Lisbeth S. Fried's insightful study investigates the impact of Achaemenid rule on the political power of local priesthoods during the 6th-4th centuries B.C.E. Scholars typically assume that, as long as tribute was sent to Susa, the capital of the Achaemenid Empire, subject peoples remained autonomous. Fried's work challenges this assumption. She examines the inscriptions, coins, temple archives, and literary texts from Babylon, Egypt, Asia Minor, and Judah and concludes that there was no local autonomy. The only people with power in the Empire were Persians and their appointees, and this was true for Judah as well. The Judean priesthood achieved its longed-for independence only much later, under the Maccabees
Herodots großes Geschichtswerk Herodot (um 484-um 425) wird mit Recht der Vater der Geschichtsschreibung genannt. Er verfasste eine Urgeschichte der alten Kulturen des Vorderen Orients, Ägyptens und Griechenlands. Im Mittelpunkt steht die Auseinandersetzung zwischen den Persern und Griechen mit den berühmten Schlachten von Marathon, an den Thermopylen, bei Salamis und Platää.