Persepolis — City of Persians
Around 60 km northeast of Shiraz, at the foot of the Koh-e-Rahmat (Mountain of Mercy) in Iran, lie the ruins of one of the greatest cities of the Achaemenid Empire: Persepolis.
Known as Parsa in Old Persian (meaning city of Persians) and Takht-e-Jamshed in modern Persian, Persepolis is now a UNESCO World Heritage site, designated as such in 1979.
Evidence of prehistoric settlement from the site upon which Persepolis is built shows that the area had been occupied long before Darius I, or Darius the Great if you prefer, made it his capital during his reign from 522 to 486 BCE. Darius was the third king of the Achaemenid Empire that lasted for over 2 centuries, and which Persian King, Cyrus the Great had established in the 6th century BCE.
Darius wanted to move the capital that Cyrus had established in Pasargadae to give the Persian administration a fresh start. But he located Persepolis in a remote region, making travel there difficult, so the administration of the Empire was overseen from other major cities such as Babylon, Susa and Ecbatana. The new city therefore became the ceremonial capital.
