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Abstract
In the text of his Babylonian cylinder Cyrus the Great indicates that the kernel of his personal title includes the phrase “king of the city of Anshan” and that each of his predecessors was known as a “great king, king of the city of Anshan”. In one view that has been current for most of the past decade these titles should be read literally, and serious consideration should be given to the possibility that Cyrus founded an Anshanite empire rather than a Persian empire. The present paper explores a number of alternative approaches to this same testimony, especially following the presentation of a new thesis (Zournatzi, pre-published) which posits that these titles do not tell us so much about the exact history of Cyrus’ ancestral line as they acquaint us with certain ideological and political sensitivities that Cyrus expected to encounter at the moment that he sought to consolidate his hold on his last major acquisition: the city of Babylon.