#Achaemenian
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alaintruong.bsky.social
Achaemenian Gold Plate. Diam 22.2 cm; H. 4.2 cm. Museum catalog number 2578, Reza Abbasi Museum, Tehran.
February 10, 2026 at 6:51 AM
laysfarra.bsky.social
Bruce Lincoln, "Religion, Empire, and Torture" (2007)
This book is concerned with two timely topics: religion and empire. More precisely, it explores the contribution of religious discourse, practice, imagination, and desire to emergent imperial ambitions. In exploring this theme, I hope to get past the familiar debate on whether ideals and beliefs or material interests constitute the real motive force in history. As most serious observers have long since realized, productive discussion begins with the recognition that consciousness and material circumstances are dialectically related and mutually sustaining. The problem to be addressed in any concrete study is not the chicken-egg dilemma—“Which comes first?”— but how a given group reshapes its consciousness (of self, other, morality, and purpose) through select acts of discourse such that its members feel licensed—or, alternatively, inhibited—in pursuing their material advantage in increasingly aggressive ways. Further, how the practices they develop in that pursuit and the success (or failure) they experience reshape their consciousness, discourse, and practice over the empire’s later history. Creating an empire is no easy matter, nor is maintaining one. Whether new or old, any empire involves massive projects of military conquest, political domination, cultural encompassment, and economic extraction that are necessary for its survival. When would-be imperialists come to regard these practices—and the violence that goes with them—as religiously wrong or morally repugnant, the likelihood that they will realize their ambitions is, thereby, greatly diminished. Conversely, when the frontline troops, administrators, strategists, tax collectors, lackeys, toadies, and lords of empire succeed in persuading themselves that their tasks are somehow just, holy, and sacred, the project is, thereby, enormously facilitated. Although these issues have acquired new urgency and cachet since the cold war gave way to America’s War on Terror, attempts to engage them on contemporary terrain encounter real difficulties. To do so successfully, one would have to resolve the following questions: (1) Has the American Republic effectively become an empire, or is it in the course of such a transformation? If so, over what period of time did this happen? Alternatively, what further steps are necessary for the completion of the process? (Here, one obviously needs to provide a clear, cogent model of what constitutes “the imperial”). (2) Has American religion and/or the role it plays in American politics—domestic and international—changed as well? If so, over what period of time, in what ways, and with what consequences? (And, here, a cogent model of what constitutes “the religious” is equally requisite). (3) Are there ways in which the observed changes in the religious have produced or facilitated changes in the political that incline the United States toward empire? Have changes in the political produced similar changes in the religious? And how do these interact with other factors (e.g., the economic, the technological, and the demographic)? These questions have been much discussed, occasioning sharp disputes among academics, journalists, activists, officeholders, and ordinary citizens. In all these circles, passions run high, perspectives differ markedly, and debate serves largely to reinforce well-entrenched opinions. None of this is surprising, for the stakes are enormous, and there is no agreement on basic terms, or on what data might have relevance, let alone on the proper means for their interpretation. In the face of such difficulties, an obvious gambit is to engage the problem obliquely by considering examples sufficiently removed from our own as to afford some critical distance. To this end, the religious politics and political religions of the British, Roman, Ottoman, Chinese, and Japanese … comprehensive bibliography of the Achaemenian Empire compiled by Ursula Weber and Josef Wiesehöfer in 1996, only 33 are devoted to the religion of the dynasty and 28 to its religious policies. Nor has the situation changed much since that bibliography was completed. Since the Achaemenian royal inscriptions were first deciphered in the middle of the nineteenth century, virtually all who have studied their religious content have felt obliged to concentrate their attention on the vexed question of whether the Persian kings and their people were Zoroastrians or not. That the debate should have continued so long is understandable, the evidence being maddeningly ambiguous, but the energy that this issue has consumed is quite disproportionate to its importance. For our purposes, it is relatively inconsequential whether we regard the imperial religion as Zoroastrian in a strict and narrow sense (i.e., consciously adhering to religious reforms effected by Zarathustra) or more broadly as Mazdaean (i.e., marked by worship of “the Wise Lord,” Ahura Mazda¯, who is understood as a pan-Iranian, and not a strictly Zoroastrian, deity). Far more important than the question of labels and classification is identifying the core principles of the Achaemenians’ cosmology, ethics, and soteriology—their sense of space, time, history, and purpose—and understanding how this interacted with their will to empire. Fortunately, there are a few works that suggest ways in which such an inquiry might be pursued. The first of these is Clarisse Herrenschmidt’s “Désignation de l’empire et concepts politiques de Darius Ier d’après ses inscriptions en Vieux Perse” (1977), which showed the overwhelming importance a myth of creation had in Achaemenian discourse. Thus, of the twenty-nine longer royal inscriptions (i.e., those having three or more paragraphs), eighteen (62 percent) open with this myth, thereby investing all that follows with a cosmogonic consciousness: a concern for how the Creator conceived… Religion, Empire, and Torture The Case of Achaemenian Persia, with a Postscript on Abu Ghraib Bruce Lincoln
February 4, 2026 at 8:59 PM
marigoldlux.bsky.social
#MetropolitanMuseumofArt Golden #Lion Roundel w/ Intertwined Tails

Shop eBay.com/usr/nycforever7
etsy.com/shop/nycsevens

#Money Clip #Achaemenian #Persian Empire #Iran 
5th-4th century B.C.
January 13, 2026 at 4:04 AM
kalidestroyer.bsky.social
Okay, you sent me down an Achaemenian rabbit hole, and I thank you for that. 😂
August 15, 2025 at 7:08 PM
han-okon.bsky.social
Gandj Nameh, Xerxes' Inscription for #EpigraphyTuesday. Found near the waterfall of Gandj Nameh, with praise to #Ahuramazda. Wrote in Persian, Elamite, and Babylonian, ca. 470. BCE. Alongside a Darius I inscription.
📷Marco Prins/ Livius.org
#AncientBlueSky #ClassicsBlueSky #archaeology #Persia
Translation inscription: A great god is Ahuramazda, who is the greatest god, who created this earth, who created yonder heaven, who created men, who created happiness for man, who made Xerxes king. One king for many, one lord for all. I am Xerxes, the great king, king of kings, king of countries containing all kinds of men, king in this great earth far and wide, son of king Darius, an Achaemenian. Text inscription: baga \ vazraka \ Auramazdâ \ hya \ mathišta \ bagânâm \ hya \ imâm \ bumim \ ad â \ hya \ avam \ asmânam \ adâ \ hya \ martiyam \ ad â \ hya \ šiyâtim \ adâ \ martiyahyâ \ hya \ Xša yâršâm \ xšâyathiyam \ akunauš \ aivam \ parun âm \ xšâyathiyam \ aivam \ parunâm \ framâtâram \ adam \ Xšayâršâ \ xšâ yathiya \ vazraka \ xšâyathi ya \ xšâyathiyânâm \ xš âyathiya \ dahyunâm \ par uzanânâm \ xšâyathiya \ ahiyâyâ \ bumiyâ \ va zrakâyâ \ duraiy \ apiy \ Dârayavahauš \ xšâyathiya hyâ \ puça \ Haxâmanišiya A scan/drawing of the Persian inscription.
July 29, 2025 at 8:27 PM
khalili.foundation
Discover the 4th-century BC Aramaic documents that shed light on the Achaemenian administration in Bactria and Sogdiana. Aramaic Documents from Ancient Bactria is a beautifully illustrated 294-page hardback with translations and expert insights.

Learn more: https://tinyurl.com/3zk26phy
July 24, 2025 at 9:36 AM
diaspora2022.bsky.social
Achaemenian, should you prefer.
July 23, 2025 at 7:56 PM
lbrzn.bsky.social
The great King, King of kings; King of countries containing all kinds of men, King in this great earth, far and wide, son of Hystaspes, an Achaemenian!”
June 25, 2025 at 2:35 AM
thomasig.bsky.social
“Save what was once known as the Iranian Empire”

Err, Parthian or Achaemenian?
michaelcaley.bsky.social Michael Caley @michaelcaley.bsky.social · Jun 13
earnestly has he lost his mind

this is, all morality aside, an absolutely insane statement
June 13, 2025 at 10:40 AM
dansedelectre.bsky.social
In what some are calling an avant garde casting decision, the role of The Childlike Empress will not be reprised by Tami Stronach but instead be played by newcomer, the 1967 paper "Urartian and Achaemenian Tower Temples," by her father, late Berkeley archaeologist David Stronach
March 18, 2025 at 5:44 AM
kathke.com
Dying to find out what empire. My money is on the Achaemenian one.
November 10, 2024 at 8:36 AM
wikiuntamed.bsky.social
Step 1️⃣ 👣: Achaemenid Empire
"The Achaemenid Empire or Achaemenian Empire also known as the Persian Empire or First Persian Empire (; Old Persian: 𐎧𐏁𐏂, Xšāça, lit. 'The..."
#FiveStepsOfWikipedia #WhereNext
🧵 3/7
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Achaemenid_Empire
Achaemenid Empire - Wikipedia
The Achaemenid Empire or Achaemenian Empire also known as the Persian Empire or First Persian Empire
en.wikipedia.org
August 22, 2024 at 3:25 PM
fuck.ispost.ing
fuck Achaemenian
August 14, 2024 at 8:00 PM
rmoonhill.bsky.social
Pretty Achaemenian behavior, if you ask me...
August 1, 2024 at 11:46 PM
bbmilne.bsky.social
He is favoured by misery
a bruised moon w/
gibbous eyes
& I’m rarely cast in rainbows
but his ennui play’s as long as his sneering fingers

He shapes them like an Achaemenian bull-
righteous & two faced-
clumsy puppets of
once-great empires
he could never name

#whistpr #vss365 #poetry
May 10, 2024 at 3:56 PM
arthistoryanimalia.bsky.social
#MetalMonday:
Silver Ram’s Head Rhyton, c. 700-600 BCE, from Ziwiye (Iran)
On display at Penn Museum
Read more about this piece here: www.penn.museum/sites/expedi...
“This silver rhyton, or drinking vessel, comes from this western mountain area of Iran and illustrates many of the features characteristic of the style in-vogue there during the eighth and seventh centuries B.C. Looking at the vessel, one sees the head of a ram with tightly curled horns and a neck that flares out to an open end. The neck is executed in the form of a purely decorative series of horizontal flutings of the type common to the Achaemenian art of the following centuries. The drinking edge is finished off with a simple fold of the metal. The lower end of the neck joins the head with an abrupt transition to conventionalized fleece, indicated by simple circles impressed with an annular drill. The effect is that of two separate pieces joined, but in fact only a single piece of silver was used.” “The termination of the fleece in a straight line between the eyes draws attention to the great width separating the base of the horns, themselves emphasized by a rather triangular treatment. In spacing and styling, the horns depart from their natural condition where they are usually close together with flattened bases. The use of three complete turns, the tightness of the coil, and the protrusion from the head are also liberties taken by the artist, producing a geometric effect in what pretends to be a natural representation. The excessive protrusion of the horns allows them to serve as handles when holding the rhyton. The smooth face and bold eyes form a neat contrast to the elaboration of fleece and horns. The deep eyes, probably originally inlaid, are reinforced by the large, conventionalized eyebrows and exaggerated tearducts. The two appendages below the horns appear to be drooping ears made visible by the artificially tight curl of the horns.”
April 16, 2024 at 3:56 AM
wildgorillaman.bsky.social
Firstable this discourse is Achaemenian erasure.

Secondable I only think about it in the context of telling Rome fanboys that Romans were a) not white and b) not straight.

How often do I do this? Every chance I get.
September 22, 2023 at 8:18 PM
historyofpersia.bsky.social
In general, academic grudges and feuds over jargon and nomenclature are very stupid. That said, I will always glare a little bit at the word "Sasanian." Sure we used to say "Achaemenian" too but it's ~dead. Now you've got Achaemenid, Seleukid, Arsakid, Sasanian as the standards.
November 19, 2024 at 3:41 AM
biblioiranica.info
Achaemenian Palaces and the Zoroastrian Ritual Surfaces https://t.co/vV8665VE8F https://t.co/V9M3mdAOUx
January 8, 2017 at 4:22 PM