Achaemenid Royal Inscriptions: collection of Old Persian cuneiform texts from the sixth, fifth, and fourth centuries BCE, left by the Achaemenid kings on their official monuments.DSaa, inscription on a slab of stone
[This text from Susa is a Babylonian, abridged variant of DSf on…
Tušpa: name of an ancient Urartian fortress on the eastern shore of Lake Thospitis, not far from the modern city of Van. One of the Achaemenid Royal Inscriptions can be found on the southern face of the citadel of Tušpa.In ca.521, the Persian…
Intaphrenes (Old Persian Vindafranâ): Persian courtier and general. Intaphrenes was one of the seven conspirators who killed the Magian usurper Gaumâta and helped Darius I the Great become king (September 522 BCE).
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Kingdom of Israel: the northern of the two Jewish states after the kingdom of Solomon was divided. Israel was a regional superpower, but unable to retain its independence in the face of Assyrian imperialism. The name "Israel" survived as the…
Istakhr: ancient Sasanian royal residence, very close to Persepolis; modern Takht-e Tavoos.
Istakhr
In 224 CE, a Persian nobleman named Ardašir, son of…
One of the last kings of Judah, Jehoiachin (r.598-597) was taken captive by the Babylonians (2 Kings 24.15; ABC 5) and lived in exile in the country of the conquerors. However, he was released, and a couple of cuneiform tablets…
In the war between the Jews and the Romans of 66-70, the Jewish general Joseph son of Matthias defended Galilee against the Roman legions. After he had been defeated, he defected to his enemies, and advised the Roman general Vespasian.…
Kalhu or, Biblical, Kalah (Hebrew כלח): capital of ancient Assyria, modern Nimrud.History
The ziggurat of Nimrud
This city, called Kalhu by the Assyrians…
Kaneš or Neša: central town in the Middle Bronze trade network of Anatolia, with several palaces and an Assyrian trading post (modern Kültepe, twenty kilometers northeast of modern Kayseri).Early History
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Kara Tepe: ancient Buddhist monastery near modern Termez (southern Uzbekistan).Early Bactria
Bactrian imitation of an Athenian drachm
Since the early Achaemenid age, Bactria…
Kassites (Akkadian Kaššu): tribal federation living in the Zagros mountains, in modern Luristan. In the seventeenth century BCE, they threatened Babylonia, which they captured in the fifteenth century. More than a millennium later, they are mentioned - now called Cossaeans…