Archaeological Notes on “Achaemenid” Anshan.

The dynastic affiliation and the ethnic origin of the kings who conquered the largest empire of the Ancient World represent one of the most debated issues in the history and archaeology of ancient Iran. The debate concerns, on one hand, the use of the term “Achaemenid”, which is commonly albeit generically used to define those kings starting from the first conqueror of the empire, Cyrus the Great, and on the other hand the title of “king of Anshan”, which is used by the few official epigraphical sources of Cyrus’ time. If the term “Achaemenid” takes us to Persia, the term “Anshan” suggests Elam: an only apparent dychotomy, as the most up-to-date studies have sought to demonstrate. The author, without entering into the philological and historical aspects of the subject, dedicate his space in the volume to an interpretation of “Achaemenid” Anshan based on evaluation of the archaeological evidence, and particularly the evidence from the site of Tol-e Malyan, but also on information of a different nature. The article is dedicated with true affection to Adriano Valerio Rossi, as the only homage which an archaeologist working on ancient Iran could offer to the most perceptive of the Italian iranologists.