Rev. Epwarp Hincxs on Persepolitan Writing. 119 
ments. Even in the inscriptions of Darius, there seems to be one instance, at 
least, of a character representing a syllable. I allude to the name which is in 
one place written Shuguda, and in another Ség(w)da; where the secondary 
form of g preceding w must, I think, be read syllabically gv. In the inscription 
of Artaxerxes Ochus, the secondary form of w before 7 is used more than once 
to express the syllable wi, as is the secondary form of m for mi. The knowledge 
which we now possess of the strictly syllabic nature of II. enables us to account, 
in the most satisfactory manner, for all these anomalies. An old custom, though 
discountenanced at court, is not easily eradicated from a people, and will occa- 
sionally shew itself. I should add that there are two instances of double letters 
regularly used in I. Instead of a secondary form of ¢ to be used before 7, analo- 
gous to 19, the secondary form of p before 7, I. used 34 to express the combina- 
tion ¢r. The character 15, too, which is used with 8 (7) to express “king,” has 
been supposed by Westergaard to be rp, thus giving the word narpa, from 
nar, “a man,” and pa, “to defend,” a compound which is said to be used in 
Sanscrit. 
4. I now come to consider the errors which Lassen has committed in 
respect to the powers of individual letters. There have been, as yet, thirty-three 
characters met with, exclusive of double letters and contractions, such as é7 and rp. 
I arrange these as three vowels, nineteen primary consonants, and eleven secon- 
dary consonants. As to the vowels, sixteen of the primary consonants, and nine 
of the secondary ones, the only objection that can possibly be raised to Lassen’s 
values is, that he does not give the same values to the nine last as to the corres- 
ponding primary characters, but imagines distinct values for them. There remain 
five characters, three primary, and two secondary, of which Lassen’s values at 
least need to be verified ; and as to one of these, that numbered 10, it has been 
proved by Holtzmann, in the clearest manner, that his value is altogether wrong ; 
that it is related, as a secondary letter before 7, to d and not to k’, or ch. Of the 
other four I will endeavour to settle the values in what follows, But though 
Lassen has given correct values to the sixteen primary consonants in question, 
they are not always such as suggest their pronunciation to an Englishman. I will, 
therefore, substitute other values for them adapted to England. The alphabet will 
then stand thus, the first value of each character being Lassen’s and the second 
my own. As to the vowels and semivowels I refer to the observations already 
