Empire, Authority, and Autonomy in Achaemenid Anatolia

Description

The Achaemenid Persian Empire (550-330 BCE) was a vast and complex sociopolitical structure that encompassed much of modern-day Turkey, Syria, Jordan, Israel, Egypt, Iraq, Iran and Afghanistan and included two dozen distinct peoples who spoke different languages, worshipped different deities, lived in different environments and had widely differing social customs. This book offers a radical new approach to understanding the Achaemenid Persian Empire and imperialism more generally. Through a wide array of textual, visual and archaeological material, Elspeth R. M. Dusinberre shows how the rulers of the Empire constructed a system flexible enough to provide for the needs of different peoples within the confines of a single imperial authority and highlights the variability in response. This book examines the dynamic tensions between authority and autonomy across the Empire, providing a valuable new way of considering imperial structure and development.

Elspeth R. M. Dusinberre is an Associate Professor in the Classics Department at the University of Colorado, Boulder. She has published articles in the American Journal of Archaeology, Ars Orientalis, Anatolian Studies and the Annual of the American Schools of Oriental Research. She is the author of Aspects of Empire in Achaemenid Sardis and Gordion Seals and Sealings: Individual and Society.