Image: Standard of Cyrus the Great (White)

Description: Reconstruction of the Achaemenid "falcon standard", based on the design of a tile of Egyptian blue frit found at Persepolis in 1948 (Īrān-Bāstān Museum, Tehran, no. 2436), with the addition of coloring. The plaque shows Egyptian Horus, but in the Persian context was likely associated with the Avestan "glory-bringing bird", varəγna. Literature: Sāmī, Persepolis, tr. R. Sharp, Shiraz, 1970, fig. facing p. 100; H. Luschey, "Ein königliches Emblem," AMI 5, 1972, pp. 257-60. A. Shapur Shahbazi, DERAFŠ, Encylopedia Iranica (1994). The standard is described by Xenophon in Cyropaedia (Book VII, C.1) as: "...and the word went down the lines, "Eyes on the standard and steady marching!". The standard was a golden eagle, with outspread wings, borne aloft on a long spear-shaft, and to this day such is the standard of the Persian king." (however here he is describing Artaxerxes II's standard at Cunaxa).
Title: Standard of Cyrus the Great (White)
Credit: Own work, Based on a photpgraph hosted at iranica.com (it is our understanding that this photograph shows a reconstruction and not the actual artefact from Persepolis).
Author: Sodacan This W3C-unspecified vector image was created with Inkscape .
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Usage Terms: Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0
License: CC BY-SA 3.0
License Link: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0
Attribution Required?: Yes