Identifier: mediababylonpers00ragouoft (find matches)
Title: Media, Babylon and Persia : including a study of the Zend-Avesta or religion of Zoroaster, from the fall of Nineveh to the Persian war
Year: 1889 (1880s)
Authors: Ragozin, Zénaïde A. (Zénaïde Alexeïevna), 1835-1924
Subjects: Zoroastrianism Iran -- History Babylon (Extinct city) -- History
Publisher: London : T. Fisher Unwin New York : G.P. Putnam's Sons
Contributing Library: Robarts - University of Toronto
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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Baby-lonian monuments are the Persian ones, and, like thecylinders, somewhat posterior to the time our his-tory has reached, indeed still later, since we owethem to Persian kings, successors of Kyros. Themost important one for the point now under exami-nation is the famous RocK OF Behistun or BlSU-TUN, or rather the inscription engraved on that rockby Dareios, second successor of Kyros, and afterhim the greatest of the Akha;menians. The rock,noticed from very ancient times on account of itsisolated position and peculiar shape, rises nearlyperpendicular to a height of 1700 feet, the moststriking feature of the road from Hamadan (ancientAgbatana) to Baghdad, and near the modern townof KiRMANSHAH. On the straightest and smoothestface of the rock Dareios determined to perpetuate,by means of sculpture and writing, the great deedsof his reign. The monument was to be absolutely * Tintir,—the most ancient name of Babylon, in the Accadian, orpre-Semitic period ; see Story of Chaldea, p. 216.
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284 MEDIA, nABYLON, AND PllRSIA. indestructible, and, first of ;dl, inaccessible to thesacrilegious hand of invader or domestic foe. Thiswas so well secured by the height at which the workwas executed—over 300 feet from the base,—thatit could be scarcely got at for the purpose of study-ing or copying it. Indeed, the French scholars,Messrs. Flandin and Coste, after many attempts, gaveup the task, which it was the glory of Sir Henry—then Major—Rawlinson, with the help ( field-glassessuccessfully to achieve, at the cost of three yearslabor (1844-1847)—infinite hardships and dangers,and an outlay of over five thousand dollars. Howthe artists and engravers originally ever got to theplace, is a question which the steepness of the ascentmakes very puzzling, unless there were some prac-ticable paths which were cut away subsequently;and even then they could not have worked withoutladders and scaffoldings. Besides, the rock had toundergo an elaborate preliminary preparation

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