Though he was Greek, Herodotus's hometown of Halicarnassus was part of the Persian Empire.

尽管希罗多徳是希腊人，但他的家乡哈利卡尔那索斯是波斯帝国的一部分。

Until Muhammad's time, the region hadn't been considered a serious match for the powerful neighboring Persian and Byzantine empires.

直到穆罕默德时代，该地区才被视为与强大的邻国波斯和拜占庭帝国相匹敌。

In 539 BC, the Achaemenid Persian empire takes over Babylon.

公元前 539 年， 阿契美尼德波斯帝国占领了巴比伦。

Let’s start with the Persian empire, which became the model for pretty much all land-based empires throughout the world.

让我们从波斯帝国开始，它成为全世界几乎所有陆基帝国的典范。

So even if you weren’t Persian, the Persian Empire was pretty dreamy.

所以即使你不是波斯人，波斯帝国也很梦幻。

What brought about the decline of this  first iteration of the Persian Empire?

是什么导致了波斯帝国第一次迭代的衰落？

Plus, Zoroastrianism forbid slavery, and so slavery was almost unheard of in the Persian Empire.

此外，琐罗亚斯德教禁止奴隶制，因此奴隶制在波斯帝国几乎闻所未闻。

Without a doubt, Xerxes was the catalyst  that started the fall of the Persian Empire.

毫无疑问，薛西斯是导致波斯帝国衰落的催化剂。

By 330 BCE, the Persian empire would topple to the  invading armies of Alexander the Great of Macedon.

到公元前 330 年，波斯帝国将被马其顿亚历山大大帝的入侵军队推翻。

He governed the vast Persian empire – which now stretched from Egypt to the frontiers of India – in such a way that nothing happened anywhere that he himself had not decreed.

他将如今从埃及延伸至印度边境的整个巨大的波斯帝国管理得井井有条——他的政令到处都得以畅通实施。

Maybe Rome became an empire before it had an emperor. Like, remember the Persian Empire?

也许罗马在有皇帝之前就成为了 一个帝国。 比如，还记得波斯帝国吗？

First to fall was the Sassanians, the last non-Muslim successor to the Persian Empire.

首先倒下的是波斯帝国的最后一位非穆斯林继承人萨珊人。

By noon this day, you will be dead men. A thousand nations of the Persian Empire descend upon you.

不到中午，你们就是死人了。上千个波斯帝国的属国会向你们扑来。

Possibly the best-known person to bear the name is Alexander the Great, the 4th century B.C. military strategist who was the king of Macedonia and conquered the Persian Empire.

该名字最著名的拥有者可能就是亚历山大大帝了，他是公元前4世纪的军事战略家，他是马其顿国王，而且征服了波斯帝国。

Both the silver and the free men came, in his interpretation of events, from the contemporary Persian empire's habit of hiring Greeks as mercenary soldiers.

在他对事件的解释中，白银人和自由人都来自当代波斯帝国雇佣希腊人作为雇佣兵的习惯。

Despite its vast territorial power,   the Persian Empire would inevitably collapse as its resources were  stretched thin due to constant war.

尽管领土强大，但波斯帝国不可避免地会崩溃，因为它的资源由于不断的战争而捉襟见肘。

All in all, if you had to live in the 5th century BCE, the Persian Empire was probably the best place to do it.

总而言之，如果你不得不生活在公元前 5 世纪，波斯帝国可能是最好的地方。

These were a form of easily portable and exchangeable wealth invented in the kingdom of Lydia, one of Persia's conquests, and adopted by Cyrus, the Persian empire's founder.

这是一种易于携带和交换的财富形式，在波斯征服的吕底亚王国发明，并被波斯帝国的创始人居鲁士采用。

During the reign of Cyrus II and Darius I, the Persian Empire had expanded substantially to  become the most powerful empire in western Asia.

在居鲁士二世和大流士一世统治期间，波斯帝国大幅扩张， 成为西亚最强大的帝国。

The fall of the Greek republics, and of the Persian empire was the effect of the irresistible superiority which a standing arm has over every other sort of militia.

希腊共和国和波斯帝国的没落是常备军比其他任何类型的民兵都具有不可抗拒的优势的结果。