Mandane, daughter of Astyages of Media and mother of Cyrus the Great, embodies the dynastic hinge on which Iran’s first empire turned: a princess whose marriage to Cambyses I of Anshan fused Median prestige with Persian ascent. In the lore Herodotus preserves, ominous dreams shadow her childhood, prophecies that tried to restrain destiny yet heralded a son who would overturn it; in history’s reckoning, her lineage gave Cyrus a double claim—by birth to the Median house and by father to the Achaemenid line—legitimizing conquest as restoration. Through Mandane, two courts, two languages, and two noble traditions braided into a single sovereignty that would stride from the Zagros to the sea. As Queen of Spades she is the matriarchal root and right: the quiet authority of blood that made victory lawful, and gave empire a mother-tongue.