Persepolis is the final and most eloquent expression of
the culture of the Ancient Near East. In majesty and splendor it has
hardly ever been challenged. Its size is overwhelming, its meaning profound,
but if we are to appreciate this momentous creation to the full, we must
sympathetically search for the point of view of the building and try
to understand just why such vast treasure and immense effort were lavished
on it.
The western world, ever since Persepolis was discovered, has thought
of it as the capital of Iran, as a group of temples or luxurious palaces
built for the honor and glory of the Achaemenid dynasty. Actually, as
contemporary schalars now agree, it was none of these. The thousands
of documents, namely clay tablets, that have been excavated make no reference
to the political, economic or military administration of the Persian
Empire. It was not a collection of temples, for worship was in the open
ai,r as Herodotus a contemporary witness asserted, and which is confirmed
by the two altars across the way at Nakhsh- e-Rustam. Nor was it a group
of palaces for royal residence.
Persepolis was occupied only on great occasions of national importance.
There are almost no signs of daily wear such as blunted edges of window
frames or doors and hollowed steps. Palaces there were, but for temporary
occupancy only. The real character of Persepolis was as a setting for
an invocation by the whole nation, led by the divinely invested King,
from the sacred spot where the Achaemenids, by the grace of the Great
God Ahura Mazda, overcame all enemies and astablished a world empire
which was planned to bring peace, order and prosperity into a chaotic
world.
Darius declared:"I am one who loves righteousness and hates iniquity....
It is not my will that the strong should oppress the weak.... God's plan
for the earth is not turmoil but peace, prosperity and good goverment." These
humane sentiments found expression in the nobility and sheer beauty of
the buildings: more national gracious than the work of Assyrians or Hitties,
more lucid and humane than that of the Egyptians. The beauty of Persepolis
is not the accidental counterpart of mere size and costly display; it
is the result of beauty being specifically recognized as of sovereign
value.
When Persepolis was built the world was already old. The Pharaohs had
long since passed their zenith. The division of the Jewish nation had
already taken place. The Assyrians had systematically dismembered Israel.
The ferocity of the Assyrian wars with Judah is recorded in the chronicles
of Sennacherib, who assaulted Judah about 700 B.C. The Assyrians were
supplanted by the Babylonians. "Dread and terrible are they," said
Habakkuk, the prophet of the Babylonians. The people of Judah suffered
the same fate as the people of Israel. They were dragged off into exile,
the 59-year Babylonian captivity. As it appears in the narrative of wars,
the people of Judah and Israel seem to have been victims of overwhelming
military forces. But the Jewish prophets proclaimed it otherwise. The
Babylonian exile was thought to be a punishment for their sins. They
awaited, in exile in Babylon, the decision of their Lord, and at last
deliverance came in a remarkable manner. "The Lord stirred up the
spirit of Cyrus, King of Persia, so that he made a proclamation and also
put it in writting:"the Lord God of Heaven.... charged me to build
him a house at Jerusalem. Whoever is among you of all his people, may
the Lord his God be with him."
Cyrus the Great, founder of the Achaemenian Empire, annexed Babylonia
in 538 B.C. The Jews were released from captivity and allowed to return
to Jerusalem to rebuild their Temple.
The first capital of the Achaemenian Empire was set in the spacious meadows
of Pasargadae, 134
km from Shiraz and 77 km from Persepolis. Pasargadae
is the first world artistic manifestation of the first world empire which
extended from the Nile to the Oxus and from the Aegean to the Indus River.
But the rapid expansion of the Achaemenian Empire demanded that another
site be chosen. It is said that Cyrus himself chose the site of Persepolis
at the foot of the Kuh-i-Rahmat, the "Mountain of Mercy", about
70 km from Pasargadae. In 529 B.C. Cyrus the Great died in the plains
to the east of the Caspian Sea. His body was brought back to Pasargadae
and placed in a tomb already prepared. Today his venerated cenotaph is
called in Iran the Tomb of Solomon's Mother.
Rediscovery of Persepolis began towards the end of fifteenth century
and, ever since, the magnificence of its ruins has fired the imagination
of the western world. In the annals of ancient history, however, there
is no mention of this important monument. The absence of any historical
reference to Persepolis becomes an enigma when there are innumerable
references to the earlier capitals of the Achaemenians. The Persian capitals,
in the extent records from Babylonia and Egypt, were refered to as Babylon,
Ecbatana (modern Hamadan), the fortress, and Shushan or Susa, the palace.
Likewise the contem- prary Greeks had no knowledge of Persepolis before
Alexander ravaged it. Another important source of information on the
Imperial Persian residence of Ekbatana and Susa, is the Bible. In the
Bible there is no mention of Persep- olis. And finally there is the Greek
physician Ctessias, who lived in the court of Artaxerxes II for 24 years.
Ctesias, author of a book on Persian history, seems never to have heard
of Persepolis. The usual view that Perse- polis was primarily a group
of impressive palaces built in the capital city of a great empire in
order to express political might and to gratify royal pride is Western
thinking: factual, literal, rationalistic. It fails to comprehend the
constellations of reliance on emotion and symbolism.
Persepolis was, in fact, a sacred national traditional monument to the
achievements and power of the Achaemenid kings, but it also emphasizes
their divine investiture. It was the dynastic shrine but never the political
capital: none of the thousands of documents found there are political
and the location was quite unsuited for governing an empire. The great
kings were in residence only rarely and then only temporary; Susa, Babylon,
and Ekbatana, all more practically located, were seats of government.
Persepolis was, in fact, a sacred national shrine dedicated to a specific
purpose to serve as a potent setting for the spring festival, Now Ruz.
By all the resources of symbolic representation, the Divine power were
implored to grant fertility and abundance. Persepolis itself exhibits
magnitude, power and wealth, with a commanding force sufficient to evoke
those powers.
The Terrace
is about 1475 feet long by 985 feet wide and about 25
to 60 feet high.
The platform was surrounded by a fortified wall, and at the north-western
corner of the complex is a monumental stairway of 106 steps, about 23
feet wide, leading to the Gatehouse of Xerxes, a square hall with four
columns, and three doorways, each about 36 feet in height, to the west,
east and south. The south doorway of the Gatehouse opens onto a court
from which one gains access to the Apadana of Darius and Xerxes. The
Apadana is a great square hall about 250
feet long, with 36 colomns.
There are two stairways to the north and east of the Apadana, decorated
with reliefs depicting tribute-bearers.
At the south-east corner of the Apadana is the Tripylon, or Council Hall,
which has an entrance stairway adorned with reliefs. There are three
great decorated doorways and a square hall with four columns. To the
west of the Tripylon is a poorly preserved section known as the "problematic
structure", and further west again is the
Tachara, or palace, of
Darius, which has a hall with decorated doorways, a porico, and a number
of small rooms. South of these three units is the Hadish, or palace,
of Xerxes, similar in plan to the pre- ceding building, with a balcony
overlooking the plain. A stairway leads to the "Haram"--composed
of various apartments of hypostyle construction with deco- rated doorways
and a vestibule-which, together with the rectangular treasury, with various
hypostyle halls,and a basrelief showing the homage paid to Darius, occupies
the entire southern side of the Terrace. The north-east corner of the
terrace is devoted chiefly to the Throne
Hall of Xerxes, or Hall of a
Hundred Columns with its propylaea, court, vestibule, and rich decoration
of which only the bases of the columns remain.
East of the court is a hypostyle hall with portico, and south of the
hall are various rooms, Outside the terrace, to the south, is the unfinished
tomb of Darius III (336-331 B.C.). Very little remains of the city at
the foot of the Royal residence; to the north-west there is a window
with bas-relief and, nearby, column bases, perhaps the remains of a Seleucid
Temple; to the north- east is a decorated portal, and to the south, column
bases, a pool, and the remains of a palace with hall vestibule, and a
trilingual inscription of Xerxes I.
