Elam III

  General Description   Our Neo-Elamite III period begins in 647 BCE, the date of the invasion of Elam and sack of the ancient city of Susa by the Neo-Assyrian king Ashurbanipal, ^[1] and ends in 539 BCE. This date marks the capture of Babylon by the first king of the Achaemenid Persian Empire, Cyrus the Great, who must have been ruling in Susa by 540 BCE. ^[2] By this time, the Elamite civilization had occupied the highlands of the south-western Iranian plateau and the fertile lowlands of the Susiana plain for over two millennia.
Population and political organization
The traditional interpretation of this period has been that Elam effectively ceased to exist as an independent state after Ashurbanipal’s invasion, becoming a province of Neo-Assyria until Assyria’s own fortunes declined several decades later. ^[3] However, some scholars believe that Ashurbanipal’s destruction of Elam may not have been as complete as he claimed. ^[4] The archaeologist Pierre de Miroschedji has argued that by 625 BCE, Elam’s government was restored and that the royal chancellery was active at Susa. ^[5] The extent of Babylonian and Persian influence on Elamite politics in the century before c. 540 BCE is also a matter of ongoing debate. ^{[6] [7]}
Secure population estimates for the area under Elamite control in this period are lacking.

[1]: (Álvarez-Mon, Garrison and Stronach 2011, 10) Álvarez-Mon, Javier, Mark B. Garrison, and David Stronach. 2011. "Introduction." In Elam and Persia, edited by Javier Álvarez-Mon and Mark B. Garrison, 1-32. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/items/itemKey/WF4UWMWH.

[2]: (Potts 2004, 307) Potts, D. T. 2004. The Archaeology of Elam: Formation and Transformation of an Ancient Iranian State. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/items/itemKey/WDUEEBGQ.

[3]: (Potts 2004, 288) Potts, D. T. 2004. The Archaeology of Elam: Formation and Transformation of an Ancient Iranian State. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/items/itemKey/WDUEEBGQ.

[4]: Wouter Henkelman 2016, personal communication.

[5]: (de Miroschedji 1982, 62 in Potts 2004, 301) Potts, D. T. 2004. The Archaeology of Elam: Formation and Transformation of an Ancient Iranian State. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/items/itemKey/WDUEEBGQ.

[6]: (Potts 2012, 46) Potts, Daniel T. 2012. "The Elamites." In The Oxford Handbook of Iranian History, edited by Touraj Daryaee, 37-56. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/items/itemKey/BEAERFCW.

[7]: (Amiet, Chevalier and Carter 1992, 13) Amiet, Pierre, Nicole Chevalier, and Elizabeth Carter. 1992. "Susa in the Ancient Near East." In The Royal City of Susa: Ancient Near Eastern Treasures in the Louvre, edited by Prudence O. Harper, Joan Aruz, and Françoise Tallon, 1-24. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Seshat URL: https://www.zotero.org/groups/1051264/seshat_databank/items/itemKey/9KQATXPQ.