Persian History
A short look at the long history of Persia.
Origins of Persia and Iran
The Iranian Plateau has been inhabited for many thousands of years. Indo-Iranian groups, a branch of the Indo-European language family, are thought to have reached the region around 4,000 years ago. There, the immigrants mixed with local populations and split into several related Iranian peoples, including the Medes, Persians, and Parthians.
Early Persian history is dominated by the powerful Assyrian Empire, one of the first civilizations to conquer large swathes of land in the Middle East. After centuries of rivalry and the rise of a Neo-Assyrian Empire, Persians and Medes took part in a joint campaign to break the authority of Assyria forever. In 612 BCE, they joined forces with Babylonians, Cimmerians, Scythians, and Chaldeans to destroy the Neo-Assyrian capital at Nineveh. The Medes organized into a large and wealthy kingdom, which came to dominate the Persians as a vassal state.
The Achaemenid Empire
This power dynamic flipped in 550 BCE with the rise of Cyrus the Great. Cyrus, a maternal grandson of the Median King Astyages, became king of the city of Anshan in 559 BCE. He led a successful mutiny against Astyages six years later, eventually marrying the king’s daughter to cement his rule. His Achaemenid Empire went on to conquer Lydia and Babylon, forming the largest known empire up to that point in history.
Cyrus’ successors pushed Persia’s boundaries farther, gobbling up Egypt, Thrace, and much of Greece. A series of costly defeats against the Greek Delian League halted the Persian advance into Europe by 449 BCE. The Corinthian War saw Athens and other Greek city-states ally with Persia against Sparta. Persia switched sides toward the end of the conflict, walking away with significant gains in land in 387 BCE.
At its height, the Achaemenid Empire controlled people of many different cultures, languages, and religions. It maintained power through a careful policy of tolerance for its citizens. The Persians appointed governors to their conquered provinces, but local politics were generally allowed to follow their original structures. By showing respect for the customs of the defeated, Persia for the most part secured the loyalty of its vassals.
The Achaemenid Empire ruled for over 200 years. A new empire from the west, however, would soon sweep it out of existence. North of Greece, in the Kingdom of Macedon, a young man named Alexander inherited a large and disciplined army from his father. He led an unprecedented campaign of conquest, including defeating the Persian King Darius III in 331 BCE. Alexander’s Seleucid Empire absorbed Persia, spreading Greek Hellenic language, philosophy, and art to the far corners of his new civilization.
The Parthian and Sasanian Empires
After the collapse of Alexander’s empire, another Iranian culture, the Parthians, took power in 248 BCE. The Parthians were notable for their mounted archery, which thwarted multiple Roman invasions. They benefited from growing trade along the Silk Road between Han China and the Romans and the legacy of the Achaemenids. Their prosperity extended their reign to 224 CE, but the Persians soon rose again. As the Parthians declined, their Persian Sasanian vassals were ready to take their place.
Like the Parthians, the Sasanian Empire came into constant conflict with the Roman world, primarily the Byzantine Empire. Repeated conflicts with the Romans, including the capture of an emperor and a costly siege of Constantinople, left the empire poorly prepared for the rise of Islam. In 636, an Arab Muslim army defeated the Persians at the Battle of al-Qādisiyyah. The Rashidun Caliphate moved on to conquer Persian holdings in Iraq and the rest of the Middle East, establishing Islamic authority for centuries to come.
Persia Under Islamic and Mongol Rule
The people of Persia then fell under the control of the Umayyad and Abbasid Caliphates. They did not abandon their culture; instead, Persian arts and customs came to heavily influence the growth of Islam. The majority of people converted to the new faith from religions like Zoroastrianism, Nestorian Christianity, and Manichaeism. Powerful Persian families continued to wield political influence, particularly in the city of Baghdad. Their poetry, literature, and science all contributed to the Islamic Golden Age, built on a long heritage of Mesopotamian, Greek, Persian, Arab, and Roman foundations.
In the 13th century, a new wave of invaders came to the Middle East. They were the Mongols, an army of horsemen and siege weapons led by the famed Genghis Khan. The Mongols, offended by a previous slaughter of their emissaries, pillaged much of the Islamic world. They burned whole cities, destroyed valuable infrastructure, and eradicated a large portion of the population. Genghis Khan’s heirs founded the Ilkhanid dynasty, which soon converted to Islam. The Ilkhanids adopted elements of Persian culture and encouraged trade along the Silk Road. Increased trade brought new cultural exchange to Iran, particularly the arts and engineering of China.
As the Ilkhanate weakened and fragmented, a new empire gained ascendancy. The Timurids, founded by Timur in 1370, drew cultural influences from the Turks, Mongols, and Persians alike. Around this time, much of the former Persian territories began converting from Sunni to Shia Islam. A series of Oghuz-Turkic dynasties fought for control of the Iranian Plateau as Timur’s dynasty declined.
Early Modern Persian and Iran
Persians did not regain true control of their ancient homeland until 1501, when the Safavid Empire came to power. The Safavids embraced Shia Islam and developed a strong military based on gunpowder. They soon locked horns with the neighboring Ottoman Empire, reclaiming Baghdad and other territories from the Turks. One of Iran’s foundational figures, Shah Abbas I, reigned from 1587 to 1629. He oversaw a period of great expansion, diplomacy, and artistic progress in what is now Iran.
The Safavids held their own against Russia and the Ottomans for a century, but the larger empires grew eager for more land. Persia lost the Caucasus region to Russia in 1723. Within a year, the Safavids had fallen to civil and foreign wars, their lands divided between their neighbors. The dynasty was briefly restored by Nader Shah, who in turn founded his own short-lived Ashfarid dynasty in 1736. The Qajar dynasty emerged in the wake of the Ashfarids in 1796. The Qajars prioritized recovering the Caucasian provinces. The Russo-Persian Wars, however, ended with resounding defeat for the Persians.
The Founding of Modern Iran
The 19th and early 20th centuries saw Persia reduced to a single piece in a global political game. Its oil reserves and strategic position made it a vital region to control for many world powers of the time. In 1921, the nation adopted a constitutional monarchy with Reza Shah Pahlavi at its head. Reza Pahlavi built an authoritarian state seeking to modernize Iran. He loosened religious restrictions, imposed Western dress on the populace, and built modern infrastructure. The Shah sided with Germany against Iran’s archenemy, Russia, in World War II. As a consequence, the British and Russians invaded the nation and deposed him in favor of his son. They built oil fields to supply the Allied cause, which remained under British control until 1951.
After World War II, the Soviet Union and British oil politics all worked against a stable Iranian government. The government under Mohammad Reza Shah, led by Prime Minister Mohammed Mosaddeq, moved to nationalize its oil and gain greater autonomy from Europe. Mosaddeq threatened the reign of Mohammad Reza Shah, who had the support of the West. In response, the United States and Britain instigated a coup in 1953. They imprisoned Prime Minister Mosaddeq and saved the Shah from exile.
The Iranian Revolution
The Shah maintained power until 1979. His citizens, frustrated by rapid modernization and rampant outside influence, ousted him in the Islamist-driven Iranian Revolution. The resulting modern state of Iran developed into a theocratic republic, initially led by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Relations with the United States broke down further during the Iran Hostage Crisis, when students seized an American embassy and held its diplomats hostage.
In recent decades, Iran has successfully defended its borders from Iraq, implemented presidential elections, and gradually thawed its foreign diplomacy. The Iran Nuclear Deal of 2015 offered hope of better relations with the United States and Europe, though it has been largely abandoned by the US as of 2018. Iran continues to balance the demands of Islamic conservatism with the reformist zeal of a young and modern-minded populace. Today, Persian people make up about 60 percent of the population of Iran.
References
Amanat, Abbas. Iran: A Modern History. Yale University Press. 2017.
André-Salvini, Béatrice. Forgotten Empire: The World of Ancient Persia. University of California Press. 2005.
Axworthy, Michael. A History of Iran: Empire of the Mind. Basic Books. 2016.
Newman, Andrew. Safavid Iran: Rebirth of a Persian Empire. I.B. Tauris. 2012.
“The World Factbook: Iran.” Central Intelligence Agency, Central Intelligence Agency, 12 July 2018, www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ir.html.
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