Cyrus the Great (reigned 550-530 BC) was the founder of the Persian Empire. His reign witnessed the first serious contacts between Persians and Greeks and the permanent loss of political power by the peoples of the old centers of power in Mesopotamia....

CYRUS II (c. 585–c. 529 BCE), called Cyrus the Great; builder and ruler of the Persian empire from 559 BCE until his death. A king of the Achaemenid dynasty, Cyrus (OPers., Kurush) combined great ambition, shrewd calculation, and military...

c. 600-529 B.C. Persian king and emperor who established the Persian Empire. He succeeded his father as prince of Persis, a part of the Median Empire. He rebelled against and defeated the Medes and went on to conquer other neighboring nations including...

Cyrus the Great (Old Persian: Τ𐎢ν𐎢ρ[1], Kūruš,[2] modern Persian: کوروش بزرگ, Kurosh-e Bozorg) or کوروش کبیر Kurosh-e Kabir (c. 590 BC or 576 — August 530 BC), also known as Cyrus II of Persia and Cyrus the...

Israeli archaeologists charged that digging overseen by Islamic religious leaders at a hotly disputed Jerusalem holy site damaged a wall that might date back to the Bible.Islamic authorities responsible for Haram as-Sharif, known to Jews as Temple Mount, said digging a trench was necessary to...

Sanabargh Zahedi“I will release water into Sivand Dam personally,” announced Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran’s hard-line president, on April 17.  Two days later, on April 19, with his orders the process began.Although it may seem that this is a simple routine to start filling a dam with...

Iranian engineers began filling a new dam Thursday as archaeologists warned that its reservoir will flood newly discovered antiquities and could damage Iran's grandest site, the ancient Persian capital of Persepolis.At the inauguration ceremony, attended by Energy Ministry officials, pipes were opened for water to...

As a young woman in Tehran during the 1970s, Susan Manavi never visited a cemetery, even after her grandparents were laid to rest a couple of years before Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution.Although they were buried in a Jewish cemetery near the city, Manavi's parents adhered...