page_title: Tyre, Lebanon
section_title: Persian period (539–332 BCE)
hierarchical_section_title: Tyre, Lebanon / History / Persian period (539–332 BCE)
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: " mh sgr (caractères phéniciens). Dauphin à droite, sur deux lignes de flots&#160;; dans le champ inférieur, un murex. Revers&#160;: . Chouette à droite, tête de face, avec un sceptre et un fléau égyptiens incus&#160;; dans un carré incus." العربية: عملة فضية سكت في صُور بتاريخ 437-425 ق.ح.ع، يظهر في الصورة على اليسار دلفين وصدفة موركس، وعلى اليمين بومة مع صولجان مصري.
context_page_description: Tyre is one of the oldest continually inhabited cities in the world, though in medieval times for some centuries by just a tiny population. It was one of the earliest Phoenician metropolises and the legendary birthplace of Europa, her brothers Cadmus and Phoenix, as well as Carthage's founder Dido. The city has many ancient sites, including the Tyre Hippodrome, and was added as a whole to UNESCO's list of World Heritage Sites in 1984.
  The historian Ernest Renan noted:
  One can call Tyre a city of ruins, built out of ruins.
  Today Tyre is the fifth largest city in Lebanon after Beirut, Tripoli, Aley and Sidon, It is the capital of the Tyre District in the South Governorate. There were approximately 200,000 inhabitants in the Tyre urban area in 2016, including many refugees.
context_section_description: The Achaemenid Empire of the Persian king Cyrus the Great conquered the city in 539 B.C. The Persians divided Phoenicia into four vassal kingdoms: Sidon, Tyre, Arwad, and Byblos. They prospered, furnishing fleets for Persian kings. However, when Cambyses II organised a war campaign against Carthage, Tyre refused to sail against its daughter city. 
  
  Under Persian sovereignty, Tyre – like the other Phoenician city states – was at first allowed to keep its own kings, but eventually the old system of royal families was abolished:
  "a republic was instituted [..]: it was the government of the suffetes (judges), who remained in power for short mandates of 6 years."
  Tyre's economy continued to rely largely on the production of purple dye from Murex shellfish, which appeared on a silver coin of Tyre around 450–400 BCE, when the city started minting its own currency. Other motives on coins included dolphins.
  
  Herodotus visited Tyre around 450 BCE and found the temple of Melqart
  "richly adorned with a number of offerings, among which were two pillars, one of pure gold, the other of emerald, shining with great brilliancy at night"
  Some historians speculate that the emerald pillar was made of glass and lit up with a lamp.
  According to Roman historian Justin, an insurrection of slaves took place during the Persian period, which spared only the life of one slave-master named Straton – who was then selected by the former slaves to be the new king and established a dynasty.
  In 392 BCE Evagoras, Prince of Cyprus, started a revolt against the Persian rule with Athenian and Egyptian support. His forces took Tyre by assault – or by secret consent of the Tyrians. However, after ten years he terminated the rebellion and Tyre once again came under Persian control. It abstained from Sidon's insurgency in 352 BCE and profited commercially from the destruction of the neighbouring city.
caption: Silver coin minted in Tyre dated 437–425 BCE, on the left a dolphin and a murex, on the right an owl with an Egyptian sceptre
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