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PERSIA
ANCIENT
IRAN
and the
CLASSICAL
WORLD
Edited by Jeffrey Spier, Timothy Potts, and Sara E. Cole

J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles

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This publication is issued on the occasion of the exhibition Persia: Ancient Iran
and the Classical World, on view at the J. Paul Getty Museum at the Getty
Villa, Malibu, from April 6 to August 8, 2022 .

The exhibition is made possible through major support from Elizabeth and
Bruce Dunlevie, the Spogli Family Foundation, and the Getty Patron Program.
Farhang Foundation is the Exhibition Cultural Partner.

© 2022 J. Paul Getty Trust

[Cover/frontis captions TK]
Published by the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
Getty Publications Illustration Credits
1200 Getty Center Drive, Suite 500
Every effort has been made to contact the owners and photographers of
Los Angeles, California 90049-1682 illustrations reproduced here whose names do not appear in the captions
getty.edu/publications or in the illustration credits listed at the back of this book. Anyone having
further information concerning copyright holders is asked to contact
Nola Butler, Project Editor Getty Publications so this information can be included in future printings.
Karen Jacobson with Jane Bobko, Manuscript Editors
Victoria Barry, Editorial Assistant
Jeffrey Cohen, Designer
Victoria Gallina, Production
Kelly Peyton, Image and Rights Acquisition

Distributed in the United States and Canada

by the University of Chicago Press
Distributed outside the United States and Canada
by Yale University Press, London

Printed in Germany
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
ISBN 978 -1 - 60606 - 680 -5

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 CONTENTS

ix Foreword 9 PART

1
Timothy Potts

xii Lenders to
the Exhibition

xiii Scientific Committee

1 Introduction:
Ancient Iran THE ACHAEMENID
EMPIRE
and the Classical
World
Jeffrey Spier and
Timothy Potts 550–330 BC

10 Map

13 Time Line of Achaemenid Kings

14 Persia before the Persians

Timothy Potts

25 Shifting Identities in Pre-Achaemenid Iran:

Elamites, Medes, and Persians
Wouter F. M. Henkelman

33 Kingship in the Achaemenid Empire

Robert Rollinger

43 Visual Arts of Collective Imperial Identity:

From Persepolis to the Mediterranean
Margaret Cool Root

53 The Greco-Persian Wars: Image, Effect, and Afterlife

Margaret C. Miller

63 Greeks, Lydians, Carians, and Lycians

in Achaemenid Asia Minor
Jeffrey Spier

73 Persia in Cyprus
Antigoni Zournatzi

80 THE ACHAEMENID
EMPIRE
Catalogue 1–78

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143 PART 255 PART

2 3
THE PARTHIAN THE SASANIAN
EMPIRE EMPIRE
ca. 247 BC–AD 224 AD 224–651

144 Map 256 Map

147 Time Line of Seleucid and Arsacid Kings 259 Time Line of Sasanian Kings
and Roman Emperors and Roman and Byzantine Emperors

149 Alexander the Great and the Seleucids: 261 The Sasanian Empire
Iran in the Hellenistic Period (ca. 330–150 BC) M. Rahim Shayegan
Rolf Strootman
273 The Royal Image in Ancient Persia
157 The Parthian Empire Matthew P. Canepa
Jake Nabel
283 Persia and Rome: The Historical
165 Parthia and the Geography of Empire and Ideological Gaze
Stefan R. Hauser Touraj Daryaee

175 In Search of Parthian Art: Arsacid Influence 292 Epilogue: The End of Antiquity in Iran
in the Representational Arts of the Parthian and the Postclassical Inheritance
Empire Hugh Kennedy
Lucinda Dirven

185 Religion in the Parthian Empire 297 THE SASANIAN

Albert de Jong EMPIRE
Catalogue 145–209
193 Greek in Asia: Understanding Hellenism in Susa
and Seleucia on the Tigris
Vito Messina and Miguel John Versluys 361 References Cited

403 Contributors
200 THE PARTHIAN
EMPIRE 404 Illustration Credits

Catalogue 79–144 406 Index

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