When Darius had killed the usurper Smerdis and gained the crown, a new usurper, Vahyazdata, who likewise pretended to be Smerdis, the son of Cyrus, rose in Yautiya, but was defeated in two battles by Darius's generals and put to death (Behistun inscription). Cyrus had built his capital with his palace and tomb, in Pasargadae (q.v.). Darius founded a new city about 3om. farther south on the left bank of the Pulwar, near its confluence with the Kur, with a large terrace, on which his magnificent palace and that of his son Xerxes were built. As Pasargadae was named of ter the tribe in whose district it lay, so the new capital is by the Persians and Greeks simply called "the Persians"; later authors call it Persepolis (q.v.), "the Persian city." Both in Persepolis and Pasargadae large masses of gold and silver from the tribute of the subject nations were treasured, as in Susa and Ecbatana. But Persis lies too far off from the centre of the Asiatic world to be the seat of government. Like Arabia and similar countries, it could exercise a great momentary influ ence in history and produce a sudden change throughout the world; but afterwards it would sink into local insignificance. So the Persian kings fixed their residence at Susa, which is always considered as the capital of the empire' (therefore Aeschylus wrongly considers it as a Persian town and places the tomb of Darius here). After the reign of Xerxes, Persis and Persepolis became utterly neglected in spite of occasional visits, and even the palaces of Persepolis remained in part unfinished. But the national feeling of the Persians remained strong. When Alexander had won the victory of Arbela, and occupied Babylon and Susa, he met (in the spring of 33o) with strong resistance in Persia, where the satrap Ariobarzanes tried to stop his progress at the "Persian gates," the pass leading up to Persepolis. Here Alex ander set fire to the cedar roof of the palace of Xerxes as a sym bol that the Greek war of revenge against the Persians had come to an end. Our best information tells us that he soon had the fire extinguished (Plut. Alex. 38) ; the story of Thais is a pure fiction, and we may well believe that he repented the damage he had done (Arrian. vi. 3o, I).
Alexander had planned to amalgamate the former rulers of the world with his Macedonians; but his death was followed by a Macedonian reaction. Peucestas, the new satrap of Persis, fol lowed the example of Alexander, and thus gained a strong hold on his subjects (Diod. xix. 48) ; nor did Seleucus, to whom the 'To the Pateiskhoreis belongs the lance-bearer of Darius, "Gobryas (Gaubaruva) the Patishuvari," mentioned in his tomb-inscription; they occur also in an inscription of Esarhaddon as Patushara, east wards of Media, in Choarene at the Caspian gates; the Kyrtii are the Kurds.
dominion of the east ultimately passed (from 311 onwards), dis dain the aid of the Persians ; he is the only one among the Dia dochi who retained his Persian wife, Apame, daughter of Spita menes. Seleucus and his son Antiochus I. Soter tried to introduce Hellenism into Persis. Of Greek towns which they founded here we know Alexandria in Carmania (Plin. vi. 1o7; Ptol. vi. 8, Ammian. Marc. 49), Laodiceia in the east of Persis (Plin. 6, 115), Stasis, "a Persian town on a great rock, which Antiochus, the son of Seleucus, possessed" (Steph. Byz. s.v.), Antiochia in Persis, founded apparently by Seleucus I. and peopled by Anti ochus I. with immigrants called together from all Greece, as we learn from a psephisma passed by "boule and demos" of this town in 206 in honour of Magnesia on the Maeander. But at the same time we find in the centre of Persis in the district of Istakhr (the town which succeeded Persepolis) a local dynasty with Persian names (Bagdat, Vahuburz, Astakhshatr, Vatafradat), and the still unexplained title Fratadara. On their coins in Aramaean Pehlevi
which begin about 250 B.C., they have Persian features and wear the headdress of the satraps; on the reverse is the fire-altar with the image of Ahuramazda hovering above it and the standard of the empire. They must have been recognized as vassals by the Seleucids ; but a story preserved by Polyaenus (vii. 30) narrates, how one of them, Oborzos (Vahuburz), allured 3,00o settlers (evidently Greek settlers) into a fertile plain and annihilated them at night. Another story (Polyaenus vii. 39) relates, how in the same way a general of Seleucus (evidently Seleucus II. 225), destroyed 3,00o Persian rebels with his Macedonian and Thracian troops. Thus the Seleucid supremacy was restored, but the dynasty of the Fratadaras was suffered to continue. When in 221 Molon, the satrap of Media, rebelled against Antiochus III., his brother Alexander, satrap of Persis, joined him, but they were defeated and killed by the king. Persis remained a part of the Seleucid empire down to Antiochus IV. Epiphanes, who at the end of his reign restored once more the authority of the empire in Babylonia, Susiana and Persis; perhaps a battle, in which the satrap Numenius of Mesene (southern Babylonia) defeated the Persians on the shore of Carmania on sea and land (Plin. vi. 152), belongs to this time. But after the death of Antiochus IV. (164) the Seleucid empire began to dissolve. While the central prov inces, Media and northern Babylonia, were conquered by the Parthians, Mesene, Elymais and Persis made themselves inde pendent.
Persis never became a part of the empire of the Arsacids, although her kings recognized their supremacy when they were strong (Strabo xv. 728, 736). From the periplus of the Erythraean sea 33-37 we learn that their authority extended over the shores of Carmania and the opposite coasts of Arabia. On their coins they now wear Parthian dress and have the title of King (written malkd, pronounced Among their names we find Darayav (Darius), probably the founder of a town, Darabjird, in eastern Persia, his son Artaxerxes (according to a fragment of Isidore of Charax in Lucian, Macrob. 15, murdered by his brother Yosithros at the age of 93 years), Narses, Manocihr and others. From the traditions about Ardashir I. we know that at his time there were different petty kingdoms and usurpers in Persis ; the principal dynasty is by Tabari called Bazrangi. The coins demonstrate that Hellenism had become quite extinct in Persis, while the old historical and mythical traditions and the Zoroastrian religion were supreme. There can be no doubt that at this time the true form of Zoroastrianism and the sacred writings were preserved only in Persis, whereas everywhere else (in Parthia, in the Indo Scythian kingdoms of the east and in the great propagandist movement in Armenia, Syria and Asia Minor, where it developed into Mithraism) it degenerated and was mixed with other cults and ideas. So the revival of Zoroastrianism came from Persis. When Ardashir I. the son of a king of Istakhr began to subdue the other Persian dynasts and in A.D. 224 defeated and slew the Parthian king, Artabanus, his aim was religious as well as politi cal. The new Sassanid empire which he founded enforced the restored religion of Zoroaster (Zarathustra) on the whole of Iran.
The new capital of Persis was Istakhr on the Pulwar, about 9m. above Persepolis, now Hajjiabad, where already the predeces sors of Ardashir I. have resided. It was a great city under the Sassanids, of which some ruins are extant. But it shared the fate of its predecessor ; when the empire was founded the Sassanids could no longer remain in Persis but transferred their head quarters to Ctesiphon. (ED. M.)