page_title: History of Anatolia
section_title: Achaemenid Empire
hierarchical_section_title: History of Anatolia / Classical Antiquity / Achaemenid Empire
caption_attribution_description: English: The ruins of the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus in Caria (now Bodrum in Turkey), constructed for King Mausolus during the mid-4th century BC.
context_page_description: The history of Anatolia can be roughly subdivided into prehistory, Ancient Near East, Classical Anatolia, Hellenistic Anatolia, Byzantine Anatolia, followed by the gradual Seljuk/Ottoman conquest in the 13th to 14th centuries, Ottoman Anatolia and the modern history of the Republic of Turkey.
context_section_description: By 550 BCE, the Median Empire, which had existed for barely a hundred years, was suddenly torn apart by a Persian rebellion.  As Lydia's king, Croesus had a large amount of wealth which to draw from, and he used it to go on the offensive against the Persian king Cyrus the Great. In the end, Croesus was thrust back west and Cyrus burned the Lydian capital Sardis, taking control of Lydia in 546 BCE.
  The remaining kingdom of Ionia and several cities of Lydia still refused to fall under Persian domination, and prepared defenses to fight them and sending for aid from Sparta. Since no aid was promised except for a warning to Cyrus from their emissary, eventually their stance was abandoned and they submitted, or they fled as in citizens from Phocaea to Corsica or citizens from Teos to Abdera in Thrace.
  The Achaemenid Persian Empire, thus founded by Cyrus the Great, continued its expansion under the Persia king Darius the Great, in which the satrap system of local governors continued to be used and upgraded and other governmental upgrades were carried out. A revolt by Naxos in 502 BCE prompted Aristagoras of Miletus to devise a grandiose plan by which he would give a share of Naxos's wealth to Artaphernes, satrap of Lydia, in return for his aid in quashing the revolt. The failure of Aristagoras in fulfilling his promise of rewards and his conduct disturbed the Persians, so much so that he resorted to convincing his fellow Ionians to revolt against the Persians. This revolt, known as the Ionian Revolt, spread across Anatolia, and with Athenian aid, Aristagoras held firm for a time, despite the loss in the Battle of Ephesus. The burning of Sardis in 498 BCE enraged Darius so much that he swore revenge upon Athens. This event brought down the hammer upon Aristagoras as the Persian army swept through Ionia, re-taking city by city. It was the eventual Battle of Lade outside Miletus in 494 BCE that put an end to the Ionian Revolt once and for all.
  Although the Persian Empire had official control of the Carians as a satrap, the appointed local ruler Hecatomnus took advantage of his position. He gained for his family an autonomous hand in control of the province by providing the Persians with regular tribute, avoiding the look of deception. His son Mausolus continued in this manner, and expanded upon the groundwork laid by his father. He first removed the official capital of the satrap from Mylasa to Halicarnassus, gaining a strategic naval advantage as the new capital was on the ocean. On this land he built a strong fortress and a works by which he could build up a strong navy. He shrewdly used this power to guarantee protection for the citizens of Chios, Kos, and Rhodes as they proclaimed independence from Athenian Greece. Mausolus did not live to see his plans realized fully, and his position went to his widow Artemisia. The local control over Caria remained in Hecatomnus's family for another 20 years before the arrival of Alexander the Great.
caption: The ruins of the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus in Bodrum, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.
exif: {}