Queen Tomyris and the death of Cyrus
A nomad queen promises Persia's founder his fill of blood
According to Herodotus, Cyrus II tricked and captured the son of Tomyris, queen of the Massagetae, who then took his own life. Beyond the river the Persians were routed and Cyrus killed, and the queen plunged his head into a skin of blood, saying she had promised him his fill.
Wikipedia (Russian) · Wikipedia (English) · 6th century BC
Meanwhile around the world (±25 years)
Europe
- c. 550 BC Greeks found Olbia — 20 years earlier
- c. 509 BC Founding of the Roman Republic — 21 years later
- 508 BC Cleisthenes' reforms and the birth of democracy — 22 years later
Middle East
- 550 BC Cyrus the Great founds the Achaemenid Empire — 20 years earlier
- 539 BC Fall of Babylon to Cyrus — 9 years earlier
- c. 520 BC The Behistun inscription — 10 years later
Alive at the time
- Cyrus the Great (aged 70)
- Pythagoras (aged 40)
- Gautama Buddha (aged 33)
- Confucius (aged 21)
- Mahavira (aged 69)
- Laozi (aged 41)
- Darius the Great (aged 20)
- Sun Tzu (aged 14)
- Leonidas I (aged 10)
- Heraclitus (aged 5)