Ancient Persia in Western History: Hellenism and the Representation of the Achaemenid Empire - Paperbackby Sasan Samiei (Author) Ancient Persia in Western History is a measured rejoinder to the dominant narrative that considers the Graeco Persian Wars to be merely the first round of an oft repeated battle between the despotic 'East' and the broadly enlightened 'West'. Sasan Samiei analyses the historiography which has skewed our understanding of this crucial era contrasting the work of Edward Gibbon and Goethe, which venerated Classicism and Hellenistic