King Darius says: By the grace of Ahura Mazda, I am of such a sort (that) I am a friend of the right - of wrong I am not a friend. It is not my wish that the weak should have harm done him by the strong, nor is it my wish that the strong should have harm done him by the weak. The right, that is my desire. To the man who is a follower of the lie I am no friend. I am not hot-tempered. What things develop in my anger I hold firmly under control by my thinking power. I am firmly ruling over my own impulses.
- Tomb of Darius at Naqsh-e-Rustam
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I miss the days when to be a great ruler you also had to have a great beard. This new beardless future is a bleak one!
(source: Darius The Great from Civilization 5) |
Don't look at this episode as our last one with the Persians, look at it as a first for the show where we pause in covering one civilization to go back and catch up with another! But before that happens we've got a lot to talk about with Darius, who takes the silver medal for "Most hated Persian king by the Greeks" (gold medal goes to his son of course!)
Incidentally I'm still on the hunt for some podsafe ancient Greek or something similar to that music. I might be biting the bullet soon and paying for a magnatune subscription, which will actually pay off down the road, but it's also nice to feature other artists!
Anyway, I'll figure it all out. Not to worry!
MP3 Download
Music Credits
http://persia.org/audio.html
Artist unknown! It's the one called avayeh2.wav
Resources
Nice essay on Persian army tactics
Eastern extent of Darius' empire
An example of a gold daric
An amazing list of Darius resources, plus other Persian stuff!
Seal of Darius (that lion took an arrow to the face!)
