The remains of Palace S. The first Palace constructed at Pasargadae. Credit: Bernard Gagnon

A sketch of the Seal of Cyrus I from Anshan, featuring the king mounted with a spear in a combat scene. Credit: Livius.org

Left: The winged genius at Pasargadae, Gate R, as it stands today. Right: a sketch depicting how the same relief may have looked while intact. Credit: Pontecelo and John Henry Wright

The Tomb of Cyrus the Great at Pasargadae. Personally I really like this particular picture because it’s one of the few with people in the shot to give a sense of how large the structure is. Credit: Wright.one

Gallery of art and architecture described in the episode, click on a picture to see it full size. Left to right: Palace S at Pasargadae, the Seal of Cyrus I sketched, side by side Gate R today and restored sketch. Bottom: Tomb of Cyrus the Great. Captions posted as a comment on each image All images from Wikimedia Commons via Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License.

This time we’re taking a break from the narrative for a bit. Now that this show has all of Cyrus’s major conquests under its belt, its probably worth getting a sense of what these Persians were actually like. This episode covers art, architecture, clothing, and the major cultural influences of the early Persian period, under the Teispid kings. Let’s see what the world around Cyrus the Great might have looked like.



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