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The Ancient World Pierre Briant: Histoire de

l'empire perse: de Cyrus à Alexandre. 1248 pp.
Paris: Arthème Fayard, 1996. Fr. 280.

A. D. H. Bivar

Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies / Volume 60 / Issue 02 / June 1997, pp
347 - 349
DOI: 10.1017/S0041977X0003648X, Published online: 05 February 2009

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A. D. H. Bivar (1997). Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, 60, pp
347-349 doi:10.1017/S0041977X0003648X

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 REVIEWS 347
j. DAVID HAWKINS: The hieroglyphic perfectly. (I cite the evidence from these
inscription of the Sacred Pool Bogazkoy seals in advance of their publication
with the kind permission of Suzanne Herbordt.)
Complex at Hattusa (Sudburg). The sequence read by Hawkins as INFRA
(Studien zu den Bogazkoy-Texten, d-ka occurs seven times and obviously is a key
Beiheft 3.) 139 pp. Wiesbaden: to understanding the entire text. Hawkins's
Harrassowitz Verlag, 1995. DM 78. reading implies that the sign INFRA stands
above the other two, with the reading going
from top down and then right-left or left-
Excavations in the' Sudburg' area of Bogazkoy right, as often. However, as his excellent
(ancient Hattusa) during 1988 brought to light drawing shows, in every single instance the a
a new Hieroglyphic Luwian inscription. Further sign is written as a ligature with the INFRA.
investigation showed that the inscription was This can hardly be accidental. Any interpreta-
originally situated on the side-wall of one of tion of this combination must begin from a
two small chambers which led under the corners reading A + INFRA-A:a.
of a man-made dam forming a large shallow
pool—all part of a cult complex. The cultural, Elucidation of this fascinating but puzzling
historical and linguistic importance of the new text will occupy scholars for years to come. We
text can hardly be overestimated, and I am are indebted to Professor Hawkins for furnish-
happy to state unequivocally that this eagerly ing us such an exemplary foundation for this
awaited critical first edition is absolutely first- undertaking.
rate in every respect. H. CRAIG MELCHERT
Following an introduction by Peter Neve
which succinctly provides the archaeological
context, David Hawkins offers a transliteration
and translation of the text, accompanied by a PIERRE BRIANT: Histoire de I'empire
copious philological, geographical, and histor- perse: de Cyrus a Alexandre.
ical commentary. Excellent photographs of the 1248 pp. Paris: Artheme Fayard,
inscription allow readers to confirm for them-
selves the fidelity of Hawkins's characteristically 1996. Fr. 280.
accurate hand copy. In addition to an index
and glossary, we receive the unexpected bonus To write a history of the Achaemenid Persian
of transliterations and translations of the Empire both comprehensive and original is no
Yalburt inscription, the Emirgazi altars (with small task. This was long ago the monumental
new collations!), and the Kizildag-Karadag theme of Herodotus (the ' Father of History'),
group, again with ample commentary. and subsequently an almost obligatory exercise
for ancient historians. Yet the previous
As Hawkins properly emphasizes, the standby—the Assyriologist A. T. Olmstead's
Sudburg text presents great interpretative chal- History of the Persian empire (Chicago, 1948)—
lenges. It shares with other second-millennium is now 48 years old. Archaeological and
hieroglyphic texts the use of unusual logograms epigraphic discoveries in the interim have been
and of logograms without phonetic comple- extensive. Some of the new ground is covered,
ments. In addition, however, it makes almost e.g. by M. A. Dandamaev and A. G. Lukonin,
no use of sentence-initial conjunctions. As a The culture and social institutions of ancient
result, it is often hard to tell where clauses Iran (Cambridge, 1989). Yet while this concen-
begin and end, much less to distinguish subject trates on the new, especially Babylonian mat-
from object. Under these circumstances, initial erial, it is not planned as a comprehensive
interpretations will diverge radically, and it will history, so it is certainly time for a
surely be some time before a consensus emerges. re-examination of the theme.
Here I wish to stress only that Hawkins's The narrative portion of this work runs to
crucial interpretation of the last sentence in the 896 pages, divided into six parts. The first
text, identifying the chamber in which the covers the classic story of the rise of the
inscription is found as a man-made entrance to Achaemenids under Cyrus the Great and
the underworld, is absolutely compelling. I will Darius. The second surveys the central appar-
confine my other remarks to two issues regard- atus of the empire. The third describes the
ing the reading of signs, merely alluding to the statistical and economic evidence at the 'grass
possible interpretative consequences. roots', deriving from Babylonian and Elamite
Any attempt to interpret CRUS-nu-pa in tablets, papyri, and Egyptian inscriptions. The
line 1 as a Luwian verb stem (p. 30) is quite fourth narrates the evolution of the empire
hopeless, on morphological and phonotactic from the death of Darius (486 B.C.) to the
grounds. Hawkins himself (personal commun- demise of Artaxerxes III (338 B.C.), and covers
ication, June 1995) has offered suggestive the interaction of Persia with Greek civilization.
evidence for a phonetic value nax for CRUS 2 The fifth part is a survey of the territory and
(the horizontal leg). Several personal seals from resources of the last Achaemenid ruler,
the 1990-91 Bogazkoy campaigns appear to Darius III. The sixth examines the conflict
contain a personal name CRUS2-nu-wa/i. In between Alexander and Darius III, factors
two instances (Bo 90/725 and 1008) there is at critical in the contest, and the reasons for the
right angles a broken cuneiform text with lines fall of Achaemenid kingdom. For continuity of
beginning lna-\\ and LU[]. It seems reasonable reading, the text is drafted without footnotes,
to infer a name Nanuwa, which is attested in the necessary documentation being provided in
cuneiform in KBo XXIII 32 Ro 5 and 6. In a copious section organized according to subdi-
Sudburg the resulting sequence nax-nu-pa inevit- visions of the text, and entitled ' Notes docu-
ably recalls Cuneiform Luwian nammjm=pa mentaires'—which runs from p. 905 to p. 1077.
'but now', a sense which fits the context This contains some of the most interesting and
348 REVIEWS
critical discussions. Admittedly, cross-reference (Smerdis), son of Cyrus and joint ruler with
between these, the bibliography, the abbrevi- his brother Cambyses, had been secretly killed
ations and the text is sometimes laborious. The at his brother's behest. Cambyses used the
page-headers of the text give the chapter titles, prince's major-domo, a Magian, to conceal the
not their numbers, while those of the notes death by substituting in the palace the Magian's
give the numbers, but not the titles. Yet such brother, who resembled the prince in appear-
is the richness of content that this inconvenience ance. As Cambyses was returning from Egypt,
will be accepted gladly enough. he learned the Magians had finally rebelled
These notes are followed by the massive against him in the name of Smerdis (thus Hdt.),
bibliography of 65 pages, the nearest yet assuming that the king dare not avow the
achieved to a comprehensive repertoire on fratricide. Cambyses however revealed the situ-
Achaemenid history. This documentation is so ation to his chiefs, but accidently sustaining a
vast it can truly be characterized as stupefying; fatal wound, was eliminated from the contest.
an individual might despair of examining it all His kinsman and spear-bearer Darius hastily
at first hand. Even so, one must resist the returned to Iran. Conferring with six compan-
illusion that it is exhaustive. For example, the ions who shared his suspicions, all went directly
discussion of the inscribed chert vessels at to the palace and slew the Magians. The
Persepolis (p. 446) shows no indication the sceptical position, adopted incidentally by
author was acquainted with evidence that these Olmstead, and depending on quite minor
objects came as tribute from Arachosia, as discrepances between the versions, is that the
suggested by J. Naveh and S. Shaked, ' Ritual tale of the two Magi, and of Bardiya's death,
texts or treasury documents', Orientalia, 42/3, was an invention: that Darius himself was the
1973, 445-57, indeed absent from the listing. usurper, and the person slain by the seven
The bibliography does nevertheless include conspirators Bardiya himself.
P. Bernard's 'Les mortiers et pilons de It is true that Herodotus may not rank as
Persepolis', Studia Iranica, 1/2, 1972, simultan- independent (p. 112), depending indirectly on
eously reaching similar, only slightly less the Behistun inscription. Yet the historian was
detailed conclusions. Likewise, the notice of a persistent inquirer, who recited his work at
Metiochus, son of Miltiades (p. 362, read Hdt. Athens among the enemies of Persia. He could
vi, 41) and his Persian marriage makes one be expected to report any current murmur
spare a tear also for Parthenope—the daughter discreditable to Darius. It is moreover cynical
of Polycrates of Samos, with whom the younger to believe Darius's denunciations of ' The Lie'
man's name is eternally linked. She is the were mere propaganda, concealing a usurpation
heroine of the most poignant love-tale of of his own. He had, after all, been one of
Antiquity, remembered throughout medieval Cambyses's (and thus the dynasty's) most
Persian literature as Wamiq u 'Adhra, (cf. Bo trusted officers in Egypt. Moreover, the role of
Utas,' Did 'Adhra remain a virgin?', Orientalia Prexaspes, allegedly the actual killer of Bardiya,
Suecana, 33-35, 1984-86, 429-41; Tomas cannot be ignored. Later, his son Aspathines
Hagg, 'Metiochus at Polycrates' court', became a leading supporter of Darius, and of
Eranos, 83, 1985, 92-102). Yet even should it his successor Xerxes. This certainly carries an
turn out, in his huge documentation, that the implication that Aspathines considered Darius
author occasionally nodded, the Homeric scale had justice on his side.
of the assemblage makes such lapses The fundamental principle in ancient history
understandable. is that we must write it from ancient sources.
It must be said at the outset this treatment If we conclude these sources are spurious, then
is a magisterial achievement, providing the we have no information. We are not entitled to
most comprehensive survey yet of the reject the sources, and re-write from specula-
Achaemenid Empire. The author's approach is tion. The nineteenth century was obsessed with
above all that of a classical specialist, as much conspiracy theories, seeing 'forgeries' every-
at home with minor authors as with Herodotus, where in the ancient record. Expanding evid-
Thucydides, and Arrian. He has thoroughly ence tends rather to confirm the traditional
combed the subsidiary and fragmentary sources, or to show that their mistakes were
sources, collecting many scattered, frequently those of honest error.
unnoticed, matters of Persian interest. At the On Xerxes's notorious 'Daiva Inscription'
same time, more fully than would most (p. 569) the discussion seems vague. The old
Classicists, he has analysed and incorporated proposal of I. Levi (' L'inscription triomphale
newly-discovered evidence for the provinces: de Xerxes', Revue Historique, 185, 1939,
the Babylonia of the tablets, the Egypt of the 105-22), that the inscription relates to Xerxes's
Aramaic parchments and papyri, the monu- capture of Athens, merits more attention than
ments and inscriptions of Lycia and elsewhere it has received. In the Pasargadae excavations,
in Asia Minor, giving a clear view of the a second copy was discovered—built into a
continental expanse of the Persian empire. drain! The first copy, at Persepolis, was turned
Coverage is of course sparser for such outlying face downwards as a seat in the Fortification
regions as Thrace, Afghanistan, and Gandara, area. It is clear the inscription had never been
but the sheer scale of the empire is admirably displayed. This fits well with Athens, where the
shown. city was taken, but ten days later the Persian
The main reservation with regard to this fleet was defeated at Salamis, and Xerxes
presentation concerns its trend to hyper- himself forced to flee. One can envisage, after
scepticism, deriving, ultimately, from a fashion the initial success, that instructions were sent
of the nineteenth-century Germans. The classic to engrave the inscription, but soon afterwards
example is of course the case of Pseudo- countermanded. The stones already inscribed
Smerdis: according both to the Behistun inscrip- were quickly hidden away. That the inscription
tion of Darius, and Herodotus, Bardiya does not specify the enemy defeated is not
 REVIEWS 349
surprising; if it had been inscribed at the time 66), where the Parthian and MP equivalent is
the Persian armies were in Attica, that would framadar, a dignity evidently developing into
have been common knowledge. the vuzurg framadar of the fifth century A.D.,
It is worth noticing too that the inscription and so (with vuzurg>wazTr) to the later 'grand
of the Sasanian Shapur I (A.D. 240-72) at the vizier'. Thus the king's major-domo, rather
Ka'ba-i Zardusht throws useful light on the than the chiliarch (p. 269), could have
Achaemenid record. For the Sasanians, developed into the traditional' Prime Minister'.
Babylonia (not Assyria) was Asuristan, just as The conservatism of Iranian institutions and
Hdt. in, 92 <kno Bx/ivXcovog SE K<XI rrfg Xoint]g nomenclature is remarkable, making Sasanian
A<saopb\g implies that in his day Babylon was evidence pertinent to Achaemenid problems.
regarded as part of Assyria. It seems clear that For the 'palace of Belesys' (too Bi.Xs.aoog
after the rebellion of Babylon under Xerxes, fiaoiXax) in Xenophon's Anabasis, I, 4, 10
despite the author's reservations regarding (p. 646) there must be a connection with the
punishments inflicted (p. 560), the city was Roman toponym Barbalissus, byb'lsy of the
subjected to a damnatio memoriae. Trans- KZ Parthian version. Here the Parthian evid-
Euphratesia ('Eber Nahra) was detached from ently represents Syriac BeO Balis 'The House
Assyria, which was then amalgamated with of Belesys', so precisely the wording of
Babylonia. Thenceforth the province must have Xenophon. Whether the present Qal'at Balis
been known to Iranians as 'Assyria', even on the Euphrates represents the governor's
though the headquarters apparently remained actual residence, or inherited its name from
at the old metropolis, Babylon. nearby, still requires investigation. Again from
Amongst officers of the Achaemenid court, the KZ Greek text (1. 53) we know today that
one who does not here receive quite his due is puxysmiv ' t o magianize' means in the Farasha
the major-domo. Known in Greek as enkponog, inscription, not (p. 733) ' qui devint mage de
in the Armazi bilingual we find the Aramaic Mithra', but transitively ' to sacrifice according
equivalent RB TRBS 'Master of the to the Magian rite'—in contradistinction to
Household'. That the Greek term of vaguer the Greek Bveiv.
meaning (' steward') was the stock translation Over-sceptical, again, seems the aspersion
may have been partly due to the accidental (p. 1014) cast on the apocryphal postscript to
word-play between the terms. Thus Herodotus Xenophon's Anabasis (vn, 8. 25). This, possibly
(m, 63, 2) reports, in the words of a Persian an interpolation (and perversely suppressed by
messenger, that Patizeithes (Gaumata), the some editors), has every appearance of
Magus, held this office (6 de \ioi tiiyog, xov reflecting a reliable source. For the opposite
Kfi6t]g snkponov TCOV OIKICOV xnsds^e, oviog tendency, we may note the copious citations of
) Ctesias, usable no doubt for matters within his
That this official was Hinz's ' Hofmarschal' own experience, but notoriously inventive and
(Altiranische Funde und Forschungen, 64), and fanciful on remoter epochs. Yet one must admit
controller of the OKrjn-couxoi 'staff-bearers', that the author's selection seems generally
who ushered visitors into the royal presence, judicious.
and himself bore the same characteristic staff The comments above relate chiefly to tech-
of office, seems entirely probable. So the nical detail, and to minutiae of method. Above
author's 'II convient done de rester prudent all, this work is a monumental achievement,
sur l'identite du personnage qui salue le roi sur fully justifying the eulogy 'ce livre sans preced-
les reliefs d'audience' may be over-cautious. ent ni equivalent'. It is certainly the definitive
Most probably the major-domo was the con- survey for this century of the Achaemenid
troller of access to the inner reaches of the empire and its related researches—an indispens-
royal court, as was the chiliarch to the outer able standby for teacher, student and amateur
(p. 270). The term inixponog re-appears in the alike.
Greek of the Shapur KZ inscription (11. 62 and A. D. H. BIVAR

THE NEAR AND MIDDLE EAST

URI RUBIN: The eye of the beholder: elements of the portrait found in the hadlth,
the life of Muhammad as viewed by are organized for detailed analysis in the light
of universal principles apparently applicable to
the early Muslims. A textual ana- any prophetic career, under general headings:
lysis. (Studies in Late Antiquity and Attestation; Preparation; Revelation; Perse-
Early Islam, 5.) ix, 219 pp. cution; Salvation.
Princeton, NJ: Darwin Press, 1995. This study abandons all effort to separate
$27.50, £18. the 'historical' from the 'fictional' in early
Islamic texts. Rather, the aim is to discover the
Prophetological theory and literary typology inner dynamics of the hadlth by identifying
may provide a useful framework for study of themes which ' mainstream Islam', as mirrored
the processes by which medieval Islam gradu- in the classical collections, could evidently not
ally constructed in its own image the portrait absorb. Dogmatic principle inhibited inclusion
of its own prophet from hints in the Quran, in the musannaf works of concepts freely cir-
notions acquired from its cultural competitors culating in earlier musnad, sira and tabaqdt
and its vision of the place Islam occupied in compilations.
the divine plan for mankind. The separate Inevitably, such an aim results in a dense