[Public Research] Media

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The History Of Media

(From The Rising Of Media To The Parthian Conquest)

1.Introdution : The Medes were an ancient Iranian people who lived in the western and central portions of present-day Iran. This area is known as Media , They entered this region with the first wave of Iranian tribes, in the late second millennium BC (the Bronze Age collapse). By the 6th century BC, after having together with the Babylonians defeated the Neo-Assyrian Empire, the Medes were able to establish their authority, lasting for about sixty years, from the sack of Nineveh in 612 BC until 549 BC when Cyrus the Great established the Achaemenid Empire by defeating Astyages, king of Media.

According to Herodotus: The Medes were called anciently by all people Aryans; but when Medea, the Colchian, came to them from Athens, they changed their name. Such is the account which they themselves give".
Medea is the sorceress daughter of King Aeëtes of Colchis in the Greek myth of Jason and the Argonauts. There is not a clear Indo-European etymology for the name of Medes, Herodotus, lists the names of six Median tribes, three of which have Iranian etymologiesThus Deioces collected the Medes into a nation, and ruled over them alone. Now these are the tribes of which they consist: the Busae, the Paretaceni, the Struchates, the Arizanti, the Budii, and the Magi.
Gudea ruler of Lagash in Mesopotamia (2143-2124 BC) mentioned "Mada" as a land that grains grow on it. Šulgi ruler of third Ur dynasty (2095-2048 BC) built "bád mada ki" that means wall of Media. "ki" is a descriptive symbol that comes after geographical places. A lot of translators translate "mada" generally into land. "Mada" uses as a suffix before names of lands that are located in west of Iranian plateau like "Martu", "Subartu", "Anšan", "Kimaš", "Gutium" and etc. "Šu-Sin" ruler of third Ur dynasty (2038-2030 BC), reported his military expedition to lands and cities of Zagros, and pillage of gold from "Mada". Translation of "Mada" as "desert" is incorrect because all of lands uses after "Mada" are located in mountains and plateaus.

2.Orgins :
The prehistoric origin of the Medes lies in the common Indo-Iranian homeland in the Eurasian steppes. The early Iranian expansion took them towards the Persian Plateau and the Zagros mountains during the later second millennium BC as part of the population movements associated with the Bronze Age collapse , it is not clear whether Medes were considered to form a distinct ethnic or linguistic identity.

3.History :
The very existence of a Median empire is questioned by modern scholars. It is being increasingly argued that such a political entity even if existed, must have been merely a political alliance among highland neighbors of Assyrians, such as Armenia in southeastern Anatolia, Sagartians in Kurdistan, and the actual Medians in the area between what is today Hamadan-Kirmanshah in cental Zagros. Neither cuneiform sources nor archaeological evidence nor biblical accounts support the historiography provided by Herodotus, who claimed there existed a Median empire.
Although Herodotus credits “Phraortes son of Deioces” (probably c. 715) with the creation of the Median kingdom and the founding of its capital city at Ecbatana (modern Hamadan), it was probably not before 625 BC that Cyaxares, grandson of Deioces, succeeded in uniting into a kingdom the many Iranian-speaking Median tribes,With the capital Ecbatana.
According to Herodotus, the conquests of Cyaxares the Medes were preceded by a Scythian invasion and domination lasting twenty-eight years (under Madius the Scythian, 653-625 BC).The Medes tribes seem to have come into immediate conflict with a settled state to the West known as Mannae, allied with Assyria. Assyrian inscriptions state that the early Medes rulers, who had attempted rebellions against the Assyrians in the time of Esarhaddon and Ashur-bani-pal, were allied with chieftains of the Ashguza (Scythians) and other tribes — who had come from the northern shore of the Black Sea and invaded Asia Minor. The state of Mannae was finally conquered and assimilated by the Medes in the year 616 BC.
In 612 BC, Cyaxares conquered Armenia, and in alliance with Nabopolassar (who created the Neo-Babylonian Empire), succeeded in destroying the Assyrian capital, Nineveh, in 612 BC, and by 606 BC, the remaining vestiges of Assyrian control. From this point, the Medes king ruled over much of northern Mesopotamia, eastern Anatolia and Cappadocia. His power was a threat to his neighbors, and the exiled Jews expected the destruction of Babylonia by the Medes.
When Cyaxares attacked Lydia in the Battle of Halys, the kings of Cilicia and Babylon intervened and negotiated a peace in 585 BC, whereby the Halys River was established as the Medes' frontier with Lydia. Nebuchadrezzar of Babylon married a daughter of Cyaxares. Cyaxares' son, Astyages (584 BC - 550 BC), went to war with the Babylonian king Nabonidus.An equilibrium of the great powers was maintained until the rise of the Persians under Cyrus the Great.

Median Kings :
Deioces 728-675 BC
Phraortes 675-653 BC
Madius the Scythian 653-625 BC
Cyaxares 625-585 BC
Astyages 589-549 BC

Achaemenid Persia

In 553 BC, Cyrus the Great, King of Persia, rebelled against his grandfather, the Mede King, Astyages son of Cyaxares; he finally won a decisive victory in 550 BC resulting in Astyages' capture by his own dissatisfied nobles, who promptly turned him over to the triumphant Cyrus.
After Cyrus's victory against Astyages, the Medes were subjected to their close kin, the Persians.
In the new empire they retained a prominent position; in honor and war, they stood next to the Persians their court ceremony was adopted by the new sovereigns, who in the summer months resided in Ecbatana; and many noble Medes were employed as officials, satraps and generals. Interestingly, at the beginning the Greek historians referred to the Achaemenid Empire as a Median empire.
After the assassination of the usurper Smerdis, a Mede Fravartish (Phraortes), claiming to be a scion of Cyaxares, tried to restore the Mede kingdom, but was defeated by the Persian generals and executed in Ecbatana (Darius I the Great in the Behistun inscr.). Another rebellion, in 409 BC, against Darius II (Xenophon) was of short duration. But the Iranian tribes to the north, especially the Cadusii, were always troublesome; many abortive expeditions of the later kings against them are mentioned.
Under Persian rule, the country was divided into two satrapies: the south, with Ecbatana and Rhagae (Rey near modern Tehran), Media proper, or Greater Media, as it is often called, formed in Darius I the Great's organization the eleventh satrapy , together with the Paricanians and Orthocorybantians; the north, the district of Matiane (see above) , together with the mountainous districts of the Zagros and Assyria proper (east of the Tigris) was united with the Alarodians and Saspirians in eastern Armenia, and formed the eighteenth satrapy.
When the Persian empire decayed and the Cadusii and other mountainous tribes made themselves independent, eastern Armenia became a special satrapy, while Assyria seems to have been united with Media; therefore Xenophon in the Anabasis always designates Assyria by the name of "Media".

Seleucid Empire

Following Alexander's invasion of the satrapy of Media in the summer of 330 BC, he appointed as satrap a former general of Darius III the Great named Atropates (Atrupat) in 328 BC, according to Arrian. In the partition of his empire, southern Media was given to the Macedonian Peithon; but the north, far off and of little importance to the generals squabbling over Alexander's inheritance, was left to Atropates.
While southern Media, with Ecbatana, passed to the rule of Antigonus, and afterwards (about 310 BC) to Seleucus I, Atropates maintained himself in his own satrapy and succeeded in founding an independent kingdom. Thus the partition of the country, that Persia had introduced, became lasting; the north was named Atropatene (in Pliny, Atrapatene; in Ptolemy, Tropatene), after the founder of the dynasty, a name still said to be preserved in the modern form 'Azerbaijan'.
The capital of Atropatene was Gazaca in the central plain, and the castle Phraaspa, discovered on the Araz river by archaeologists in April 2005.
Atropatene is that country of western Asia which was least of all other countries influenced by Hellenism; there exists not even a single coin of its rulers. Southern Media remained a province of the Seleucid Empire for a century and a half, and Hellenism was introduced everywhere. Media was surrounded everywhere by Greek towns, in pursuance of Alexander's plan to protect it from neighboring barbarians, according to Polybius . Only Ecbatana retained its old character. But Rhagae became the Greek town Europus; and with it Strabo names Laodicea, Apamea Heraclea or Achais. Most of them were founded by Seleucus I and his son Antiochus I.

Ashkani

In 221 BC, the satrap Molon tried to make himself independent (there exist bronze coins with his name and the royal title), together with his brother Alexander, satrap of Persis, but they were defeated and killed by Antiochus the Great. In the same way, the Mede satrap Timarchus took the diadem and conquered Babylonia; on his coins he calls himself the great king Timarchus; but again the legitimate king, Demetrius I, succeeded in subduing the rebellion, and Timarchus was slain. But with Demetrius I, the dissolution of the Seleucid Empire began, brought about chiefly by the intrigues of the Romans, and shortly afterwards, in about 150, the Parthian king Mithradates I conquered Media.
From this time Media remained subject to the Arsacids or Parthians, who changed the name of Rhagae, or Europus, into Arsacia , and divided the country into five small provinces . From the Parthians, it passed in 226 to the Sassanids, together with Atropatene.