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Description
Darius the Great is one of the most divisive figures in ancient history, though not for lack of trying. Every account we have of his life was either commissioned directly from his own mouth, or parroted by his enemies generations later. As such, everything in his biography is subject to scrutiny. He was born in the 6th century BCE to Hystaspes, the Satrap of Bactria under the reign of Cyrus the Great. "Hystaspes" is the Greek rendition of "Vishtaspa", and he is often identified with the king Vishtaspa who first sheltered Zarathustra and adopted his teachings. Indeed, Darius makes a big deal out of praising the head Zoroastrian god, Ahura Mazda, though I should note that not everyone is convinced he was a Zoroastrian per se. Still, the etymology and traditional timeline adds up, so I'm willing to give it to him. Supposedly, Darius was also a distant cousin to Cyrus himself, through a shared ancestor he names as "Achaemenes" (hence why we call it the "Achaemenid Empire"). I should note that Cyrus's own genealogies all conveniently stop just short of the placement of this supposed "Achaemenes", so there's a very real possibility Darius just pulled this out of his ass to legitimize his throne. You see, by all accounts, Darius was the last person anyone wanted to be crowned king. It is said that Cyrus had a vision while campaigning in Scythia that Darius's ambition would be a threat to his dynasty, and so ordered Hystaspes to keep a stern eye on his son and ship him off to some middle-of-nowhere bureaucrat job where he couldn't be a political threat to anyone. Given how I'm sitting here telling his story over two thousand years later, I'm sure you can guess how that turned out.

Cyrus was succeeded by his son Cambyses in 530 BCE, and by all accounts, he was a delirious tyrant. And by "all accounts", I of course mean the only one we have, that being Darius's account, but I digress. Cambyses hated his younger brother Bardiya, and had him assassinated and replaced with a body double. Discovering the ruse, Darius banded together with six conspirators and assassinated the imposter in 522 BCE, all for the good of the Empire, of course. Cambyses is said to have "accidentally" died falling onto his own spear around this same time. Hmm. Since both sons of Cyrus had no heirs, the six conspirators were left to figure out how best to reconstitute a desolate Iran. Otanes, the torn uncle of Cambyses, argued the monarchy should be abolished, and power should be given back to people with a fair and equal democracy. Megabyzus, their money man, said that was dumb and lame and that Persia should be an oligarchy run by rich elites. Darius then stepped in and argued that the monarchy should remain in place, as it is what the Empire had been used to. And who was so humble as to accept the burden of filling in as king? Why Darius of course! And yet for some reason, Darius found himself suppressing rebellions across the Empire for pretty much the next four years. The Behistun Inscription itself lists "nine lying kings" from Egypt to Babylon to Bactria whom Darius had to slay in order to maintain his powe- uhhhh I mean… stabilize the Empire. Yes. That one.

Of course, it's not his quashing of dissonance or his later campaigns against Scythia and the Indus Valley that make Darius famous well into the modern day. No, we only care about what Persia's doing once they start bullying the Greeks, of course. In 499 BCE, Ionian rebels living in conquered Persian territory revolted against the puppet rulers installed by Darius, and Darius couldn't stand for that! Especially not when the city-state of Athens threw money at the rebels after they realized how uncomfortably close Darius's borders were getting. By 492 BCE, Darius had an invasion force to send over into Greece, but bad weather, and frankly bad luck, prevented any progress. 490 BCE rolled around eventually, though, and brought back the chance for Persia to pull itself up by the bootstraps and lay waste to their enemies. While this was successful at first, Athens turned things around at the Battle of Marathon that year. The victory was so spectacular and crucial that the Athenian army sent a messenger to run nonstop all the way to Athens to inform their leaders of the good news. The runner, Pheidippides, thusly collapsed dead from exhaustion, and to this day people continue to do this run voluntarily for some reason. An extremely peeved Darius was forced to withdraw his forces and start planning a new invasion, but he died while suppressing another rebellion in Egypt in 486 BCE, leaving his son Xerxes to pick up the baton as Greece's final boss fight.

Design notes, I kept things relatively simple, and referenced three ancient depictions of Darius when composing this sheet. The most obvious one is the Behistun Inscription, which has Darius crushing the imposter Bardiya under his boot. Subtle. The next is from an ornate Greek vase apparently just called the "Darius Vase", nice, which was painted by an anonymous artisan sometime in the 4th century BCE, and features Darius enthroned surrounded by his war council. Lastly there's the Egyptian statue of Darius currently housed in the National Museum of Iran in Tehran, which despite missing the top half is just absolutely gorgeous. Like I mentioned before, I was originally gonna make Darius the villain of the D&D campaign I ran a while back, because well just look how shady this guy's life was. However, the lack of conflicting accounts, and the juicy narrative Darius provides me with to spin a fun who-dun-it storyline with the madness of Cambyses, ultimately I went the opposite direction. Darius was still a manipulative politician who is more than capable of cruelty when it gets him what he wants, but he only directed it towards those who served what he saw as a corrupt and dying monarchy. He believed he was conspiring on behalf of the people, while Cambyses was slowly losing his mental health and having his paranoia manipulated by the main villains my party was up against. Much of Darius's cruelty comes from being spurned by his father and Cyrus on nothing more than a vision. He very much had something to prove, but he did his best to direct his ambitions towards the people who snubbed him. He'll deal with the consequences of his actions later…

Description
Darius the Great is one of the most divisive figures in ancient history, though not for lack of trying. Every account we have of his life was either commissioned directly from his own mouth, or parroted by his enemies generations later. As such, everything in his biography is subject to scrutiny. He was born in the 6th century BCE to Hystaspes, the Satrap of Bactria under the reign of Cyrus the Great. "Hystaspes" is the Greek rendition of "Vishtaspa", and he is often identified with the king Vishtaspa who first sheltered Zarathustra and adopted his teachings. Indeed, Darius makes a big deal out of praising the head Zoroastrian god, Ahura Mazda, though I should note that not everyone is convinced he was a Zoroastrian per se. Still, the etymology and traditional timeline adds up, so I'm willing to give it to him. Supposedly, Darius was also a distant cousin to Cyrus himself, through a shared ancestor he names as "Achaemenes" (hence why we call it the "Achaemenid Empire"). I should note that Cyrus's own genealogies all conveniently stop just short of the placement of this supposed "Achaemenes", so there's a very real possibility Darius just pulled this out of his ass to legitimize his throne. You see, by all accounts, Darius was the last person anyone wanted to be crowned king. It is said that Cyrus had a vision while campaigning in Scythia that Darius's ambition would be a threat to his dynasty, and so ordered Hystaspes to keep a stern eye on his son and ship him off to some middle-of-nowhere bureaucrat job where he couldn't be a political threat to anyone. Given how I'm sitting here telling his story over two thousand years later, I'm sure you can guess how that turned out.

Cyrus was succeeded by his son Cambyses in 530 BCE, and by all accounts, he was a delirious tyrant. And by "all accounts", I of course mean the only one we have, that being Darius's account, but I digress. Cambyses hated his younger brother Bardiya, and had him assassinated and replaced with a body double. Discovering the ruse, Darius banded together with six conspirators and assassinated the imposter in 522 BCE, all for the good of the Empire, of course. Cambyses is said to have "accidentally" died falling onto his own spear around this same time. Hmm. Since both sons of Cyrus had no heirs, the six conspirators were left to figure out how best to reconstitute a desolate Iran. Otanes, the torn uncle of Cambyses, argued the monarchy should be abolished, and power should be given back to people with a fair and equal democracy. Megabyzus, their money man, said that was dumb and lame and that Persia should be an oligarchy run by rich elites. Darius then stepped in and argued that the monarchy should remain in place, as it is what the Empire had been used to. And who was so humble as to accept the burden of filling in as king? Why Darius of course! And yet for some reason, Darius found himself suppressing rebellions across the Empire for pretty much the next four years. The Behistun Inscription itself lists "nine lying kings" from Egypt to Babylon to Bactria whom Darius had to slay in order to maintain his powe- uhhhh I mean… stabilize the Empire. Yes. That one.

Of course, it's not his quashing of dissonance or his later campaigns against Scythia and the Indus Valley that make Darius famous well into the modern day. No, we only care about what Persia's doing once they start bullying the Greeks, of course. In 499 BCE, Ionian rebels living in conquered Persian territory revolted against the puppet rulers installed by Darius, and Darius couldn't stand for that! Especially not when the city-state of Athens threw money at the rebels after they realized how uncomfortably close Darius's borders were getting. By 492 BCE, Darius had an invasion force to send over into Greece, but bad weather, and frankly bad luck, prevented any progress. 490 BCE rolled around eventually, though, and brought back the chance for Persia to pull itself up by the bootstraps and lay waste to their enemies. While this was successful at first, Athens turned things around at the Battle of Marathon that year. The victory was so spectacular and crucial that the Athenian army sent a messenger to run nonstop all the way to Athens to inform their leaders of the good news. The runner, Pheidippides, thusly collapsed dead from exhaustion, and to this day people continue to do this run voluntarily for some reason. An extremely peeved Darius was forced to withdraw his forces and start planning a new invasion, but he died while suppressing another rebellion in Egypt in 486 BCE, leaving his son Xerxes to pick up the baton as Greece's final boss fight.

Design notes, I kept things relatively simple, and referenced three ancient depictions of Darius when composing this sheet. The most obvious one is the Behistun Inscription, which has Darius crushing the imposter Bardiya under his boot. Subtle. The next is from an ornate Greek vase apparently just called the "Darius Vase", nice, which was painted by an anonymous artisan sometime in the 4th century BCE, and features Darius enthroned surrounded by his war council. Lastly there's the Egyptian statue of Darius currently housed in the National Museum of Iran in Tehran, which despite missing the top half is just absolutely gorgeous. Like I mentioned before, I was originally gonna make Darius the villain of the D&D campaign I ran a while back, because well just look how shady this guy's life was. However, the lack of conflicting accounts, and the juicy narrative Darius provides me with to spin a fun who-dun-it storyline with the madness of Cambyses, ultimately I went the opposite direction. Darius was still a manipulative politician who is more than capable of cruelty when it gets him what he wants, but he only directed it towards those who served what he saw as a corrupt and dying monarchy. He believed he was conspiring on behalf of the people, while Cambyses was slowly losing his mental health and having his paranoia manipulated by the main villains my party was up against. Much of Darius's cruelty comes from being spurned by his father and Cyrus on nothing more than a vision. He very much had something to prove, but he did his best to direct his ambitions towards the people who snubbed him. He'll deal with the consequences of his actions later…