By Steven Scarpa, Associate Director of Marketing and Communications
The Cyrus Cylinder, sometimes called “the first charter of human rights,” is currently on display at the Yale Peabody Museum through the end of June.
The piece, on loan from the British Museum, helps the Peabody Museum engage in a vital conversation about the present and the deep past, about statesmanship and universal values, said Agnete Lassen, associate curator of the Babylonian Collection at the Yale Peabody Museum and lecturer in Yale’s Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations.
“I like to think about what are shared human values. What do we want to have as a society? What are the ideals, goals, and values that we have?” Lassen said. “This is an important document and just having it in New Haven is a big deal.”
Professor Irving Finkel, the Senior Assistant Keeper at the British Museum and one of the world’s foremost experts on the cylinder, will speak on the topic on May 1 at 6:30 pm. Finkel will offer an illustrated lecture entitled Cyrus and his Cylinder: What was he Thinking?, describing the reality about King Cyrus’s cylinder, and explaining how progress in archeological research has widened our understanding of the man and his motives.
The inscribed clay cylinder, named after King Cyrus I, founder of the Persian Empire, was excavated in 1879 by Mosul-born archaeologist and diplomat Hormuzd Rassam, who sent it to the British Museum in London. Another small piece, donated to Yale University in 1922 by James B. Nies, was later reunited with the London fragment once researchers realized that the two were related. The pieces are usually on display together at the British Museum.
“We have very little information about Cyrus and his reign – this is one of the few pieces of information we have,” Lassen said.
The text, written in Babylonian cuneiform, begins with an account of the conquest of Babylon by Cyrus in 539 BCE. “It was written in a language that he might not have even understood, using a script that he might not have been able to read, following a tradition that was foreign to him … He’s signaling by doing that a respect for the people, for the Babylonian traditions,” Lassen said.
The cylinder was written to be buried in the foundations of the city wall of Babylon, a common practice at the time. While the beginning of the text on the cylinder is a piece of propaganda castigating the previous ruler for his failings, the voice of the text switches to first person:
“I am Cyrus, king of the world, the great king, the powerful king, king of Babylon, king of Sumer and Akkad, king of the four quarters (of the world).… I returned to Ashur and Susa, to Akkad and Der, (the statues) of the gods who used to dwell therein and had them live there for evermore. I gathered all their (exiled) people and brought them back to their settlements … All the people of Babylon persistently blessed my kingship, and I took care that all countries live in peace.”
With these words Cyrus allowed the previously exiled to return to their homes and for the local religion to be practiced freely (stealing the statue of a god was tantamount to taking the deity hostage.) Cyrus’ efforts to release people from captivity were likely a pragmatic approach to governance. However, the words echoed throughout the ancient world. For the Jewish people, Cyrus became a messiah-like figure; still others, including his enemies, regarded him as a model ruler. In an era not known for fair and just rulership, Cyrus’ position stands out.
“(The language and design of the cylinder) show cultural competency and inclusion – he’s speaking to different people, not just the people of Babylon so he’s incorporating different cultural traditions into this,” Lassen said.
Since its rediscovery in the 19th century, the Cyrus Cylinder has been used to promote various political and cultural agendas. “There are two different things to remember about the perception of the Cyrus Cylinder – one happened in the ancient past and the other is about current political and nationalistic agendas,” said Lassen. “The idea that the document is a charter of human rights is something that’s relevant in a modern context but would not have been anything that resonated in the ancient past.”
While the idea of human rights is a concept that would have been foreign to Cyrus himself, the modern reading of the cylinder’s objective comes from Iran in the 1970s as part of its nation building project. “They wanted to take the historical roots of their country back to Cyrus as a founding figure,” Lassen said.
A copy of the cylinder is currently on display at the United Nations in New York City.
Professor Irving Finkel, the Senior Assistant Keeper at the British Museum and one of the world’s foremost experts on the cylinder, spoke on the topic on May 1. Finkel offered an illustrated lecture entitled Cyrus and his Cylinder: What was he Thinking?, describing the reality about King Cyrus’s cylinder, and explaining how progress in archeological research has widened our understanding of the man and his motives.