PERSIAN EMPIRE

We will have to unearth the history of before 7000 years. Archaeological study suggests that still there exists some cities and human habitats, those evident; there were human habitats ahead of 7000 years old. According to the description of various clans of the Arya, the race settled in the Iranian plateau in 1500 BCE (Before the Christian Era). Among them, Medes and Persia were historically the most important. People of the Medes tribe started living in the North-West part of the plateau. People of the Persian clan came from a territory titled Persua west of Urmia Lake and started living in the southern portion of the Iranian plateau. They also named the territory Persumal.

 

However, we will have to proceed further back. The time was 2000 BCE. There was a vast green land covering the low-lying areas of the Danube River towards the East and from the north part of the Black Sea to South Russia. The green land was known as Steppes Greenland. Different shepherd tribes lived in this region. Their number was increasing gradually. At one time, the Semitic tribe, living in the South started fighting with the Indo-European tribe settled in the North. At one stage, people of the Indo-European tribe split into two groups. One group moved toward India and the other started moving towards Europe. This Indo-European tribe is known as Arya. One tiny clan of Indo-European tribes moved to today’s Iran and settled there. In this way, a number of small kingdoms emerged in this region. Two kingdoms became very strong and powerful- one was the Medes kingdom of the North region and the other was the Ansan kingdom of the South which was founded by the Persians. Medes kingdom captured neighboring Armenia and Assyria states and built up a strong and powerful Medes Empire. On the other hand, the Persian people built up the Persian Empire under the dynamic leadership of the Achaemenid.

 

Since the beginning, the Medes Empire started dominating the Persian Empire. It was happening during 600 BCE. However, the situation was changed slowly. A strong king titled Cyrus emerged in the Persian Empire, later known as Cyrus or Cyrus the Great in history. Under his strong leadership, the Persians conquered the Medes Empire, resulting in the emergence of the Persian Empire. Subsequently, the Persian Empire turned into the largest empire of the then world that covered the continents of Asia, Europe, and Africa. After the killing of great Cyrus, his son Cambyses was sworn in power. However, he couldn’t attain success alike his father. After his death, it was supposed that his brother Bardiya would replace Cambyses. It was guessed that while remained in the expedition of war, Cambyses sent assassinators to kill his brother Bardiya. Cambyses became shocked with grief and inattentive. While he was making sculptures by excavating wood with a sharp iron weapon, he suddenly sustained a stroke of that iron weapon at his thigh and after a few days, he succumbed to injury after a few days. In the absence of Cambyses, some high officials of the state declared a person as king who was almost similar to Bardiya (who was assassinated secretly), to look at. This false king was the brother of Pattizethis, responsible for the kingdom-related activities. When this information was revealed, Cambyses supporter army commanders decided to take revenge. Eventually, they succeeded in killing the false king and his brother Pattizethis. One of those army commanders was Darius by name. When there erupted a controversy about who would sworn into power of the state, the Original planner received revenge left from the competition of kinghood. Afterward, through chronologies of events, finally, Darius was sworn into power unanimously. Darius later became a great emperor like Cyrus. Eventually, at the last stage of life, he was defeated by Greek soldiers in the battle of Marathon. Still Marathon race takes place commemorating that battle. While the Greeks won the battle, one soldier named Marathon ran about 26 miles to inform the then-emperor about the good news of the battle. He died instantly in front of the emperor. After the death of Darius, the magnificence of the empire declined gradually. In 330 BCE Alexander captured Persia and after his death, Persia was ruled under the Parthian Empire established by the followers of Alexander. Eventually, in the middle of the third Christian year, First Ardasir founded the Sassanid Empire by driving out the Parthians. However, about five centuries were passed during this. Sassanid Empire once turned out to be a great force and its emperor Khusrau became the strongest emperor in the world. Third Khusrau died in 628 CE and was the most powerful emperor of that dynasty who got involved in battles against the Byzantine Empire for consecutive 26 years covering from 602 to 628. After his death, his son was sworn in power of the empire. On the other hand, the Byzantines had won more battles under the leadership of Heraclius. Their victory started during the lifetime of Khusrau. Within such circumstances, Khusrau was assassinated in 628 due to a palace conspiracy. It is worth mentioning that, during this period Islam emerged in Arab states. Hazrat Muhammad (s) received prophethood (Messenger of Allah) in 610 and Hazrat Muhammad (s) started preaching Islamic invitations in the Arabian Peninsula. The Prophet left Mecca toward Medina in 622 CE and the Muslims won the battle against the Quraish of Mecca in 624. This event coincided with the victory of Heraclius over the Persian emperor. Later, Muslims won battles against the non-believers and Byzantines won battle over the fire-worshippers of Persia.

 

Due to mutual conflict and battles between, the Byzantine and Persian empires, both empires became weak. After the death of Prophet Muhammad (s), during the Rashidun Caliphate, the Muslims won most areas of Byzantine and Persian empires under the leadership of 2nd Caliph Hazrat Umar (R).