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Astyages ; spelled by Herodotus
Herodotus

Herodotus of Halicarnassus was a Greeks historian who lived in the 5th century BC and is regarded as the "Father of History" in Western culture....
 as Astyages; by Ctesias
Ctesias

Ctesias of Cnidus was a Hellenic civilization physician and historian from Cnidus in Caria. Ctesias, who flourished in the 5th century BC, was physician to Artaxerxes II, whom he accompanied in 401 BC on his expedition against his brother Cyrus the Younger....
 as Astyigas; by Diodorus as Aspadas; Akkadian
Akkadian language

Akkadian or Assyrian-Babylonian is a Semitic language that was spoken in ancient Mesopotamia. The earliest attested Semitic language, it used the cuneiform writing system derived ultimately from ancient Sumerian language, an unrelated language isolate....
: Ištumegu), was the last king of the Median Empire
Medes

The Medes were an Ancient Iranian peoples who lived in the northwestern portions of present-day Iran. This area was known in Greek as Media or Medea ....
, r. 585 BCE-550 BCE, the son of Cyaxares
Cyaxares

Cyaxares, Hvakhshathra,Xasro or Kayxosrew , the son of King Phraortes, was the first king of Medes .He reorganized and modernized the Median Army, then joined with King Nabopolassar of Babylon....
; he was dethroned in 550 BCE by Cyrus the Great
Cyrus the Great

Cyrus the Great , , also known as Cyrus II of Persia and Cyrus the Elder, was a Persian people Shah . He was the founder of the Persian Empire under the Achaemenid dynasty, an empire, perhaps the most wealthy and magnificent in history....
.

His name derives from the Old Iranian Rishti Vaiga, which means "swinging the spear, lance-hurler."

Reign
Astyages succeeded his father in 585 BCE, following the Battle of Pteria
Pteria

Pteria may refer to:*Pteria a town in ancient Cappadocia * Pteria a genus of bivalve molluscs, the winged oysters...
, which ended a five-year war between the Lydians
Lydians

Lydians were the inhabitants of Lydia, a region in western Anatolia.Their capital was at Sardis.Their governmental system included kings,as their rulers....
 and the Medes
Medes

The Medes were an Ancient Iranian peoples who lived in the northwestern portions of present-day Iran. This area was known in Greek as Media or Medea ....
.






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Astyages ; spelled by Herodotus
Herodotus

Herodotus of Halicarnassus was a Greeks historian who lived in the 5th century BC and is regarded as the "Father of History" in Western culture....
 as Astyages; by Ctesias
Ctesias

Ctesias of Cnidus was a Hellenic civilization physician and historian from Cnidus in Caria. Ctesias, who flourished in the 5th century BC, was physician to Artaxerxes II, whom he accompanied in 401 BC on his expedition against his brother Cyrus the Younger....
 as Astyigas; by Diodorus as Aspadas; Akkadian
Akkadian language

Akkadian or Assyrian-Babylonian is a Semitic language that was spoken in ancient Mesopotamia. The earliest attested Semitic language, it used the cuneiform writing system derived ultimately from ancient Sumerian language, an unrelated language isolate....
: Ištumegu), was the last king of the Median Empire
Medes

The Medes were an Ancient Iranian peoples who lived in the northwestern portions of present-day Iran. This area was known in Greek as Media or Medea ....
, r. 585 BCE-550 BCE, the son of Cyaxares
Cyaxares

Cyaxares, Hvakhshathra,Xasro or Kayxosrew , the son of King Phraortes, was the first king of Medes .He reorganized and modernized the Median Army, then joined with King Nabopolassar of Babylon....
; he was dethroned in 550 BCE by Cyrus the Great
Cyrus the Great

Cyrus the Great , , also known as Cyrus II of Persia and Cyrus the Elder, was a Persian people Shah . He was the founder of the Persian Empire under the Achaemenid dynasty, an empire, perhaps the most wealthy and magnificent in history....
.

His name derives from the Old Iranian Rishti Vaiga, which means "swinging the spear, lance-hurler."

Reign


Astyages succeeded his father in 585 BCE, following the Battle of Pteria
Pteria

Pteria may refer to:*Pteria a town in ancient Cappadocia * Pteria a genus of bivalve molluscs, the winged oysters...
, which ended a five-year war between the Lydians
Lydians

Lydians were the inhabitants of Lydia, a region in western Anatolia.Their capital was at Sardis.Their governmental system included kings,as their rulers....
 and the Medes
Medes

The Medes were an Ancient Iranian peoples who lived in the northwestern portions of present-day Iran. This area was known in Greek as Media or Medea ....
. He inherited a large empire, ruled in alliance with his two brothers-in-law, Croesus
Croesus

Croesus was the Monarch of Lydia from 560/561 BC until his defeat by the Persian Empire in about 547 BC. The fall of Croesus made a profound impact on the Greeks, providing a fixed point in their calendar....
 of Lydia
Lydia

Lydia was an Iron Age kingdom of western Asia Minor located generally east of ancient Ionia in the modern Turkey provinces of Manisa Province and inland Izmir Province....
 and Nebuchadnezzar
Nebuchadnezzar

Nebuchadnezzar was the name of several kings of Babylonia.* Nebuchadrezzar I, who ruled the Babylonian Empire in the 1100s BC. His death causes the Chaldean Empire to crumble and fall 30 years after his death....
 of Babylon
Babylon

Babylon was a city-state of ancient Mesopotamia, sometimes considered an empire, the remains of which can be found in present-day Al Hillah, Babil Governorate, Iraq, about 85 kilometers south of Baghdad....
, whose wife, Amytis, Astyages' sister, was the queen for whom Nebuchadnezzar was said to have built the Hanging Gardens of Babylon
Hanging Gardens of Babylon

The Hanging Gardens of Babylon, also known as the Hanging Gardens of Semiramis, near present-day Al Hillah in Iraq , is considered one of the original Seven Wonders of the Ancient World....
.

Married to Aryenis
Aryenis

Aryenis of Lydia was, according to Herodotus, the daughter of King Alyattes II of Lydia and the sister of King Croesus of Lydia.Aryenis was also the Queen consort of Astyages, King of Medes and mother of Mandane of Media and a probable Amytis, married to her nephew Cyrus the Great....
, the sister of King Croesus
Croesus

Croesus was the Monarch of Lydia from 560/561 BC until his defeat by the Persian Empire in about 547 BC. The fall of Croesus made a profound impact on the Greeks, providing a fixed point in their calendar....
 of Lydia
Lydia

Lydia was an Iron Age kingdom of western Asia Minor located generally east of ancient Ionia in the modern Turkey provinces of Manisa Province and inland Izmir Province....
, to seal the treaty between the two empires, Astyages ascended to the Median
Medes

The Medes were an Ancient Iranian peoples who lived in the northwestern portions of present-day Iran. This area was known in Greek as Media or Medea ....
 throne upon his father's death later that year. By her he had perhaps a daughter Amytis married to Cyrus the Great.

The reign of Astyages was noted for its both its stability and for the growth of the eastern prophet-based religion, Zoroastrianism
Zoroastrianism

Zoroastrianism is the religion and philosophy based on the teachings ascribed to the prophet Zoroaster, after whom the religion is named. The term Zoroastrianism is in general usage, essentially synonymous with Mazdaism, i.e., the worship of Ahura Mazda, exalted by Zoroaster as the supreme divine authority....
, throughout his empire, at the same time that Croesus was overseeing an explosion of secular thought in the west (through the philosophers he patronized, Thales
Thales

Thales of Miletus , was a Pre-Socratic philosophy Greek philosophy from Miletus in Asia Minor, and one of the Seven Sages of Greece. Many, most notably Aristotle, regard him as the first philosopher in the Greek philosophy....
, Solon
Solon

Solon was an Athens statesman, lawmaker, and lyric poetry. He is remembered particularly for his efforts to legislate against political, economic and moral decline in Archaic period in Greece Athens....
, Aesop
Aesop

File:Aesop pushkin01.jpgAesop , known only for the genre of fables ascribed to him, was by tradition a Slavery in Ancient Greece who was a contemporary of Croesus and Peisistratos in the mid-6th century BC in ancient Greece....
, etc.), and Nebuchadnezzar was busily turning his city of Babylon into the greatest metropolis the world had yet seen.

After thirty-two years of relative stability, Astyages lost the support of his nobles during the war with Cyrus, resulting in the formation of the Persian
Achaemenid Empire

The Achaemenid Empire or Achaemenid Persian Empire was amongst the first Persian Empires that ruled over significant portions of Greater Iran, and followed the Ancient Iranian peoples Median Empire....
 empire.

Cyrus and Astyages in Herodotus

The account given by the ancient Greek
Ancient Greece

The term Ancient Greece refers to the period of History of Greece lasting from the Greek Dark Ages ca. 1100 BC and the Dorian invasion, to 146 BC and the Roman Republic conquest of Greece after the Battle of Corinth ....
 historian Herodotus
Herodotus

Herodotus of Halicarnassus was a Greeks historian who lived in the 5th century BC and is regarded as the "Father of History" in Western culture....
 relates that Astyages had a dream in which his daughter, Mandane, gave birth to a son who would destroy his empire. Fearful of the dream's prophecy, Astyages married her off to Cambyses I of Anšan
Anshan (Persia)

Anshan , a site on the Iranian plateau, 36 km northwest of modern Shiraz, Iran in the Zagros mountains of the Fars province, southwestern Iran, was one of the early capitals of Elam, from the 3rd millennium BC....
, who had a reputation for being a "quiet and thoughtful prince" and whom Astyages believed to be no threat.

When a second dream warned Astyages of the dangers of Mandane's offspring, Astyages sent his general Harpagus
Harpagus

Harpagus , , was a Medes general from the 6th century BC, credited by Herodotus as having put Cyrus the Great on the throne through his defection during the battle of Pasargadae....
 to kill the child, who was none other than Cyrus himself. Harpagus, unwilling to spill royal blood, gave the infant to a shepherd, Mitridates, whose wife had just given birth to a stillborn child. Cyrus was raised as Mitridates' own son, and Harpagus presented the stillborn child to Astyages as the dead Cyrus.

When Cyrus was found alive at age ten, Astyages spared the boy on the advice of his Magi
Magi

File:Adoracao_dos_magos_de_Vicente_Gil.jpgMagi is a term, used since at least the 4th century BCE, to denote a follower of Zoroaster, or rather, a follower of what the Hellenistic civilization associated Zoroaster with, which was – in the main – the ability to read the stars, and manipulate the fate that the stars foretold....
, returning him to his parents in Anshan. Harpagus, however, did not escape punishment, as Astyages is said to have fed him his own son at a banquet.

Cyrus succeeded his father in 559, and in 553, on the advice of Harpagus, who was eager for revenge for being given the "abominable supper," Cyrus rebelled against Astyages. After three years of fighting, Astyages' troops mutinied during the battle of Pasargadae
Pasargadae

'Pasargadae' was a city in ancient Iran, and is today an archaeological site and one of Iran's five UNESCO World Heritage Sites. According to the Elamite cuneiform of the Persepolis fortification tablets the name was rendered as Batrakata?, and the name in current usage derives from a Greek Language transliteration of an Old Persian P?th...
, and Cyrus conquered the Median's empire. Astyages was spared by Cyrus, and despite being taunted by Harpagus, Herodotus says he was treated well and remained in Cyrus' court until his death.

Rather than giving the popular mythology that Cyrus was suckled by a bitch, Herodotus explains that the herdsman Mitridates lived with another of Astyages' slaves, namely a woman named 'Spaco,' which he explains is Median
Median language

The Median language is the language of the Iranian Medes. Together with Gilaki, Mazandarani, Kurdish language, Parthian language and Balochi language, the language of the Medes is classified as a List of Northwestern Iranian languages language....
 for bitch.

Defeat


The contemporary Chronicle of Nabonidus
Nabonidus Chronicle

The Nabonidus Chronicle is an ancient Babylonian text, part of a larger series of Babylonian Chronicles incribed in cuneiform script on clay tablets....
 refers to the mutiny on the battlefield as the cause for Astyages' overthrow, but does not mention Harpagus by name. However, since Harpagus was Astyages' general at the battle of Pasargadae and his family were granted high positions in Cyrus' empire after the war, and since Harpagus went on to become Cyrus' most successful general, it is possible he had something to do with the mutiny against Astyages. Cyrus then went on to pillage Astyages' capital of Ecbatana
Ecbatana

Ecbatana is supposed to be the capital of Astyages , which was taken by the Persian emperor Cyrus the Great in the sixth year of Nabonidus ....
.

Ancient sources agree that after Astyages was taken by Cyrus he was treated with clemency, though the accounts differ. Herodotus says that Cyrus kept Astyages at his court during the remainder of his life, while according to Ctesias
Ctesias

Ctesias of Cnidus was a Hellenic civilization physician and historian from Cnidus in Caria. Ctesias, who flourished in the 5th century BC, was physician to Artaxerxes II, whom he accompanied in 401 BC on his expedition against his brother Cyrus the Younger....
, he was made a governor of a region of Parthia
Parthia

Parthia is a region of north-eastern Iran, best known for having been the political and cultural base of the Arsacid dynasty, after which the Arsacid Empire is then also known as the 'Parthian Empire'....
 and was later murdered by a political opponent, Oebaras. The circumstances of Astyages' death are not known.

After Astyages' overthrow, Croesus
Croesus

Croesus was the Monarch of Lydia from 560/561 BC until his defeat by the Persian Empire in about 547 BC. The fall of Croesus made a profound impact on the Greeks, providing a fixed point in their calendar....
 marched on Cyrus to avenge Astyages. Cyrus, with Harpagus at his side, defeated Croesus
Croesus

Croesus was the Monarch of Lydia from 560/561 BC until his defeat by the Persian Empire in about 547 BC. The fall of Croesus made a profound impact on the Greeks, providing a fixed point in their calendar....
 and conquered Lydia
Lydia

Lydia was an Iron Age kingdom of western Asia Minor located generally east of ancient Ionia in the modern Turkey provinces of Manisa Province and inland Izmir Province....
 in 547 BCE.

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