Darius the Great
c. 550 BC – 486 BC · 64 years · Persepolis · Middle East
Organised the empire into satrapies, introduced coinage and the Royal Road, founded Persepolis; his invasion of Greece failed at Marathon.
Wikipedia (Russian) · Wikipedia (English) · 6th century BC
Portrait: Surenae · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Contemporaries around the world
Europe
- Pythagoras — Greek philosopher and mathematician, 20 years older
- Leonidas I — king of Sparta, 10 years younger
- Sophocles — Athenian tragic playwright, 53 years younger
- Themistocles — Athenian statesman and admiral, 26 years younger
Middle East
- Cyrus the Great — founder of the Achaemenid Empire, 50 years older
- Xerxes I — king of the Achaemenid Empire, 32 years younger
- Heraclitus — Greek philosopher, 15 years younger
Asia
- Gautama Buddha — founder of Buddhism, 13 years older
- Confucius — Chinese philosopher, 1 year older
- Sun Tzu — Chinese military strategist, 6 years younger
- Mahavira — spiritual teacher of Jainism, 49 years older
The world in their lifetime
- 550 BC Cyrus the Great founds the Achaemenid Empire — aged 0, Middle East
- 539 BC Fall of Babylon to Cyrus — aged 11, Middle East
- c. 509 BC Founding of the Roman Republic — aged 41, Europe
- 508 BC Cleisthenes' reforms and the birth of democracy — aged 42, Europe
- 490 BC Battle of Marathon — aged 60, Europe