Hillah, near, Babil Governorate (Babylon Province), Iraq / Iran, Asia
Accession Date:
1976
Notes:
Cast of the Cyrus Cylinder with its presentation/storage box. The original Cyrus Cylinder or Cyrus Charter is a fired clay cylinder, now broken into several pieces, on which is written a declaration in Akkadian cuneiform script in the name of Persia's Achaemenid king Cyrus the Great. It was discovered in Babylon in Mesopotamia (modern Iraq) in 1879. It had been placed as a foundation deposit following the Persian conquest of Babylon in 539 BC, when the Neo-Babylonian Empire was invaded by Cyrus and incorporated into his Persian Empire. The original cylinder is in the collections of the British Museum, # BM 90920, Registration 1880,0617.1941, and a translation of the text can be found on the British Museum website: https://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=327188&partId=1 .
