Behistun
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How it came to be
Behistun is a limestone cliff in Kermanshah Province in western Iran, above an ancient road between Babylon and Ecbatana. The Achaemenid king Darius I had a relief and inscription carved here recording his wars against rival claimants to the throne and rebel governors; UNESCO dates the commission to 521 BC. The figure lying under the king's foot is traditionally identified as the pretender Gaumata.
The inscription is about 15 m high and 25 m wide and gives the same text in three cuneiform languages: Old Persian, Elamite and Babylonian. The British orientalist Henry Rawlinson began studying it in earnest in 1835, climbing the cliff with the help of a local boy to copy it, and sent a complete copy to Europe in 1847.
It became the first cuneiform writing to be deciphered, in the 19th century, and UNESCO compares its value for Assyriology to that of the Rosetta Stone for Egyptology. The site also holds remains from prehistory through the Median, Achaemenid, Sasanian and Ilkhanid periods, and 187 ha were inscribed in 2006.
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