on the other side of the Persian Gulf (he seems to have lost most of his army in the Gedrosian Desert). It continued to be a satrapy until Alexander's conquests of Persia, at which point it became independent. According to Herodo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Magan (civilization)
Magan (also Makkan) was an ancient region in what is now modern day United Arab Emirates and Oman, it was referred to in Sumerian cuneiform texts of around 2300 BC and existed until 550 BC as a source of copper and diorite for Mesopotamia. There is also evidence to support the idea that the Magan people were actually Sumerian. As discussed by The Archeology Fund founded by Juris Zarins, "The Sumerian cities of southern Mesopotamia were closely linked to the Gulf. Archaeologists and historians have linked sites in Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and Qatar to the Sumerian geographical term of Dilmun. Oman, was most likely the Sumerian Magan". Location Modern archaeological and geological evidence places Magan in the area currently encompassed by the United Arab Emirates and Oman. In the past, historians had debated possible locations, including the region of Yemen known as Ma'in, in the south of Upper Egypt, in Nubia or the Sudan, and others as part of today's Iran and Pakistan. Other Possibl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gedrosia (satrapy)
Gedrosia is a dry, mountainous country along the northwestern shores of the Indian Ocean. It was occupied in the Bronze Age by people who settled in the few oases in the region. Other people settled on the coast and became known in Greek as Ichthyophagi. The country was conquered by the Persian king Cyrus the Great (559-530 BCE), although information about his campaign is comparatively late. The capital of Gedrosia was Pura, which is probably identical to modern Bampûr, forty kilometers west of Irânshahr. Gedrosia became famous in Europe when the Macedonian king Alexander the Great tried to cross the Gedrosian desert and lost one third of his men. Several scholars have argued that the Persian satrapy Maka is identical to Gedrosia (which is a Greek name). One argument is the similarity of the name Maka to the modern name Makran, a part of Pakistan and Iran that is situated a bit more to the east. However, it is more likely that Maka is to be sought in modern Oman, which was ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sagartians
The Sagartians ( la, Sagartii; grc, Σαγάρτιοι ''Sagártioi''; Old Persian: 𐎠𐎿𐎥𐎼𐎫𐎡𐎹 ''Asagartiya'' "Sagartian"; Elamite: 𒀾𒐼𒋼𒀀𒋾𒅀 ''Aš-šá-kar-ti-ia'', Babylonian: 𒆳𒊓𒂵𒅈𒋫𒀀𒀀 KUR''Sa-ga-ar-ta-a-a'') were an ancient Iranian tribe, dwelling in the Iranian plateau. Their exact location is unknown; they were probably neighbors of the Parthians in northeastern Iran. According to Herodotus (1.125, 7.85) they were related to the Persians ( Southwestern Iranian), but they may also have entered a political union with the Medians (Northwestern Iranian) at some point (J. van Wesendonk in ZII 9, 1933, pp. 23f.). Ptolemy (6.2.6) locates them in Media, while Stephanus of Byzantium claims that there was a peninsula in the Caspian Sea called ''Sagartía''. They were nomadic pastoralists, their main weapon being the lasso (Herodotus 7.85). It is unclear whether they are identical to the ''Zikirti'' mentioned by Sargon I ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Drangiana
Drangiana or Zarangiana ( el, Δραγγιανή, ''Drangianē''; also attested in Old Western Iranian as 𐏀𐎼𐎣, ''Zraka'' or ''Zranka'', was a historical region and administrative division of the Achaemenid Empire. This region comprises territory around Hamun Lake, wetlands in endorheic Sistan Basin on the Iran-Afghan border, and its primary watershed Helmand river in what is nowadays southwestern region of Afghanistan. History In ancient times Drangiana was inhabited by an Iranian tribe which the ancient Greeks called Sarangians or Drangians. Drangiana was possibly subdued by another Iranian people, the Medes, and later, certainly, by the expanding Persian Achaemenid Empire of Cyrus the Great (559-530 BC). According to Herodotus, during the reign of Darius I (522-486 BC), the Drangians were placed in the same district as the Utians, Thamanaeans, Mycians, and those deported to the Persian Gulf. The capital of Drangiana, called Zarin or Zranka (like the Province), is ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Herodotus
Herodotus ( ; grc, , }; BC) was an ancient Greek historian and geographer from the Greek city of Halicarnassus, part of the Persian Empire (now Bodrum, Turkey) and a later citizen of Thurii in modern Calabria ( Italy). He is known for having written the '' Histories'' – a detailed account of the Greco-Persian Wars. Herodotus was the first writer to perform systematic investigation of historical events. He is referred to as " The Father of History", a title conferred on him by the ancient Roman orator Cicero. The ''Histories'' primarily cover the lives of prominent kings and famous battles such as Marathon, Thermopylae, Artemisium, Salamis, Plataea, and Mycale. His work deviates from the main topics to provide a cultural, ethnographical, geographical, and historiographical background that forms an essential part of the narrative and provides readers with a wellspring of additional information. Herodotus has been criticized for his inclusion of "legends and f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alexander's Conquests
The wars of Alexander the Great were a series of conquests that were carried out by Alexander III of Macedon from 336 BC to 323 BC. They began with battles against the Achaemenid Persian Empire, then under the rule of Darius III of Persia. After Alexander's chain of victories against Achaemenid Persia, he began a campaign against local chieftains and warlords that were stretched as far from Greece as the region of Punjab in South Asia. By the time of his death, he ruled over most regions of Greece and the conquered Achaemenid Empire (including much of Persian Egypt); he did not, however, manage to conquer the Indian subcontinent in its entirety as was his initial plan. Despite his military accomplishments, Alexander did not provide any stable alternative to the rule of the Achaemenid Empire, and his untimely death threw the vast territories he conquered into a series of civil wars, commonly known as the Wars of the Diadochi. Alexander assumed kingship over ancient Macedoni ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Persian Gulf
The Persian Gulf ( fa, خلیج فارس, translit=xalij-e fârs, lit=Gulf of Persis, Fars, ), sometimes called the ( ar, اَلْخَلِيْجُ ٱلْعَرَبِيُّ, Al-Khalīj al-ˁArabī), is a Mediterranean sea (oceanography), mediterranean sea in Western Asia. The body of water is an extension of the Indian Ocean located between Iran and the Arabian Peninsula.United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical NameWorking Paper No. 61, 23rd Session, Vienna, 28 March – 4 April 2006. accessed October 9, 2010 It is connected to the Gulf of Oman in the east by the Strait of Hormuz. The Shatt al-Arab river delta forms the northwest shoreline. The Persian Gulf has many fishing grounds, extensive reefs (mostly rocky, but also Coral reef, coral), and abundant pearl oysters, however its ecology has been damaged by industrialization and oil spills. The Persian Gulf is in the Persian Gulf Basin, which is of Cenozoic origin and related to the subduction of the Arabian Plate u ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cyrus The Great
Cyrus II of Persia (; peo, 𐎤𐎢𐎽𐎢𐏁 ), commonly known as Cyrus the Great, was the founder of the Achaemenid Empire, the first Persian empire. Schmitt Achaemenid dynasty (i. The clan and dynasty) Under his rule, the empire embraced all of the previous civilized states of the ancient Near East, expanded vastly and eventually conquered most of Western Asia and much of Central Asia. Spanning from the Mediterranean Sea and Hellespont in the west to the Indus River in the east, the empire created by Cyrus was the largest the world had yet seen. At its maximum extent under his successors, the Achaemenid Empire stretched from parts of the Balkans ( Eastern Bulgaria– Paeonia and Thrace– Macedonia) and Southeast Europe proper in the west to the Indus Valley in the east. The reign of Cyrus lasted about thirty years; his empire took root with his conquest of the Median Empire followed by the Lydian Empire and eventually the Neo-Babylonian Empire. He also led an expedit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Smerdis
Bardiya or Smerdis ( peo, 𐎲𐎼𐎮𐎡𐎹 ; grc, Σμέρδις ; possibly died 522 BC), also named as Tanyoxarces ( grc, Τανυοξάρκης ) by Ctesias, was a son of Cyrus the Great and the younger brother of Cambyses II, both Persian kings. There are sharply divided views on his life. Bardiya either ruled the Achaemenid Empire for a few months in 522 BC, or was impersonated by a magus called Gaumāta ( peo, 𐎥𐎢𐎶𐎠𐎫); whose name is given by Ctesias as Sphendadates ( peo, Spantadātaʰ; grc, Σφενδαδάτης ), until he was toppled by Darius the Great. Name and sources The prince's name is listed variously in the historical sources. In Darius the Great's Behistun inscription, his Persian name is Bardiya or Bardia. Herodotus calls him Smerdis, which is the prevalent Greek form of his name; the Persian name has been assimilated to the Greek (Asiatic) name ''Smerdis'' or ''Smerdies'', a name which also occurs in the poems of Alcaeus and Anacr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
