Pasargadae
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How it came to be
Pasargadae was the first dynastic capital of the Achaemenid Empire, founded by Cyrus II in Pars, the homeland of the Persians and today's Fars province. In the 6th century BC Cyrus, who reigned from 559 to 530 BC, built it near the site of his victory over the Median king Astyages in 550 BC.
Its palaces were set within a garden layout known as the Four Gardens, which became a prototype for later architecture in Western Asia. A limestone tomb on the Morgab plain is identified as the tomb of Cyrus; its chamber, on a base of six steps, is 3.17 m long and 2.11 m wide and high. It was once attributed to the Mother of Solomon. Arrian writes that Alexander the Great visited the tomb after looting Persepolis and ordered Aristobulus to enter it.
Ernst Herzfeld first explored the site in 1905 and excavated there in 1928. A team from the British Institute of Persian Studies led by David Stronach excavated from 1961 to 1963. Pasargadae was registered as a national monument of Iran in 1931 and inscribed as a World Heritage site in 2004.
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