3800 BC Iran pioneers copper smelting
Copper is extracted from ore by smelting at various sites in Iran

580 BC Zoroaster's new religion
The Iranian prophet Zoroaster teaches that there is one god, Ahura Mazda

550 BC Cyrus creates Persian empire
Cyrus, king of the Persians, takes Ecbatana, capital city of the Medes, and establishes the first Persian empire

550 BC Polo in Persia
Polo originates in the Persian empire, probably as part of the training of the imperial cavalry

545 BC Persians annexe Ionia
Cyrus annexes the Greek territory of Ionia as part of his empire, giving Persia a presence on the Aegean

539 BC Persia absorbs Babylon
A Persian army captures Babylon and brings it into the empire of Cyrus the Great

530 BC Cyrus buried at Pasagardae
Cyrus the Great is buried in an austerely impressive tomb at Pasagardae, in Persia

522 BC Darius wins Persian throne
Darius I wins the Persian throne and ushers in the heyday of the Achaemenid empire

518 BC Darius builds Persepolis
Darius starts to build a spectacular new palace and capital at Persepolis

500 BC Persian carpet in prince's tomb
A Persian rug, woven with a knotted pile, is placed in the tomb of a Scythian chieftain and survives to this day

500 BC Immortals in Persian army
The 10,000 elite troops of the Persian empire, known as the Immortals, demonstrate the power of a professional standing army

500 BC Darius builds road system
The great network of roads built by Darius I has at its centre the 2000-mile royal road from Susa to Sardis

500 BC Zoroastrian religion official in Persia
Darius I adopts Zoroastrianism as the religion of the Persian empire

500 BC Magi become Zoroastrian priests
The Magi, possibly converting from an earlier Iranian religion, become the priests of Zoroastrianism

500 BC Hockey played in Persia
Hockey, like polo, is a team game in the Persian empire

493 BC Persians recover Ionia
After six years the Persians recover control of Ionia, but Athens is now identified as a target for invasion

490 BC Persians send fleet against Greece
Darius sends a fleet across the Aegean, carrying a large army of infantry and cavalry for an attack on Athens

490 BC Persians go home
The Persian fleet moves south towards Athens, but then heads home across the Aegean without attempting an assault on the city

414 BC Persia funds Spartan fleet
The Persians, renewing their interest in the Aegean, fund the Spartans in the building of a fleet to match that of Athens

331 BC Alexander defeats Darius at Gaugamela
Moving northeast into Mesopotamia, Alexander again defeats Darius III (at Gaugamela), leaving Persia open to his advances

106 BC Silk Road open to Persia
A caravan leaves China with goods destined for Persia - proof that the eastern half of the Silk Road is now open

208 Ardashir is Persian king
Ardashir is crowned king of Fars - a first step towards his founding of the Sassanian dynasty in Persia

230 Ardashir in rock face
Ardashir, the Persian king, commissions a relief of himself in triumphant mood - carved high on a rock face at Naqsh-e Rustam

250 Mani sees two sides to everything
The Persian prophet Mani establishes the dualistic Manichaean religion

637 Muslims capture Ctesiphon
The Arabs defeat a Persian army at Kadisiya and then sack the city of Ctesiphon, effectively bringing to an end the Sassanian dynasty

644 Windmills in use in Persia
A document makes the first known reference to windmills, in use in Persia

800 Nestorians in Persia
Nestorian beliefs become the orthodoxy of the Christian community in Persia, spreading from there to India and China

866 Saffarids in Persia
The eastern part of the Persian empire comes under the control of the Saffarid dynasty

900 Zoroastrians become Parsees
Zoroastrians migrate from Muslim Persia to India, where they become known as Parsees

1010 Shah-nama of Firdausi
Firdausi completes his great chronicle of Persian history, the Shah-nama, which becomes established as Iran's national epic

1020 Avicenna in Isfahan
The Persian scholar Avicenna, author of encyclopedic works on philosophy and medicine, spends the last part of his life in Isfahan

1040 Seljuk victory at Dandanqan
The Seljuk Turks win a victory at Dandanqan, which gives them a base in the north of Iran and Afghanistan

1080 Omar Khayyámwrites quatrains
Omar Khayyám, mathematician and astronomer, writes four-line verses, or quatrains, in his spare time

1100 Assassins in Persia
The Assassins, a sect of Nizari Ismailis, begin to acquire strongholds in Persia

1256 Mongols invade Persia
Hulagu and his horde of Mongols cross the Amu Darya river and move against Muslim Persia

1257 Sa'di's Bustan
The Persian poet Sa'di publishes his Bustan ('Orchard'), a collection of moral tales in verse

1265 Mongol Il-khans in Persia
Hulagu and his Mongol descendants rule Persia as Il-khans, subordinate to the great khan in the east

1300 Persian miniatures in Tabriz
Tabriz under the Mongol Il-khans is the first centre of Persian miniature painting

1370 Hafiz and the ghazal
The Persian poet Hafiz perfects a form of short poem, the ghazal, dwelling on the pleasures of life with an undercurrent of Sufi mysticism

1450 Persian miniatures in Herat
Herat, under Timurid princes, succeeds Tabriz as the main centre of Persian art

1500 Bihzad and Persian painting
The lively realism of Kamal-ud-din Bihzad lays the basis of both the Persian and the Mughal schools of painting

1501 Safavid dynasty in Persia
The 14-year-old Ismail I is enthroned as shah of a new Persian dynasty, the Safavids

1587 Abbas I is shah
16-year-old Abbas I, subsequently one of the greatest of shahs, inherits the throne of Persia

1598 Isfahan new Persian capital
Shah Abbas builds up Isfahan as a spectacular new capital of the Persian empire

1736 Brigand on throne of Persia
The leader of a gang of tribal brigands seizes the Persian throne and takes the name Nadir Shah

1818 First Aga Khan
A leader of the Ismaili sect is granted, by the shah of Persia, the hereditary title of Aga Khan

1901 Stele of Hammurabi found
A stele is found at Susa, in Iran, giving the text of the Code of Hammurabi

1908 Oil in Iran
The Burman Oil Company, developing a concession granted in 1901 to William Knox D'Arcy, discovers oil in Iran

1921 Reza Khan leads Iran coup
An army officer, Reza Khan, becomes war minister after seizing control of Tehran with his Cossack brigade

1925 Reza Khan seizes throne
Reza Khan, by now prime minister of Iran, mounts a second coup to depose the last Qajar shah and begin his own Pahlavi dynasty

1941 August Reza Shah deposed
British and USSR troops invade Iran to depose the oil-rich Reza Shah, fearing that he may take the side of the Germans

1941 September 16 Shah's son succeeds in Iran
With British and Russian support, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi succeeds his deposed father as shah of Iran

1951 Mossadegh nationalizes oil fields
The new Iranian prime minister, Mohammed Mossadegh, passes the Oil Nationalization Act, seizing Britain's assets in the region

1953 Mossadegh removed from power
The Iranian prime minister Mohammed Mossadegh is removed from office in an armed coup sponsored by the CIA and Britain's MI6

1962 Khomeini launches campaign against Shah
Ruhollah Khomeini, a leading ayatollah in Qom, denounces the Shah of Iran and declares a fatwa against his regime

1963 Khomeini arrested
Ayatollah Khomeini is arrested in Qom, and imprisoned for eight months in Tehran, after instigating riots against the Shah

1964 Khomeini exiled
Ayatollah Khomeini, exiled by the shah from Iran, moves first to Turkey and then makes his base in Iraq

1978 Muslim demonstrations in Iran
Demonstrations take place throughout Iran, demanding Islamic rule under the leadership of Ayatollah Khomeini

1979 Shah flees from Iran
An Islamic revolution forces the Shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, to flee from Iran

1979 Khomeini returns to Iran
Ayatollah Khomeini receives a rapturous welcome on his return to Iran to head the Islamic Revolutionary Committee

1979 US embassy seized in Tehran
Supporters of Ayatollah Khomeini seize the US embassy in Tehran, taking hostage 66 US citizens

1980 US helicopters fail in Tehran rescue
A US helicopter mission fails disastrously in its attempt to rescue the embassy hostages in Tehran

1980 Iraq invades Iran
Saddam Hussein invades Iran, beginning an 8-year war that will bring massive human cost

1981 US hostages freed in Iran
Iran releases the US embassy hostages immediately after the end of Jimmy Carter's presidency

1985 Arms to Iran
President Reagan's administration breaks a US embargo with secret arms sales to Iran in return for assistance in the release of US hostages in Lebanon

1988 Fatwa against Rushdie
Ayatollah Khomeini declares a fatwa against Salman Rushdie for his Satanic Verses

1988 Iran-Iraq war ends
The Iran-Iraq war ends with the border between the countries unchanged and more than a million dead

1989 Khomeini succeeded by Khamenei
Ayatollah Khomeini dies and is succeeded by Sayed Ali Khamenei as Iran's leading ayatollah

2003 Massive earthquake in Iran
The historic city of Bam, in Iran, is destroyed in a massive earthquake, with more than 40,000 deaths

2005 Ahmadinejad is president
Fundamentalist politician Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is elected president of Iran

2005 Ahmadinejad calls for destruction of Israel
Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad causes international outrage by describing Israel as a blot that should be 'wiped off the map'