Persia and Persepolis, Part II
George Woodcock outlines how, by about 515 B.C., architects, sculptors, goldsmiths and silversmiths were assembled from all quarters of the Persian Empire to build a new capital, Parsa, which the Greeks called Persepolis.
Cambyses II died in 522 on his way back from successful campaigns in Egypt to unsettled conditions in Media, where the standard of revolt had been successfully raised by a man claiming to be his brother Bardiya. The causes of Cambyses’ death are as obscure as the other circumstances of these troubled times; he may have died by accident, or suicide, or even murder.
Darius, a remote cousin of Cambyses and grandson of the deposed Arsames of Parsa, was at this time a commander of the Ten Thousand Immortals. Supported by a group of young Persian noblemen, he led the army back to Media, and within two months he had captured and quickly executed the self-styled Bardiya, after which he proclaimed himself the legitimate heir of Cambyses.
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