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PERSIA INTRODUCTION- The Persian Empire is one of a series of imperial dynasties centered in Persia. The first of these was the Achaemenid Empire established by Cyrus the Great in 550 BC with the conquest of Median, Lydian and Babylonian empires. TABLE OF CONTENTS HISTORY LOCATION PHYSICAL FEATURES ARMY OCCUPATIONS RELIGION POPULATION WEALTH HISTORY-The history of Iran, commonly also known as Persia in the Western world, is intertwined with the history of a larger region, also to an extent known as Greater Iran, comprising the area from Anatolia, the Bosphorus, and Egypt in the west to the borders of Ancient India and the Syr Darya in the east, and from the Caucasus and the Eurasian Steppe in the north to the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman in the south.

Iran is home to one of the world's oldest continuous major civilizations, with historical and urban settlements dating back to 7000 BC.[1] The southwestern and western part of the Iranian Plateau participated in the traditional Ancient Near East with Elam, from the Early Bronze Age LOCATION- The Iranian plateau and Persia, which are bounded by the Zagros mountains to the west, the Amu Darya river to the north (per its antique definition), Afghanistan, the Pamirs, and the Indus Valley to the east, and the Persian Gulf and arid Baluchistan to the south, have historically been subject to a series of indigenous dynasties with a long intervening epoch of foreign regimes originating primarily from Central Asia and the Arabian peninsula. PHYSICAL FEATURES-Geographically, Iran is located in West Asia and borders the Caspian Sea, Persian Gulf, and Gulf of Oman. Its mountains have helped to shape both the political and the economic history of the country for several centuries. The mountains enclose several broad basins, on which major agricultural and urban settlements are located. Until the 20th century, when major highways and railroads were constructed through the mountains to connect the population centers, these basins tended to be relatively isolated from one another.

ARMY- The Achaemenid Empire (559 BC–330 BC) was the first of the Persian Empires to rule over significant portions of Greater Iran. The empire possessed a “national army” of roughly 120.000-150.000 troops, plus several tens of thousands of troops from their allies.

The Persian army was divided into regiments of a thousand each, called hazarabam. Ten hazarabams formed a haivarabam, or division. The best known haivarabam were the Immortals, the King’s personal guard division. The smallest unit was the ten man dathaba. Ten dathabas formed the hundred man sataba.

The royal army used a system of color uniforms to identify different units. A large variety of colors were used, some of the most common being yellow, purple, and blue. But this system was probably limited to native Persian troops and was not used for their numerous allies.

OCCUPATION- The Persian population is engaged in a broad array of occupations, in both urban and rural settings. In urban areas Persian society is stratified by profession; real-estate investors and commercial entrepreneurs occupy the highest position, followed by upper-level administrators, merchants, and clergy. The middle class consists largely of civil servants and assorted white-collar workers. The next group generally comprises labourers of various sorts, while the lowest class includes the unskilled and the unemployed. In rural areas, which are largely agrarian, social stratification is much less marked. RELIGION- The vast majority of Persians practice Shīʿite Islam. Before the Muslim conquest of Persia in the 7th century ce, most Persians followed Zoroastrianism, based on the teachings of the ancient prophet Zoroaster (Zarathustra), who lived during the first half of the 1st millennium bce. POPULATION- The ancient Persians were a nomadic branch of the ancient Iranian population that entered modern-day Iran by the early 10th century BC. Together with their compatriot allies, they established and ruled some of the world's most powerful empires, well-recognized for their massive cultural, political, and social influence covering much of the territory and population of the ancient world. WEALTH- Darius I had imposed a tribute of precious metals in addition to a tribute of goods on his satraps and on the subject nations of the empire. Instead of converting that tribute into coins that could then have been put into circulation, Darius and his successors had it melted and then formed into ingots of gold and silver. The bars were stored in the palace treasury, and when the kings of Persia needed to finance particular projects, wars, or adventures, the precious metals were cast into coins. It was Darius who had introduced the coining of money into the empire; hence, the Persian coin became known as the Daric. Until that time, the empire had been administered largely on the basis of barter.