ABSTRACT
A focus on pan-Iranian migrationist interpretations of the Late Bronze Age-Early Iron Age transition in Iran has not served Iranian archaeology well, arguably encouraging devotion of much time, effort and thought into the pursuit of academic dead ends. Horse management and horseback riding have been recurrently connected with the origins and early diffusion of Iranian-speaking peoples. The overall impression of Luristan in the centuries prior to the rise of the Achaemenid empire is of a region episodically controlled by multiple small-scale rulers widely distributed across the valleys and peaks with the occasional rise to prominence of larger-scale political entities such as Ellipi whose rulers were referred to as “kings” by the Assyrians. An inscribed stele found at the unexcavated site of Najafabad in Hamadan province commemorates the conquests in this region of Sargon II in the late 8th century BC.
