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THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



Photograph by Harold F. Weston 



FALLEN AND NEGLECTED, THE GUARDIAN LION OF HAMADAN STILL RECEIVES 

 LIBATIONS FROM CHILDLESS WOMEN 



This battered stone image, the only sculptural relic left at Hamadan, was spoken of by 

 Masucli, over a thousand years ago, as "very ancient." Numerous legends and traditions are 

 attached to this lion — pilgrims visit it and childless women pour oil upon its brow to remove 

 the curse of sterilitv. 



grazing on the near-by hills ; their cara- 

 van was to move on with the setting sun. 



AMONG THE RUINS OF THE GOLDEN 

 PALACES OF DARIUS AND XERXES 



Delay in transport at Hamadan caused 

 a never-to-be-forgotten w r eek in one of 

 the American M ission homes and pro- 

 vided ample time for climbing Alt. El- 

 wend (about 12,000 feet) and exploring 

 the historical sites. Queen Esther's sup- 

 posed tomb is thoroughly uninteresting, 

 and so is the Musallah, the renowned 

 Median Acropolis, unless redecked by 

 your imagination with the departed 

 splendors of antiquity. 



The crumbling mound of the Musallah 

 was the site of the palaces of the kings of 

 the Medes and Persians, of the summer 

 capital of Darius, of the golden temple of 

 Xerxes, of the seven-walled citadel over- 

 looking Ekbatana (each wall tiled with a 

 different color, the inner two being silver 

 and gold). 



1 1 ere the gold and the treasures from 

 sacked Nineveh were brought by the vic- 



torious Medes ; here Cyrus carried the 

 untold riches of Croesus ; here Darius 

 found the decree of Cyrus ordering the 

 rebuilding of the Temple at Jerusalem; 

 here Alexander the Great reveled on his 

 return from the conquest of India. 



Once mighty pillars and lofty halls 

 stood here, and now there is nothing left 

 but a mound of rubble, bits of hewn rock, 

 and small pieces of pottery, a few pits 

 where treasure-seekers have dug, and, on 

 the summit of the mound, the machine- 

 gun trenches used alternately early in the 

 World War by the Russians, Turks, and 

 Russians. 



From the pomp and splendor of the 

 court of the Achaemenian kings at the 

 height of their glory to the sentinel's im- 

 placable tread or the rat-a-tat of the ma- 

 chine-guns of foreign armies fighting on 

 neutral soil — such has been the descent of 

 Persia. 



PICTURES OF PERSIANS AND SHY MAIDENS 



When I sketch, if near a town, I in- 

 variably draw a crowd of loquacious ob- 



