Darius the Great: The Great King of Persia

just boy get started with the video today to want to mention another channel I host called mega-projects there's a channel all about mankind's greatest achievements where I take a deep look at incredible buildings project structures and more whether it's the world's most impressive skyscrapers the International Space Station or Chernobyl's new sarcophagus I cover it all new videos come out a couple of times a week on mega projects so if you think it could be for you please do head on over and subscribe there is a link below and let's get into it I am Darius the Great King of Kings king of countries containing all kinds of men King in this great earth far and wide by the favour of her aura Mazda these are the countries which I seized outside of Persia I ruled over them they bought tribute to me they did what was said to them by me they held my law firm Lee Media alarm Parthia area Bactria sogdia taurus mir draggy anna eric Hosea certain idea Gandhara India the Hamad ring King Syrians the Scythians with pointed caps Babylonia Assyria Arabia Egypt Armenia Cappadocia Lydia the Greeks the Scythians across the sea Thrace the Sun Hat wearing Greeks the Libyans the Nubians the men of Makkah and the carians those are the words of Darius the great that are inscribed on his tomb he might have been a true Achaemenid who saved Persia from an impostor or he might have been a usurper who carefully constructed a narrative to portray himself as the rightful ruler either way he became the most powerful King in the history of Persia the many lands under his domain not only represented the Achaemenid Empire at its largest extent but up until that point the largest empire the world had ever seen [Music] while information regarding Darius's early life is spotty at best we know that he was born circa 550 BC the oldest son of his TAS best and Roda goon his father was powerful man serving as a satrap of Bactria satrapies were semi-autonomous regions that king cyrus the great employed in order to maintain control over his vast arc eminent empire therefore the duties and powers of a satrap were similar to those of a governor one of the main sources for the lineage of darius is the b histone inscription a large rock relief carved straight into the mountains during his reign in it the persian emperor traces his roots all the way back to our hema knees the legendary ancestor of all the our eminent kings Darius was the son of a stabbed sir son of our sames son of RA omnis son of tastes best suit supposedly was the son of our chemin EES taste this was also the father of Cyrus the first from whom the main lineage of Persian kings was established that was the point where the family tree splintered into two branches and it wasn't until Darius became King and married into the family of Cyrus the Great that the two separate lines were reunited once again or as the inscription says eight of my dynasty were kings before me I am the ninth nine in succession in two lines we have been Kings at least that is what Darius wanted everyone to believe there are still lingering doubt surrounding the veracity of his lineage some scholars think that all of this was simply propaganda on behalf of Darius to establish himself as a blood relative of the previous kings and therefore the rightful ruler of Persia he took the throne by force so it wouldn't have been surprising for someone else to come forward and challenge his claim there are a few inconsistencies such as there being almost no mention of our chemin ease before Darius's reign propaganda or truth Darius's strategy paid off besides commissioning Z the histone inscription he also married not one not two but three of Cyrus's female family members two daughters named a toaster an artist owned and a granddaughter and named Pommies Darius's rise to the throne of Persia is presented to us in detail by good old Herodotus so expect a fair that of myth and hearsay here after the death of Cyrus the greatest son can be seized ii became the new king in 530 BC he reigns for eight years time during which he had several conquests in Africa and helped expand his father's Empire he died from a battle wound and 522 BC and since yet no sons his heir was his younger brother Bardia also called murders by the greeks according to the behistun inscription again the man who took the throne was not bhadiya at all but rather a man named gal marta who was a Mayon a priest of Zoroastrianism this claim was also supported by Herodotus who said that can be seized had his real brother killed in secret only a few people knew of this treachery among these being one of Cambay sees as stewards named patters Isis who had a brother named GAO mater who looked a lot like Bardia when the king left to fight in syria the two million siblings orchestrated the plot to take the throne with GAO mater posing as Bardia by the time word of the conspiracy reached Campisi's he was already far away on a military campaign he began making his return back to Persia but he perished on the way and thus Bardia or Hamato whoever he was became the new king he was a popular King - although he only reigns for a few months he won over the people in his empire by decreeing that all nations under his Dominion would be exempted from tribute and military service for three years the first to suspect that the man sitting on the throne was an impostor was a nobleman named attains he had his suspicions confirmed by his daughter who was one of the Kings wives attains had her check to see if her husband had is because the Megane known as Gautama had previously had his ears cut off as punishment she wrote to him that the king did not in fact have ears thus confirming to obtains that this new ruler was an impersonator he shared his findings with a few other nobles who also had their own suspicions they brought other trustworthy men into their confidence among them dari they were seven men in total and they pledged to overthrow the Asura the plan was rather simple gain entry to the Kings private chambers and slay him they knew that the palace guards were unlikely to stop them from gaining access due to their high standing and they were right they managed to enter the royal court without much effort before being approached by the eunuchs who carried messages to the king at that point that seven Nobles pulled out daggers and started stabbing them afterwards making their way into the King's chambers they were fortunate both maeín brothers were inside however they had heard the screams of the eunuchs and had time to arm themselves two of the noblemen were injured during the fight but they still managed to kill and decapitate the service afterwards they took to the streets shouting about what they did showing off the heads and rallying other Persians to their cause indeed many others took up arms and began killing all the Meggy and priests that they encountered Herodotus notes that this day later became an important festival for the Persians known as the massacre of the megan's now that the usurpers have been dealt with there was a new question that needed to be answered who would rule Persia obviously one of the seven would gain kingship but which one attains ruled himself out as he had no desire to lead the rest abated and they decided on what they believed to be a fair method of selecting the new monarch they would all travel outside the city and mount their horses the winner would be the one whose horse first made at sunrise whether or not this was a just method proved to be irrelevant because Darius decided to cheat he walked up to his horse groom named a Bars and told him to come up with a trick so that his horse would neigh on commands a Beres did as instructed and devised one of two schemes depending on the source both involving a mare that caught the eye of Darius as horse in one version the groom simply brought the two horses together at a meeting place the night before he allowed them to mate and the next day when the horse went back there he became reminded of the good times and made the other version of the story is a bit more disgusting but probably also more reliable according to ABARES he rubs the mez genitals with his bare hands then when he wanted to make the male horse neigh he simply brought his hand up to the animals nose and let him sniff it whatever method was employed it worked and Darius as horse was the first at sunrise the other nobleman did not catch on and pledged their allegiance to Darius the new King of Kings ruler of the our cabinet Empire [Music] Darrius may have haves the support of the other major nobles of persia but that did not mean that the general population was as willing to embrace him remember the king who came before him just promised them all three years without tribute not only to darius rescind their promise but he made the tributes Harsha Herodotus mentions that the two previous our cabinet Kings Cyrus and kam by seized both took their tributes in the form of gifts each satrapy giving how much they thought appropriate darius established a fixed annual tribute for each of his twenty satrapies in his empire to be paid in either gold or silver that's why they called Cyrus the father because he was merciful and cared for their well-being cam by seize the master because he was harsh and arrogance and Darius the huckster because he always sought to make a profit out of everything unsurprisingly many of the people of the arc eminent empire rebelled against Darius fortunately for him though he did have the Persian army behind him and he was able to deal with these results in the first couple of years of his rule again it's the the Heston inscription that provides us with detail as Darius also used it to brag about all the accomplishments that he had during his reign he mentions nine lion Kings from different parts of the Empire who all rose against him and were defeated of all the rebellions the one in Babylon proved to be the most troublesome a man identified in the Piston relief as Nidan Dubiel gains the kingship of the satrapy and proclaimed himself to be nebuchadnezzar the third son of nabo notice the last king of the neo-babylonian empire darius took the persian army and marched on babylon that found a city with a strong army and tough defenses that would not yield so easily seemingly the argumented emperor risked losing the war were it not for an extreme plan devised by a general named zhu Pyrus supply refers the son of megabases one of the seven noblemen one day he walked into Darius's camp with his nose and ears cut off when the king asked him who had done such a thing sipar is replied that he did it to himself his plan was to pretend to be a deserter in exile and infiltrate the Babylonians it worked Pyrus was after all a high-ranking officer so his knowledge would have been valuable to the Babylonians who had no that his mutilations would player signs that he had fallen out of favor words arias they accepted him and gave him an army and supply hrus even gained a few victories against the Persian forces to help convince them that he was on their side once he completely fooled the Babylonians he opens the gates to the city and the Persian army rushed in and crushed the rebels for his sacrifice Darius made soup iris satrap of Babylon and gave him one of his sister's marriage and other notable events from that time was the death of inter Franny's one of the seven nobles by the order of Darius himself before they all pledged their loyalty to one of their own they made a pact specifying that the other six would be able to visit the royal court whenever they pleased unannounced except for when the king was in his bedroom with one of his wives one afternoon in chief Enys did just that but was sent away by two officers because the King was indisposed angered by this refusal enter Franny's pulled out his scimitar and punished the two men by cutting off their ears and noses when Darius heard of this he began fearing that interfer knees might be plotting against him he had into Franny's and all the men of his household imprisoned with the intention of executing them the no woman's wife came to the court and wept and lamented and pleaded with Darius who eventually allowed her to select one family member whose life he would spare surprisingly she did not choose into Franny's or any of her children but rather her brother reasoning that she could get another husband she could have more children but she could not have another sibling because her parents were dead Darius agreed with our reasoning so the brother was saved while intra Franny's and his boys were put to death [Music] the military victories were what brought darius renown but he also applied new policies to improve the internal structure of his empire we already mentioned that he established new satrapies and instituted a more well-defined taxing system but he also introduced coins which became the monetary standard in Persia they were called Derek and sig loss the former being golden that Blatter silver up into the last points the Empire still used the coins they had adopted from the Lydians under King Croesus Darius also developed a network of roads called the Royal Road to facilitate faster travel and communication throughout the arc eminent empire in addition to the roadways this ancient highway also had numerous caravansaries which were outposts on the side of the road where travelers could eat sleep and change horses in the case of couriers they could also pass on their cargo to someone else who would finish their journey while they rested and waited for another courier to come along with a new package moreover those who were travelling on behalf of the Persian governments like couriers and inspectors were granted a form of passport which entitled them to food rations Herodotus also had high praise for this innovation saying that there is nothing in the world which travels faster than the Persian couriers he also said that they are stopped neither by snow nor rain nor heat nor darkness from accomplishing their appointed course with all speed and a few thousand years later this became the unofficial motto of the United States Postal Service to improve stability in his empire Darius borrowed a page out of the book of Cyrus and allowed religious freedom to the conquered kingdoms and the tribes under its domain even though Zoroastrianism was the state religion and in multiple inscriptions Darius praised Ahura Mazda the supreme deity of this religion he did not persecute those who held different religious beliefs and occasionally even took part in some of their rites Darius was also a prolific builder his crowning achievement was the city which he founded which she then turned into the new capital of his empire Persepolis inside the city there was the palace complex which included a grand construction known as the app Adana it was an audience hall where Darius received his most esteemed guests who came to bring tribute to him the city of Susa though it had been settled thousands of years prior also became one of the shining beacons of the pole under Darius who built another Palace complex there and used it as the second residence dealing with rebellions was a necessary step when taking the throne by force and ruling a large territory but what made Darius go down in history where the conquests he made in order to add to the ark emanate Empire his first acquisition of note was the Indus Valley region in the Indian subcontinent sometime around 518 BC this was a military campaign initially started by Cyrus who made some minor successful incursions in the area and conquered several tribes west of the Indus River which he organized as the province of Gandhara its exact status at that time is relatively uncertain because Darius took the credit for officially establishing it as a Santa pea of the empire in 518 he also continued further into the region and conquered an additional province identified as hadoo SH its exact location is unknown but it likely correspondent to parts of modern-day Punjab and the central Indus basin Darius's next major conflict involved one of Cyrus's enemies the Citians the original war went decidedly against the Persians it was after all Queens myris leader of a sine lien nation called the massive gate I who defeated and killed Cyrus in battle in 513 BC Darius took his army and marched from Sousa first targeting Scythian regions located in modern-day Eastern Europe along the coast of the Black Sea a particular mention here was manned Rock Lee's of Samos the chief builder whom Darius commissioned to construct him a bridge of boats so that his army may cross the bosphorous and Dardanelles straits and reach Europe Darius was ready for battle however the Syrians were not very interested in giving him one they were nomads and most of the lands they held consisted of the barren Eurasian steppe so they saw little sense in fighting and dying to protect it instead the Syrian King eyed and thyrsus enacted a scorched earth policy he got his best riders to engage and then run away from the Persian army thus leading them on a chase while the rest of his forces made sure that the enemy found no food or water on their course the Citians also asked their allies for help but most of them refused so in return Ian's army began travelling without permission through their lands towing the Persians after them the goal here was to force their now former allies to either flee or fight this strategy proved incredibly frustrating to Darius at one point he sent a message to the Scythian King demanding that he either stand and fight or surrender and paid tribute I'd and thyrsus refused giving the reason we mentioned before they had no towns or planted lands and therefore had no fears that one would be taken or the other wasted he did mention that there was one thing the Syrians would fight to protect the graves of their ancestors if Darius desired battle he should find them and try to destroy them and then the Citians would attack that being said the Citians did become more aggressive and started launching - skirmishes on the unsuspecting Persians and preying on small scouting parties Darius Sicilian campaign ended not with a bang but with a whimper eventually the ark eminent Emperor realized that it just wasn't worth it to keep pursuing the Citians forever continuously losing soldiers to sickness starvation and the occasional skirmish he opted to take a small victory in the end he gained some territory worthless or not in the inscription on his tomb did mention multiple Syrian people as among the ones who brought in tribute he also destroyed most of their alliances so the nomadic nation lost some of its power and prestige [Music] for the next decade or so Darius was concerned with internal matters if anything of note did happen we don't know about it because there was a thirteen year period with little to no chronological evidence presumably the EM bar was safe which allowed Darius to focus on construction projects and other activities to develop his empire there were still minor confrontations along side the edges of the Empire to strengthen the borders but these were handled by his generals it wasn't until 499 BC the new crisis arose with the Ionian revolt Ionia was a region that corresponds to the western coast of modern-day Anatolia which was then occupied by Greek city-states they'd originally been conquered by Cyrus and now they decided all that had enough in fact the revolt was mainly incited by one man named aristoi chorus he was the tyrants of the Ionian city of Miletus which in decades passed before being conquered was considered perhaps the wealthiest of all Greek cities in 499 BC he tried to capture an island city-state called Naxos he failed completely and then started fearing that he would be removed as leader of millet us therefore Aristagoras felt that the only way to stay in power was to rebel against the persians thursty managed to gain the support of the people of millet us afterwards he was joined by the other Ionian cities after he had banished or killed their tyrants this was starting to look like a half-decent army but to ensure success aristoi chorus still needed allies from among the strongest greek factions when it came to matters of war the first choice was obvious eres de Goris went to sparta to seek an alliance but he was turned down by King Cleomenes the first he felt that he couldn't spare his army at the time afterwards aris decorous went to Athens who did agree to fight alongside the Ionian cities as did the city of Eritrea in 498 BC a large force of Greek soldiers mainly Athenians marched on Sardis the former capital of the kingdom of Lydia and one of the most important cities of the arc aminal Empire they burns the city and when word of this reached Darius he swore vengeance on them and instructed a servant to tell him three times each night at dinner remember the Athenians after sardis the Greeks went to a thesis but by then the Persian army had had time to catch up to them the two sides met in battle and the Persians won the Athenians seeing that the Persians were perhaps not the easy pushovers that Aristagoras promised they went back home leaving the revolting Greeks to fend for themselves as far as eros decorous was concerned he didn't even fight at Sardis choosing instead to remain in militants Herodotus who described him as a man of new high courage said that when the tide started turning eros decorous took his army and fled to Thrace but was killed by the Thracians in combat even without athenian support the Ionian cities performed better than expected it took six years for Darius to get all the region's back under his control afterwards it was time to remember the athenians up until bad points the Persians left the mainland Greek cities alone but now Darius had a promise to keep in 492 BC he launched the first Persian invasion of Greece however he did not lead the troops leaving that task to his son-in-law Mardonius he had some victories against Macedonia and Eritrea but was ultimately defeated in 490 BC at the Battle of Marathon this is the battle that spawns the famous legend of Phi deputies the soldier who ran all the way from Marathon to Athens to inform them of their victory and then promptly died of exhaustion thus inspiring the modern marathon race Darius was not prepared to accept defeat instead he began raising another army but was delayed by a revolt in Egypt he fell ill and died in late 486 BC approximately 64 years old his ambition of punishing the Greeks was taken up by his son and successor Xerxes who would go on to launch a new invasion and fight the Greeks including 300 very determined Spartans but well that's a story for another day and I really do hope you enjoyed this video please do hit that like button if you did also please do check out that channel I mentioned at the beginning mega projects which I'm going to link to below and thank you for watching [Music] [Music]

Channel: Biographics

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Keywords: biographics, biography, biographies, people, famous people, simon whistler, The Great King of Persia, Darius the Great, Darius the Great life story, Darius the Great biography, Darius the Great bio, Darius the Great story, Darius the Great facts, King Darius the Great

Id: 10e5PghEh7o

Length: 22min 50sec (1370 seconds)

Published: Sat May 30 2020