Analyzing the Policies of the Achaemenid Kingdom in the Formation and Consolidation of Iranian Identity

The present paper deals with the policies of the Achaemenid kings in the process of formation and consolidation of Iranian identity in this period and tries to answer the following questions what was the position of Iranian identity in the political, religious, and cultural programs of the Achaemenid kingdom? This research has been written with a historical, political, and sociological approach based on descriptive-analytic research method. The findings of the research indicate that Median and Persian Iranians, after overtaking of the Iranian element on the Iranian plateau, introduced and consolidated the Iranian identity in the ancient world. Darius, exploiting the opportunity of ethnic-dynastic revolts after the death of Cambyses, attempted to apply three approach of cultural identity (Aryan language), political-geographic (central core of Iranian lands) and religious (placing Ahuramazda as the god of the Aryans) to Establish solidarity between the Iranian peoples and strengthen their link with the Achaemenid empire as the Iranian kingdom. These approaches, in historical, political, geographical, religious, and cultural dimensions, gave the continuation and dynamism to Iranian's identity and brought to create the concept of Iran in the political sense of the Sassanid era.