The Cyrus Cylinder
- Audio guide stop: 424
- Gallery: Room 52
- Culture: Achaemenid Dynasty
- Made in: Babylon (historic - Iraq)
- Date: 539BC (after)
- Object type: cylinder
- Materials: fired clay
- Museum number: 90920
- Museum: The British Museum
- Collection record: British Museum website
- Image © The Trustees of the British Museum, shared under a CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 licence.
Listen to the free audio guide
About this object
This is the Cyrus Cylinder, a fired clay cylinder that dates back to around 539 BC. Created during the Achaemenid Dynasty in Babylon—now part of modern-day Iraq—this object is a key historical document. Inscribed in Babylonian cuneiform script, the cylinder records the Achaemenid conquest of Babylon by the Persian King Cyrus the Great.
The text describes Babylon's decline under the last Babylonian king, Nabonidus, and Cyrus's arrival as a restorer of order and worship. Notably, the work was likely buried in the foundations of Babylon's city wall, as written by Cyrus’s allies.
You can see the cylinder's layered construction, made by adding clay to a core before being fired. Despite its fragile state today, the Cylinder remains a powerful testament to ancient Persia's early policies of religious and cultural respect—a theme that has inspired many later interpretations around peace and leadership.
See it in person
The Cyrus Cylinder is on display in Room 52 at the British Museum on Great Russell Street, Bloomsbury, London — free to enter. Choose British Museum on audioguide.london and type its audio guide stop number, 424, from the gallery label, or take a photo of it, to hear this free audio guide in six languages — no app download needed.
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