Goldie Ghamari - The History of Ancient Persia： Cyrus the Great and the Achaemenid Empire

00:00:00.000 Let's do it

00:00:30.000 Thank you.

00:01:00.000 Thank you.

00:01:30.000 Thank you.

00:02:00.000 well good evening everyone welcome to the evening edition of the goldie show

00:02:29.040 Shabbat Shalom to everyone who is celebrating the Sabbath or sorry the Shabbat I should say sorry

00:02:38.380 it's been an incredibly long day for me what's everyone drinking tonight my poison tonight is

00:02:45.820 of course bubbly but tonight I have apple apple flavored bubbly so that's what I'm drinking

00:02:55.120 tonight, let me know in the comments what you are drinking. Welcome to everyone. Of course,

00:03:00.800 welcome to my YouTube channel subscribers. Welcome to the mods. And of course, a special welcome to

00:03:09.780 all of the channel members. Great to see you all here. Thank you for joining me.

00:03:18.480 So I just want to preface this by saying I am not a historian. So I can't really watch this documentary and fact check it because I'm not a historian.

00:03:35.860 Like, I have basic knowledge, basic general info about the Persian Empire and Cyrus the Great and, you know, what did or did not happen.

00:03:47.040 But like my my knowledge of modern day Iranian history, you know, in the last, I would say, 200, 250 years, I'm much more comfortable with that than I am with with the ancient Persian history.

00:03:58.940 But but I do know enough. I do know enough. And of course, you know, I'll Google and, you know, find things.

00:04:03.940 Um, but many of you requested for me to play a documentary about, um, ancient Persia, especially

00:04:14.540 since my little rant yesterday, um, where I gave my opinion on the movie 300. Um, again, like I,

00:04:25.500 I only did that video because many of you have been asking me about my opinion on the movie 300.

00:04:32.400 and you know I figured it's it's Christmas I haven't looked at the news I don't want to look 0.60

00:04:38.440 at the news because I knew that if I look at the news it's just going to be full of like jihad and

00:04:42.860 Islamic terrorism and all that you know nonsense and I figured I'll give myself a day off so

00:04:47.040 that's why I did a post yesterday about 300 but there was surprisingly a lot of interest there

00:04:53.420 was a lot of interest and people wanted to know more about um ancient Persia and ancient Persian

00:05:01.600 history. So that's why I decided that tonight as something a little bit more chill, I will play a

00:05:11.120 video about the ancient Persian empire. And this is a learning opportunity for me as well. And to

00:05:20.420 all of the Iranians who have joined me, not just Iranians, but historians as well, or anyone who's

00:05:26.640 familiar with with the ancient Persian empire. I'm also going to rely on you to help me out in

00:05:32.660 the comments and I'll be reading all of your thoughts and your opinions as well. So I found

00:05:38.860 this video on YouTube. It's a video that was posted on a channel called History Time. This

00:05:50.120 video was posted five years ago, and it has 4.7 million views. 4.7 million views. And it's

00:05:59.940 entitled, The Entire History of the Persian Achaemenid Empire. So from 550 until 330 BC.

00:06:10.560 So basically, of course, I'm assuming it will begin with Cyrus the Great, the founder of the

00:06:17.920 Persian Empire. And let's see where it goes. Let's see where it goes. So I'm just as excited

00:06:26.960 as you are. And hopefully, hopefully I picked a good one. I mean, either way, this video has

00:06:34.660 almost 5 million views. So let's see what happens. Let's see what happens. And, you know, given

00:06:40.820 given all the nonsense we're dealing with in the world with Islamic terrorism and jihad, 1.00

00:06:46.640 I figured this would be, you know, a lighthearted way to spend our Friday evening. 1.00

00:06:53.000 So thank you, everyone.

00:06:54.800 I hope I gave you enough time to grab a drink and get settled in.

00:06:59.040 Again, tonight's bubbly flavor is apple.

00:07:03.180 So there we go.

00:07:04.960 Let's let's get started.

00:07:07.480 In the year 480 BC, war came to Greece.

00:07:23.040 Not the usual squabbling between the regional powers.

00:07:27.460 That myriad patchwork of Greek-speaking city-states, kingdoms and oligarchies

00:07:32.900 strewn around the seashores of the eastern Mediterranean.

00:07:37.480 no this threat was something else entirely okay so i'm i'm seeing i'm seeing in the comments

00:07:47.180 tim horn is saying that history time is an amazing channel i've watched their videos over

00:07:54.700 the years all right tim no pressure no pressure but you are endorsing this video so um if if if

00:08:03.180 there's something about this video i don't like i'm gonna blame you tim just saying no i'm joking

00:08:07.340 I'm joking. But but thank you for that. Appreciate that.

00:08:11.600 A Leviathan rolling in from the east.

00:08:19.080 No doubt many amongst the coalition raised to face this new threat must have cursed their cousins across the sea in Ionia for bringing down this fate upon them.

00:08:30.580 The Ionian Greeks having rebelled against their new near-eastern overlords more than a decade earlier, ushering in years of conflict in the process.

00:08:46.060 And now, out in the water, just beyond the horizon of the Greek mainland, a massive army

00:08:58.780 and fleet of ships to match had gathered, the likes of which the Greek world had never seen

00:09:06.520 before.

00:09:09.240 To those defenders, each individual Greek state being able to field a few thousand men

00:09:15.940 at best, the sheer size and composition of this new force must have been near incomprehensible.

00:09:27.860 The Greek historian Herodotus, writing several decades later,

00:09:32.260 claims that over two and a half million men were present from all nations of the known world.

00:09:38.820 Today, we simply don't know the actual size of the invasion force, though modern scholars

00:09:47.280 tend to estimate the number closer to somewhere between around 100,000 and 200,000 men.

00:09:58.200 Still, a massive force. This was the Grand Army of the Achaemenid Persian Empire.

00:10:08.820 quite simply the most powerful state that had ever existed in the history of the world

00:10:16.820 also i also i just want to preface this by saying um to you know all all the greeks and you know

00:10:27.940 romans italians in the chat this is a pure love chat this is you know we all know that in the

00:10:35.300 past, you know, whatever, but, um, I have nothing but love and respect for Greeks and Italians,

00:10:42.640 AKA the Romans. So, um, this is just a fun informational thing. I love Greece. Um, I love

00:10:49.460 everything about Greece. I love Greek culture. Um, I actually had an opportunity to visit Greece

00:10:55.020 when I was younger. One of my best friends is Greek. So nothing but pure love for Greece and

00:11:02.160 Rome. And actually, I've said this in my previous live streams, but we Iranians are actually very,

00:11:10.020 very grateful to the Greeks and the Romans because when the Arab Muslim invaders 0.96

00:11:15.920 conquered Persia in 650 AD, they burned many of our libraries. And so part of the reason 1.00

00:11:25.760 that we have a lot of knowledge about ancient persia is because of greek and roman historians

00:11:32.840 so thank you to you guys for helping us keep our history um alive because otherwise you know we 0.89

00:11:40.000 would have no idea because the arab muslim invaders burned all of our libraries so all love 1.00

00:11:45.740 for for the greeks and and romans and in many respects herodotus was quite right this force 0.98

00:11:54.460 didn't consist of Persians alone, not by a long shot. To name a few, those present

00:12:04.080 were Medes, Elamites, Babylonians, Phoenicians, Judeans, Egyptians, Bactrians,

00:12:12.220 Scythians, Sogdians, Lydians, Kushites, even Indians from the far-off eastern edge

00:12:20.500 of the known world.

00:12:25.920 Together, these were the subjects of a colossal land empire,

00:12:31.040 stretching from the deserts of Libya in the west

00:12:33.640 to the Indus River Valley in the east,

00:12:36.860 from the steppes of Central Asia in the north

00:12:40.000 to at least the first cataract of the Nile in the south.

00:12:47.360 Many of these contingents of soldiers

00:12:49.680 fought on behalf of their own local rulers,

00:12:53.340 the same elites who still governed their kinspeople at home.

00:12:57.980 Yet, in truth, above all, there was only one king who really mattered.

00:13:04.780 A king of kings, the Shahanshah, who sat on the Persian throne.

00:13:11.380 Shahanshah.

00:13:12.060 In 480 BC, that man was Xerxes, son of the mighty Darius the Great.

00:13:19.680 one of the greatest administrators in history and grandson of Cyrus the Great,

00:13:26.940 the warrior lord who brought the world to its knees.

00:13:33.040 For the Greeks, a literate society from whom most of our evidence on the Persians is derived,

00:13:39.840 the situation looked bleak.

00:13:41.660 so did you catch what he just said where he said most of the evidence for the persians

00:13:49.640 comes from the greeks i literally just said that a few minutes ago because again

00:13:53.980 during the arab muslim conquest of persia they you know the the arab muslims burned all of our

00:14:01.000 libraries so again a lot of the knowledge that we iranians have about ancient persia 0.99

00:14:06.900 is because of Greek and Roman historians.

00:14:11.300 So that's basically what he just referred to when he said that.

00:14:14.840 This last and greatest of the Near Eastern empires of the ancient world

00:14:20.000 was the most successful that the world had ever seen. 0.90

00:14:24.900 This was a very different, extremely hierarchical world to that of the Greeks, 0.85

00:14:30.660 who saved their prostrations and worship for the gods rather than mortal rulers.

00:14:40.520 Today, across the plains and mountains of the Middle East,

00:14:45.160 the remains of fire altars, monumental architecture, temples and cities can still be seen.

00:14:53.280 A testament to this long-gone-by age when all roads led to Persia.

00:15:00.660 the persians are thought to have worshipped deities of the natural world water fire earth

00:15:12.580 and above all else the sky okay i mean that's not entirely accurate because the persians didn't

00:15:22.340 worship deities. Zoroastrianism was a monotheistic religion, and all these various elements

00:15:31.760 represented God, right? So, for example, fire represented purity. So, I mean, maybe he'll

00:15:40.600 clarify that, but no, the Persians, like, they didn't worship fire or water or anything like

00:15:48.200 that um those were symbols that represented um god basically their foremost deity being

00:15:57.600 ahura mazda depicted here as a winged guardian that that's see that there you go that's that's

00:16:08.440 ahura mazda right there and that's also um my necklace so no the the persians did not worship 0.56

00:16:16.800 fire there was no fire god like that's just um that's just like an islamist lie that like the

00:16:24.280 the jihadis put out there to try and like make it seem as if as if iranians were pagan no in fact

00:16:31.100 zoroastrianism is the first monotheistic religion or one of the oldest monotheistic religions

00:16:39.160 in the world so yeah i actually i did a live stream on zoroastrianism so you can go find that

00:16:48.180 in in my previous live streams from a few days ago as such other pantheons could easily be

00:16:55.620 incorporated into their own without offending the subject peoples too much a stark contrast

00:17:02.340 to brutal empires like the Assyrians before them. 0.77

00:17:11.760 A policy which allowed them to absorb Greeks into their world fairly easily, 0.97

00:17:17.900 specifically the city-states of the Ionian shore, 0.98

00:17:22.000 absorbing them into the ever-growing empire under tributary status.

00:17:26.120 the persians idea of subject peoples was different to most other empires

00:17:34.000 being particularly lenient often allowing local rulers to carry on as before

00:17:40.180 oh my gosh no this is not a submarine

00:17:45.100 it's it's it's my you know ahura mazda does that look like a submarine to you

00:17:56.680 so there you go it's it's the same thing i have on my necklace here so yeah no this is not a

00:18:04.320 submarine this is ahura mazda and if you're interested i also have like here you go so

00:18:14.800 this is like um a relic you know it's supposed to like you know be sort of like a you know

00:18:22.080 representation of uh persepolis depictions there so you can see ahura mazda you could see you know

00:18:28.880 like this is similar to what you would find on the rock carvings in um persepolis so and then

00:18:35.600 the the writing on top there that's supposed to represent like ancient persian um cuneiform so

00:18:42.960 there you go there's there's a little bit of like a background you know backgrounder on some of the

00:18:53.680 some of the images or you know some of the things you see in my background um there you go since you

00:18:59.760 guys are watching this live stream you get to you get to see what it's all about all right um

00:19:12.960 Therefore, as soon as the Persian armies left, the Ionians revolted, culminating in the burning of the city of Sardis.

00:19:26.120 However, when they had to be, the Persians were no pushovers.

00:19:32.360 In 499 BC, the great king Darius turned his gaze to the west.

00:19:39.360 The storied and ancient city of Miletus, a centre of power since the Bronze Age, long

00:19:48.600 considered the wealthiest and greatest of all Greek cities, was burned to the ground,

00:19:54.660 its menfolk killed, women and children sold into slavery. 0.92

00:19:59.680 And now, in 480, under a new king, Xerxes, the Persians had returned in force to bring

00:20:12.000 their power to the Greek mainland, culminating in some of the most famous battles in history.

00:20:22.140 And yet, barely 80 years earlier, few outside of their homeland or the mountains of western Iran

00:20:35.400 had even heard of the people known as the Persians. They didn't have the long and storied

00:20:42.100 histories of other ancient peoples such as the Babylonians, Assyrians, Egyptians or the several

00:20:49.160 other groups who had ruled parts of the Near East before them. In truth, these were outsiders,

00:20:57.960 whose distant ancestors, like the Greeks, had rolled off the Eurasian steppe atop war chariots 0.55

00:21:04.920 to bring the world of the city builders to its knees. 0.90

00:21:12.280 Though relative newcomers on the world stage, the impact of the Persians on the lands that they 0.99

00:21:17.800 ruled would change the course of history forever but who were the persians where did they come from 0.83

00:21:27.080 and how did they build the greatest empire the world had ever seen let's go back to the time

00:21:35.240 when persia ruled the world

00:21:37.560 that's me that's my people although technically i'm only half persian i'm also um i can also

00:21:48.060 trace my lineage back to elam as well because i was born there we spoke about that in a previous

00:21:53.120 live stream as well so yeah oh hello there pete kelly here usually i write and produce all of the

00:22:07.400 videos that you see on this channel this time however the initial research and script was

00:22:13.060 written by somebody else and he has his own youtube channel one of the very best on the

00:22:18.540 internet for ancient history and definitely one of my favorites go and check out history with

00:22:24.080 sigh here and don't forget to subscribe okay let me let me go find let me go find that um give me

00:22:32.460 a moment guys before i forget i want to find history with psi oh oh my gosh so as guys as soon

00:22:46.300 as i searched history with psi the first video that came up was cyrus the great and the birth

00:22:56.320 of the Achaemenid Empire. Oh my gosh, I'm subscribing right away. Okay, wait, wait,

00:23:03.900 let me, let me, let me share this with you guys so that you can, no, you know what, I will,

00:23:09.100 I will put the link to History with Sai in the live chat so that you guys can subscribe as well.

00:23:18.740 And then after we're done this documentary, if there's interest, we'll go watch one of History

00:23:24.520 with size videos because this guy looks really interesting. Okay, this is fantastic.

00:23:54.520 in the world, it's essentially a Netflix for scholars, comprised entirely of documentaries,

00:24:01.420 with the largest collection of history content found anywhere, and many other genres, a lot

00:24:07.820 of them available in 4K. My personal recommendation this time is The Neanderthal in Us, a fascinating

00:24:15.620 look at the human story, perhaps an insight into distant ancestors.

00:24:24.520 Click on the link in the description below, or go to try.magellantv.com forward slash history time for your exclusive month-long free trial.

00:24:35.680 Now, back to the ancient world.

00:24:38.360 in order to really understand the history of the persians we must look far outside the

00:24:54.680 traditional heartlands of the city builders of the near east to the outsiders on the periphery

00:25:01.860 lands with no writing and very little archaeology to go on.

00:25:08.880 As so often happens in history, we must look to a fresh infusion of warrior culture

00:25:15.120 from a barbarian outer world, forcing its way into power over an older, more settled land. 0.69

00:25:24.740 First of all, we must look at another related Iranian people to the Persians,

00:25:31.520 The Medes.

00:25:35.980 Today, it's thought that the ancestors of both Persians and Medes,

00:25:41.600 who were Indo-European-speaking tribes,

00:25:45.240 first started migrating from the steppes of Central Asia

00:25:48.500 to what is today the Iranian Plateau, sometime in the 2nd millennium BC.

00:25:55.060 Leaving in their wake horse gear, chariot accoutrements,

00:25:59.500 bronze weapons, drinking vessels, and even vast archaeological sites.

00:26:07.500 These were pastoralist societies of mobile herders and tribespeople,

00:26:13.780 eventually settling down to farm too.

00:26:18.240 It isn't for a thousand years that we get written records of these people.

00:26:23.940 For the most part, their stories lost in the mists of time.

00:26:29.500 The first written record of the Medes comes in the year 835 BC, in the annals of the Assyrian

00:26:41.080 king Shalmanesir III, as a people occupying large parts of the areas around the Zagros

00:26:49.080 Mountains, barbarians on the periphery of his world.

00:26:57.940 It's now thought that this may have simply been the far western extremity of the Median domain. 0.77

00:27:05.940 Median territory perhaps stretching all the way to the great salt deserts of central Iran.

00:27:15.940 There's no way to know for sure as Assyrian sources aren't specific on the matter.

00:27:21.940 Meads themselves didn't leave behind any written texts or records of their own.

00:27:27.940 What is known is that several Assyrian kings after Shalmanesir also claim to have fought many campaigns against the restless Meads.

00:27:39.740 Oh, so I'm seeing a few comments from people who are new to the live stream asking if this is a watch party.

00:27:47.220 Yes. Sorry. So, yes, I do my usual daily show where I talk about politics and Islamic terrorism

00:27:59.780 and jihad. That happens at 12 noon Eastern, my native Fridays. And then in the evenings, 0.95

00:28:06.560 I generally just do like a chill watch party where I watch a documentary about various topics.

00:28:13.240 and instead of just watching it on my own, I'll live stream it so we can all watch together

00:28:19.220 and comment. It's something I started doing a few months ago. There was interest in it so that's why

00:28:24.640 I've continued and tonight the topic is the ancient Persian empire. So welcome to the live stream.

00:28:35.620 We're told that Assyrian forces would regularly march deep into the Zagros mountains to subdue

00:28:41.880 tribes of Medes, only to have them revolt the following year, forcing the Assyrians back

00:28:48.940 in ever greater numbers.

00:28:53.680 Both Assyrian sources and the later writings of Herodotus portray the Medes as a fiercely

00:29:00.340 independent but disunited people, ruled over by tribal chieftains, each of whom may have

00:29:09.100 controlled a single fortress and several adjacent villages, from time to time coalescing into larger

00:29:15.880 groups and then collapsing again. Tradition has it that eventually the Medes grew tired of both

00:29:23.060 Assyrian attacks and the general lawlessness throughout their land, and so they united

00:29:29.900 together to form a single kingdom. Perhaps having learned the art of statesmanship from their

00:29:37.040 syrian and elamite neighbors much like germanic tribes with the roman empire

00:29:46.000 though his existence cannot be con um so the reason that iran hasn't changed its name back

00:29:53.760 to persia is because the original name of the country is iran persia is actually the greek word

00:30:02.160 for iran so um in in our own language farsi we don't call ourselves persian we don't call the

00:30:10.320 country persia we call ourselves irani and name the name of our country is iran thousands of

00:30:18.240 years ago it was called iran shaft so um i know there's like some misconception about iran versus

00:30:24.560 persia i will i am planning on making like a short video about it just to explain um

00:30:32.160 But yeah, like like Persia is a Greek word and Persia is now, you know, like like the Greek word for for Iran.

00:30:41.680 So we've never called ourselves Persian in our own language.

00:30:47.300 It's always been Iranian and Iran. 0.80

00:30:50.600 So that's why that's why it's it's Iran.

00:30:53.280 But I will make a short video explaining that because I know that there is some confusion, you know, between Iran and Persia.

00:31:00.920 and of course, you know, Persian and Farsi and Iranian.

00:31:04.400 And I know it can be pretty confusing for non-Iranians,

00:31:08.420 but I'm more than happy to make a video about that in the future.

00:31:13.880 Confirmed by archaeology or any other sources,

00:31:18.160 Herodotus writes that eventually the man they chose to lead them

00:31:22.020 was called Deocese.

00:31:23.820 However, it was Deocés' grandson, King Syaxares, who turned the fledgling Median state into

00:31:36.480 a world power. 0.94

00:31:42.300 Allying with the King Nabopolassar of Babylon, as well as Cimmerian and Scythian horse nomads, 0.78

00:31:49.120 the two kings took advantage of a crisis of um so so katner the reason that some iranians

00:32:00.160 you know prefer to be called persian um is because after the islamic regime took over iran in 1979

00:32:12.660 and then iran unfortunately became associated with islamic terrorism many iranians decided

00:32:22.080 to distance themselves from that by just you know saying you know call me persian because persian

00:32:28.940 you know sounds nicer than than iranian um max amini was it max some some comedian did um

00:32:40.820 did like a comedy skit about it. Let me see if I can find that. Comedy skit.

00:32:53.720 Yeah, so, I mean, I'll see if I can find it. Here we go.

00:33:02.780 it was it was monster brawny i think this is it okay so here let me um

00:33:12.140 okay so i i haven't seen this skit in a very very long time but um this is i would say this 0.99

00:33:25.620 is probably the best, you know, sort of fun, lighthearted explanation for why some Iranians

00:33:34.200 prefer to refer to themselves as Persian instead of Iranians. It's literally because after 1979, 0.60

00:33:42.080 the Islamic Republic, you know, ruined the name of Iran and Iranians. And it's only recently, 0.83

00:33:49.200 it's, I would say it's only within the last five to 10 years that we Iranians have now fought back

00:33:56.740 and we are reclaiming our Iranian identity and Iranian heritage. So here, let me, let me share

00:34:06.320 this with you. This will, this will give you a pretty good explanation. Here we go.

00:34:19.200 you guys like the orange this i don't get hit by any cars halloween okay that's halloween

00:34:34.560 it's halloween they're working with me that's great no just a freeway worker i uh

00:34:42.800 clean clean a lot of leaves that's what i do

00:34:45.980 So, yeah, my name is Maz Jobrani, and I'm an American citizen.

00:34:51.600 Thank you.

00:34:53.360 Yes, yes, yes.

00:34:55.040 And I've grown up in America.

00:34:57.880 All right, yeah, but I was born in Iran.

00:35:01.500 Yeah, all right, yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:35:03.660 You guys are like, whatever, bro, that's your problem.

00:35:07.380 Deal with it, man. 1.00

00:35:09.180 Yeah, it's not the best time to be from the Middle East. 1.00

00:35:12.200 Iranians, though, have learned how to deal with it. 0.98

00:35:13.980 we've learned how to trick americans uh we say we're persian have you heard that

00:35:17.780 it sounds a lot nicer and friendlier and exotic and confusing you know

00:35:22.780 it's great where i was like no no i'm not iranian no no no no no i am persian

00:35:28.200 like the cat meow

00:35:31.000 i am the cat meow

00:35:39.220 No. I am not access of evil. No, no, no. I am Persian. Like the rug. Hello. I am soft. You can lay down on me. I'm colorful and hand-woven. I'm Persian. Yeah, it's not a good thing. Some of my friends just became Italian. I don't know if you've met those Middle East sinners.

00:36:01.620 Yeah, I got a buddy, be at a party, meet some girls, he'll be like this. 1.00

00:36:06.180 Come meet my friends, come over here, come on.

00:36:07.680 This is Hassan Hossein Ali Reza, Mohammed Maaz.

00:36:10.920 And I'm Tony.

00:36:15.540 Oh yeah, they're Iranian, I'm Italian. 0.91

00:36:17.460 Hey, I'm Tony.

00:36:19.300 You are talking to me, eh?

00:36:23.280 Ciao, forgetting about it.

00:36:32.020 i forgot about it a long time ago my friend so um that's that's you know the the tongue-in-cheek

00:36:42.180 version of why certain you know why some iranians refer to themselves as persian um especially

00:36:51.380 especially back in the 80s and 90s when the islamic republic had first occupied iran and you know

00:37:01.620 And people, people didn't know the difference between Iran and the Islamic Republic.

00:37:07.500 Thankfully, that has now changed because of social media, because of people who have been

00:37:12.060 speaking out, because of, you know, His Royal Highness, King Nizal Pahlavi II.

00:37:17.160 If you watched my live stream earlier today, I shared his speech where he spoke about how,

00:37:24.520 you know, Iran was occupied in 1979 by the Islamic Republic.

00:37:29.740 And then, you know, they basically took over the country. So but, you know, in in a nutshell, this, you know, tongue in cheek comedy skit is the best explanation as to why Iranians call themselves Persian, although that's changing now.

00:37:46.860 That's, that's, that's definitely changing for sure. Um, yeah, like Persian is just one ethnicity 0.98

00:37:54.480 within the Iranian nation. There are many various ethnicities, although, um, I will say this

00:38:01.320 amongst us Iranians, um, we don't ask each other like what our ethnicity is because it's, it's

00:38:09.440 irrelevant, right? Like I'm, I'm only half Persian. The, you know, my other, actually,

00:38:15.220 I would say, like, I'm probably like one quarter Persian.

00:38:20.000 The other 75% of me is Lor Bakhtiari.

00:38:23.880 And I guarantee you, like, no one here who isn't, like, if you're not Iranian, you've

00:38:29.740 never heard of Lor Bakhtiari, like, you just haven't.

00:38:33.080 But again, like, like, within our own culture, it's very rude to ask someone, like, what

00:38:39.720 is your ethnicity?

00:38:40.620 And again, because Iran is such an ancient nation, we can't even like looking at someone, we can't even tell, right, like who they are or like what their background is, because ultimately we're all Iranian first and we're all united with our, you know, Iranian identity.

00:39:00.180 So I just wanted to, to point that out as well. So there you go. I hope I hope that gives you a

00:39:06.600 little bit of explanation as to why, you know, some Iranians will say they're Persian. I will

00:39:14.280 make a video about that in the future. But you know, there you go a little a little comedy break.

00:39:19.700 Elijah, I know you're watching, you can consider that your commercial break for the live stream.

00:39:24.840 All right, let's get back to the actual episode now, the actual documentary.

00:39:30.540 And weak rulers in Assyria to launch a two-pronged assault on this ancient superpower.

00:39:38.240 Eventually bringing it to its end once and for all, leaving a massive vacuum in its wake.

00:39:46.500 In the aftermath of the collapse of the Assyrian Empire, the two allies split the territories

00:39:54.820 of this mighty empire amongst themselves, with the Babylonians taking most of Mesopotamia

00:40:01.580 and the Levant, whereas the Medes took land in Anatolia all the way to the Halis River

00:40:07.660 on the border with the Kingdom of Lydia.

00:40:09.780 An ancient land that would eventually make its way into Greek legend.

00:40:19.940 For five years, King Syaxares and the Medes fought against King Aliates and the Lydians,

00:40:27.500 with neither side being able to gain the upper hand.

00:40:30.280 Finally, apparently after a solar eclipse

00:40:37.680 it was taken to be a sign the gods were displeased

00:40:40.460 the two sides made peace in 585 BC 0.86

00:40:44.440 The following year, Syaxares died

00:40:49.280 and his son Astyages became king

00:40:52.240 Outside of Herodotus, there is little information

00:40:57.460 about the reign of Astyages

00:40:59.200 Overall, though, it seems that the three most powerful kings of the ancient Near East at

00:41:05.860 the time, Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, Croesus of Lydia, and Astiages of Media, were at peace

00:41:14.060 with one another. Though this would prove to be the calm before the storm. According to 0.86

00:41:23.000 Herodotus, one of the Median king's vassals, was the kingdom of Parsa, which the Greeks

00:41:29.600 called Persia. Being a closely related Iranian people, the Persians had much in common with

00:41:38.540 the Medes. They had similar customs, religion, and spoke a dialect of the same Indo-European

00:41:45.880 language. It was perhaps for this reason that Astyages married his daughter Mandani to his

00:41:54.980 vassal Cambioses of Persia. It was these two who would become the parents of arguably Persia's

00:42:03.120 greatest ever king, Cyrus II, better known to history as Cyrus the Great.

00:42:15.880 Today, ancient cities still litter the plains and mountains of modern-day Iran.

00:42:26.980 Vast edifices and statues jutting out of the dusty ground.

00:42:34.060 Leftovers from the slew of empires and kingdoms who once ruled this land in antiquity.

00:42:45.880 Elamites, Medes, Persians, Parthians, Sassanians and Arabs, all left their mark here.

00:42:57.360 In order to get to the origins of the mightiest of all Persian kings, however, a figure still

00:43:05.280 revered in the Middle East today, we must look to one of the oldest cities of all.

00:43:12.800 the rugged zagros mountains in the southwest of the country home to one of the oldest urban

00:43:20.640 centers in the entirety of the middle east this is anshan firmly placed within the elamite sphere

00:43:30.480 of influence that's where i'm from i was born there i was born in afos which is like 60 60

00:43:40.240 kilometers from churazambia anyways we'll get to that we'll get to that i spoke about this in in

00:43:44.960 the previous previous live stream about ancient persia but yeah like my my ancestry and lineage

00:43:51.360 literally goes can be traced back to elam as well a center of power since the fourth millennium bc

00:44:04.480 like the sumerians actually so let me just go back a little bit here i want to show you guys

00:44:09.360 something. Persians, Parthians, Sassanians, and Arabs. All left their mark here. In order to get

00:44:20.020 to the origins of the mightiest of all Persian kings, however, a figure still revered in the

00:44:26.340 Middle East today, we must look to one of the oldest cities of all. To the rugged Zagros

00:44:34.000 mountains in the southwest of the country home to one of the oldest urban centers it's coming 0.95

00:44:45.440 this is an sham firmly placed within the elamite sphere of influence okay so do you see here let

00:44:54.160 me make this um no that didn't actually do anything so do you see um in the red area like

00:45:01.040 the orangey area in the top left, it says Susa. So the modern day name for Susa is Shustar. Okay,

00:45:11.720 so Shustar is still around. And I actually have a lot of family living, like a lot of extended

00:45:22.400 family living in Shushtar. Um, I've actually visited Shushtar and people, um, in that area,

00:45:32.440 they speak a dialect of, of Persian called Shushtari. So I can't, I can't speak it because

00:45:41.120 I mean, I grew up in Canada mostly, but I can understand Shushtari. Um, and, and Shushtari

00:45:47.560 is like one of the oldest dialects of, of Farsi here. Let me show you some photos guys of, of

00:45:54.660 Susa. Um, like when I say Susa is like thousands of years old, I'm not kidding here. Let me, um,

00:46:04.520 let me, let me pull up my Facebook, my Facebook album here from like 2010. Cause I, I visited it.

00:46:11.140 Um, last time I visited Iran was 2010 before I became politically active. Of course, I haven't,

00:46:18.040 I haven't been back since then. Um, because if I, if I went back, that would, you know,

00:46:23.700 be bad news for me. Um, so here's like some ruins. You can see me like sitting there. This is like

00:46:34.780 the ruins of like a tower or something in Susa um there's me again so this is like this is like 0.98

00:46:42.560 an ancient watchtower so this is like um you know like thousands of years ago um the the Elamites

00:46:51.940 and then eventually the the Persians right like they would um have like guards in in these watch

00:46:59.200 towers and they would just like watch over the land. Right. So there's this and then that's my 0.99

00:47:06.700 cousin. So then you can see like more ruins. OK, so these are all ruins in Susa and you could just

00:47:13.160 like walk amongst them. Right. Again, so so this is like the irrigation system from Susa, which is

00:47:22.940 like thousands of years old. Like I think it's like like Susa is 2000 years old, at least like

00:47:27.480 modern day Susa or Shustad as we call it in Persian is like thousands of years old. So here

00:47:34.020 you can see like, um, you can see like all that there and you can tell it's just like super old.

00:47:41.480 Right. And then here I am in like the, the underground like tunnels that were built. Um,

00:47:50.620 again, like you can just tell like this, like you're literally walking through something

00:47:54.580 that was built thousands of years ago. Right. Yeah. So, so this is, this is Sousa. This is

00:48:02.720 Sousa. Let me see what else I can find here. Oh yeah. And then these are, this is like the

00:48:08.000 irrigate, like kind of like leading to the old irrigation system. Right. You can kind of see

00:48:13.380 these like built in like tunnels here. You can see like more carvings there and stuff. So

00:48:19.380 um yeah let's see what else I can find here oh that's just like random photos

00:48:26.780 oh and then I just want to show you another really cool so this is again the ruins from

00:48:32.780 the ruins from uh the Persian empire in Elam I shouldn't have done this but I totally did so I

00:48:40.340 went through the barrier and then I was like sitting on this um sitting on this ancient

00:48:47.280 carving from the Persian Empire. So I shouldn't have done that, but I did.

00:48:56.820 And yeah, so it's like you literally walk around any city in Iran, and you can find artifacts that

00:49:05.420 are like 1000s of years old, right? So here, like literally, like just pillars, pillars from the

00:49:10.340 Persian empire, just, you know, fallen, fallen over. Um, this was at, this was at the museum.

00:49:17.540 Um, we actually went to the museum in Susa. Wait, what's this?

00:49:26.860 So, so I actually visited, so, you know, Darius, so in, in the documentary,

00:49:32.820 century when they talk about Darius, right? Um, I actually visited Darius's palace, see

00:49:40.980 Appadonna palace for, well, they say Darius, but Darius is Darius. So this is all like close to

00:49:47.860 where I was born. Right. Um, this is, this is part of, this is like, I think this is part of his

00:49:52.740 palace there. I don't know. I can't remember like talking a long time ago now. Um, and yeah,

00:50:00.000 so here you can see like so in that map where they're talking about susa i literally visited

00:50:07.680 the susa museum and these are all the photos that i took myself right so there you go a little little

00:50:15.120 cool piece of history there for you guys um a center oh i i see some super chats sorry okay

00:50:22.240 so let me just respond so uh coffee well you want me to get a coffee i mean i have i have

00:50:29.280 um my bubbly i don't drink coffee in the evenings i drink my sparkling water and tonight it's apple

00:50:35.760 although i'm running low so i have to get another one um learning language goldie if you can take

00:50:42.000 an interview from yosef haddad i know yosef haddad very well um i'm actually good friends with um

00:50:48.720 his fiance, Emily Schrader. Fun story. The night that I think it was the night that Sinwar was

00:51:00.900 exterminated by the IDF. I was actually in Israel. And I actually met up with Emily and

00:51:10.760 Yosef, and we partied in Tel Aviv. And we basically, yeah, we're celebrating the extermination 0.79

00:51:19.060 of Yahweh Sinwar while I was in Israel. So, I mean, I'm happy to reach out to him. But I mean, 1.00

00:51:24.400 I already know him. He's a fantastic person. He does great work. But I will make a note of that

00:51:29.620 for sure. Thank you for the suggestion. You guys, I know more people than you think.

00:51:36.540 don't get I'm just going to say this just because I'm new to YouTube and just because like I'm just

00:51:42.640 starting my channel and my live streams don't think I don't know people I know more people

00:51:49.300 than you think like this this phone right here my phone has more phone numbers than you can think

00:51:56.020 that's one of the benefits of having been a politician for you know 10 years so there you go

00:52:02.380 But I'll reach out to Yosef for sure.

00:52:04.520 All right, let's continue the documentary.

00:52:07.180 ...of power since the fourth millennium B.C.

00:52:15.260 Like the Sumerian cities to the west,

00:52:18.760 by the time Anshan came under Persian rule in the seventh century B.C.,

00:52:24.040 supposedly captured by the warlord Teosbys,

00:52:28.460 it was already a storied and ancient place.

00:52:32.380 And soon enough, it would serve as the capital of a new, fledgling Persian state.

00:52:41.480 Phateaspes was the great-grandfather of Cyrus.

00:52:45.900 And as far as he was concerned, the progenitor of his royal house.

00:52:54.420 Yet, nonetheless, this is a period steeped in the mists of time,

00:52:59.560 with very little concrete evidence to go on.

00:53:06.320 No, if someone was in jail, I can't get you out of jail.

00:53:09.700 No, no.

00:53:10.880 I've only used my powers for good, never for evil.

00:53:14.220 So if you're in jail, you're on your own.

00:53:17.000 Sorry.

00:53:18.240 There are many stories regarding Cyrus's birth and upbringing,

00:53:22.960 most appearing to be more legend than fact.

00:53:26.140 Indeed, many of these tales come from later Greek and Roman writers

00:53:33.060 Such as Herodotus, Tessias, Xenophon and Arian

00:53:37.840 Outsiders looking in

00:53:40.320 And they disagree on several of the major events and details of his life

00:53:49.820 For example, Herodotus writes that the last king of the Median Empire, Astyages

00:53:55.800 was Cyrus' grandfather, while Tessias, a 5th century Greek writing at the Achaemenid court,

00:54:03.500 claims that there wasn't actually any familial relationship between the two.

00:54:11.320 What the accounts do agree on, as well as writing from neighbouring Babylonia,

00:54:16.720 is that whether they were related or not, the young Cyrus, clearly an able politician

00:54:22.380 and capable military leader, was able to overthrow Astyagis by around 550 BC,

00:54:30.900 becoming the king of a unified Persian Median state.

00:54:38.180 According to the Greek geographer Strabo, it was on the site of his victory over the Medes

00:54:43.680 that Cyrus established his new royal capital of Pasagade,

00:54:47.900 An especially important site for hundreds of years to come.

00:54:59.520 Kings in the ancient world were overthrown and replaced by their enemies all the time.

00:55:06.220 But what made Astyages' defeat around 550 BC different than many of his peers of the past

00:55:12.780 is that Cyrus apparently showed his former liege lord mercy.

00:55:17.900 not only allowing him to live out his final days with dignity and honour,

00:55:25.580 but keeping him on at court as a member of the king's entourage.

00:55:32.720 Though this was likely not the first time that a king had been showed mercy by an enemy,

00:55:38.260 such events were rare, particularly between rivals in the ancient world.

00:55:43.580 However, if the stories about his life are true, from the very beginning Cyrus had made it his

00:55:53.640 general policy to not only treat his defeated enemies with dignity, but also be tolerant of

00:56:00.480 their customs and religion. Sometimes even showing deference for the customs of newly incorporated

00:56:09.040 peoples, such as with Mesopotamia, where local infrastructure was simply absorbed into the

00:56:15.300 new empire. It's this policy of tolerance that would eventually make the Persians famous

00:56:24.340 in the ancient world, and probably to a great extent allowed them to rule over such a diverse

00:56:31.740 group of peoples. Cyrus' relatively sudden rise to power didn't go unnoticed by the

00:56:42.740 other kingdoms of the region, especially the superpowers of Lydia and Babylon. Both had

00:56:56.880 treaties with Media and Astyages, a respected king, not the Persian Cyrus, who they viewed

00:57:05.940 as a usurper of the Median throne. The Lydian king Croesus, famous in future generations

00:57:16.740 as an incomprehensibly wealthy ruler, confident after victories against the Greek city-states

00:57:23.380 to his west sought to put an end to the um i see some you know i see a number of you are asking

00:57:30.960 about you know what iranians think of greeks and what greeks think of iranians i can tell you um

00:57:36.980 that iranians and greeks you know it's it's all love it's all love um i would say if anything

00:57:43.680 the fact that both of our civilizations are so ancient and you know there's so much history um

00:57:51.920 It's more of a source of pride. There's literally, like, no bad blood between Iranians and Greeks. Like, it's all love. It's all support. I have a lot of Greek friends, a lot of Greek, you know, followers, and I love everything about Greece.

00:58:09.040 and um yeah like it's just um it's kind of cool that like both of our civilizations are thousands

00:58:16.360 of years old and we just we share so much uh share so much history so i mean you know obviously like

00:58:22.720 thousands of years ago there were wars and stuff but it's not like there's there's any hatred or

00:58:27.100 anything like that so i have nothing but respect for for greek people like it's just it's it's all

00:58:32.720 love it's all love the upstart empire now bordering him to the east 0.96

00:58:36.880 Crossing the ancient boundary of the Hallis River to march into Cappadocia, for decades

00:58:51.500 the boundary between Lydian and Median territory.

00:58:56.460 According to Herodotus, Croesus, renowned for his elite cavalry, confronted the Persians

00:59:01.680 and Medes under Cyrus.

00:59:05.640 Ultimately, the battle was a stalemate, and as the campaigning season drew to a close,

00:59:15.400 Croesus decided to fall back to his capital of Sardis, far to the west.

00:59:23.380 Not thinking for a moment that Cyrus would continue to pursue him across western Anatolia,

00:59:29.560 A huge gamble for a new king.

00:59:34.040 How wrong he was.

00:59:37.520 Not only did Cyrus pursue the Lydians, a campaign that could easily have cost him his life,

00:59:44.320 but after a battle and a short siege at the Lydian capital,

00:59:49.160 he succeeded in capturing and absorbing the entire kingdom as a new province in his empire.

00:59:59.560 According to Herodotus, Cyrus initially planned to burn the Lydian king on a funeral pyre.

01:00:11.360 Other sources argue Croesus planned to burn himself.

01:00:16.560 But ultimately, rains sent by the gods doused the fire.

01:00:21.880 Instead of dying, this once proud king, like Astyages before him, apparently joined Cyrus' retinue, becoming one of his closest advisors.

01:00:35.460 Shortly afterwards, the Greek city-states of Ionia, along the Aegean coast, once subject to Lydian tribute, now submitted to Cyrus' rule.

01:00:45.500 Cyrus' most famous conquest, however, and the one that would immortalise him, was that

01:00:55.340 of the Neo-Babylonian Empire, and its fabled capital city of Babylon.

01:01:05.120 During Cyrus' time, the Babylonian state was going through a period of gradual decline.

01:01:11.040 It also didn't help that its king, Nabonidus, successor of the great Nebuchadnezzar,

01:01:18.440 apparently spent much of his time offending both Babylon's people and its priests

01:01:23.780 by neglecting their patron deity, Marduk, in favour of another, Sin, the god of the moon.

01:01:34.400 In fact, Nabonidus had embarked on a ten-year pilgrimage of sorts around northern Arabia,

01:01:41.040 to build and restore temples dedicated to the moon god.

01:01:49.520 The Babylonian Chronicle tells of how Nabonidus failed to return for the New Year's festival

01:01:55.360 in commemoration of Marduk, leaving his son Belshazzar to lead the festivities

01:02:00.800 and run the day-to-day activities of the empire in his absence. A massive insult.

01:02:06.960 Today, scholars tend to think that when it became clear Cyrus had his sights on Babylon,

01:02:16.960 a vastly rich and powerful land bordering his own.

01:02:21.420 Many in the city who were displeased with Nabonidus may have invited the Persians in.

01:02:28.800 For all sources agree that in 539 BC the city was conquered without the shedding of blood.

01:02:36.960 Just like his other conquests, Cyrus treated the citizens of Babylon with kindness,

01:02:48.620 and was tolerant of their religious practices,

01:02:51.580 even masterfully portraying himself as Marduk's chosen representative,

01:02:56.480 in direct opposition to Nabonidus. 0.91

01:02:59.720 In the process, not only absorbing Babylon itself, but all of its subject peoples, stretching 0.65

01:03:14.100 all the way to the borders of Egypt. 0.65

01:03:21.940 It was during this time that Cyrus famously freed the Jews, who had been exiled in Babylonia

01:03:28.660 since the time of Nebuchadnezzar nearly 60 years prior, not only permitting them to return to their

01:03:35.620 homeland but helping to rebuild the Jewish temple in Jerusalem. Passages from the Bible's Book of

01:03:45.540 Ezra where the Persian king is reportedly speaking in the first person underscores Cyrus's kindness

01:03:52.660 towards his new Jewish subjects.

01:03:57.120 Thus says King Cyrus of Persia, 0.62

01:04:00.300 The Lord, the God of heaven,

01:04:01.940 has given me all the kingdoms of the earth,

01:04:04.540 and he has charged me to build him a house

01:04:07.000 at Jerusalem in Judah.

01:04:09.960 Any of those among you who are his people,

01:04:12.880 may their God be with them,

01:04:15.180 are now permitted to go up to Jerusalem in Judah

01:04:18.180 and rebuild the house of the Lord,

01:04:21.300 the God of Israel.

01:04:22.660 he is the god who is in jerusalem and let all survivors in whatever place they reside be

01:04:29.380 assisted by the people of their place with silver and gold with goods and with animals besides

01:04:36.580 free will offerings to the house of god in jerusalem for centuries such biblical passages

01:04:49.300 along with testaments to Cyrus' benevolent nature in Herodotus' histories and Xenophon's

01:04:55.140 cyropedia, were dismissed by many historians as being simply legends that were compiled

01:05:01.380 decades if not centuries after the Persian king's death.

01:05:07.140 Then, in 1879, a clay foundation cylinder with cuneiform writing on it

01:05:13.300 was found amongst the ruins of ancient Babylon.

01:05:19.300 You guys know what that is. That's the Cyrus Cylinder. I just put it in the chat. 0.90

01:05:31.680 When the text was deciphered, it revealed that the aforementioned texts may not have been legends after all.

01:05:39.740 Written shortly after his conquest of Babylon, the text of the cylinder tells how Cyrus was the chosen agent of Marduk,

01:05:49.000 sent to bring peace and justice to the land.

01:05:53.680 Part of it, purporting to be in Cyrus' own words, states the following.

01:06:01.660 I am Cyrus, king of the universe, the great king, the powerful king,

01:06:08.180 king of Babylon, king of Sumer and Akkad, king of the four quarters of the world.

01:06:13.980 son of cambyses the great king king of the city of anshan descendant of tespez the great king

01:06:22.720 king of the city of anshan my vast troops were marching peaceably in babylon and the whole of

01:06:31.560 sumer and akkad had nothing to fear um so someone in the chat someone in the youtube youtube chat

01:06:38.360 asked if the cyrus cylinder is older than islam yes the cyrus cylinder is um i think over a thousand

01:06:47.640 years older than when islam was invented in fact many things about the persian empire um persian

01:06:55.000 history identity culture um existed for thousands of years before before islam was invented even like

01:07:02.280 one of our foods or missabzi or missabzi is literally thousands of years older than when

01:07:08.360 islam was invented so yeah like it the persian empire has been around for thousands of years yeah

01:07:16.120 i sought the safety of the city of babylon and all its sanctuaries

01:07:21.400 as for the population of babylon i soothed their weariness i freed them from their bonds 0.70

01:07:27.800 marduk the great lord rejoiced at my good deeds i sent them back to their places to the city of 0.95

01:07:40.120 ashur and susa akkad the land of eshnuna the city of zamban the city of maternal did you hear how

01:07:48.400 he mentioned susa remember i showed you photos of me visiting susa um susa is called shushtar today

01:07:56.400 literally the the city that i was born in afoz is older than when islam was invented the city

01:08:03.140 that i was born in um is like at least a thousand years older than than when islam was invented so

01:08:10.620 yeah like and even even in the cyrus cylinder he's referring to susa right let's go back a

01:08:16.440 little bit like listen to what he's saying had nothing to fear i sought the safety of the city

01:08:22.500 of Babylon and all its sanctuaries. As for the population of Babylon, I soothed their

01:08:28.980 weariness. I freed them from their bonds. 0.95

01:08:34.020 Marduk, the great lord, rejoiced at my good deeds. I sent them back to their places, to

01:08:43.880 the city of Ashur and Susa, Akkad, the land of Eshnunah, the city of Zamban, the city 0.98

01:08:49.960 of Meturnu, Dur, as far as the border of the land of Guti, the sanctuaries across the river Tigris,

01:08:57.400 whose shrines had earlier become dilapidated, the gods who lived therein and made permanent

01:09:03.560 sanctuaries for them. I collected together all of their people and returned them to their

01:09:11.240 settlements, and the gods of the land of Sumer and Akkad which Nabonidus, to the fury of the

01:09:18.120 lord of the gods had brought into shuana at the command of marduk the great lord i returned them

01:09:25.880 unharmed to their cells in the sanctuaries that make them happy

01:09:37.160 both the biblical passage as well as the babylonian cylinder attest to cyrus's policy of religious

01:09:43.720 tolerance something did you guys catch that like literally 2 500 years ago cyrus the great invented

01:09:52.680 the concept of freedom of religion aka religious tolerance right so that's something that existed

01:09:59.480 within the persian empire did you catch that it the gods who lived therein and made permanent

01:10:07.560 sanctuaries for them. I mean, the entire concept of modern-day human rights was inspired by the

01:10:16.280 Cyrus Cylinder and the Persian Empire. I collected together all of their people

01:10:23.800 and returned them to their settlements. And the gods of the land of Sumer and Akkad, 0.81

01:10:29.640 which Nabonidus, to the fury of the lord of the gods, had brought into Shuana,

01:10:34.840 At the command of Marduk, the great Lord, I returned them unharmed to their cells, in the sanctuaries that make them happy. 0.67

01:10:50.680 Both the biblical passage, as well as the Babylonian cylinder, attest to Cyrus' policy of religious tolerance. 0.97

01:10:59.240 Something that with few exceptions would remain a core policy of future Achaemenid kings.

01:11:07.120 In fact, nearly all of the Greek and Roman historians who would later write about the Achaemenid's style of governance

01:11:14.380 noted that all subject peoples were allowed to worship and carry on with their lives and customs as they pleased,

01:11:23.460 provided that they paid their taxes to the central government.

01:11:28.240 Such a policy was also practical, since it would have been impossible in the long term to have managed such an expansive and diverse empire without showing goodwill towards subject peoples, most of whom were proud and fiercely independent, and for the most part could continue to consider themselves as such.

01:11:50.240 Whilst it seems clear that Cyrus respected the religious practices of others,

01:11:59.760 scholars have long debated what the actual native religion of the Achaemenids was.

01:12:05.220 Interestingly, no texts or inscriptions have been found

01:12:08.680 that specifically link Cyrus to any form of religious practice.

01:12:12.620 However, based on what is known of ancient Median and Persian religion, especially that

01:12:23.180 of Cyrus' successors Darius, Xerxes and the rest of the Achaemenid line, the ancient Persians

01:12:30.320 are believed to have practised a form of Zoroastrianism, the religion taught by the prophet Zarathustra,

01:12:42.040 known as Zoroaster in Greek writings.

01:12:49.040 Believed to have lived around 1800 BC,

01:12:53.040 during the murky epoch of the Bronze Age.

01:12:57.040 Zarathustra proclaimed that there was only one God,

01:13:02.040 Ahura Mazda, whose name means Lord of Light and Wisdom,

01:13:07.040 and that mankind was in a cosmic struggle against the forces of evil.

01:13:12.820 Those who were on the side of Ahura Mazda against evil and spoke the truth

01:13:17.380 would be rewarded after death with entrance into heaven, known as the House of Song,

01:13:23.900 while those who allied with evil, also known as the Lie, would be punished in the afterlife and live in hell.

01:13:30.960 At the end of time, there would be a final judgment, whereby all souls would be judged again.

01:13:39.260 And after a purification process, even those who had committed grave wrongdoings would be allowed to enter into heaven.

01:13:46.520 Many scholars believe that it's from Zoroastrian religion that the concepts of heaven, hell,

01:13:56.960 a day of judgment, the devil, angels, and perhaps even the concept of monotheism itself

01:14:03.680 may have stemmed.

01:14:04.960 Towards the end of his reign, having achieved the greatest territorial expansion ever yet

01:14:18.340 seen in history, Cyrus continued to expand his state, leaving his son and crown prince

01:14:26.480 Cambioses as king in Babylon.

01:14:34.960 I was grabbing a drink refill because my bubbly finished. So my current flavor is lime. But I just

01:14:45.120 wanted to point out that, you know, all this stuff about Zoroastrianism being the first monotheistic 0.90

01:14:51.700 religion, the, you know, Iranians inventing the concept of heaven and hell, even the word paradise,

01:14:59.420 The word paradise is an Iranian word. It's paradis. And again, right here, right? This is Ahura Mazda, which I have here as my good luck charm. So there you go. Little bit of info and knowledge for you guys. 1.00

01:15:20.420 the great king began conducting campaigns into what is now central asia

01:15:30.060 perhaps seeking to control the lucrative trade routes crisscrossing eurasia

01:15:36.460 and also to protect his borders from outside attack

01:15:40.220 resulting in the incorporation of a number of eastern lands into his now ever expanding state

01:15:50.420 He also had plans to conquer Egypt, though this was a dream that Cyrus himself was not able to achieve.

01:16:05.420 According to Herodotus and most other sources, the great king was killed in battle with nomadic tribes.

01:16:12.420 tribes, most likely Scythian horse nomads, along his empire's northeastern frontier.

01:16:23.100 The one dissenting source is the Greek general and philosopher Xenophon, who in his Syropedia

01:16:30.340 claims that Cyrus died peacefully of old age. He was buried in a modest tomb that he himself

01:16:38.440 had designed in his capital city of Pasargadae.

01:16:44.520 Cyrus had been a great king. However, like many similar rulers throughout history,

01:16:51.000 his realm could very easily have collapsed not long afterwards.

01:16:56.280 Cyrus was fortunate in that a significant number of his successors were great too.

01:17:08.440 Near the city of Kermanshah in western Iran, a vast multilingual inscription and rock

01:17:19.480 relief stand immobile on the landscape, dwarfing those who come to look at them, carved into

01:17:29.120 a cliff face here some 2500 years ago.

01:17:36.780 This is Mount Behistun, and the inscription here, a little like the Rosetta Stone, written

01:17:43.400 in three languages and thus vital in the modern translation of hundreds of cuneiform tablets,

01:17:50.440 was made by the Persian king Darius the Great sometime between the years 522 and 486 BC.

01:18:01.740 Along with singing the deeds of the latest King of Kings,

01:18:05.620 the inscription also gives the very first mention

01:18:08.780 of the supposed patriarch of the royal family, Achaemenes,

01:18:15.320 said by Darius to be the father of the Taespes

01:18:18.900 mentioned by Cyrus.

01:18:22.420 Thus, the Persian royal house would be known

01:18:25.320 as the Achaemenid dynasty.

01:18:27.100 However, there's a good argument that this Achaemenes never existed at all.

01:18:38.060 Perhaps a clever piece of political scheming by a usurper, looking to write himself into the royal family.

01:18:49.440 Nevertheless, the name stuck, and Darius is regarded as one of the greatest of all Persian kings.

01:18:57.100 But how did he get into power in the first place?

01:19:05.420 On Cyrus' death in 530 BC, it was his son Cambiases II who succeeded him,

01:19:13.660 continuing his father's policy of expansion to annex the island of Cyprus,

01:19:19.020 before turning his gaze toward Egypt.

01:19:23.000 um to the person who asked me why i'm wearing a wig i'm wearing a wig um because i'm a massad

01:19:32.240 agent so i wear the wig to hide my identity right because like i i can't i can't let people know

01:19:40.580 that i'm massad so the wig helps to um hide my my massad identity so but you're good you you

01:19:48.120 caught on like, oh my gosh, like you, um, wow. You are definitely like a Mossad, like a Mossad

01:19:56.720 catcher, right? Like you were instantly able to tell that, um, I have a wig. So good for you.

01:20:03.040 Good for you. I hope, um, I hope Hamas is paying, paying you well. I will wear a different wig next 0.98

01:20:10.340 time because this one of course has, has been found out now. So I need to, I need to find a

01:20:15.420 new one. It's, it's all over. Like I guys, I might as well just, you know what? I might as well just

01:20:19.660 shut down my channel, just shut down my channel, delete all my videos and just like start from

01:20:25.820 scratch with a new identity, a new name, and obviously a new wig. Um, just let me know in

01:20:33.280 the comments if for like my, my next channel, um, like my next Mossad identity, um, do you want me

01:20:41.180 to go like blonde brunette or redhead because obviously I can't go black anymore because

01:20:46.640 the black wig um is too is too recognizable now just let me know in the comments thanks

01:20:52.520 in 525 BC defeating the pharaoh Semeticus III in a battle just outside the Egyptian capital of

01:21:01.620 Memphis. Cambioces remained in Egypt for three years, consolidating his rule as well as launching

01:21:12.200 efforts to conquer neighbouring Libya and Nubia. However, his absence from the Persian heartland 0.59

01:21:20.360 caused a crisis. One that not only threatened his rule, but the Persian Empire itself. Some

01:21:30.920 scholars call these events the crisis of 522 BC. Herodotus tells us that Cambioses

01:21:40.480 went mad, furiously killing sacred animals all over Egypt. Though there is

01:21:47.600 no other evidence for this, soon enough Cambioses would be dead, the Empire at

01:21:54.600 very real risk of falling apart.

01:22:00.920 Enter Darius the Great.

01:22:06.300 The story of how Darius came to the throne is a fascinating one.

01:22:12.440 The most well-known version being told in the Behistun inscription, commissioned by

01:22:17.980 Darius himself, therefore espousing his view of the crisis and its resolution.

01:22:30.520 According to Darius, Cambiases had a brother named Bardia, whom he slew in secret before

01:22:38.440 embarking on his Egyptian campaign.

01:22:42.900 We're not told the motive, but it's assumed that his reason was to prevent Bardia from

01:22:47.560 possibly usurping the throne in Cambiases' absence.

01:22:52.120 However, while Cambiases was in Egypt, a man named Gaumata, who was a Bardia look-alike, took the throne.

01:23:02.120 Gaumata was able to do this because he covered his tracks by slaying many of Bardia's close associates, while also terrifying the people.

01:23:14.120 Nevertheless, Darius, with the help of a handful of chosen men, six of whom are specifically mentioned, was able to kill the usurper Gaumata, after which Darius, a self-proclaimed relative of Cambioses and Cyrus, was chosen as the new king.

01:23:32.120 it's a great story and it may well be true however it's just as likely that the cunning

01:23:43.840 Darius perhaps no relation at all oh I just want to say something really quickly so um what's

01:23:50.760 really funny to me is all the trolls who claim that I'm paid by IPAC um APAC is an American

01:23:58.020 lobby group I'm literally Canadian so why would APAC pay a Canadian right like this is how 0.99

01:24:04.820 stupid and low IQ they are that's why I just ignore the APAC stuff because I'm like this is 0.99

01:24:10.300 just so so stupid like I'm I'm literally Canadian like I have nothing to do with with APAC or 1.00

01:24:16.520 anything like that um but yeah it's just it's the same arguments no matter like it just shows how 0.98

01:24:23.080 low iq these people are right so anyways i'm glad you guys are enjoying the live stream i'm certainly

01:24:29.480 um enjoying it and um i'm i'm not banned from entering the u.s i've actually visited the u.s

01:24:37.980 several times um i'm not banned i'm i'm a canadian citizen so i wouldn't be banned from entering the

01:24:45.020 u.s i go all the time i love the u.s alter the royal family simply killed bardia before ascending

01:24:51.820 the throne and creating an elaborate story to justify his actions. Maybe even creating

01:24:58.380 a common ancestor to link him to the royal house. Whatever the truth, the Achaemenid 0.97

01:25:06.640 dynasty was born. And every king to follow would be a descendant of Darius. Whether or

01:25:15.760 or not they were related to Cyrus.

01:25:20.760 Of course, when he assumed command, Darius had an especially difficult task ahead of him.

01:25:27.760 Imposter kings and rebels now sitting on thrones all over the realm. 0.95

01:25:33.760 In Elam, Media, Babylonia and elsewhere.

01:25:38.760 Apparently an extremely capable military commander, perhaps belying his true identity as a general.

01:25:50.760 Darius claims that with his allies he was able to put down every single rebellion,

01:25:56.760 being victorious in 19 battles, all within the space of a single year.

01:26:02.760 Finally, by 522 BC, after restoring order, Darius became the rightful Shahan Shah, or

01:26:12.940 King of Kings. Or, there was nobody left to argue with him.

01:26:21.940 Herodotus also tells a similar, though more dramatic tale, which was probably based off

01:26:27.660 of Darius' story to begin with.

01:26:31.700 In his account, he calls Bardia Smyrdis.

01:26:36.480 Darius' story is hotly debated amongst scholars, many of whom simply believe it to be an outright

01:26:43.180 fabrication concocted by the king himself to cover the fact that he was a usurper.

01:26:49.760 However, regardless of the details, it illustrates the fragility of the empire during this particular

01:26:56.920 time.

01:26:58.660 a strong king it would simply fall apart fighting so hard to keep the empire together

01:27:06.740 darius was determined to do whatever it took continuing many of the policies of cyrus he

01:27:13.700 formally divided the empire into provinces called satrapies appointing each with a hand-picked

01:27:20.740 governor that's also another thing that iranians invented was the concept of like local governance

01:27:26.660 and provinces literally another um like Iranian invention amongst like many other things but by

01:27:34.320 the way by the way um anyone who celebrates a birthday the concept of a birthday party

01:27:41.660 and dessert was also invented by Iranians there you go these tended to be individuals related

01:27:49.500 to the royal house. Areas retained autonomy and were to a certain extent self-sufficient kingdoms.

01:28:01.980 To further foster the territorial integrity of the empire, Darius commissioned several

01:28:08.600 large construction projects, including a vast network of roads and highways, one of which

01:28:15.980 would be known as the royal road this highway starts okay so we have we have a super chat oh

01:28:26.200 my gosh guys we're doing so good are things gonna get spicy on a friday night now we've been going

01:28:33.900 for an hour and a half and things are things have been pretty pretty good i know there's a lot of

01:28:39.520 trolls in the chat you know what's really interesting like i'm literally playing a

01:28:44.420 documentary about ancient Iran. It has nothing to do with modern day politics, nothing to do with

01:28:49.120 Islam or anything like that. And yet there are so many like jihadi trolls in the chat. Isn't that 0.92

01:28:54.640 weird? Isn't that weird how they're getting so like threatened? So, I mean, all right. I mean,

01:29:00.720 people are responding. So here we go. So Batman says,

01:29:04.200 trolls mad because of what Al Zut did to Momo. I actually don't know the full, actually, no,

01:29:15.040 I do know the full story of Al Zut. I know you guys have asked me to play it.

01:29:20.940 You know, I think Raymond Ibrahim has actually done like an episode or a podcast or a show or

01:29:30.420 something on on al-zut so i mean if the trolls keep up maybe i'll look into that but right now

01:29:39.240 i'm just like i'm enjoying iranian history ancient persian history um but i mean you you make you

01:29:47.520 make a fair point it's just i just find it fascinating like literally it's it's just

01:29:52.160 a watch party about ancient Iranian history. And yet the very, the very notion of Iran existing

01:30:04.280 prior to Islam is so triggering to the jihadis that they're in the comments just trolling,

01:30:11.720 right? Like, this is what I mean, like, literally, just my identity as an Iranian is enough to like,

01:30:18.620 set people off. Like that's how triggered they are by the fact that the Iranian civilization 1.00

01:30:24.340 still exists and they weren't able to, to Arabize us. Right. So very, very weird. Um, Annie, 1.00

01:30:32.980 hello from South Africa. What is your response to those who say that the West destroyed Iran,

01:30:39.860 not Islam. Sorry if you already answered this. So, I mean, if you're referring to the 1979

01:30:52.260 Islamic Revolution, the West certainly did have a role to play in that. And it was more

01:31:04.100 France, UK, United States taking the side of the radical Islamists and communists 0.82

01:31:15.300 because they thought that they would be better able to control the Islamic terrorists. And then 0.92

01:31:21.720 of course, when the Islamic terrorists took over, they turned Iran into a 7th century Islamic hell 1.00

01:31:28.060 hole governed by Sharia law. If you want to know more about that, um, let me just pull this up very 0.99

01:31:36.800 briefly for you. Um, so if you want to learn more about the Islamic revolution and what happened

01:31:47.800 there, um, let me just share my screen here. Sorry guys, one moment. Um, so if you go to my YouTube

01:31:57.540 channel and then scroll down to Iranians rate documentaries about Iran. Okay. And then the

01:32:06.960 first one here, literally the first one, and I I've even labeled it, I've even labeled it watch

01:32:13.120 first, right? So watch first, 1979 Islamic revolution explained by an Iranian. It's a

01:32:19.780 four hour live stream. The documentary itself is one hour long, but I provide three hours of

01:32:28.960 commentary, supporting documentation, additional videos, testimony, things like that. And so this

01:32:38.260 this four hour live stream will answer a lot of your questions about what happened leading up to

01:32:47.620 the 1979 Islamic revolution. So I hope that answers your question. But yeah, that's, that's

01:32:55.100 what you want to watch this one right there. So literally on my YouTube page, scroll down to where

01:32:59.620 it says Iranians rate documentaries about Iran, literally the first one, and I've even changed the

01:33:04.740 title, it says watch first. So that's the one you're going to want to watch that will answer 0.95

01:33:09.620 um pretty much all of your questions about um what happened and um and the the involvement of

01:33:17.960 the west um diablo del fuego namaskaram please check out abhijit chavda about persia and

01:33:31.960 Zoroastrian history would like your thoughts on his series. I will make a note of that. And I mean,

01:33:40.480 I'm so I'll make a note of that. I'm happy to look into it. But I mean, to be perfectly honest

01:33:46.240 with you, I'm not a historian. I'm not a theologian. So I mean, I, I, I'm happy to watch

01:33:55.320 it. And I'm happy to give my opinion, but it wouldn't be like a qualified opinion, right?

01:34:02.180 Because I'm not an expert on that stuff. I could give you my opinion as a layman, but my area of

01:34:11.560 expertise is modern Middle Eastern politics, Islamic terrorism, and jihad. Like that's where 0.99

01:34:20.420 I can give a qualified opinion. Anything else would just be like a personal opinion. So I'll

01:34:30.100 make a note. I'm happy to look into it. But I mean, I don't know how valuable my opinion would

01:34:37.980 be on on something like that. But I will make a note. I'll add it to my list of things to watch.

01:34:45.600 thank you so much for for that i'll make a note of it here all right oh um we have a super sticker

01:34:53.140 from pieran thank you so much for the super sticker and your support appreciate that i hope

01:34:59.120 you are enjoying the live stream and uh let's get back to our documentary now thank you everyone

01:35:06.480 the city of susa in southwestern iran all right let me let me just go back a little bit because

01:35:11.820 we kind of missed that part there. Regardless of the details, it illustrates the fragility

01:35:16.460 of the empire during this particular time. Without a strong king, it would simply fall apart.

01:35:25.100 Fighting so hard to keep the empire together, Darius was determined to do whatever it took.

01:35:32.220 Continuing many of the policies of Cyrus, he formally divided the empire into provinces

01:35:37.900 called satrapies, appointing each with a hand-picked governor.

01:35:44.380 These tended to be individuals related to the royal house.

01:35:49.260 Areas retained autonomy and were to a certain extent self-sufficient kingdoms.

01:35:59.820 To further foster the territorial integrity of the empire,

01:36:04.080 Darius commissioned several large construction projects,

01:36:07.540 including a vast network of roads and highways,

01:36:12.460 one of which would be known as the Royal Road.

01:36:17.820 This highway started in the city of Susa in southwestern Iran,

01:36:23.280 extending all the way to the city of Sardis in western Anatolia,

01:36:28.120 not too far from the Aegean Sea.

01:36:30.300 Darius also ordered the building of a canal between the Red Sea and the Nile, a forerunner

01:36:38.740 of the modern-day Suez Canal.

01:36:43.520 Like Sargon the Great of the Akkadian Empire, or Ashurnasipal of Assyria, Darius also built

01:36:51.740 a new capital city to reflect his greatness as a king.

01:36:58.520 um okay so another comment why are persians gravitating to christianity rather than returning

01:37:08.380 so um i know i made a video about how christianity is the fastest growing religion in occupied iran

01:37:18.200 um i did that only because it's around christmas time and so i wanted to focus on you know the

01:37:24.100 Christian theme, and also give a shout out to the Iranian Christians who are being persecuted.

01:37:31.100 Zoroastrianism is the second fastest growing religion in occupied Iran. But on top of that,

01:37:41.080 the vast majority of Iranians, like I would say somewhere like maybe like even

01:37:46.060 like 40 to 50% of Iranians are actually agnostic or atheist. So they don't officially

01:37:56.640 prescribe to one religion or another. However, having said that, these Iranians who are agnostic 0.54

01:38:08.240 or atheist, they still gravitate towards Zoroastrianism, because Iranian culture is

01:38:17.240 ingrained in Zoroastrianism. So you will find a lot of Iranians who wouldn't call themselves 0.99

01:38:26.320 practicing Zoroastrian, but they would identify as secular, like secular Zoroastrian, right? So,

01:38:34.620 So, you know, like they wear the Far-Bahar symbol, they celebrate all Zoroastrian celebrations, and they take pride in Zoroastrian imagery because the Zoroastrian identity is tied to the Iranian identity, basically, right?

01:38:54.120 Like, as you can see, like, you know, even like 2,000, 3,000 years ago, right? 0.58

01:38:58.460 It was all about Zoroastrianism.

01:39:00.160 So that's why I say Christianity, and this is according to statistics as well, Christianity is the fastest growing religion. 0.86

01:39:10.760 Zoroastrianism is the second fastest growing religion. 0.72

01:39:14.940 However, like half of Iranians who are just, you know, done with religion, they still identify with the core principles of Zoroastrianism, even though they wouldn't consider themselves like practicing Zoroastrians.

01:39:37.560 So I will be making a video about that in the future. I'm actually working on making a whole

01:39:43.360 series of videos about religion in Iran. So I've spoken about Christianity. I'm going to make one

01:39:50.140 about Zoroastrianism. I'm going to make one about the Baha'is. I haven't even spoken about the 1.00

01:39:54.920 Baha'is yet and how the Baha'is are heavily persecuted, right? I'm going to make one about

01:40:01.060 Iranian Jews. I'm going to make one about Iranian Muslims. So I'm working on that series. But yes, 0.59

01:40:06.620 Zoroastrianism is a very, very integral part of our Iranian identity and culture. And we are going

01:40:17.540 through an Iranian national revival. So I have a feeling that Zoroastrianism is going to be making 1.00

01:40:26.180 a huge comeback, especially after Iran is freed from the Islamic dictatorship. I hope that answers 1.00

01:40:35.800 your question thank you so much Persepolis meaning city of the Persians the new capital

01:40:47.640 was located in the Persian heartland around 50 kilometers from Passagarde ancient Greek

01:40:56.760 historians wrote that during the empire's heyday it was the wealthiest and most magnificent city

01:41:03.000 in the known world, surpassing even Babylon.

01:41:13.000 Finally, with order restored throughout the realm, Darius launched new military campaigns

01:41:19.480 to expand the empire's borders, including new lands in Central Asia and territories

01:41:27.320 in the east, up to the Indus River in what is now Pakistan.

01:41:32.800 However, it's his campaigns in Greece, the start of what would become the Greco-Persian

01:41:39.220 Wars that have gained the most attention as well as notoriety in the Western world.

01:41:46.420 In 499 BC, and with help from Athens and Eritrea, the Ionian Greeks along the Aegean Sea revolted

01:41:54.880 against their Persian overlords.

01:41:57.320 The rebels made it as far as the city of Sardis, former capital of the Lydian kingdom, which

01:42:04.060 they sacked and burned.

01:42:06.660 It was a short-lived victory, however, and by 493, the rebellion was crushed.

01:42:16.440 In order to prevent future attacks from the Greek mainland, Darius launched a campaign

01:42:22.200 to punish Athens, Eritrea and any other troublemakers.

01:42:27.320 In 492 BC, a Persian force seized Thrace and Macedonia, but aborted the attack on Athens

01:42:38.080 due to bad weather conditions and hostile local tribes.

01:42:43.500 By 490 however, the Persians crossed the Aegean Sea, capturing several islands before landing

01:42:52.980 on the mainland.

01:42:56.200 they were defeated by Greek forces on the plains of Marathon.

01:43:04.840 The conflict didn't end there however, with Darius making plans to return and subjugate

01:43:11.160 all of Greece. Though this wouldn't happen during his lifetime, as he died four years later.

01:43:18.840 At his death, the Persian Empire was at its very height in terms of power and territory.

01:43:27.600 The task of punishing Greece would fall to his son and successor, Xerxes.

01:43:33.760 In the West, Xerxes remains probably the most famous Persian king of all, immortalised but

01:43:51.700 also vandalised by his role in the Greco-Persian Wars, most notably his defeat of the 300 Spartans

01:44:00.640 at the Battle of Thermopylae.

01:44:03.440 Portrayed most recently

01:44:04.740 by the Hollywood movie

01:44:06.120 300.

01:44:07.780 Oh, I can't believe, oh my gosh.

01:44:10.640 Oh, I hate that movie.

01:44:12.000 I hate that movie.

01:44:14.040 Guys,

01:44:15.040 I don't hate the movie because 0.94

01:44:17.960 the Persians lost. 1.00

01:44:19.600 Like, obviously not.

01:44:20.840 I hate the movie because

01:44:22.220 they make my ancestors

01:44:24.480 look like, you know, 0.93

01:44:26.600 bald, demonic, 0.94

01:44:28.800 like, pierced,

01:44:30.640 ogre people from like lord of the rings right i made a whole rant about it but yeah like it was 0.99

01:44:37.320 just so stupid so stupid complete historical revisionism as well but yeah 0.97

01:44:42.460 so stupid in persia xerxes was remembered as great second only to cyrus and darius 1.00

01:44:53.320 it goes without saying that greek society was a very different one to that of the persians 0.95

01:45:00.280 A people who favoured oral tradition over the written word, much of which has either

01:45:07.080 been lost or distorted over time.

01:45:10.320 Therefore, for the most part, when it comes to Xerxes, ruling over the greatest empire

01:45:16.420 in the world at its very height, the story is told from his enemy's point of view.

01:45:23.400 yet because these sources do exist we can arrive at a picture of his life

01:45:30.120 oh my gosh galathios how do you think they made my ancestors look like warriors in bikinis oh my

01:45:38.280 gosh i mean yeah geez it's uh it's rough it's rough it's rough but but see this is what xerxes

01:45:50.600 oh my gosh this is i haven't even seen this documentary guys and this is literally the

01:45:55.920 same photo the same image that i used in my rant about 300 yesterday i literally used this photo

01:46:02.960 and i was like this is probably what he looked like nonetheless

01:46:05.920 life wouldn't have been easy for a persian prince raised by eunuchs at eight oh did you see that

01:46:19.840 Guys, wait, wait. Where'd it go? Wait, wait. Where's that? 0.69

01:46:29.960 That's what I was sitting on. Remember, guys? I showed you that photo earlier from my Facebook page.

01:46:38.880 remember when i i i was um visiting susa and then i snuck behind the barricade and i sat on

01:46:50.700 that remember here let me pull it up again oh i was i shouldn't have done that like i should not

01:46:56.500 have done that but um here let me let me show this so so you see you see that what's up what's

01:47:03.980 paused on the screen right now here how do i move this

01:47:14.220 that's me that's me sitting on on the exact same thing except here like this this this version is

01:47:22.460 broken right but um yeah that's that's the the statue that you're seeing in um

01:47:33.980 in uh the movie persian prince raised by eunuchs at age seven according to a later greek source

01:47:43.420 xerxes would have been taught to ride and hunt at age 14 his teaching would begin

01:47:51.420 instructing him to be wise just prudent and brave

01:47:55.580 Finally, by age 16, 10 years of national service would begin,

01:48:03.900 with an emphasis on archery, javelin throwing, competing for prizes and hunting.

01:48:13.420 Then finally an official military career would begin, for some 25 years to come.

01:48:19.500 after which came elevation to the status of elder and advisor to the king.

01:48:29.500 By no means guaranteed the throne, this life would continue unless disrupted by the death of a king.

01:48:37.500 Such as happened in 486 BC when Darius finally passed away,

01:48:43.500 in the midst of preparations for a new war against Egypt.

01:48:47.500 Egypt, but not before naming Xerxes as his heir. But this didn't necessarily mean a

01:48:56.680 smooth transition, for another claimed the throne too. Xerxes had the right pedigree

01:49:06.000 for sure, his mother being Atosa, a daughter of Cyrus the Great. Yet the eldest prince

01:49:15.420 was his half-brother, Artobazan, born of a commoner.

01:49:23.900 So to the people in the comments who are saying,

01:49:28.080 I'm very passionate, but the Greeks won.

01:49:31.060 Guys, I'm not denying that the Greeks won.

01:49:34.080 I have no issue with that.

01:49:36.320 Like I said, it's all love between Iranians and Greeks.

01:49:42.020 It's not like I see a Greek person and I'm like,

01:49:44.800 oh my God, the battle of three Thermopylae or whatever. Like it's literally not like that.

01:49:50.280 Iranians and Greeks are like really close. We have similar culture, similar custom,

01:49:56.980 even similar foods. So like, I don't take issue with the battle. I take issue with the fact that

01:50:04.240 the movie directors portrayed Iranians as a bunch of like inbred half naked pierced freaks. That's 0.97

01:50:11.460 what i take issue with not not with the battle like i don't under i don't understand why people

01:50:16.140 don't get that point right like anyways all good all all love between iranians and greeks

01:50:22.000 due to the high prestige of his mother um some of you are asking me to comment on uh the

01:50:30.940 relationship between greeks and turks i'm not touching that one i'm not getting involved in

01:50:36.180 that drama, not my business, not my concern. But Iranians and Greeks, we are close, we have no

01:50:44.100 issues. And apparently the words of Demaritus, a Spartan king in exile at the Achaemenid court,

01:50:53.240 who argued that the eldest doesn't necessarily need to inherit the throne. Xerxes was triumphant.

01:51:00.520 by december being crowned without challenge as the new great king he was 36 years old

01:51:09.480 oh um someone commented in the chat that they're armenian

01:51:17.240 iranians we also love armenians we have a lot of armenians in in iran um actually during the

01:51:24.960 Armenian genocide many Armenians fled and sought refuge and safety in Iran that was before of

01:51:33.380 course the Islamic dictatorship took over so nothing but love for Armenians again like nothing

01:51:40.080 but love for all people Turks Armenians Greeks for me I'm I love all people I respect all people

01:51:46.940 um whenever i i take issue with something i take issue with a government policy or decision right

01:51:56.160 like even even when i speak about the islamic republic i'm not hating on iran i'm not hating

01:52:02.680 on iranians because i make a distinction between the government and the government policies versus

01:52:08.840 the people and that's the same thing with all people from all various countries i love all

01:52:14.360 people from all countries. And that's why I make it very clear that I'm only speaking about

01:52:20.140 government policies, government decisions, right. And I think sometimes people don't make that

01:52:26.840 distinction. And I think that's where the confusion comes in, right. And I think it's

01:52:31.660 really important for us as you know, we're all human. We should always make that distinction

01:52:38.700 between government policy or, you know, the decisions of a government versus the people

01:52:44.840 itself. So yeah, I see a starred comment here. Tinley, funny how people gloat about Spartans

01:52:57.040 beating Persians, then the next Greek war, they allied. Yeah, you're absolutely right. I mean,

01:53:02.340 literally, I think it was like three years later. So three years after the Battle of Thermopylae,

01:53:08.700 the Spartans and Persians um made an alliance and you're right they kicked the they kicked the crap

01:53:16.020 out of Athens so again like I I don't I don't get into these things for me it's all love but you

01:53:24.120 make a very good point and you know I guess this is why history is important because you know people

01:53:29.020 want to make a comment but then they literally don't know what happened three years later so

01:53:33.620 yeah that's um that's a very good point there i definitely definitely agree with that

01:53:41.700 he had the bloodline and all the prestige that came with it

01:53:45.540 but it remains to be seen whether he'd be a capable ruler like his father and grandfather

01:53:55.140 xerxes's first challenge as king was to put down rebellions in egypt and babylon both of which he

01:54:03.060 was able to accomplish. And once peace had been restored in those restless provinces,

01:54:09.060 he too, like his father before him, made preparations for an invasion of Greece.

01:54:15.060 By 480, the great king amassed a gigantic army, very possibly over 100,000 men, and

01:54:25.060 and invaded the mainland, seizing Thessaly, Macedonia and other parts of northern Greece.

01:54:33.060 Spartan forces, elite warriors who'd trained their entire lives for war,

01:54:39.060 by now allied with the Athenians, were able to halt the Persian advance at the Pass of Thermopylae.

01:54:45.060 before eventually they were defeated by the numerically superior Persian force.

01:54:57.900 The sacrifice of the Spartans was not in vain, as it gave the Athenians time to escape.

01:55:06.240 When Xerxes' army reached Athens, save for a few defenders, they found the place more or less abandoned.

01:55:15.060 It's people living to fight another day.

01:55:20.520 Xerxes put the city to the torch, but he could not kill his population. 0.95

01:55:26.960 This was an act which would return to haunt the Persians 150 years later. 0.98

01:55:35.460 The next major confrontation took place at Salamis, 0.98

01:55:39.580 where a Greek fleet, possibly aided by the weather, won a decisive victory.

01:55:45.060 destroying Persia's superior naval capabilities.

01:55:50.140 It's these two battles, Thermopylae and Salamis,

01:55:53.720 that future Greek writers and historians such as Herodotus

01:55:57.460 would cite as being momentous events

01:55:59.800 that were turning points in the history of Greece.

01:56:04.640 The war didn't end there, however.

01:56:08.420 While Xerxes returned to Persia

01:56:10.800 to oversee matters elsewhere in his massive state,

01:56:15.060 He left a sizeable Persian force in Greece, under the command of his trusted general, Mardonius.

01:56:22.540 A force to be reckoned with since the time of Darius.

01:56:27.120 In 479 BC, Mardonius attacked the region of Attica, engaging with Greek forces at Palatay.

01:56:35.500 The battle remained a stalemate until Mardonius, fighting in the thick of the action, was killed, throwing his forces into disarray.

01:56:45.060 and forcing the Persians to retreat back to Asia.

01:56:49.680 After this second great defeat,

01:56:52.740 no future Persian force would ever land on the Greek mainland again. 0.75

01:57:00.360 These military conflicts in Europe had taught the Persians

01:57:04.320 that the Greek city-states, though divided amongst themselves,

01:57:08.060 would unite against a foreign aggressor.

01:57:10.460 And so, the Persian kings, long having allied with Greek rulers on occasion, adopted a strategy

01:57:19.040 of using the near-unlimited financial resources of the Persian state to create diplomatic

01:57:24.720 alliances with select city-states, and to support them against their local rivals.

01:57:32.380 This strategy of divide and rule worked, and within a few years the Greek city-states were

01:57:38.340 back to fighting amongst themselves. Posing little threat to Persian interests in the

01:57:44.100 region. It would take an especially powerful and cunning ruler to unite the Greeks. A ruler

01:57:55.480 to rival Cyrus. In the 5th century BC, no such figure existed, and few would have predicted

01:58:04.540 that one ever would.

01:58:17.060 Despite his defeats in Greece, Xerxes' nearly 20 years of rule is still regarded as a golden

01:58:23.600 age.

01:58:26.220 By 465 BC however, this would change.

01:58:31.860 According to the later Greek historian Diodorus Siculus, Xerxes was assassinated by the man

01:58:38.720 closest to him, the captain of his royal guard, Artabanos, seemingly in order to gain more

01:58:46.520 power and influence through Xerxes' successor, Artaxerxes.

01:58:52.640 Instead, the new king, whether he'd been in on the plan or not, had Artabanus killed.

01:59:01.280 For 40 years to come, Artaxerxes ruled over a time.

01:59:06.000 Guys, for those of you in the chat who are saying you want to visit Iran, do not visit Iran right now. 0.87

01:59:14.140 Iran is occupied by an Islamic dictatorship. 0.84

01:59:17.160 they take hostages all the time and they ransom people. The only reason you don't hear about it 0.97

01:59:25.440 is because your governments don't want to be embarrassed on the world stage. So do not travel

01:59:34.240 to occupied Iran. Do not listen to the paid influencers because the Islamic dictatorship 0.99

01:59:41.040 will literally pay influencers to go to Iran and make videos and pretend as if everything is okay 0.95

01:59:48.500 and normal. Meanwhile, us Iranians, we're just shaking our heads going, what's going on? And

01:59:54.800 when we try to call it out, we're accused of being liars, right? So do not go to Iran. It is 0.99

02:00:02.500 not a safe place. It is an Islamic dictatorship. They have been taking hostages and holding them 1.00

02:00:09.640 ransom for the last 47 years. Again, you don't hear about it. You don't hear about it because

02:00:15.680 your governments do not want to embarrass themselves in front of the Islamic dictatorship. 1.00

02:00:21.620 But do not go. It's not safe to go until the Islamic dictatorship is overthrown. 0.99

02:00:30.340 Once Iran is free, then of course everyone will be welcome, just like everyone was welcome

02:00:37.140 prior to 1979, Iran was the number one tourist destination in the Middle East. And when Iran is 0.95

02:00:45.500 free, it will once again be the number one tourist destination. But right now, it is not

02:00:51.440 not at all a safe place. Do not go. Simple logic. Don't focus on what separates us. When I was going

02:01:00.340 through the wounded warriors process. I had a caseworker named Aisha. She always said she was

02:01:07.300 Persian. God bless the Shah. Thank you so much. I appreciate that. Very kind of you to say. Thank 1.00

02:01:14.120 you for the support. And I think the wounded warriors process is, it's not like an American 0.99

02:01:24.500 thing for for veterans who've served. I'm not American. I'm Canadian. I'm sorry if that's the

02:01:31.120 case. And thank you for your service as well. I have a lot of respect for for veterans, whether

02:01:38.880 they're, you know, Canada, United States, Israel, or, you know, any country that is defending

02:01:46.240 Western civilization and and democracy. So thank you so much for your service. Really appreciate

02:01:53.280 that time of stability and peace for the persian empire yet the empire had stopped growing 0.97

02:02:05.520 and future kings wouldn't be so lucky much was changing in the greek world to the west 0.99

02:02:12.960 and more and more greek generals such as themistocles would involve themselves in the

02:02:18.240 effect oh you are american i love america i love america you know um one of the most frequent

02:02:27.200 comments i get from people who you know support me or follow me is they'll always write like an

02:02:32.960 angry comment like where's your american flag why don't you have an american flag and i'm like

02:02:38.800 because i'm canadian so you know i have my i have my canadian flag but i don't have an american flag

02:02:45.360 but i have a lot of respect and love for the united states i love americans um america is

02:02:51.360 pretty much my second home my favorite state is texas i love love like if i had to pick a state

02:02:57.600 to move to um if i was going to go to the united states definitely texas like i just i love texas

02:03:05.440 um love everything about it so yeah god god god bless america

02:03:11.040 and thank you for keeping the rest of us safe because i mean geez like without america the 0.80

02:03:18.340 islamists would have like taken over i actually so earlier today in my live stream i shared um

02:03:24.880 tulsi gabbard's speech at tp usa where she was warning about the threat of radical islamism 0.58

02:03:32.800 right um and yeah i'm so glad texas is banning sharia law that's why like that that's that's

02:03:39.820 makes me love texas even more bears of the persian state

02:03:48.300 in truth not much is known about artaxerxes reign although we do know that his successor

02:03:55.020 xerxes ii occupied the throne for a mere 45 days before he too was cut down by the assassin's blades

02:04:03.900 without clear guidelines for royal succession the rot of factionalism was beginning to seep in

02:04:14.440 according to tessias a struggle soon broke out no texas has a beach isn't isn't it like

02:04:23.320 galveston or something wait where's galveston

02:04:30.280 i'm pretty sure texas yeah texas had i've been to galveston as a child

02:04:37.160 texas has a beach no no fake news here no fake news see i i i know my i know texas i know texas

02:04:45.080 ...out between Xerxes' brothers, Sogdianus and Ocus, with the latter eventually winning out,

02:04:55.400 assuming the throne in 423 BC as Darius II. Again, not much is known about Darius' reign.

02:05:05.200 A Median rebellion in 409 BC is mentioned by Xenophon.

02:05:09.160 oh major you found out about an iranian restaurant in lubbock when you're mobile again you're gonna

02:05:20.160 check it out and freak out the va let me know how the let me know how it goes let me know what you

02:05:26.420 order i'm i'm looking forward to um to your experience iranian food is great it's so delicious

02:05:31.980 as long as you know what to order and like you know you're not intimidated but it's it's so good

02:05:38.220 it's so good if you guys haven't checked out like my iranian food video i did a food review video

02:05:43.580 it's somewhere on on my youtube page and generally tensions with certain greek factions

02:05:50.940 began to rise breaking out into all-out war with athens on a few occasions

02:05:59.420 so much so that he is remembered as darius nothos or darius the bastard

02:06:08.220 Following Darius' death in 404 BC, a full-scale civil war broke out between Darius II's son and successor Artaxerxes II,

02:06:19.740 and another son known as Cyrus the Younger, supported by thousands of battle-hardened Greek mercenaries,

02:06:30.660 notably under the Athenian general and historian Xenophon, who would record the ensuing events for posterity.

02:06:38.220 In 401 BC, the two sides finally engaged near the small town of Kruksana on the Euphrates

02:06:47.580 River.

02:06:49.120 When Cyrus was killed, however, by one of Artaxerxes' champions, his faction quickly

02:06:56.980 fell apart.

02:06:59.540 Artaxerxes II became the new king, and the 10,000 Greeks had to march across the empire

02:07:06.580 to get home. Like the first Artaxerxes, the second Achaemenid king of his name also had

02:07:18.380 a lengthy reign, in this case 46 years. Though for once there may have been some stability

02:07:27.020 within the Achaemenid household, his reign also had its setbacks.

02:07:34.200 no such thing as the arabian gulf it's the persian gulf it's been the persian gulf for

02:07:39.960 thousands of years and it will continue to be the persian gulf for thousands of years to come

02:07:48.520 for example the loss of egypt had to be contended with

02:07:52.840 and there are few records of any persian expansion in any other direction

02:07:57.080 Artaxerxes II, however, was able to manage Greece by continuing the Persian policy of

02:08:07.140 divide and rule, of supporting one city-state against another.

02:08:13.680 Still, he was no Cyrus or Darius, and upon his death in 359 BC, one of his sons succeeded

02:08:21.940 him, taking the name Artaxerxes III.

02:08:27.080 In a sense, Artaxerxes III was the type of king that the stagnant Persian Empire needed to turn its fortunes around.

02:08:36.360 Whereas his father had lost Egypt, Artaxerxes successfully brought it back into the fold,

02:08:43.400 as well as suppressing rebellions in Phoenicia and Cyprus.

02:08:51.320 Though successful on the battlefield, the end of his reign was marred by a plot.

02:08:57.080 oh okay guys we have someone from dubai in the chat so hello from dubai just watched your

02:09:04.380 comparison reel about xmas in the uae in france great observation appreciate your views thank

02:09:10.600 you so much and welcome you know um so my my evening live stream the one that you're watching

02:09:16.840 right now um is a little bit more chill it's more just you know documentaries or you know

02:09:22.440 uh, cool, interesting topics that we watched together. Um, my main live streams, which I do

02:09:28.460 at 12 noon Eastern standard time. That's when I focus more on politics, Islamic terrorism, 1.00

02:09:34.980 jihad. And I mean, I kid you not literally every other live stream or podcasts that I do. Um, 0.99

02:09:43.920 I play that video of, um, Oh gosh, let me, let me pull up. I want to make sure I get like,

02:09:50.180 I can never remember his name. It's your foreign affairs minister. And it's that video from 2017

02:09:59.280 where he's warning people, he's warning Western politicians about the threat of radical Islam, 0.74

02:10:10.700 right? Let me pull it up here. Where's my video? 0.92

02:10:20.980 why can't i not why can't i not find it now um let me go to my profile search there we go

02:10:30.100 and in honor of you i'm going to please i don't get too many people from from dubai um in my

02:10:37.620 live stream so all right so i i always always like literally every other live stream that i do

02:10:45.220 I play this video by Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed. And you know that speech, that talk that he gives

02:10:52.920 back in 2017, right? Let me pull it up here.

02:11:03.220 And I really, I always like to play this because like,

02:11:06.840 I like I always make a distinction like I'm here to talk about like radical Islamic terrorism 0.66

02:11:15.960 jihad I speak about the Muslim Brotherhood right um and I love using the UAE as um as a comparison 0.76

02:11:27.200 and so here's the video like literally every other political live stream that I do um

02:11:35.960 I actually played this video today in my live stream and let me say this in

02:11:44.860 English so you can understand what I'm saying no I know you have translation

02:11:50.560 but I just want to make sure you get it right there will come a day that we will

02:11:59.060 see far more radical extremists and terrorists coming out of Europe because of lack of decision

02:12:09.920 making, trying to be politically correct, or assuming that they know the Middle East

02:12:18.240 and they know Islam and they know the others far better than we do.

02:12:22.900 And I'm sorry, but that's pure ignorance. 0.81

02:12:29.060 and yeah so one of my favorite videos i play this video all the time to basically compare

02:12:36.100 like what's happening in the west versus how middle eastern countries like the uae 0.98

02:12:43.220 are dealing with the threat of islamic terrorism so um yeah welcome welcome and um i'm really glad

02:12:51.940 that you appreciated my my iranian here video um about the uae beautiful country um maybe one day 1.00

02:13:00.820 i'll be able to to visit the uae but uh yeah no fantastic welcome welcome all right let's get back

02:13:08.260 to our documentary orchestrated by his close confidant a eunuch named bagoas who craved more

02:13:18.500 power for himself. Artaxerxes III and all but one of his sons were assassinated by

02:13:25.640 Bagoas, who, we're told by Greek writers, wanted to control the empire through a puppet

02:13:32.600 ruler. That puppet turned out to be Arsys, who eventually ascended the throne as Artaxerxes

02:13:40.880 the fourth, though with Bagoas calling the shots. Arsys only ruled for two more

02:13:49.580 years before he himself was poisoned, presumably by Bagoas. With the Achaemenid 1.00

02:13:58.280 royal family being decimated by so many assassinations, soon enough there was

02:14:03.740 only one prince left from the ruling dynasty who could still make a

02:14:07.640 legitimate claim to the throne. At the time, already in his 40s, with no hope in

02:14:14.400 normal circumstances of ever becoming king, he served as the governor or satrap

02:14:20.540 of Armenia. Called back to the Persian heartland for his coronation, the prince

02:14:28.460 assumed the throne name Darius III. 0.88

02:14:33.080 Little did he know his reign would be the last of any Achaemenid, for a new

02:14:39.880 kingdom was on the rise.

02:14:49.200 By the time Darius III became the new King of Kings in 336 BC, news of the

02:14:57.120 internal strife and regicide plaguing the ruling Persian house had reached

02:15:02.600 all the way across the Western Sea, to the mountain kingdom of Macedonia, a warlike realm

02:15:10.920 on the periphery of the Hellenistic world.

02:15:17.860 In the previous decades, the highly capable ruler of Macedon, Philip II, had forcibly

02:15:24.240 united the major Greek city-states, save Sparta under his banner.

02:15:30.560 His next plan, allegedly, to invade the Persian Empire.

02:15:38.660 But Philip had made many enemies over the years.

02:15:44.580 And that was when the assassin's blades cut him down too.

02:15:51.800 He was succeeded by his son, just 18 years old, but already a tested general.

02:15:59.200 His name, of course, was Alexander.

02:16:03.500 By 336 BC, the highly efficient imperial system of administration that had been started by

02:16:11.700 Cyrus the Great and perfected by Darius I, now suffered from gross mismanagement and

02:16:19.020 corruption.

02:16:21.820 The satrapies, especially Babylonia and Egypt, were restless, burdened by heavy taxes.

02:16:29.920 This, coupled with the instability and bloodletting within the royal family, led to a situation ripe for foreign invasion.

02:16:38.340 Just two years later, the young Alexander, all the might of Greece behind him, ever spurred 0.73

02:16:50.920 on by his insistence that his father had been murdered by Persian assassins, crossed over

02:16:56.840 the Hellespont to Asia Minor.

02:17:02.620 There, he defeated a modest Persian force at the Granicus River.

02:17:09.140 Freeing Ionia from centuries of foreign occupation. 0.91

02:17:16.420 The first in a remarkable series of victories that would bring the world to its knees. 0.88

02:17:25.500 Within a year, Alexander occupied most of Asia Minor.

02:17:29.520 In 333, he marched south into what is today Syria, where the army of Darius III, probably

02:17:37.920 double the size of the invasion force, awaited him.

02:17:46.160 Near the town of Issus, on a narrow coastal plain, bounded by mountains and the sea, they

02:17:55.200 met there in November.

02:17:56.620 The fighting was fierce, and both sides well matched.

02:18:03.640 Until Darius' chariot was seen leaving the field, apparently fleeing in panic,

02:18:10.680 abandoning not only his army, but his mother, wife and infant heir.

02:18:18.780 Shattering the morale of the Persian troops, they broke and fled.

02:18:23.280 Alexander was victorious and took Darius's family under his personal protection.

02:18:36.280 Of course, he didn't stop there, continuing south along the Mediterranean coast,

02:18:41.280 facing strong resistance only at Tyre and in Gaza, before venturing on to Egypt.

02:18:47.280 to Egypt. On his way there Darius sent the young king a peace offering claiming

02:18:55.680 that he would yield all of the lands east of the Euphrates to the Macedonian

02:18:59.780 conqueror if he suspended hostilities. Alexander refused, he wanted the entire

02:19:10.880 empire or nothing at all.

02:19:16.920 Victoriously riding into Egypt by 332 BC.

02:19:22.080 To a downtrodden Egyptian population, weary of outside Persian rule, Alexander was treated

02:19:29.080 as a hero and portrayed himself as such.

02:19:34.740 breadbasket under his belt, his army well rested. The road lay wide open to the heart of the Persian 0.98

02:19:42.980 Empire. By October 331, near the town of Gaugamela, in today's northern Iraq, Darius had assembled

02:19:56.260 another huge force. He had the advantage, choosing the battlefield and having weeks to prepare.

02:20:04.740 Again, however, it was Alexander who triumphed, relying on his elite hoplite infantry, cutting-edge military technology to hold the centre,

02:20:15.740 and his swift companion cavalry to outmanoeuvre the enemy's wings.

02:20:21.740 Again, Darius was seen leaving the field before the battle's outcome was clear, causing his men to panic and follow him into retreat.

02:20:34.740 from then onward alexander had little trouble taking over what was left of the persian empire

02:20:42.100 eventually may yeah i was gonna say i don't know why the chat is hating on alexander the great i

02:20:51.760 mean obviously as an iranian like you know i don't like the fact that he conquered whatever

02:20:57.200 but i mean he was still called alexander the great for a reason and one of the things that

02:21:03.140 made alexander great is because when he did conquer certain parts of the persian empire

02:21:10.100 he actually adopted the traditions of the persian empire and so modern western civilization

02:21:16.320 is not actually founded on on the greeks it's founded on the persians because when alexander

02:21:22.700 the great conquered persia he took everything that the persians had done and then basically

02:21:28.360 like incorporated that into his own empire so i mean let's not let's not hate on alexander the

02:21:38.060 great just because we're biased like um you know he he's he's called the great i mean i mean he's

02:21:45.880 he's no cyrus the great he's no cyrus the great but you know like cyrus the great you know alexander

02:21:52.000 the great. Alexander was great too. Let's put it that way.

02:21:57.260 Taking it to the royal cities of Passagarde and Persepolis. At Passagarde, he paid tribute

02:22:04.740 to the tomb of Cyrus, even stationing guards there to protect it in his absence.

02:22:10.900 Persepolis, though, was a different matter.

02:22:19.900 There, Alexander's men are said to have taken three months in order to empty the city of

02:22:25.260 its vast treasures.

02:22:27.840 After this, reportedly during a night of drunken revelry, and perhaps at the instigation of

02:22:34.300 a Greek courtesan, Alexander set the city on fire.

02:22:38.560 burning a good part of this magnificent capital to the ground yeah that that part

02:22:45.720 was in revenge for xerxes's burning of athens 150 years earlier

02:22:51.300 i mean that's the thing with war right it's like one side does something and then the other side

02:22:59.100 you know and then they go back and forth and so like this this is why this is why like i say like

02:23:04.880 we can't we can't hate right because there's so much history there right i mean obviously

02:23:11.840 burning cities isn't a good thing regardless so yeah

02:23:18.560 regardless the burning of persepolis symbolized the end of the achaemenid ruling house

02:23:25.520 and the glorious empire they had presided over which now was mostly in the hands of alexander

02:23:33.280 and the Greeks. Oh, no. Oh, no. Oh, no. The Indians, the Indians have entered the chat. 0.98

02:23:45.520 Guys, like this is lethal. When you have like three ancient civilizations, you got the Greeks, 1.00

02:23:51.760 you got the Iranians, you got the Hindus talking about ancient civilization. That's how you know 0.99

02:23:58.400 things are going to get interesting. So Diablo says, oh man. Okay. So these are not my words,

02:24:04.500 by the way, not my words, not my words. I'm just reading what Diablo said. Alexander the Pompous

02:24:10.100 lost in India. He barely managed to defeat King Purusha on the outskirts of Punjab. The Nanda

02:24:17.620 empire at the time had 6,000 war elephants and a hundred thousand soldiers. That's why his army 0.94

02:24:25.080 turned back. Yeah. I mean, I, I believe that I believe that. So, um, yeah, this is, this is an

02:24:33.120 interesting chat. You got the Iranians, you got the Greeks, you got the, the, the Indians all

02:24:38.520 talking about ancient, ancient civilization, um, and ancient historical battles. Pretty,

02:24:44.200 pretty interesting there. So I did not know that, um, about, about Alexander the Great and what

02:24:51.720 happened um what happened uh in in punja very interesting thank you for sharing that i i enjoyed

02:25:00.960 that little piece of of information there darius is said to have fled to ecbatana and then to areas

02:25:12.100 of eastern iran with his presumably still loyal nobles their plan was probably to connect with

02:25:18.520 the satraps and commanders of the eastern provinces of the empire, most likely in Bactria and Sogdiana.

02:25:27.040 Oh, yeah, Major, you make a good point. Peace is defined as the period between wars

02:25:32.020 where both sides rest and rearm. Yeah, you make a very, very good point there. Very good point.

02:25:41.660 Alexander, though, was in hot pursuit. It's not known exactly what happened in the end,

02:25:47.000 But by the time Alexander caught up with the king, the last Achaemenid had been stabbed

02:25:53.280 and left to die, or was already dead, at the command of Bessus, the satrap of Bactria.

02:26:08.440 And so, in the summer of 330 BC, the Achaemenid line officially came to an end.

02:26:20.720 Alexander is reported to have given Darius a royal burial.

02:26:25.120 As for Bessus, he declared himself to be Darius' successor, attempting to make peace

02:26:30.960 with Alexander, thinking that the latter might reward him for killing his former king.

02:26:39.320 Alexander rejected the offer, and according to the historian Quintus Rufus, had Bessus

02:26:46.040 arrested, tortured and then killed for betraying his rightful king.

02:26:51.960 That's rough.

02:26:56.020 In the end, Alexander continued to campaign into Central Asia before arriving in what

02:27:01.900 is now India.

02:27:05.180 Oh, oh, look, they just mentioned India.

02:27:09.140 OK, we're almost at the end.

02:27:10.760 Let's see.

02:27:11.220 Let's see what he says about India.

02:27:12.640 I think there's only like one or two minutes left.

02:27:15.160 And now I get to the super chat. 1.00

02:27:16.520 Conquering lands beyond those ever secured by the Persians. 0.82

02:27:20.160 he probably would have gone further but his men were tired of fighting and demanded that they

02:27:27.880 return home facing a mutiny alexander marched west back to babylon where eventually he died

02:27:36.040 in 323 unlike cyrus's empire alexander's fell apart almost immediately after his death

02:27:44.820 and and that's why it's you know cyrus the great and alexander the great you know he was great too

02:27:54.140 but cyrus the great right there you go that's that's why a little bit of true a little bit

02:27:59.900 of fun trolling there for you guys generals fighting over the spoils and eventually dividing

02:28:05.080 it up amongst themselves the cultural impact of the conquest however was immense

02:28:11.980 with the descendants of these generals still being in control hundreds of years later

02:28:20.160 whilst Hellenisation occurred all over the lands of the former Persian state

02:28:25.160 and cities named for Alexander built as far afield as Egypt and Afghanistan.

02:28:34.260 As for the Persians, they carried on under several dynasties

02:28:39.300 Most notably, the Seleucids and the Parthians.

02:28:44.960 Until another native Persian dynasty, the Sassanians, would come to power in the year 224 AD.

02:28:53.580 The Achaemenid Empire, though, remained the model that was followed by these and other dynasties.

02:28:59.480 as they tried to manage diverse groups of people and nations with different customs, languages, religions, and laws under a single ruler

02:29:08.500 in a world that was becoming ever more interconnected and ever more complex.

02:29:17.080 If you'd like to hear more about this world, then why not subscribe for much?

02:29:22.200 Okay, so there's the end of that documentary. Let me go to some of the super chats here.

02:29:26.980 so possum the cat says that's why winners write the history absolutely you're absolutely correct

02:29:32.980 there um diablo says his successor seleucus married his daughter to emperor chandragupta

02:29:41.580 maurya for peace treaty and 500 elephants as a gift to fight his other macedonians oh wow i did

02:29:50.420 not i did not know that that's fascinating wow i love i love learning all these like tidbits from

02:29:56.900 you know, different places around the world, different cultures, different, you know,

02:30:01.100 different periods in time. No, that's, that's so fascinating. I really do appreciate all of

02:30:07.000 your input here. I mean, if you guys enjoyed this, I'm more than happy to find other like

02:30:15.520 documentaries about different, different parts or, you know, different, I guess, different

02:30:23.100 years of, of the Persian empire. Like this one focused only on the Akhameneid, um, period. But

02:30:31.900 you know, like I could find other ones that may be focused on the Sassanids or something like that.

02:30:35.940 Again, like I'm not, I'm not an expert on ancient Persian history. You know, I'm learning, um, just,

02:30:43.700 just like all of you. Um, so I'm happy to, to find more documentaries about, um, you know,

02:30:51.940 ancient Persia and share all of those with you in future videos. So I did want to share

02:31:01.020 a video that I made. So this is, if you guys want to know what the armies of Cyrus the Great looked

02:31:12.140 like. And if you want to know what the armies of the Achaemenid period looked like, I actually

02:31:21.760 have a video. I played this video in my rant yesterday about 300, but this is like a historically

02:31:29.900 accurate depiction and recreation of what Cyrus the Great's armies would have looked like 2,500

02:31:40.540 years ago. So I will play that for you. Um, momentarily, Dr. Banu, I'm a cop. We have the

02:31:48.720 first, the great Ramses and Egypt is the greatest ancient cradle of civilization. Um, so I'm just

02:31:58.240 going to say, I have a lot of, a lot of respect for, for ancient Egypt. In fact, um, you see that?

02:32:06.020 So, I got a little, I got a tattoo there, and I got a tattoo there as well. So, I have a lot of love, a lot of respect for ancient Egypt. I was actually a huge, like, ancient Egyptian buff, like, when I was a kid.

02:32:24.560 I would read all the books about like, um, all the Egyptian kings and, you know, Ramsey's the

02:32:30.660 first, Ramsey's the second, uh, King Tut, like everything. Um, so big, big fan of the Egyptian,

02:32:38.580 um, civilization, big fan of, um, everything related to, to ancient Egypt as well. Beautiful

02:32:47.460 civilization beautiful culture thank you for sharing that um diablo chaturanga went to persia

02:32:57.860 became shatranj and then went west to become chess okay you should check out the story of parsis

02:33:04.820 yeah i've spoken about the parsis that fled to india um during the arab muslim conquest of um of

02:33:11.540 persia so at some point i'm gonna find a documentary about that and live stream that as

02:33:17.140 as well. That's a fantastic, fantastic suggestion. Thank you

02:33:20.260 so much for that. The major acumenid administration. Let

02:33:30.100 me see this here. Okay, so I will, I'm going to save this

02:33:39.820 video. I'm going to save this to my, my watch later list. Thank you so much for that suggestion.

02:33:49.400 Um, major definitely look forward to, to playing that in a future live stream for sure. Um, so

02:33:59.320 So, okay, I'm going to play this video, which is a historically accurate depiction of what the armies of Cyrus the Great would have looked like 2,500 years ago.

02:34:15.420 This is footage from 1971, when the Shah of Iran, Shahan Shah Aryomer, whom we love very, very much, he celebrated the 2500 anniversary of the founding of the Persian Empire, starting with Cyrus the Great.

02:34:33.360 and he held a very long military parade showcasing all of the various elements of

02:34:41.160 the Persian army throughout the years, starting with the time of Cyrus the Great. So this clip

02:34:49.180 is only the portion that relates to Cyrus the Great, but if you want to watch the full video,

02:34:57.660 it's on my youtube it's just called the 2500 year anniversary of the persian empire so um here we

02:35:05.480 go i'm going to play this and then afterwards i'm going to call it a night and end the live stream

02:35:12.240 so thank you everyone for joining me thank you um for all of your comments thank you for making

02:35:18.580 this a very fun and enjoyable friday evening thank you to the mods for working overtime thank you to

02:35:24.200 the subscribers. Thank you to the members. Thank you for all the super chats. So I'm glad you guys

02:35:29.960 enjoyed this and, um, I'll see you guys soon. I'll see you guys soon. All right, here we go.

02:35:40.440 Oh yes. Shabbat Shalom.

02:35:54.200 like this is what

02:36:24.180 the Greeks sort of seen when the Persians were in

02:36:54.180 I love you

02:37:24.180 Thank you.

02:37:54.180 Look at that stage tower. Isn't that insane? This is from like 3,000 years ago.

02:38:24.180 there you go a little bit of Persian pride for you guys if you're interested in watching the

02:38:52.000 entire, um, military parade and the entire, um, uh, 2,500 year celebration that the Shah of Iran

02:39:00.540 had in 1971, let me know. I've live streamed it before, but I did that like three months ago when

02:39:07.100 my channel was very, very small. So I'm more than happy to do another, um, live stream now that my

02:39:14.300 channel has gotten bigger and I have more viewers more than happy to do another watch party live

02:39:20.240 stream where we go over the entire military parade that the Shah of Iran organized for the

02:39:29.140 celebration of the 2,500-year anniversary of the Persian Empire. Frank, thank you so much for the

02:39:36.520 super sticker. Really appreciate that. I hope you enjoyed the live stream tonight. Again, thank you

02:39:41.840 everyone for joining me. I hope you have a fantastic weekend. To all my Jewish friends and

02:39:47.580 followers. Shabbat shalom. And see you all soon. And as always, payan de iran javitsha.

02:40:17.580 Thank you.

02:40:47.580 We'll be right back.

02:41:17.580 Thank you.

02:41:47.580 We'll be right back.

02:42:17.580 You

Goldie Ghamari - December 27, 2025

The History of Ancient Persia： Cyrus the Great and the Achaemenid Empire

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