Ancient Western Asia: Elam, Media, and the Rise of the Achaemenid Empire

Vocabulary practice flashcards covering ancient Near Eastern chronology, Elamite history, the Medes, Neo-Babylonian inscriptions, and the early reign of Cyrus the Great.

Neo-Assyrian Period

The historical era in ancient Western Asia spanning from 934 to 612 BC.

Neo-Babylonian Period

The historical period in ancient Mesopotamia lasting from 625 to 539 BC.

Achaemenid Persian Period

The imperial era of ancient Persia extending from 538 to 331 BC.

Astyages

The Median king (cuneiform: Ishtumegu) whose troops revolted and delivered him in fetters to Cyrus, king of Anshan, in 550/549 BC.

Ecbatana

The royal residence and capital of Media (cuneiform: Agamtanu), from which Cyrus took silver, gold, and other booty to Anshan.

Dynastic Prophecy

A Babylonian cuneiform text (BM ME 1881,0428.168) composed after the late fourth century BCE that characterizes Nabonidus as a rebel prince of Harran and Cyrus as a 'king of Elam.'

Anshan

An ancient Elamite and Persian regional center located in the Kur River Basin of southwest Iran, ruled by Cyrus the Great and his ancestors.

Proto-Elamite

An early, mostly undeciphered writing system used by scribes on the Iranian plateau around 3000 BCE.

Susiana

The alluvial lowland plain around Susa annexed by highland Elamite rulers in the third millennium BCE, which became the core of Elam by the first millennium BCE.

King of Susa and of Anshan

A royal royal title that came into usage during the Middle Elamite period, reflecting rule over both the lowland plains and the highland Iranian plateau.

Untash-Napirisha

A Middle Elamite king who reigned around 1250 BC and constructed the baked-brick ziggurat and glazed-brick high temple (kukunnum) for Inshushinak at Siyan-kuk.

Shutruk-Nahhunte

A king of Susiana who invaded Babylonia and carried captured monumental artifacts, such as the Law Code Stela of Hammurabi, to Susa.

Battle of Til Tuba

A 646 BCE battle commemorated on Nineveh palace reliefs in which the Neo-Assyrian king Assurbanipal defeated the Elamites.

Te'umman

The Elamite king defeated and beheaded by Neo-Assyrian forces at the Battle of Til Tuba in 646 BCE.

Nabopolassar

The founding king of the Neo-Babylonian Empire who identified himself as a 'son of a nobody,' cast off the Assyrian yoke from Akkad, and rebuilt the wall Imgur-Enlil.

Imgur-Enlil

The great wall of Babylon, restored by Nabopolassar, described in his inscriptions as an eternal boundary marker, high mountain, and strong shield.

Ebabbar

The temple of Šamaš at Sippar, where King Nabonidus excavated 18 cubits into the ground to uncover the original foundation tablets of the Akkadian king Narām-Sîn.

Ehulhul

The temple of the moon god Sîn in Harran, destroyed by the Medes and later reconstructed by Nabonidus following a divine dream command from Marduk and Sîn.

Extispicy

The divinatory inspection of animal entrails, which King Nabonidus repeatedly performed to obtain divine confirmation from Šamaš and Adad before undertaking temple rebuilding.

Deioces

According to Herodotus (1.102), the ruler who united the Medes into a single nation consisting of six tribes: the Busae, Paretacenians, Struchates, Arizantians, Budians, and Magians.

Nush-i Jan

An eighth-century BCE Median architectural complex in western Iran featuring high mud-brick walls, storage rooms, a columned hall, and a decommissioned shrine, but lacking a large surrounding settlement.

Godin Tepe

An archaeological site in northwestern Iran occupied from the fifth millennium BCE onward, featuring a columned hall and fortified manor interpreted as the palace of a Median chieftain.

Luristan Bronzes

An extensive group of Iron Age bronze artifacts from western Iran, often lacking secure archaeological context because the majority were looted from graves.

Arjan

A sixth-century BCE Neo-Elamite elite tomb site excavated in Khuzistan containing high-status decorated metalwork and bronze vessels.

Cyrus Cylinder

A 539 BCE cuneiform foundation deposit from Babylon in which Cyrus the Great legitimizes his rule through Marduk and identifies his royal lineage as King of Anshan.

Teispes

An early royal ancestor and king of Anshan mentioned in the genealogy on the Cyrus Cylinder from whom Cyrus the Great claimed descent.

Umakishtar

The Median king (Cyaxares) who captured Tarbisu and sacked Ashur in 614 BC before entering into an accord with the king of Akkad.