The Archaeology of Fars from Late Achaemenid to Early Hellenistic Times

The article adds the important archaeological evidence on the post-Achaemenid period in Fars, usually studied only through historical sources. After J. Wiesehöfer‘s pioneering historical exploration of 1994, a considerable series of valuable studies have contributed to our understanding of the history of this period, finally acknowledging its fundamental role in the ideological continuity from the Achaemenid through the Sasanian dynasty. However, this is a field in which the ideological biases of ancient historiographers play an unfavourable role: thus the study of the archaeological sources have a fundamental importance. The article updates the information on the subject thanks to the author’s discovery of E. Herzfeld’s notebook concerning his excavations of the Frataraka Temple at Persepolis, mentioning the findspot and the chronological context of the five slabs with Greek inscriptions, which till now had been unknown.