Persian Tribute Bearer

Unknown Persian Tribute Bearer

TRIBUTE BEARER

by Kitty Jospé

From this fragment of  limestone, I invite you to imagine what it must have been like to witness the arrival of delegates of the Persian empire, to Persepolis, bearing tribute for the annual New Year Festival (Nowruz, pronounced no-rooz, means “new year”). The empire stretched from Libya in Africa, through Turkey, Iraq, Iran, to India, touching the Kurdish lands to the north.

The label identifies the bas-relief of a Tribute Bearer, ca. 358-338 BCE, wearing a typical Persian costume, ascending a staircase with his offering. The word “Median” refers back to ancient Iran, and a unified state formed in the 7^th century BCE which together with Babylonia, Libya, and Egypt became one of the four major powers of the ancient near east.  The “Medes” are credited with the foundation of Iran as a nation and empire, the largest of its day until Cyrus the Great founded the unified Mede and Persian Achaemenid Empire.

Visualize representatives from 23 different nations, all with different dress, different languages, all bearing tribute to the King of Kings! On March 21st, the vernal equinox, the representatives of the different Satrapies (governorships) established by Darius came to Persepolis to celebrate the Persian New Year, Nowruz, and present the king with their finest gifts: elephant tusks, and animals, rich jewels, golden bowls, foodstuffs and wine, silks and tapestries, priceless carpets, from as far away as Libya, Egypt, Turkey, the borders of India, the northern lands near the Caspian and Black seas.  Persepolis carvings show Bactrians, Babylonians, Phoenicians, Ethiopians, Indians and Arachosians. Such ceremony would make you believe in a great king. Cyrus means “like the sun”.

Imagine, wooden columns that appear as high as redwood trees set between stone bases and capitals, made of Lebanon cedar and teak trees from India.  Just like the Rosetta stone with three languages, you would see the inscription, “I am Cyrus the Great” written in Old Persian, Elamite and Aramaic.   Who is this Cyrus?  With over 2,500 years of history, it is hard to know the truth.   You will read many accounts, some saying he was son of a nomadic shepherd, which is later refuted.  However, in his thirty year reign, he established the unification of the Persian Empire, and is recognized for his achievements in human rights, politics, and military strategy, as well as his influence on both Eastern and Western civilizations. 

How better to create a majestic atmosphere and a convincing display of power than to create  palaces of enormous proportions, and to have  23 nations bring tribute on New Year’s day,  ascending 20 meters of an impressive staircase to an entrance with two large bulls?  Our fragment shows a tribute bearer, which would have been one of thousands of bas-reliefs decorating this broad staircase of 111 steps, 6.9 meters wide with treads of 31 centimeters and rises of 10

centimeters, started in 518 BCE.  Originally, the steps were believed to have been constructed to allow for nobles and royalty to ascend by horseback. New theories suggest that the shallow risers allowed visiting dignitaries to maintain a regal appearance while ascending. The top of the stairways led to a small yard in the north-eastern side of the terrace, opposite the Gate of Nations.

Cyrus, Darius, and Xerxes all had a hand in the building of the palace complex.  Darius built Tachara or the Hall of Mirrors as his private palace. The hall was covered with polished stones that reflected images when sunlight shone through the windows. The Throne Hall or the Hundred-Columns Palace was founded by Xerxes and completed by his son Artaxerxes I at the turn of the fifth century BC and used black marble columns.  The Hadish was king Xerxes' personal palace, reputedly the first to be burned by Alexander (referred to by Persians as  “the not-so Great”) who looted the treasury and destroyed all traces of this legacy of two centuries of beauty and splendor.

Although we do not have a bas-relief showing Zoroastrian Nowruz  with the spring equinox power of an eternally fighting bull (personifying the Earth), and a lion (personifying the Sun), we do have our Assyrian bas-relief of the Wingèd Genius tending to a tree form, symbolic of some ritual ceremony.

In MAG’s niche, we have over 4,000 years of history!  The Kufic calligraphy on the bowls is the first Arabic calligraphic script used by Muslims to record the Qur’an in the 700’s. The cuneiform inscriptions on tablets pre-date this by over a thousand years.  On tours you might want to mention the Cyrus Cylinder, whose text is a royal building inscription and illustrates how Cyrus adopted Mesopotamian traditions and symbols to legitimize his conquest and peaceful control of Babylon. The claim of the cylinder as the first “declaration of human rights,” however, has been discredited.   

The illuminated wine ode, (leaf from a manuscript of poetry by Umar Ibn-al-Farid)  written in the 12^th century, was reproduced in the 17^th century and attests to the importance of living life with full heart and infused with a sense of the divine.

 For evoking Nowruz, you might wish to recite the following translation of a verse by Omar Kayyam, translated by Shahin Monshipour, professor and cultural anthropologist.  (This form is called  rubái, the plural is rubáiyát which is roughly equivalent to a quatrain with a rhyming scheme of AAAA or AABA.)

                A joyous day

                Not heavy with heat, not burdened by cold,

                Cloud dusting off the garden’s tired face,

                The nightingale singing, his soul singing to a yellow rose,

                Wine, wine, red wine,

                Red wine we must drink – behold!

The wine is metaphoric for the reinvigorating pulse of energy we feel in our blood at spring, nature dusting off the old, and the nightingale, who sings only songs of praise, in spite of being pieced by thorns, until we are flushed with new life.