Persia from the Earliest Period to the Arab

98 HISTORY OF PERSIA.
three different types, arranged in parallel lines; the
Persian occupying the first place or that furthest to
the left.
Other inscriptions referring to Darius, but of later
date, have been found at Nakhsh-i-Rustam, near Per-
sepolis : on these we find a somewhat longer list of
conquered nations ; and, if " the Scythians beyond the
Sea " is an allusion to the famous expedition of Darius,
these could not have been finished before B.C. 492.
There is one of the inscriptions (the upper one in
Persian) containing nearly sixty lines, in tolerable
preservation. We owe to the zeal of M. Westergaard,
aided by a powerful telescope, the best copy of these
inscriptions, which have been translated by Sir H. C.
Rawlinson and M. Lassen, and are, in sense, sub-
stantially the same as that at Alwand. Besides these,
there is a short inscription of Darius, on a very beauti-
ful cylinder, in the British Museum, one of the finest
known specimens of Persian gem engraving, and on a
stone found near the embouchure of the ancient canal
leading from the Nile to the Red Sea.
The inscriptions of Xerxes, the son and successor
of Darius, though numerous, have little of variety
or interest. They are found at Alwand, at Perse-
polis and at Van, and commence generally with the
invocation to Ormazd, and the formal declaration of
the royal name and titles adopted in the previous reign.
We are not able to determine their chronological
order; but with reference to the inscriptions found
near Ecbatana, Sir H. C. Rawlinson observes, " that they
were probably engraved on the occasion of one of the
annual journeys which the monarchs respectively made