The Legendary Founder, Achaemenes

According to tradition, Achaemenes founded the dynastic house that would govern Persia for two centuries. Herodotus describes Achaemenes as the founder of one of the three clans of the Pasargadae tribe (Herodotus, Hist., 7, 11). Herodotus was probably repeating a genealogical legend invented by Darius, who had no legitimate claim to the throne (Briant, “Achaemenids,” 5). On the Cyrus Cylinder, Cyrus makes no mention of Achaemenes in his genealogical history in lines 20–21. This did not prevent Darius from inserting Achaemenes into Cyrus’ lineage, as he did in a trilingual inscription at Pasargadae after he assumed the throne (Kuhrt, The Persian Empire, 177).

Darius’ official version of his ascension in the Behistun Inscription created the Achaemenes lineage that linked him to Cyrus and Cambyses. Darius was probably within the extended clan of Persian royalty, but he needed to validate his claims to the throne as the direct heir to a distant founder. He therefore used Achaemenes as this figure. After tracing his lineage back to Achaemenes in lines 1–2, he summarizes his claim by stating:

“Darius the king proclaims: For this reason we are called Achaemenids. From long ago we are noble; from long ago we are royal. Darius the king proclaims: Eight of our family were kings before; I am the ninth; nine kings are we in succession” (lines 3–4, as translated in Kuhrt, The Persian Empire, 141).

Later classical authors such as Herodotus accepted his claim at face value and established the term “Achaemenid” as the title for both the royal house and the empire. Aelian even went so far as to claim that “Achaemenes, the Persian, from whom the Persian nobility is descended, was nursed by an eagle” (Aelian, Nat. an., 12, 21). Aelian, who wrote in the second century ad, no doubt had in mind the eagle’s role as a symbol of Rome’s empire, making this high praise indeed.