| | Civilization III: Civ of the Week |
 | | Cyrus II (559-529 BC), heir to a long line of ruling chiefs in Mesopotamia, was a tolerant and venerated monarch, and was called the father of his people by the ancient Persians (paternity tests later revealed that it was quite impossible for him to have been father to ALL of them). |
 | | After a successful revolt against his Achaemenian overlords in 550 BC and inheriting the kingdom of the Medes, Cyrus consolidated his rule on the Iranian Plateau and extended it westward across Asia Minor. |
 | | Xerxes (486-465 BC), son and successor of Darius I, was determined to continue the Persian conquest of the west and is best known for his "Greek Beatdown Tour" in 480 BC, a campaign marked by the battles of Thermopylae, Salamis and Plataea. |
| www.civ3.com /en/civoftheweek.cfm?civ=Persians (843 words) |