What+we+can+learn+from+the+fall+of+an+empire

W hat can we learn from the fall of and empire?

__**The fall of the Persian empire**__

The Persian Empire began to fall after the great Darius (see events and leaders) died and was relived by his son Xerxes. Xerxes was a young but powerful leader he had been waiting his entire life to relive his father Darius’s from the throne and once he did he began to campaign against the Greek’s. His first act was to try and take the city of Athens by building a boat bridge across the Hellespont (see events and leaders) and marching an army of approximately 240 to 250 thousand men toward Athens, they would first have to travel through a narrow pass at Thermopylae and destroy a meager army 6000 Spartans but when Xerxes finally got to Athens no one was their he thought that the Greeks coward away because of their vast numbers so In a rage Xerxes burnt Athens to the ground. Xerxes immediately regretted this and ordered Athens to be rebuilt this act would come to haunt Persia almost 2 hundred years later. ([] is a citation [] and that)

The Greeks had heard of this act of vandalism and lured the Persian naval fleet into a small bay and though the Persians had far superior numbers (about 2 to 1) the Persian fleet experienced the naval equivalent of grid lock the Persians could not move in the small bay and the Greeks simply used their massive ships to smash the smaller Persian ships in half this was the first major loss for Persia and ultimately showed the world that the Persian empire was no longer invincible then In 465 BC the Persian king Xerxes died of old age and was replaced by his son Artixerxes and began to build what his grandfather Darius had started Persepolis (the great city of Persia) it would be the last great engineering feat of Persia what Artixerxes did was create the hall of a hundred pillars this hall was about 200m squared inside of the hall this was absolutely astounding and must have been a disaster to execute. (The second is Oxfords First Ancient History by: Roy Burrell and illustrations by: Peter Connolly pg.152-154) []

After the Persians accomplish Persepolis Artixerxes died in 424 BC and this begins to stir up a power struggle for about 80 years and when all of this is happening a young prince is studying the hero Cyrus the great (see events and leaders) his name is Alexander. In 336 BC a distant relative of Artixerxes comes to power his name is Darius the 3rd and he will always have the title as the king who lost an empire. Over time Alexander and Darius the 3rd met many times and Darius the 3rd eventually got pushed back to the crown jewel of Persia the city that Artixerxes finished Persepolis. When Alexander pushed Darius to Persepolis he had been know to not allow his soldier’s to pillage or destroy anything but once Alexander had overthrown the city the celebrations and festivities got out of hand and the city was burned to the ground this was one of the saddest moments in history it had taken more than 400 years for this to be built and once it was finally finished it was destroyed. Then Darius the 3rd managed to escape the wrath of Alexander only to be murdered by one of his own men Alexander hunted down the people who killed Darius and said that only kings deserve to kill kings. Once he found Darius’s body he gave him a grand burial and burned him into the heavens this was the end of the Archimedean dynasty and the end of the great Persian Empire though many Greek generals still took command of areas of Persia and still called it Persian territory this was the end of the great Persian Empire. youtube video 4 on intro pg and The second is Oxfords First Ancient History by: Roy Burrell and illustrations by: Peter Connolly pg.145 []

I believe that the greatest thing we can learn from this empire is their engendering feat 's all of course thanks to Darius the great who some consider to be the greatest builder of all time with places like Persepolis, the great boat bride, the royal road, the rebuilding of the capital at Susa, and of course just the general building of an entire empire is something to marvel about and learn from(see events and leaders). The boat bridge involved the first application of weight distribution, Persepolis involved the use of cranes and the most precise hand crafted work ever seen to that time and the royal road a road that stretched 1500 miles across the empire allowing trade and free travel to the people of Persia. we can learn from the military losses to Alexander the great and the introduction to the now still used battle tactics were the military try's to lure parts of the army apart so that in the space that the soldier's have just opened the cavalry can proceed and strike right into the heart of the opposing army which was introduced at the battle of marathon.we can learn moral lesson's like when Xerxes burned athens to the ground and then nearly 200 years later the crown jewel of Persia Persepolis was burned by Alexander the great. The second is Oxfords First Ancient History by: Roy Burrell and illustrations by: Peter Connolly pg.146 youtube video on intro pg #5 []

in conclusion i believe that the Persian Empire was probably one of or the best empires the world has ever seen they paid their workers money, they alowed women in the work force in fact women were generals to and they freed the jews as slaves at Babylon( thanks to Cyrus the great see events and leaders. the great Persian empire was one of the very few empires that deserved the title GREAT.