Apadana

It belongs to the oldest building phase of the city of Persepolis, in the first half of the 6th century BC, as part of the original design by Darius the Great.

)[2] As a modern architectural and archaeological term, the word apadana is also used to refer to Urartian hypostyle halls, such as those excavated at Altintepe and Erebuni.

Its inner walls were covered with glazed brick reliefs and featured soldiers of the Eternal Guard, a winged lion, and a lotus flower.

[citation needed] The Apadana was the largest building on the Terrace at Persepolis and was excavated by the German archaeologist Ernst Herzfeld and his assistant Friedrich Krefter, and Erich Schmidt, between 1931 and 1939.

Important material relevant to the excavations are today housed in the archives of the Freer Gallery of Art in Washington, DC.