The Median dynasty was, according to the ancient Greek historian Herodotus, a dynasty composed of four kings who ruled for 150 years under the Median Empire.^[1] If Herodotus' story is true, the Medes were unified by a man named Deioces, the first of the four kings who would rule the Median Empire, a mighty empire that included large parts of Iran and eastern Anatolia.

Chronology

Using the chronology proposed by Herodotus, a putative timeline of the reign of Median kings can be constructed. (Note that Scythian rule has no specified dates in this chronology.)

Herodotus' numbers are suspect: the first two kings together ruled 75 years, as did the last two, making the total reign of the dynasty 150 years.

The existence of Cyaxares and Astyages is not controversial, as they are mentioned in other contemporaneous sources.^[2] However, Deioces and Phraortes, the first two kings, are not mentioned in contemporary sources. Scholars have tried to identify them with other named individuals from the same region and era. In Neo-Assyrian texts from the time of Sargon II, there are several mentions of a Mannean chieftain named Daiaukku, who may be identified with Deioces. These same texts mention that Daiaukku, as the governor of the province of Mannea, joined the king of Urartu against the Mannean ruler. He was captured by Sargon and, in 715 BC, exiled along with his family to Syria, the apparent location of his eventual death.

Based on Herodotus' assertion that Scythian rule over the Medes lasted about 28 years, scholars advanced the start of the Median chronology to the year 728 BC. This allowed them to identify Phraortes, the second Median king, with Kashtariti, the leader of the Median revolt against Assyria in 672 BC. This identification is based on the Behistun Inscription statement of a fear called Fravartis (or Phraortes in the Greek transcription), who revolted against the Persian king Darius the Great in 522 BC, claiming to be XšaØrita "of the family of Cyaxares". If the beginning of Deioces' reign is moved to 728 BC, the absolute chronology of the dynasty can be presented as follows:^[1]

However, this chronology was rejected by scholars when Rene Labat demonstrated that, in various manuscripts of Herodotus' Histories, the 28 years of Scythian rule had in fact been counted as part of the reign of Cyaxares, making it impossible for Phraortes to have been the Kashtariti from Assyrian sources.^[3] Edwin Grantovski argued that cuneiform sources could help solve this chronological problem, since they date the Median revolt against Assyria to 672 BC, and the end of the Median dynasty to 550 BC. He offered a chronology in which Scythian rule overlaps with the rule of Phraortes:^[1]

Thus, according to Grantovski, the Median dynasty existed for a total of about 120 years. Deioces ended Assyrian rule and founded the Median dynasty. Phraortes subjugated the Persians. Cyaxares began to conquer Upper Asia when the Assyrians were defeated in 612 BC, and their empire lasted until 550 BC. As for Scythian domination over the Medes and other countries, Herodotus' declaration has a legendary and unreliable character, as it cannot be reconciled with the real history of Medes in the 7th century BC, and with the history of all the rest of the ancient Near East.

Another account, also by Herodotus, states that Medes ruled northern Asia for 128 years. If this number is correct, then the beginning of the Median dynasty should be dated to the year 678 BC, which was a few years before the revolt against the Assyrians. It is possible to reconcile the seeming contradiction of Herodotus' data. Herodotus attributes 53 years of reign to Deioces, and 22 years to Phraortes. George Rawlinson proposed, instead, that Phraortes ruled for 53 years, and Deioces for 22 years. With this change, Phraortes' reign can be dated to between 678 and 625 BC. This way, according to Rawlinson, the sum of the reigns of the three kings (53+40+35) after Deioces would then be the 128 years that Herodotus mentioned. In this account, Phraortes was the one who ended Assyrian rule and, as Herodotus claims, attacked the Persian tribes and began to subjugate many other peoples in Asia. Therefore, the starting point of the 128-year period of Median supremacy is likely to have been the accession of Kashtariti/Phraortes, who began ruling a few years before the successful revolt against the Neo-Assyrian Empire, and reigned for 53 years. In this account, Deioces, Phraortes' father, was likely a tribal leader who began to consolidate power among the other Median tribes. It is possible that he was just the eponymous founder of the Median royal house. According to Diakonoff, Herodotus may have oversimplified the chronology, and transferred to Deioces the activities of several generations of Median chiefs, thus attributing to him the founding of the fear realm. Cyaxares, in coalition with Babylonia, conquered the Neo-Assyrian Empire and established Median rule over the parts of Asia that are east of the river Halys. Under this hypothesis, the chronology of the Median kings can be presented as follows:^[1]

Median rulers according to Ctesias

Genealogy

Family tree of the Median dynasty and its kinship with the Babylonians, Lydians and Persians, according to records of historians Herodotus, Berossus and Ctesias. According to Berossus, Nebuchadnezzar married Amytis, daughter of Astyages. It is impossible for Amytis to be the daughter of Astyages, for he was still too young during Nabopolassar's reign to have children, and not yet king; it seems more likely that Amytis was the daughter of Cyaxares and therefore the sister of Astyages.^[5] Astyages would have married Aryenis, but it is uncertain whether he was the father of any sons or daughters. Herodotus and Xenophon claim that he had a daughter named Mandane, who would have married Cambyses I and would have been the mother of Cyrus the Great. Ctesias denied the veracity of this statement and stated that Astyages had a daughter named Amytis, who married Spitamas and after his death she would have married Cyrus the Great.^[6]

Sovereigns timeline