Armed Forces and Units
Achaemenid Immortals
Ancient
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The Immortals were the elite standing infantry corps of the Achaemenid Persian Empire, so named by Greek writers because losses were replaced instantly to keep the unit's strength fixed at 10,000. Recruited from Persians, Medes and Elamites and equipped with the akinakes short sword, spear and wicker shield, the corps formed the royal guard and the core strike force of the Persian army under Cyrus the Great, Darius I and Xerxes I, including the invasion of Greece described by Herodotus. The corps' fate after the fall of the Achaemenid Empire to Alexander the Great in 330 BC is not recorded in the surviving sources.
Facts
Force TypeElite standing heavy infantry corps of exactly 10,000 men, kept perpetually at full strength by immediately replacing any casualty or loss so the unit's numbers never visibly changed 1 CountryAchaemenid Persian Empire 1 Disputed
Founded YearSources date the corps' organization anywhere across Cyrus the Great's and Darius I's reigns; no single foundation year is attested directly. Cross-Tradition Connections
Sources
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