By an irony of history the Persian Empire's administrative structure can be viewed in full after its conquest only. Two archival lists stand at Diod. XVIII 3 (Perdiccas distributes the satrapies at Babylon in 323) and XVIII 39 (Antipater distributes the satrapies at Triparadeisus in 321). Hieronymus of Cardia, Diodorus' source in Books XVII-XXII, preserved these documents. In Table 20.1, the satrapies are presented according to the order of the division at Babylon:
One must consider both lists side by side in order to get a complete list of satrapies owing to accidental omissions in both. The first list treats Thrace and Macedonia (Nrr. 10 and 11) with the other satrapies (de facto justified) while the second omits them since these territories were not historically satrapies.
Both lists also show that long-term historical trends, from the Persian period, were continuing. The Persians often split overlarge satrapies into smaller ones. Thus Caria stood under the satrap of Lydia during Agesilaus' invasion of Asia Minor in the 390s (see chap. 15), but shortly thereafter it had its own satrap (see chap. 19). In 323 the old Persian satrapy of Babylon was split into two satrapies, Mesopotamia and Babylon, and the old Persian satrapy of Media was split into Greater Media and Media Atropat-ene. Paradoxically, the Persians also grouped together satrapies, which had not proved viable alone, to form "double-satrapies." This too continued under Alexander and his successors with some new arrangements of double-satrapies (Arachosia + Gedrosia and Aria + Drangiane - Nrr. 16 and 17 respectively).
Finally, the list of satraps shows the old Persian satrapal class - at Alexander's death already reduced to three if one includes Oxyartes - continuing to lose ground. In 323 half of Atropates' satrapy (Media) was taken from him, and in 321 a Macedonian replaced Phrataphernes in Parthia and Hyrcania.
World History
