(Asia Minor) and created an effi cient intelligence service. He
determined how much each province could pay in taxes and
then taxed half that amount. He built major palaces at the an-
cient city of Susa and the new capital of Persepolis.
Aft er putting down a rebellion of Greek city-states in
Asia Minor, Darius launched an attack on Athens in Greece,
which had supported the rebels. His forces were defeated at
Marathon in 491 b.c.e. His son Xerxes (r. 486–465 b.c.e.)
campaigned against Greece in 480–479 b.c.e., but the Per-
sians were defeated by an alliance of Greek city-states. In 401
b.c.e. a civil war broke out between the Persians of Artaxerxes
II (r. 404–359/358 b.c.e.) and Greek mercenaries commanded
by his brother, Cyrus the Younger. Cyrus was defeated, but
the Greek mercenaries fought their way out of the Persian
Empire, as recounted by Xenophon.
SELEUCID KINGDOM (CA. 311–CA. 140 B.C.E.)
Th e last Persian monarch was Darius III (r. 336–330 b.c.e.). In
336 b.c.e. Alexander the Great invaded the Near East with a
well-trained army of Greeks and Macedonians. He fought a se-
ries of battles against superior numbers, fi rst taking the cities
of the eastern Mediterranean, then Egypt, Assyria—where he
defeated Darius III at the battle of Gaugamela—and Babylonia
and fi nally Iran. It took until 328 b.c.e. to secure the Persian
Empire, aft er which Alexander conquered part of northwest-
ern India in 326 b.c.e. He seemed to take on the role of a Persian
emperor aft er that and had plans for an invasion of Arabia, but
aft er an arduous overland journey through Baluchistan and
eastern Iran and following the burning of Persepolis, he died
at Babylon of a fever in 323 b.c.e. Th ereaft er, the empire he had
briefl y created broke into smaller kingdoms ruled by two of
of Alexander’s generals, Seleucus I (r. ca. 311–281 b.c.e.), who
founded the Seleucid Kingdom, and Ptolemy I (r. ca. 323–285
b.c.e.), who founded the Ptolemaic Kingdom (322–168 b.c.e.).
Th ese kingdoms, centered on Syria and Mesopotamia (Seleu-
cid) and Egypt and Cyprus and the southern Levantine coast
(Ptolemaic), eventually succumbed to the superior strength of
Parthia in the east and Rome in the west.
PARTHIAN EMPIRE (CA. 250 B.C.E.–226 C.E.)
Th e Parthians originally lived in what is now northeastern
Iran and adjacent parts of central Asia. Th e kingdom of Par-
thia, as known from coin issues, began with the reign of Ar-
saces I (r. ca. 250–ca. 248 b.c.e.), whose capital was at Nisa in
what is present-day Turkmenistan and aft er whom the dy-
nasty is sometimes referred to as Arsacid. Mithridates I (r.
171–138 b.c.e.) conquered southwestern Iran and pushed the
western frontier across most of Mesopotamia. Th e Arsacid
kings established a more centrally located capital at Ctesiphon,
near Baghdad, and for many years the Euphrates formed the
border between Rome’s eastern provinces and the Parthian
Empire. Artabanus V (r. ca. 213–226 c.e.), the last Parthian
king, was overthrown by Ardashir I (r. 226–241 c.e.) from Is-
takhr, near Persepolis, who established the Sasanian Empire
(226–651 c.e.), Iran’s last great pre-Islamic state.
ASIA AND THE PACIFIC
BY KIRK H. BEETZ
HARAPPAN CIVILIZATION
Harappa and Mohenjo Daro were the two largest cities of the
Harappan civilization, and both were close to the Indus River.
Th e civilization included numerous towns and villages scat-
tered over an area that extended from central Asia to south of
the Himalayan Mountains and along the seacoast west and
south of the mouth of the Indus River. Its size was enough
to qualify it as a large nation for its era, 2600–1500 b.c.e. Its
government is a mystery because its written language has
yet to be deciphered, and the Near Eastern civilizations with
which it traded give it only brief mentions in their surviving
records.
In about 1900 b.c.e. natural disasters began to undermine
the main Harappan cities and towns. Rivers oft en fl ooded
and sometimes changed their courses, inundating cities and
towns and forcing the Harappans to repeatedly repair or even
rebuild them. By 1500 b.c.e. Harappa was in steep decline as
its people abandoned their cities, probably because of fl oods
and bad harvests. In about 1500 b.c.e. Aryan tribes from cen-
tral Asia invaded the Indus valley and the rest of northern In-
dia. Even so, some Harappan villages and towns survived in
northern India and passed on their art and religion to later
generations.VEDIC INDIA
Th e word Ve d i c refers to the Vedas, the oldest sacred writings
of Hinduism. Passed on orally until they were fi rst written
down in the 500s b.c.e., they recount the wars of the Aryan
tribes and the sources of their religious beliefs. Vedic India
dates to about 1500 to 60 b.c.e. Vedic society was stratifi ed
into groups called castes. Th ere were four principal castes: At
the top was that of priests, called Brahmans; second was that of
warriors and political rulers, called Kshatriyas; third was that
of merchants, money lenders, and farmers, called Vaishyas;
fourth was that of craft speople, servants, and minor govern-
ment offi cials, called Sudras. Below all these people were the
people without a caste. Castes were hereditary, meaning a
person’s caste was the same as that of his or her parents. Th is
social system set the pattern for the rest of India’s history.
Th e Aryans were originally nomads who directed sheep
and cattle to diff erent grazing grounds according to the sea-
son. Some of their descendants in northern India continued
to practice the old way of life into the 21st century. Most of
the Vedic people began to settle down as they spread east-
ward and southward. By the 800s b.c.e. they had formed
many small tribal territories called janapadas across north-
ern India. Th e janapadas were constantly at war with one an-
other, and the stronger ones absorbed the weaker ones until
16 were left in the late 700s b.c.e. Th ese territories were called
mahajanapadas. Th eir power extended south to the Godavari
River, which fl ows west to east, almost bisecting India.empires and dynasties: Asia and the Pacific 401