Rather than one single empire, the Persian Empire was, in fact, a series of empires which ruled over the Western Asiatic in antiquity. These empires include the Median empire (8th-6th century B.C.), the Achaemenid Empire (6th -4th century B.C.), the Parthian Empire (3rd century BC – 3rd century A.D.) and the Sassanian Empire (3rd – 7th centuries A.D.). Because Persian art was produced by a wide range of civilizations over more than millennia, it is far from uniform. However, certain motifs, such as the hunt and the glorification of leaders, run throughout.