8 The Susians and the other lands of the Cissians.
9 Babylon and Assyria.
10 The Ecbatanians, the rest of Media, Paricanians, and Orthocorybantes.
11 The Caspians, Pausicae, Pantimathi, and Daritae.
12 The Bactrians as far as the Aegli.
13 The Pactyic region, the Armenians, and the adjacent regions as far as the Black Sea.
14 The Sagartians, Sarangians, Thamanians, Utians, and Mycians.
15 The Saca and Caspians.
16 Parthians, Chorasmians, Sogdians, and Areians.
17 Paricanians and the Ethiopians of Asia.
18 The Matieni, Saspires, and Alarodians.
19 The Moschi, Tibareni, Macrones, Mossynoeci, and Mares.
20 The Indians.
These are the people paying tribute. Other people, only giving presents to the Persian king, are the Arabs, the Ethiopians, and the Colchians. The list is certainly not exhaustive. In the work of the same author, other people occur as well, e.g. in Asia Minor (1.170–180): Caunians, Calyndians, and Pedasians.
Also Xenophon (Cyrop. 1.1.4) gives a list of people subdued by Cyrus II: Medes, Hyrcanians, Surians, Assyrians, Arabians, Cappadocians, Phrygians, Lydians, Carians, Phoenicians, Babylonians, Bactrians, Indians, Cilicians, Sacians, Paphlagonians, Magadidians, Greeks in Asia, Cyprians, Egyptians, “and many other nations, whose names one cannot even say.” It should be noted, however, that the conquests of Xenophon's Cyrus are not the same as those of the historical Cyrus (Ambler 2001: p. 287), e.g. Egypt was only conquered by his son Cambyses.
The Languages of the Achaemenid Empire: An Overview
Xenophon has it that Cyrus “ruled these nations even though they did not speak the same language as either he himself or one another.” Diodorus tells his readers that before the battle of Gaugamela the Achaemenid king “was most concerned lest some confusion should arise in the battle from the numerous people assembled that differed in speech” (Diodorus Siculus 17.53.4). In his Bīsitūn inscription, Darius I commands the diffusion of his text in his subordinates' languages: “Afterwards this inscription I sent off everywhere among the provinces. The people unitedly worked upon it” (iv 91–92). Finally, in Esther 3.12 one may read that an order was to be sent “to every province in its own script and every people in its own language.”
These are only four examples of the multilingual character of the Achaemenid Empire, in which languages of various families were spoken. East Iran has its own languages and dialects (e.g. Arachosian, Bactrian, Sogdian), which was already noticed by Strabo (Geogr., 15.2.8). In the north, northern Iranian languages were spoken, whereas Elamite, Persian, and Median controlled southwest and central Iran. In Egypt, Mesopotamia, the Levant, and Anatolia people continued to speak their own languages: Egyptian, Babylonian, Aramaic, Phrygian, Anatolian languages (Lycian, Lydian), Greek, etc. (see Chapter 54 The Interplay of Languages and Communication).
Language and Administration in the Achaemenid Empire
After their glorious military expeditions which resulted in the creation of a huge territorial empire (Figure 3.1), the Achaemenid kings faced a political unit with lots of different ethnic groups as well as languages. It was a daunting task to keep such a large territory together. The Achaemenid administration especially had to deal with various administrative systems in different languages. The big challenge here was to communicate commands and directives to the various satrapies and to make these orders comprehensible for the non‐Persian‐speaking inhabitants of these satrapies, even more so knowing that the knowledge of Old Persian, the king's and the Persian elites' vernacular, was not widespread in the empire (Briant 1996: p. 525).
In fact, in order to solve these linguistic problems the Achaemenids conducted an active language policy (Tavernier 2008; 2017; 2018; forthcoming). The main basis for the reconstruction of this policy is the many administrative formulas at the end of, e.g., letter‐orders. Such formulas are attested in Aramaic texts (from Egypt as well as from Bactria), Egyptian (demotic) texts, and Elamite texts. They reveal a coherent system, imposed by the Achaemenid kings and used throughout the existence of their empire, both geographically and chronologically. The formulas are attested from the reign of Darius I (521–486 BCE) to that of Artaxerxes III (358–338 BCE) in texts from Egypt (Arsames Correspondence [Aramaic], Pherendates Correspondence [Egyptian]), Persia proper (Persepolis Fortification and Treasury Archives [Elamite]), and Bactria (Akhvamazda Correspondence [Aramaic]).
The administrative notes are attested only on letters from the satrap or from his administration; letters to satraps do not have these formulas. Unfortunately, this implies that outside of the satrapal administration the Achaemenids' dealing with multilingualism cannot be reconstructed. In addition, the evidence for this system does not cover the whole Achaemenid territory, as it is not attested in Anatolia, although various Aramaic inscriptions were found there.
The formulas are:
| Language | Level 1 | Level 2 | Level 3 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Aramaic | PN1 knows this command PN1 is the master of the command | PN2 is the sepīru | PN3 wrote |
| Egyptian | PN1 knows this command | PN2 is he who wrote this letter | PN3 wrote |
| Elamite | PN1 knew about this PN1 delivered the command | PN3 received the draft from PN2 | PN3 wrote |
From these formulas a reconstruction model of how royal or satrapal commands were created can be drawn up:
1 A high official (e.g. satrap) passes a (royal) command in Old Iranian to one of his officials. This person (PN1) is the one who knows the command.
2 The official transmits the command to the interpreter (PN2) in Old Iranian. This is equivalent to formula P.
3 The interpreter notes it down in Aramaic.
4 If necessary, the interpreter also makes a translation into Egyptian or Elamite.
5 He passes this translation to an indigenous scribe (PN3).
6 This scribe makes an additional copy, the copy of which is preserved.
The interpreters‐scribes, called teppir in Elamite, spr in Aramaic, and sepīru in Akkadian, occupied a considerable position in the Achaemenid administration. This is corroborated by the high rations they received according to the Persepolis Fortification Tablets (Tavernier 2007b: p. 63). In fact, interpreters (῾ερμηνεύς) occur frequently in the Greek sources (e.g. Xen., Anab., 1.2.17 and 8.12).
This also implies that Aramaic, although it did not supplant the local languages which remained in use throughout the Achaemenid period (Briant 1996: p. 524), was imposed on the empire as an administrative language. It lay as a veil on the whole territory of the Achaemenid Empire. In this capacity, Aramaic was the linguistic binder of the empire, the language used throughout its territory, between the Old Persian level and the local administrative level. The following table makes this clear:
| Administration level |
Language
|
|---|