The rhetoric of Achaemenid art

Abstract

Empires are like humans: they are born, they live and they die... In the middle of the sixth century B.C. a newly founded empire by the Achaemenid Dynasty began to dominate the Near East and its environment, which is known to be the treshold of civilization. The conquest of the vast territory was based on military power. However to provide the continuum of their rule Achaemenids created a new form of art, in their capital city Persepolis, which would be recognized and would imply the Achaemenid imperialistic ideology. In this thesis, the history and art history of the Achaemenid Empire was analyzed with modern data and applications in political propaganda, advertising and architecture. The analysis was mostly focused on the capital city Persepolis and its art works to reveal the parallels between the modern and the archaeological. The aim of this thesis is to discuss the unchanging nature of the events taking place in history, and human psychology throughout centuries, even millennia: after 2500 years, we see the same implications to effect people’s psyche.