After some battles the Persians led by Cyrus the Great emerged victorious, subsequently conquering Median territories and establishing the Achaemenid Empire.

[2] The Babylonian texts suggest that the decisive battle and the capture of Ecbatana, the capital of Media, were only the climax of the Medo-Persian hostilities that lasted for at least three years (553-550 BCE).

If credibility is given to the information provided by Herodotus, Xenophon, Diodorus, and some other classical authors, Cambyses I was married to Mandane, the daughter of the Median king Astyages (r. 585-550 BCE).

[10] In 558 BC, Cyrus II, called "the Great" by the Greeks, became the king of the Persian tribes, with the Pasargadae holding the most important position among them.

The center of the Persian state was located around the city of Pasargadae, where an intensive construction program began in the early years of Cyrus's reign.

[6] At the time when Cyrus II became king of the Persians, there were four powerful states in the entire Near East: Media, Lydia, Babylon, and Egypt.

Media and Babylon were initially allies, but their relations began to deteriorate, leading both Babylonian and Median kings to willingly accept refugees from each other's territories.

According to his inscriptions, in his first year of reign, Nabonidus received orders from the god Marduk in a dream to restore the temple of Ehulhul in Harran, a city in northern Mesopotamia that had been under Median control since the fall of Assyria.

[4][3] Media was already preparing for an attack on Babylon, and the relationship between the two countries was mutually tense, as evidenced by the anti-Median tone of Babylonian inscriptions from this period.

[3] According to the Greek historian Herodotus (I 123-128), the Median general Harpagus, who had been cruelly insulted by Astyages, decided to seek revenge against his king and initiated a conspiracy.

Herodotus's account should be critically examined, but it does seem that there was indeed a group of nobles in Media who were unhappy with Astyages' policies and were prepared to defect to their enemies' side.

I. M. Diakonoff and I. G. Aliev proposed the hypothesis that this group consisted of representatives of tribal nobility against whom Astyages had fought in his efforts to establish a strong and centralized state.

It's possible that the conspiracy of the Median nobility only materialized during the time of the war with the rebels and may not have on its own led to the start of the rebellion, as Herodotus claims.

According to Herodotus, after learning the content of Harpagus's letter, Cyrus convened a meeting of Persian tribes, including the Pasargadae, Maraphii, and Maspii, and then read aloud to them an edict he had drafted, claiming he had received it from Astyages.

In the first battle, Astyages did not participate, and his general Harpagus, in command of the Median army, defected with a large portion of the troops to Cyrus's side.

Astyages then ordered the impalement of the Magi who had misinterpreted his dream, possibly some of whom had been in contact with the conspirators, and all Medes, including the old and the young, were to be armed.

According to Ctesias, Cyrus defeated the Median forces near the town of Hyrba (whose location remains unknown), but in the following fight Astyages gained the upper hand, and the Persians fled back to Pasargadae.

Justin (I 6) relates that when Astyages was beginning to lose the battle, he placed special troops behind his lines with orders to kill any defectors.

Astyages probably relied on the city's fortifications to offer prolonged resistance: according to Ctesias, he was captured while hiding in the attic of the royal palace along with his daughter and son-in-law Spitamas.

While there is no evidence to contradict that it occurred in the Murghab plain, due to the uncertainties surrounding the context of the revolt, we cannot place too much confidence in this location.

However, Xenophon must have been aware of the true turn of events because in the Anabasis (III 4.8-12), he reported on the war between the Persians and the Medes, while in the Cyropaedia, historical facts seem to have been intentionally obscured to idealize Cyrus.

The Cylinder of Sippar reports that in 553 BCE, Cyrus rebelled against the Medes and with his small army, he defeated the many Median troops and captured Astyages, bringing him in chains to his land.

[4] The capture of the Median royal treasury represented a remarkable sign of his newfound power, and Oebares was responsible for transporting them to Persia.

This booty was certainly of great practical importance; as far as we know, it was the first time that Cyrus had boundless resources at his disposal for the campaigns that lay ahead.

It appears that in the mid-6th century BC, qanats (underground irrigation channels) were excavated in Persia, giving this part of Iran a competitive advantage over Media.

In the years 549-548 BCE, the Persians occupied the territories that had belonged to the defunct Median state, including Parthia, Hyrcania, and apparently Armenia.

Ctesias (Persica IX 2-3) wrote that the Hyrcanians joined Cyrus before his victory over Astyages, while the Parthians did so after the fall of Ecbatana to the Persians.

[19] According to Nicolaus of Damascus, after learning of Astyages's defeat, the Hyrcanians, Parthians, Sacae, Bactrians, and other nations recognized Cyrus as their king.

Eager to expand his domains to the east, Croesus presented the subsequent operations as an expedition intended to avenge his brother-in-law Astyages.

Perhaps the Babylonian king Nabonidus also belonged to the same alliance[21] because, despite seeing benefits in the Medo-Persian conflict, the growing power of Cyrus posed a great threat to the Neo-Babylonian Empire.