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it was originally intended to face the terrace up to the 

 superior level, and perhaps to erect thereon some great 

 structure. The whole, indeed, with the absence of in- 

 scriptions and sculptures on the tablet, suggests the idea 

 of a discontinued work. Local tradition states that the 

 famous artist Ferhad, to whom all the antient works 

 in this part of the country are attributed, was to have 

 built a palace on the terrace for the fair Shirtn, by order 

 of the king Khosru Parvtz, but that the work was in- 

 terrupted by the untimely death of the artist. Sir Robert 

 Ker Porter, however, is rather of opinion that it must 

 have been originally designed as the platform for a temple. 

 The absence of anything of a columnar form among the 

 materials for this structure, in a country where archi- 

 tectural fragments of this description abound on every 

 antient site, is thought by the same author to have occa- 

 sioned the name of Btsutun to be given to the place. The 

 word signifies ' without pillars ;' for sutun means a pillar 

 in Persian, and bi is the negative prefix. Kinneir con- 

 siders the term to have originated in the impending and 

 unsupported appearance of the cliff above the tablet. There 

 are also numerous fragments of columns at the distance of 

 a few miles on the road, so that Captain Keppel, instead of 

 considering the word to mean ' no pillars,' conjectures that 

 it may be a corruption of Bist-autun, or ' twenty pillars,' 

 in the same manner as the ruins of Persepolis are called by 

 the Persians Chehel-sutun, or ' forty pillars.' This con- 

 jecture is at least ingenious ; but although the writer of the 

 present article has also seen the bases and shafts of columns 

 on which this etymology is founded, his personal observa- 

 tions did not lead him to consider that they had any con- 

 nexion with the works at the spot which is properly deno- 

 minated Btsutfln. 



At the distance of about fifty yards from this platform, 

 immediately above the source of a clear stream which issues 

 from the mountain, there is a broad protruding mass of rock, 

 on which there are remains of an immense piece of sculptured 

 work, but so much defaced that it is scarcely possible to 

 make out one continued outline, although by close attention 

 parts of the rudely-chiselled forms of several colossal figures 

 may be traced. The exceedingly mutilated state of these 

 sculptures has been somewhat singularly produced. In the 

 first place, it appears that a large tablet had been raised in 

 the central portion of the work for the insertion of a Greek 

 inscription, and this again has given place to a recent in- 

 scription in the Persian character, relating to the grant of 

 lands for the support of a caravansera, which is immediately 

 opposite to it in the plain. This inscription, being long and 

 very closely written, has nearly obliterated that which pre- 

 ceded. Parts of two lines were, however, deciphered and 

 copied by Sir R. K. Porter, though with difficulty, as this 

 tablet is much higher up on the face of the mountain than 

 the former, and in a situation much more difficult of access. 



Kinneir is inclined to concur with the authorities which 

 attribute these works to Semiramis, and it is best to state 

 the grounds of this conjecture here, because it can scarcely 

 extend to the sculptures which remain to be noticed. In- 

 deed, the differences of opinion as to the date of these works 

 arose partly from its having been forgotten that it was not 

 necessary to suppose them all of the same sera. Diodorus 

 (II. 13), following Ctesias (whose residence at the Persian 

 court and his access to Persian documents entitle his state- 

 ments on such subjects to some respect), says that Semi- 

 ramis, on her march from Babylonia to Ecbatana, encamped 

 near a mountain called Bagistanon, in Media, where she 

 made a garden of twelve stadia in circuit, in a plain country 

 watered by a fountain. The mountain was dedicated to 

 Jupiter, and, towards the garden, had steep rocks seventeen 

 istadia in height. She smoothed the lowest part of the rock, 

 and caused her image to be sculptured on it, with a hundred 

 of her guards standing around her. Near this she also 

 caused an inscription to be made, in Syriac letters, recording 

 that Semiramis had ascended from the plain to the top of 

 the mountain, by heaping up the packs and fardels of the 

 beasts of burden that were with her. That this is to be 

 referred to Bisutun is argued from the consideration, that 

 it is really situated on the road to Ecbatana, which is cer- 

 tainly Hamadan ; that one side of the mountain fronts a 

 plain country watered by a small river, which winds round 

 the foot of the hill ; and that the rocks are really sculptured 

 in the manner described. The Assyrian queen and her 

 guards cannot indeed be discovered in the remaining sculp- 

 tures ; but their figures may have existed in the large piece, 



the sculptures of which have been obliterated to make room 

 for inscriptions. To these arguments some add the not im- 

 probable conjecture that the present name Bisutun may 

 be a corruption of the antient Bagistana, making allowance 

 for the exaggeration which converts 1500 feet into ] 7 stadia. 

 The identity of the sites is, to our minds, established ; and 

 while we feel willing to throw aside so much of the account 

 we have quoted as refers to Semiramis and her exploits, we 

 are rather surprised that no writer to whom we have referred 

 on the subject seems to have perceived that the real value 

 of the statement from Ctesias consists in its proving that 

 the sculptures not only existed in his time, but were even 

 then considered antient enough to be referred to the time 

 of Semiramis. 



Somewhat farther to the eastward, and at a greater 

 height on the smoothed surface of the rock, another sculp- 

 ture appears. It is in comparatively good preservation, and 

 from the superiority of its workmanship, and the general 

 resemblance to the sculptures at Persepolis, may be pre- 

 sumed nearly coeval with those celebrated specimens of 

 antient art. It exhibits a line of twelve erect figures, of 

 about half the size of life. One of them is a king or ge- 

 neral, distinguished by his more majestic stature, with two 

 armed attendants behind him. He holds a lance in his left 

 hand, and rests it, together with his left foot, upon the body 

 of a prostrate man who lies upon his back, and with out- 

 stretched hands seems imploring for mercy. Standing 

 thus, and holding up his right hand, with the two fore- 

 fingers extended, and the other two pressed down on the 

 palm, he seems addressing his commands or admonitions 

 to nine captives who stand before him, all of whom have 

 their hands tied behind their backs, and eight of whom are 

 united by a rope passed around their necks. The attitude 

 of the supposed monarch is full of majesty and grace; and 

 in Sir R. K. Porter's opinion, the varied expression in the 

 different faces may be regarded as almost equal to any 

 thing of the kind done by the chisel. There are two old 

 men among the captives ; the rest are middle-aged. The 

 exposed limbs of two of them, the outline of the dressed 

 figures, and the easy and natural motion with which they 

 advance, show no common measure of anatomical know- 

 ledge in the artist, who might, not improbably, be a Greek 

 in the service of a Persian king. In the centie of the 

 whole, above the heads of these persons, appears the aerial 

 personage who often appears in Persian sculptures, and 

 which is supposed to be the Ferwer, a spiritual prototype 

 of the king, which, according to the Zendavesta, always 

 hovers near him. 



Over the head of each individual in this bas-relief there 

 is a compartment, with an inscription in the arrow-headed 

 writing, most probably descriptive of the character and 

 situation of each person ; and immediately under the sculp- 

 ture there are two lines extending the whole length of the 

 group. Under these also there are eight deep and closely 

 written columns in the same character. We cannot learn 

 that these inscriptions have ever been copied ; nor would it 

 be of much use if they were. We are not wholly hopeless, 

 however, that some process may yet be discovered through 

 which we may be enabled to obtain the historical informa- 

 tion, which here and elsewhere is locked up in arrow-headed 

 inscriptions. (Sir Robert Ker Porter's Travels in Georgia, 

 Persia, fyc., vol. ii., which contains engravings of most of 

 the objects mentioned in this article ; Kinneir's Geogra- 

 phical Memoir of the Persian Empire ; Erdmann, De Ex- 

 peditione Russorum Berdaam versus, Casan. 1832, t. iii. 

 pp. 86-96 ; Keppel's Personal Narrative, &c.) 



BESSARA'BIA, the most south-western province of the 

 Russian empire, consists of those portions of Turkey lying 

 between the Dniester and the Pruth which were wrested 

 from the Turks by the treaty of Bucharest in 1812; 

 they previously formed the north-eastern part of Mol- 

 davia and the Budjak, or Bessarabia Proper, and now con- 

 stitute, under the Russians, one of the provinces in- 

 cluded in what is designated ' The Southern Region.' An 

 addition of much importance in a political point of view has 

 since been made to it under the treaty of Adrianople, in 

 1829 : we here allude to the large islands which are formed 

 by the three mouths of the Danube, denominated the Kili, 

 Suline, and St. George's Channels. The Pruth, therefore, 

 and the easternmost line of the Danube, from the point 

 where the Pruth falls into it, to the Black Sea, form the 

 present boundary between Russia and Turkey in Europe. 



Bessarabia Proper, also called the ' Steppe of the Budjak,' 



2 A t 



