Medes
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Mede from palace of Xerxes, Persepolis. |
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Face of one Mede in close-up. |
The
Medes (Modern
Persian مادها,
Madha) were an
Iranian people, who lived in the north, western, and northwestern portions of present-day
Iran, and roughly the areas of present day
Tehran,
Hamedan,
Azarbaijan, north of
Esfahan,
Zanjan, and
Kurdistan. This region was known in Greek as
Media (
Μηδία). By the
6th century BC, the Medes were able to establish an empire that stretched from
Aran province (the modern-day
Republic of Azerbaijan) to north and
Central Asia and
Afghanistan.
The Medes are credited with the foundation of Iran as a nation and empire, and established the first Iranian empire, the largest of its day until
Cyrus the Great established a unified empire of the Medes and
Persians, often referred to as the
Achaemenid Persian Empire, by defeating his grandfather and
overlord,
Astyages the
shah of Media. Until that point, all
Iranians were referred to as Mede or Mada by the peoples of the Ancient World.
Medes in ancient times intermarried with other Iranians, especially
Persians. Thus many modern Iranians are descendants of the Medes. However, they are generally assumed to be the forefathers of today's
Kurds.
Apart from a few personal names, the language of the Medes is almost entirely unknown, but was undoubtedly quite similar to the
Avestan and
Scythian languages, and modern
Kurmanci or
Kurdish; according to some research Persians and Medians could communicate with each other at that time.
Herodotus, i. 101, lists the names of six Mede tribes:
Thus 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. Herotodus also mentions that "the Medes had exactly the same equipment as the Persians; and indeed the dress common to both is not so much Persian as Median." (7.62) "These Medes were called anciently by all people
Aryans; but when Media, the Colchian, came to them from
Athens, they changed their name. Such is the account which they themselves give." --- the Medes, History of Herodotus (7.7).
Medea is the Colchian-
Thracian witch of
Jason & the
Argonauts, in
Greek myth.
The origin and history of the Medes is quite obscure, as we possess almost no contemporary information, and not a single monument or inscription from Media itself. The story that
Ctesias gave (a list of nine kings, beginning with Arbaces, who is said to have destroyed
Nineveh in
880s BC, preserved in Diod. ii. 32 sqq. and copied by many later authors) has no historical value whatever; though some of his names may be derived from local traditions.
Josephus relates the Medes (OT Heb. Madai) to the biblical character,
Madai, son of
Japheth. "Now as to
Javan and
Madai, the sons of Japhet; from Madai came the Madeans, who are called Medes, by the Greeks"
Antiquities of the Jews, I:6.
Other ancient historians including
Strabo,
Ptolemy,
Herodotus,
Polybius, and
Pliny, mention names such as
Mantiane,
Martiane,
Matiane,
Matiene, to designate the northern part of Media.
We can see how the Iranian element gradually became dominant; princes with Iranian names occasionally occur as rulers of other tribes. But the Gelae, Tapuri,
Cadusii, Amardi, Utii and other tribes in northern Media and on the shores of the Caspian may not have been Iranian stock. Polybius (V. 44, 9), Strabo (xi. 507, 508, 514), and Pliny (vi. 46), considered the
Anariaci to be among these tribes; but their name, meaning the "not-Arians", is probably a comprehensive designation for a number of smaller indigenous tribes.
The Medes, people of the
Mada, (the Greek form is
Ionic for ), appear in history first in
836 BC. Earliest records show that
Assyrian conqueror
Shalmaneser III received tribute from the "Amadai" in connection with wars against the tribes of the
Zagros. His successors undertook many expeditions against the Medes (
Madai).
At this early stage, the Medes were usually mentioned together with another steppe tribe, the
Scythians, who seem to have been the dominant group. They were divided into many districts and towns, under petty local chieftains; from the names in the
Assyrian inscriptions, it appears they had already adopted the
religion of
Zoroaster.
An Assyrian military report from
800 BC lists 28 names of Mede chiefs, but only one of these is positively identified as Iranian. A second report from c. 700 BC lists 26 names; of these, 5 seem to be Iranian, the others are not.
Sargon in
715 BC and
713 BC subjected them up to "the far mountain Bikni," i.e. the
Elbruz (
Damavand) and the borders of the desert. If the account of Herodotus may be trusted, the Medes' dynasty derived its origin from
Deioces (
Daiukku), a Mede chieftain in the
Zagros, who was, along with his kinsmen, transported by Sargon to Hamath (Haniah) in
Syria in
715 BC. This Daiukku seems to have originally been a governor of
Mannae subject to Sargon, prior to his exile.
In spite of repeated rebellions by the early chieftains against the Assyrian yoke, the Medes paid tribute to Assyria under Sargon's successors,
Sennacherib,
Esarhaddon and
Ashurbanipal, whenever these kings marched in with their fierce armies. Assyrian forts located in Median territory (Zagros Mtns) at the time of Esarhaddon's campaign (ca. 676) included Bit-Parnakki, Bit-kari and Harhar (Kar-Sharrukin).
In the second half of the
7th century BC, the Medes gained their independence and were united by a dynasty. The kings who established the Mede Empire are generally recognized to be
Phraortes and his son
Cyaxares. They were probably chieftains of a nomadic Mede tribe in the desert and on the south shore of the
Caspian, the
Manda, mentioned by Sargon, and they likely founded the capital at
Ecbatana. The later Babylonian king
Nabonidus also designated the Medes and their kings always as
Manda.
According to Herodotus, the conquests of Cyaxares the Mede were preceded by a Scythian invasion and domination lasting twenty-eight years (under Madius the Scythian, 653-625 BC). The Mede 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 Mede rulers, who had attempted rebellions against the Assyrians in the time of Esarhaddon and Assur-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
Armenia and
Asia Minor; and
Jeremiah and
Zephaniah in the Old Testament agree with Herodotus that a massive invasion of
Syria and
Philistia by northern barbarians took place in
626 BC. The state of Mannae was finally conquered and assimilated by the Medes in the year 616 BC.
In 612 BC, Cyaxares conquered
Urartu, and with the help of
Nabopolassar the Chaldean, succeeded in destroying the Assyrian capital,
Nineveh; and by 606 BC, the remaining vestiges of Assyrian control. From then on, the Mede king ruled over much of Iran, Assyria and northern Mesopotamia, Armenia and
Cappadocia. His power was very dangerous to his neighbors, and the exiled
Jews expected the destruction of
Babylonia by the Medes (Isaiah 13, 14m 21; Jerem. 1, 51.).
When Cyaxares attacked
Lydia, the kings of
Cilicia and
Babylon intervened and negotiated a peace in
585 BC, whereby the
Halys was established as the Medes' frontier with Lydia.
Nebuchadrezzar of Babylon married a daughter of Cyaxares, and an equilibrium of the great powers was maintained until the rise of the Persians under
Cyrus.
About the internal organization of the Mede Empire, we know that the Greeks adopted many ceremonial elements of the Persian court, the costume of the king, etc., through Media.
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. Thus were the Medes 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. 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 in the Behistun inscr.). Another rebellion, in 409 BC, against
Darius II (Xenophon, Hellen. ~. 2, 19) was of short duration. But the non-Aryan 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' organization the eleventh satrapy (Herodotus iii. 92), 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 (Herod. iii. 94; cf. v. 49, 52, VII. 72).
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".
Alexander the Great occupied the satrapy of Media in the summer of
330 BC. In 328 he appointed as
satrap a former general of Darius called
Atropates (Atrupat), whose daughter was married to
Perdiccas in 324, 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. The kings had a strong and warlike army, especially
cavalry (Polyb. v. 55; Strabo xi. 253). Nevertheless, King
Artabazanes was forced by
Antiochus the Great in
220 BC to conclude a disadvantageous treaty (Polyb. v. 55), and in later times, the rulers became dependent in turn upon the
Parthians, upon
Tigranes of Armenia, and in the time of
Pompey who defeated their king Darius (Appian, Mithr. 108), upon
Antonius (who invaded Atropatene) and upon
Augustus of Rome. In the time of
Strabo (AD
17), the dynasty still existed; later, the country seems to have become a Parthian province.
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. But the opinion of modern authors that it had been a special refuge of Zoroastrianism, is partly based on a folk etymology of the name (explained as "country of fire-worship"), partly on Zoroastrian traditions, including traditions regarding the birthplace of Zoroaster, and partly because of the natural phenomenon of flames escaping from rock fissures, occurring throughout the former territory of Atropatene. There can be no doubt that the kings adhered to the Persian religion; though it may not have been deeply rooted among their subjects, especially among the non-Aryan tribes.
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 (x. 27). Only Ecbatana retained its old character. But
Rhagae became the Greek town
Europus; and with it
Strabo (xi. 524) names
Laodicea,
Apamea Heraclea or Achais. Most of them were founded by Seleucus I and his son
Antiochus I.
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 (Justin xli. 6).
From this time Media remained subject to the
Arsacids or Parthians, who changed the name of Rhagae, or Europus, into
Arsacia (Strabo xi. 524), and divided the country into five small provinces (Isidorus Charac.). From the Parthians, it passed in
226 to the
Sassanids, together with Atropatene.
By this time the older tribes of Aryan Iran had lost their distinct character and had been amalgamated into one people, the Iranians. The revival of Zoroastrianism, enforced everywhere by the Sassanids, completed this development. It was then that Atropatene became a principal seat of fire-worship, with many fire-altars. Arsacia (Rhagae) now became the most sacred city of the empire and the seat of the head of the Zoroastrian hierarchy; the Sassanid
Avesta and the tradition of the
Parsees therefore consider Rhagae as the home of the family of the Prophet
Zoroaster.
Strabo, in his "Geography", mentions the affinity of Mede with other
Iranian languages:
"The name of Ariana is further extended to a part of Persia and of Media, as also to the Bactrians and Sogdians on the north; for these speak approximately the same language, with but slight variations." (Geography, 15.8)
Mede words in
Old Persian or Aryan are common, as these two languages were from a common origin. For example,
Herodotus mentions the word
Spaka (
dog), still found in Iranic languages such as
Talyshi. The following Iranian words are similarly thought to be of Mede origin (I.M Diakonoff, Medes)
Farnah: Divine glory; (also appears in
Avestan),
Paridaiza:
Paradise, (as in Pardis پردیس)
Vazraka: Great, (as
modern Persian Bozorg بزرگ),
Vispa: All, (as in Avestan),
Mithra: The
yazata,
Xshayathiya (
King).
*
List of Kings of the Medes*
Full list of Iranian kingdoms*
Iranian Languages (CAIS)*
The Coming of the Iranians & the First Iranian Government, the Median Empire
