OCR GCSE Ancient History The Persian Empire 559 to 465 BC overview quiz quiz

Media, Lydia and Babylon

Egypt, Greece and India

Assyria, Phoenicia and Judah

Macedon, Thrace and Scythia

A ruthless conqueror who destroyed the temples of the city

A liberator chosen by the god Marduk who restored cults

A Greek-style democratic ruler elected by the people of Babylon

A living god who was to be directly worshipped by all his subjects

Babylon, 539 BC

Lydia, 546 BC

Egypt, 525 BC

Athens, 490 BC

It says Darius was peacefully elected to the throne by a vote of all the satraps of the empire

It completely denies that there was ever any usurper sitting on the throne at all in the period before Darius finally took power for himself

It says that the dying Cambyses personally chose Darius to be his heir and successor as king

It claims Darius alone killed the usurper Gaumata with Ahuramazda's favour, whereas Herodotus names seven conspirators

A governor of a province who collected tribute and kept order

A royal messenger who carried the king's orders along the Royal Road

A type of coin that was used for trade across the Persian empire

A priest of the god Ahuramazda who led worship at the royal court

To carry religious pilgrims to the ceremonial capital at Persepolis

To allow fast communication and movement across the empire

To mark out the western border of the empire against the Greeks

To transport the empire's tribute and goods along the great rivers

Great battles fought by the Persian army against the Greeks at Marathon

The building of the Royal Road that ran all the way from Sardis to Susa

Delegations of subject peoples bringing gifts to the enthroned king

The death of Cambyses and the rise of Darius the Great to the throne

Because Persia had banned the worship of the traditional Greek gods in Ionia

Because Athens had invaded the Ionian Greek cities and forced them to fight back

Because the new king Xerxes had sharply raised the level of taxes that the Ionian cities had to pay

Because of resentment at Persian-backed tyrants, tribute and the ambition of Aristagoras

It enraged Darius and gave him a reason to target Athens, which had helped the rebels

It brought about the immediate and total end of the whole Persian empire under Darius

It made the city of Sardis the new capital of the Greek world instead of Athens

It directly started the long Peloponnesian War between Athens and Sparta in Greece

They had a very much larger army than the Persian invaders who landed at Marathon

Their tactics, heavy hoplite armour, the absent Persian cavalry and good leadership

They used a large force of their own cavalry to ride down the Persian foot soldiers

The Persian army never actually landed on Greek soil and so no real battle took place

Thermopylae

Marathon

Salamis

Artemisium

As nothing more than bad luck with the storms and the weather at sea

As a clear Persian victory rather than as any kind of defeat for Xerxes

As the fault of the Spartans, who failed to hold the pass at Thermopylae

As the punishment of royal hubris (overreaching pride)