Prof. Sir John Boardman: 'The Achaemenid Persian Heritage: Greeks and Alexander'

This lecture focuses on Achaemenid Persia of the 6th to 4th century BC, which was the greatest of the empires of the Old World, rivalling even that of Rome. It created a road system virtually from the Mediterranean to China, and its political organisation in satrapies was the most efficient of antiquity. Moving west, it did not conquer the Greek homeland, yet in a way controlled it with its gold, and certainly brought under its rule the Greeks of Asia Minor. The result was a subtle blending of Greek and eastern traditions which reached its peak in the construction of Persepolis. Alexander the Great destroyed all that, but he admired Persia and its ways, and after him the east, even into India, displays much that was translated from the Greek world. Moreover, Alexander himself became adopted as a Persian – Iskander. There were poems, stories and pictures of his exploits in Persian poems and art. It is a mysterious and fascinating blend of east and west.