ACHÆMENES, the ancestor of the Persian kings, and founder of the Achæmenidae, which was the most illustrious family of the Pasargadae, the noblest of the Persian tribes. He is said to have been nourished by an eagle. The unbroken line of succession of this family of kings is given in Herodotus, lib. vii. 11, where Xerxes declares himself sprung "from Darius, son of Hystaspes, son of Arsames, son of Ariamnes (Αριανός), son of Teispes, son of Cyrus, son of Cambyses, son of Teispes, son of Achæmenes." The adjective Achæmenian is sometimes used by the Roman poets in the sense of Persian.—Hor. od. iii. 44. Epod. xiii. 8.