Prexaspes () was a prominent Persian during the reign of

Cambyses II Cambyses II () was the second King of Kings of the Achaemenid Empire, reigning 530 to 522 BCE. He was the son of and successor to Cyrus the Great (); his mother was Cassandane. His relatively brief reign was marked by his conquests in North Afric ...

(530–522 BC), the second

King of Kings King of Kings, ''Mepet mepe''; , group="n" was a ruling title employed primarily by monarchs based in the Middle East and the Indian subcontinent. Commonly associated with History of Iran, Iran (historically known as name of Iran, Persia ...

of the

Achaemenid Persian Empire The Achaemenid Empire or Achaemenian Empire, also known as the Persian Empire or First Persian Empire (; , , ), was an Iranian empire founded by Cyrus the Great of the Achaemenid dynasty in 550 BC. Based in modern-day Iran, it was the larges ...

. According to

Herodotus Herodotus (; BC) was a Greek historian and geographer from the Greek city of Halicarnassus (now Bodrum, Turkey), under Persian control in the 5th century BC, and a later citizen of Thurii in modern Calabria, Italy. He wrote the '' Histori ...

, when Cambyses ordered his trusted counselor Prexaspes to kill

Bardiya Bardiya or Smerdis ( ; ; possibly died 522 BCE), also named as Tanyoxarces (; ) by Ctesias, was a son of Cyrus the Great and the younger brother of Cambyses II, both Persian kings. There are sharply divided views on his life. Bardiya eithe ...

(also known as Smerdis), the King's own brother, Prexaspes loyally carried out his order. Herodotus provides two versions of the murder. After moving from

Egypt Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northe ...

(where he was stationed) to

Susa Susa ( ) was an ancient city in the lower Zagros Mountains about east of the Tigris, between the Karkheh River, Karkheh and Dez River, Dez Rivers in Iran. One of the most important cities of the Ancient Near East, Susa served as the capital o ...

, Prexaspes either killed Bardiya in a hunting field near Susa, or drowned him in the Erythrean Sea. After Cambyses' death, Prexaspes denied murdering Bardiya at first, but ultimately, in the words of ''

Brill's New Pauly The Pauly encyclopedias or the Pauly-Wissowa family of encyclopedias, are a set of related encyclopedia An encyclopedia is a reference work or compendium providing summaries of knowledge, either general or special, in a particular field o ...

'', "revealed before the assembled Persians the usurpation by the

Magi Magi (), or magus (), is the term for priests in Zoroastrianism and earlier Iranian religions. The earliest known use of the word ''magi'' is in the trilingual inscription written by Darius the Great, known as the Behistun Inscription. Old Per ...

( Patizeithes), called for their overthrow and committed suicide (Hdt. 3,66 ff.; 74 ff.)."

The name

The original Iranian form of the Hellenized personal name ''Prexaspes'' is not attested in the Indo-Iranian languages, and there is no Old Iranian word that corresponds to the Greek Πρηξ- (/prēk^(h)s/). Since the mid-19th century, numerous scholarly endeavors have aimed to link the name documented by

to Old Iranian languages. A recent linguistic study published in 2024 identifies Prexaspes as the

Ionic Greek Ionic or Ionian Greek () was a subdialect of the Eastern or Attic–Ionic dialect group of Ancient Greek. The Ionic group traditionally comprises three dialectal varieties that were spoken in Euboea (West Ionic), the northern Cyclades (Centr ...

representation of the Old Iranian Bahuvrihi compound *Para.wakhsh.aspa, which translates to "one who possesses a croup (-high) horse." .Āzādān, Pīrōz (Peyravi, Morad). 2024. ''Prexaspes'' is the Ionic rendering of the Old Iranian *''Para.wakhsh.aspa''. Onoma 59, 263–276. DOI: 10.34158/ONOMA.59/2024/13.

References

Sources

* * {{Cite encyclopedia , title=Prexaspes , encyclopedia=Brill's New Pauly , publisher=Brill Online , url=https://referenceworks.brillonline.com/entries/brill-s-new-pauly/prexaspes-e1008180?s.num=7&s.f.s2_parent=s.f.book.brill-s-new-pauly&s.q=persian , last=Wiesehöfer , first=Josef , date=2006 , editor-last=Salazar , editor-first=Christine F. , authorlink=Josef Wiesehöfer , editor-last2=Landfester , editor-first2=Manfred , editor-last3=Gentry , editor-first3=Francis G. * Āzādān, Pīrōz (Peyravi, Morad). 2024. ''Prexaspes'' is the Ionic rendering of the Old Iranian *''Para.wakhsh.aspa''. Onoma 59, 263–276. DOI: 10.34158/ONOMA.59/2024/13. 6th-century BC Iranian people People from the Achaemenid Empire Suicides in Iran 520s BC deaths