Ancient history from the monuments

Front matter

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Chapter I

Cyrus — Croesus — War in North-east Asia — Fall of Babylon — • Tomb of Cyrus — Cambyses — Pseudo-Bardes — Darius— Campaign in Scythia — Home at Susa — Inscription and Coin of Pythagoras — Burning of Sardis — Second Invasion of Europe — Marathon Page 16

Chapter II

Xerxes — Canal of Athos — Thermopylae — Salamis — Artaxerxes I. — Darius II. — Artaxerxes II. — Cyrus the Younger — Ochus — Darius III. — Alexander — Graneikus — Issus — Visit to Jerusalem — Arbela , Page 46

Chapter IV

Tomb of Cyrus — Inscriptions of Darius — Behist&n — V&n, &c. — Inscriptions of Xerxes — Artaxerxes, &c. — Persepolis — Istakhr — Susa — Tomb of Darius Page 87

Chapter V

Arsacidae — Arsakes I — Tiridates I — Artabanus I — Mithradates I — Phraates II — Scythian Invasion- -Mithradates II — Progress of the Romans — Orodes — Crassus — Pompey — Antony — Tiridates, son of Vologases— Trajanus — Avidius Cassius — Severus — Artabanus — Battle of Nisibis Page 123

Chapter VI

Sassanidse — Ardashir I. — Shahpiir I. — Valerian — Odsenathus — Varahran II. — Tiridates of Armenia — Galerius — Narses — Shahpiir II. — Zu'laktaf — Julian III. — Firuz I. — Nushirwan — Mauricius — Khosrii II. — Heraclius — Muhammed — Yezdigird III. — Muhammedan Conquest — Sassanian Monuments at Nakhshi-Rustam, Nakhsh-i-Regib, Shahpiir, Takht-i-Bostan — Mr. Thomas's interpretation of the inscriptions at Hajiabad.

LIST OF DYNASTIES.

[Occasionally, these dates are only approximate : it has not been thought necessary to insert the names of rulers who ruled for less than a year.]

I. EARLY PERSIAN (ACH/EMENIDiE).

B.C.

Cambyses I

Cyrus 558

Cambyses II 529

Pseudo-Smerdis (Bar-

Darius 1 521

B.C.

Xerxes 486

Artaxerxes I (Longi-

manus) 465

Darius II (Nothus) 425-24 Artaxerxes II (Mnemon) 405

Artaxerxes III

(Ochus) 359

Darius III (Codo-

mannus) 336

(Battle of Arbela).... 331

2 ARSACID^.

[Each of these princes bore also the dynastic title of Arsakes ; hence Mithiadates I is the same as Arsakes VI.]

B.C.

Arsakes about 250

Tiridates 1 247

Artabanus I._ 214

Priapatius 196

Phraates 1 181

Mithradates 1 174

Phraates II 136

Artabanus II 128-7

Mithradates II 124

(Mnaskyres) f

Sanatroces 76

Phraates III 66

B.C.

Mithradates III 60

Orodes 1 56-55

Phraates IV 37

Phraataces 1 dates doubt- Orodes II J ful.

Vonones I.. .date doubtful A.D.

Artabanus III 16

Gotarzes ~| dates doubt .

Vardanes > f u | Vonones II j Vologases I 51

A.D.

Pacorus II 78?

Mithradates IV 107

Chosroes 113

Vologases II 130

Vologases III 149

Vologases IV 191

Vologases V f

Artabanus IV 415?

(Battle of Hormazd and death of Artabanus IV) 226

A.D.

Ardashirl (Babekan) 226

Shahpur 1 240

Hormazd 1 273

Varahran 1 274

Varahran II 277

Varahran 111 294

Narses 294

Hormazd II 303

Shahpur II (Zu'luktuf) 310

SASSANID.ffi.

A.D.

Ardashir II 381

Shahpur III 385

Varahran IV (Ker-

man-Shah) 390

Yezdigird 1 404

Varahran V (Gaur).. 420

Yezdigird II 448

Hormazd III 458

Firiiz 458

Palash 484

A.D.

Kobad 488

Jamasp 498

Khosru I (Nushir-

Hormazd IV 579

Khosru II (Parviz)... 591 Kobad II (Sheruyieh) 628

Yezdigird III 632

(Overthrown by the

Musulmans) 641

FROM THE EARLIEST PERIOD TO THE OVERTHROW OF ITS NATIVE DYNASTIES BY THE MUHAMMEDANS.

Introduction

The history of Persia; as generally understood, may be considered as a supplement to that of Assyria and Babylonia, the events that have made her most famous in antiquity having been achieved after the empire of the first had passed away, and the second had been subjugated by the Persians.

The small province of Persis (in the Bible Paras, in the native inscriptions Parsd), whence the name of Persia is derived, was bounded on the north by Media, on the south by the Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean, on the east by Caramania (Kerman), and on the west by Susiana. It was, indeed, nearly the same district as the modern Farsistan, the name of which is obviously derived from it ; and in length and breadth not more than 450 and 250 miles respectively.

With regard to the population which occupied this district at the earliest historical period, it is certain from the Cuneiform inscriptions, that they were not the original dwellers in the district, but themselves immigrants, though it is not so certain whence. It would lead us too far a-field to discuss here the wide question of the settlement of the nations after the Biblical Flood, confirmed so remarkably as this is by Mr. George Smith's recent discoveries. Moreover, it is not possible to fill up, except conjecturally, many wide spaces, both of time and territory. Admitting, however, the existence of a Deluge, such as that recorded in Holy Writ, a long period must have elapsed before the different families of mankind had arranged themselves in the groups and in the districts we find them occupying at the dawn of history.

There are reasonable grounds for thinking the highlands of Central Asia the historical cradle of the Japhetic race ; whether, with some writers, we conceive this mountainous region to be the Alpine plateau of Little Bokhara, or, with others, the great chain south and south-west of the Caspian Sea : the first theory suits best for a descent into India; the second for a migration into Europe.*

The former view, taken broadly, is confirmed by the early Persian traditions preserved in the two first chapters of the Vendidad, (though this compilation as we now have it, is very modern), an outline, in

* I venture to think it unwise to attempt, with Clinton and other learned chronologists, to space out the time occupied for each settlement or movement of the nations after the Flood, or to attempt to ascertain the number of the population of pre-historic Asia. For such speculations, we have, assuredly, no reliable data.

the judgment of Heeren, so evidently historical, as to require nothing but sufficient geographical knowledge for the identification of the places therein mentioned. Whether any of these traditional legends are really due to Zoroaster (Zaratrusthra), [indeed whether a Zoroaster ever lived], is of little importance : but this much, however, is certain that they enshrine fragments of the most ancient belief of the Persians. Thus, they describe as the original seat of the Persian race, a delicious country named Eriene-Veedjo, the first creation of Ormuzd, the Spirit of Good, with a climate of seven months of summer and five of winter. But Ahriman, the Spirit of Evil, smote this land with the plague of ever-increasing cold, till at last it had only two months of summer to ten of winter. Hence, the people quitted their ancient homes, Ahriman having, for fifteen successive times, thwarted the good works of Ormuzd, and having, by one device or another, rendered each new abode uninhabitable. The names of these abodes are given and some of them may be even now identified ; and there can be little doubt, that they indicate a migration from the north-east towards the south and south-west, that is, from the Hindu-Kush westward to Media and Persia. The original situation of Eriene, a name of the same origin as the modern Iran (and possibly of Erin or Ireland), would, on this supposition, be to the north of the western chains of the Himalaya, a country enjoying a short summer, and great extremes of heat and cold.

IO HISTORY OF PERSIA.

Such, briefly, is the legendary "story of Persia, which it is best to leave as it is. As, however, I shall have again to refer to what has been called the creed of Zoroaster, that is, the theory of the separate existence of principles of good and evil, I must give the substance of what is most usually acknowledged about him and the religious system named after him. Those who care for fuller details can consult the Zend-avesta * as first published by Anquetil Du Perron, and the various commentaries or modifications of it, suggested by the studies of M. M. Westergaard, Spiegel, Haug, Burnouf, Oppert, and others.

I do not myself doubt that Zoroaster, whether or not a king (as some have held), was truly a teacher and reformer, and, further, that his religious views represent the reaction of the mind against the mere worship of nature, tending as this does, directly, to polytheism and to the doctrine of "Emanations." It is, I think, equally evident that such views embody the highest struggle of the human intellect (unaided by Revelation) towards spiritualism, and that they are, so far, an attempt to create a religious system by the simple energies of human reason. Hence their general direction is towards a pure monothe-

* Zend-Avesta, more correctly Avesta-u-Zend, i. e. text and commentary, The fragments we now have are not older, if so old, as A. D. 226, when Ardashir I., founded the Sassanian Empire in Persia. Of the twenty-one books said to have been then collected, one only, the Vendidad (Vidse-vadata), " the law against demons," has been preserved nearly entire. (Dr. Haug, Essays, &c, Bombay, 1862.)

ism; and, had no evil existed in the world, the theory embodying them would have remained unassailed and logically successful. On this rock, however, all the spiritual theories of early times necessarily split. Zoroaster or his disciples halted where all must halt who have not the light from on high, the one sure support of Jew and Christian alike. They could not believe that God, the good, the just, the pure, and the perfect, would have placed evil in a world he must have created good, like himself: hence, as evil is none the less ever present, they were forced to imagine a second creator, Ahriman, the author of evil, and to give him, during the present existence, equal power with that wielded by the Spirit of Good. They held, however (and this is a most important part of Zoroastrianism), that a day would come when the powers of evil would be finally annihilated, and the truth be reinstated, never again to fail. I ought to add that the modern Parsees, whether of Jezd in Persia or of Bombay, do not represent the purity of the original Zoroastrian faith, their views being essentially pantheistic, in that they substitute emanation for creation and confound the distinction of good and evil, by making both spring from one creative principle.

Of the two other great races who take their names respectively from Ham and Shem, it is enough to state here that modern philology attributes to Ham the Cushite tribes of Arabia and Ethiopia, the Egyptians, Philistines, Canaanites*, and the Berber

* I venture myself to doubt whether the Philistines and Canaanraces of North Africa, with, probably, some of the primeval inhabitants of Southern India (the Nishadas) and the most remote peoples of Northern Europe as the Finns.

In like manner, the Shemitic population seems from the earliest period to which they can be traced back, to have occupied nearly the same abodes as in later times, viz : — the range of country from Armenia (Arphaxad) over Assyria and Babylonia, to the southern end of Arabia. That there may have been in the southern part of the same country a still earlier race, the Accadians, I do not doubt.

Certain broad characteristics have been accepted as distinguishing in a remarkable manner each of these races. Thus the so-called Hamites appear, universally, as the pioneers of material civilization, with a great power over some elements of knowledge, but with an equally entire absence of all elevating ideas. Their former presence is recognised in the foundations of states by brute force, and by the execution of gigantic works in stone, like Stonehenge, Carnac, &c, if, indeed, these monuments are, as has been usually maintained, attributable to so remote a period. Along, however, with this material grandeur, we find the grossest forms of natureworship ; while so remarkably have the Hamite

ites were the same race ; certainly from what we know of them they differ greatly in character. I incline to think the Philistines the same as, or connected with, the Phoenicians and, if so, Shemites : on the other hand, the Canaanites may be Hamites ; but anyhow, of a different origin.

population fallen into the background or disappeared, in comparison with the other races, that we are forcibly reminded of the prophetic words, " Cursed be Canaan (or Ham), a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren ;" and again, "Blessed be the Lord God of Shem, and Canaan shall be his servant."*

In striking contrast to the Hamites, the Japhetic peoples appear everywhere as the promoters of moral as well as of intellectual civilization. As a rule, practisers of agriculture rather than hunters, with fixed abodes in preference to tents, their several dialects (now easily traceable by comparative philology) amply confirm the early existence among them of institutions fitted to raise human beings above the "beasts that perish."

Hence we find them, in the most remote ages, planting corn and feeding on meat instead of on acorns and berries, contracting marriages by fixed and settled forms, resisting polygamy, and protecting their wives with the veneration Tacitus so much admired in the German tribes of his day. To them, also, is due the institution of the Family and of a Religion, at first, as shown by the Vedic hymns, a pure Theism — the worship of one God, — though with an early and natural tendency to "emanations" and their ultimate result, Polytheism. One of the hymns of the Rig-veda (according to Professor Max Muller) explains with singular clearness the progress of this change, in the words, "The wise men give many names to the Being who is One. ' ' Sacrifices to please or propitiate the powers thus separatelydeified, were the natural but later developments of the Polytheistic idea.

The characteristics of the third or great Shemite* race, stand out in equally bold relief against the dark background of material Hamitism, though, like the other early races, they too, at times, exhibited abundant and luxuriant forms of idolatry. In these, generally, we find a moral and spiritual eminence superior to the best which the Japhetic races have worked out, while to one of them, the Jews, we owe the guardianship of that Book, in which alone we find religious subjects dealt with in a language of adequate sublimity; the one volume, indeed, to which we can refer with unhesitating faith as containing, though with tantalizing brevity, all that is certain of the origin of the human race. It is satisfactory to know that, though, naturally, the tenth chapter of the book of Genesis, — the Toldoth-beni- Noah, or roll-call of the sons of Noah, in other words, of the nations, — has been discussed in innumerable volumes, has been in fact the battleground of believers as well as of infidels, the main outline there traced is confirmed in all essential particulars by recent Assyrian discoveries. It is quite worth the while of any scholar to look back at the interpretation given to it by the learned Bochart,

* It has been long the fashion to talk of the Semitic nations, languages, &c., but Shemite, Shemitic, is the correct form. Shem means " name," much like the Greek cn)n a - two centuries and a half ago ; he will, I think, be surprised to see how much of what that great Frenchman proposed so long ago, is still admitted by the more complete investigations of the comparatively new science of philology.

Chapter I

Cyrus — Crcesus — War in North-east Asia — Fall of Babylon — Tomb of Cyrus — Cambyses — Pseudo-Bardes — Darius — Campaign in Scythia — Home at Susa— Inscription and Coin of Pythagoras — Burning of Sardis — Second Invasion of Europe — Mardonius and Datis — Marathon.

Having said so much by way of introduction, I now proceed to give some account of what we know of Persia historically (from the sixth century b. c. to the seventh century A. D.), and of the monuments still therein attesting its former grandeur. Now, first, it may be noted that there is no mention of Persia in the tenth chapter of Genesis, or in the Zend-avesta, nor does this name occur on any Assyrian monument before the ninth century b. c. On the other hand, the list in this chapter places the Madai or Medes among the sons of Japhet, which, as Aryans, is their right position. The natural inference is, that those Aryan tribes who were subsequently called Persians, had not yet descended so far to the south, but were still clinging to the steeps of the Taurus. A little later, the inscriptions of Shalmaneser show that they had reached Armenia, but, as only petty chiefs are recorded, it is probable that their government had not yet crystallized into a settled monarchy. Later however, under Sennache- 16 rib, the Perso-Aryans had reached the Zagros, and, thence, their further descent by the defiles of the Bakhtyari mountains into Persis was comparatively easy and rapid, though their migrations perhaps did not cease till near the close of the great empire of Assyria. The Aryan Medes had, on the other hand, held for many years a prominent place among the Western Asiatic populations, and it is likely that the Persian tribes acknowledged the superiority of the Median monarch, much as at the present day the Khedive of Egypt acknowledges the supreme rule of the Sultan of Turkey, in other words, that the ruler of Persis was the chief feudatory of the Median empire. It must not however be forgotten, that Darius the son of Hystaspes claims for his own house, the possession of a kingdom with eight immediate predecessors, he himself being the ninth, a claim he could hardly have put forth publicly had there been at the time any doubt about it. The Median empire appears to have been established about B. c. 647, just when the adjoining nations were marshalling their forces to put an end to Nineveh, which had so long ruled them with a rod of iron ; while, from this statement of Darius, it is further probable that there were tributary kings in Persis up to about the same period.

Darius himself asserts that the first king of Persia was called Achsemenes, a statement confirmed by the well-known fact that the Achaemenidas were acknowledged as the leading family among the Persians. Indeed, as Professor Rawlinson has well remarked, in

B l8 HISTORY OF PERSIA.

the East, an ethnic name is very often derived from that of one person, as in the case of Midianite, Moabite, from Midian and Moab. But though there can be little doubt that Persian history may be deemed historical from the time of Cambyses, the father of Cyrus, there is nothing really worth recording till we come to Cyrus himself, under whom Persia takes the place in Western Asia, erst held by the Shemitic empires of Assyria and Babylon.

How Cyrus attained to this pre-eminence has been much discussed ; but we do not really want more than the notice in the Bible, which is remarkably clear and graphic : " Then I lifted up mine eyes, and saw, and, behold, there stood before the river a ram which had two horns : and the two horns were high ; but one was higher than the other, and the higher came up last. I saw the ram pushing westward, and northward, and southward ; so that no beasts might stand before him, neither was there any that could deliver out of his hand ; but he did according to his will, and became great." * And again, ''The ram which thou sawest having two horns are the kings of Media and Persia, "f

It has been argued by Heeren (indeed this was the common view put forward by writers fifty years ago), that the rise of Cyrus was similar to that of many other personages in Eastern history, in fact, nothing but the successful uprising of a rude mountain tribe of nomad habits. But the history of Cyrus implies something more than this, for the revolution in which he was the chief actor, was obviously in some degree a religious revolt. Cyrus was, we know, a zealous adherent to the Zoroastrian faith in the unity of God ; and had been brought up at a court, where Magism, or the worship of the elements, prevailed. Cyrus must have felt this yoke a galling one, alike for himself and for his countrymen, while he was doubtless stimulated to greater efforts by the weakness of the Median ruler, Astyages. It is also likely that he fled the court of the Median king from a natural disgust at the falsity and frivolity he saw around him ; the war which ensued between him and Astyages being, perhaps, at first, scarcely anticipated, the more so, that the Persians of pure blood must have been but a small minority of the whole Medo- Persian population. The conflict was indeed at first doubtful, but in the end, Astyages having been thoroughly beaten, Pasargadas became the capital, and Zoroastrianism the established religion of the now combined Perso-Median empire.

The action of Cyrus was simply in accordance with the universal habits of a race iconoclastic in principle and in deed. Wherever the Persians carried their victorious arms, they burnt and destroyed the temples of their nature-worshipping enemies. The ruins of the temples in Egypt, at Sardis and at Athens, and of the statues on the Sacred Way of Branchidse, attest the measure of their religious hatreds, rather than their ruthlessness as barbarians. Hence a natural bond of union between the Persians and the

Jews, as they were at that time the only nations supporting pure Theism. In aiding the restoration of the Jews, Cyrus knew he was upholding a faith with much resemblance to his own, and the same motives influenced Darius, in completing the rebuilding of the temple after it had been temporarily interrupted by the rebellion of the Magian Pseudo-Smerdis.* Nor were the Jews forgetful of the support they had received from the Persian monarchs, as they adhered firmly to them.

On the effect produced by the substitution of Cyrus for Astyages, of a Persian for a Median, history has left no definite trace, perhaps, because such a change must have had but little effect on the bulk of the conquered people. Indeed the establishment of the Zoroastrian system would scarcely have been an offence to any but the Magian priesthood who, thereby, lost their occupation. Iconoclastic abroad, the Persians were, on the whole tolerant at home ; moreover the higher classes of the Medians probably cared little what form of worship was professed at court. That the union of the two empires was soon complete is clear, from the number of nativeborn Medians whom Cyrus selected for his generals and chief officials.

Having united the " Medes and Persians," Cyrus at once contemplated making his empire the foremost in Asia ; and for the first steps he took he had

* Ezra i. 5; Haggai i. 14; Ezra vi. 8, 9. Josephus, however, states that the building of the city and temple had also been stopped during the reign of Cambyses. — Ant. Jud. xi. 2.

pretext enough to satisfy the conscience of any Asiatic chieftain. Without going into details on a portion of history well known to all readers of Herodotus and Xenophon, it is enough to state here that, owing to the invasion and ultimate repression of a horde of Cimmerian nomads from the North, a war of considerable dimensions had taken place a few years before between Asia Minor and Media, in which the final struggle is said to have been stopped by the eclipse predicted by Thales. The conquests of Cyrus naturally tended to fan the flame, and so much alarmed the then chief ruler in Asia Minor, Crcesus of Lydia, that he was induced to seek the alliance of Greece, Egypt, and Babylon, though, whether with the view of attacking Cyrus or of repelling an invasion by him, is not certain. On the other hand, Cyrus acted at once, and, with the decision of an able general, closed on the Lydian king before he could receive the sought-for aid, and thus put an end, in the briefest manner, to the separate existence of the kingdom of Croesus, who remained for more than thirty years the guest of himself and of successive Persian monarchs. Nor was this all ; the conquest of the rest of Asia Minor, by the aid of his Median generals Harpagus and Mazares immediately followed, while we may believe that the proposed alliance of Crcesus with Babylon and Egypt was not forgotten when Cyrus had leisure to turn against these powers his conquering legions.

The next period of the life of Cyrus is involved in obscurity, and we know little more than that he was engaged in a series of wars, of the actual motives of which we are uninformed, with the Bactrians and other tribes of North-east Asia, which lasted for thirteen or fourteen years. As Arrian however places a Cyropolis (elsewhere called Cyreschata) on the Jaxartes, we may presume that even Sogdiana fell under the sway of Cyrus. Again, as we find traces of him to the extreme north-east, as far as the territory, believed to be that of the Sacae, and also to the south-east and south, in Seistan (Sacastene) and Khorasan, we must suppose that, at various intervals, he overran the whole district between the Jaxartes on the north, the Indus on the east, and the Indian Ocean on the south. Perhaps too, as suggested by Professor Rawlinson, these wars really resembled the annual out-marches recorded of the kings of Assyria, rather than a sustained and continuous campaign of many years' duration.

The most remarkable event, however, of the life of Cyrus is his conquest of Babylonia, the more so that he appears here in direct connection with a portion of the Bible history, which is, I believe, accepted as true by some who doubt almost everything else. "It was not," says Professor Rawlinson, "till B.C. 539, when he was nearly sixty years of age, that the Persian monarch felt himself free to turn his attention to the great kingdom of the south;" and, though the accounts of this expedition vary, they may on the whole be harmonized without much difficulty. According to Herodotus, on his march from Ecbatana towards Babylon, Cyrus was delayed a whole summer and autumn in punishing, by the division of its stream into 360 smaller channels, the river Gyndes, in which one of the sacred white horses had been accidentally drowned ; an act apparently silly, but perhaps intended, either to afford his army the opportunity of wintering in a mild climate under tents, or, what is more likely, done with the view of misleading the Babylonians as to the nature of the proposed attack.

Few details have been preserved of the actions of Cyrus after passing the Gyndes, but it is agreed that Nabonidus, the then King of Babylon, on his defeat, threw himself into the adjacent town of Borsippa, leaving his youthful son Belshazzar,* to defend the great city itself as best he could. And in this Belshazzar might have been successful, had not Cyrus drawn off the waters of the Euphrates by cutting several canals above the city, so as to make the river shallow and fordable.

The accounts of the actual taking of Babylon, in the Bible, Xenophon, and Herodotus mainly agree ; nor, indeed, can we doubt that Cyrus was aware of an approaching festival in which the whole population would be engrossed, though he could hardly

* This name, slightly modified as Bil-shar-uzur, occurs on three cylinders found at " Ur of the Chaldees," by Mr. John Taylor: it is certain that he was the eldest son of Nabunit (Nabonidus in Berosus, Labynetus in Herodotus), and that he governed Babylon on his father's retirement to Borsippa. The reading by Sir Henry Rawlinson of this name is unquestionable ; it has moreover been similarly read by M. Oppert on cylinders found at Abu Shahrein in Lower Chaldsea.

have expected that the gates would have been left wholly unguarded. Babylon, as we know from Herodotus, was surrounded by enormous walls and a wet ditch, while, recently, Nabonidus had lined the sides of the river with other and similar walls, the bricks of which bear his name in Cuneiform characters, moreover had also added brazen gates for a further protection.

Cyrus, then, having prepared his trenches, quietly abided his time ; till, at length, when the night of the festival came round, finding the water sufficiently shallow, he entered the city through the river gates, which had been incautiously left open, and, in a brief period, carried all before him : then it was, as we are told, that messengers ran to and fro " to show the king of Babylon that his city was taken at one end. ' ' * When morning came Cyrus found himself master of the great city, and a Shemitic emperor had ceased to rule in "Babylon the glory of the Chaldees' excellency." Not long after, on the surrender of Borsippa, the old monarch Nabonidus was sent to Carman ia; but whether as its viceroy we are not informed. It is fair to suppose that, though Belshazzar was but a youth, and naturally, therefore, little if at all skilled in war, he would, but for this coup de main, have prevented a town, in size representing a fortified territory, falling so readily to an enemy probably not better provided for a lengthened siege than were the Assyrians of old.

* Jerem. xi. 31.

The fall of Babylon led to two immediate results: viz. the transference of the ancient Shemitic idolatrous empire, to the Zoroastrian Persians, and the restoration of the Jews.* It is indeed not possible to discuss here the motives of Cyrus for this latter act ; which may well have been of a mixed kind : thus while he would naturally have been strongly interested in the only monotheistical people dwelling near him, he must as naturally have desired to secure Jewish neutrality, if not active support, in the designs he had already entertained against Egypt, f What, however, strikes one as extraordinary is, that he did not, so far as is recorded, take any steps to reduce Phoenicia, though, in a war with Egypt, the resources of that remarkable country would have told more against him than any opposition on the part of the Jews.