PERSIAN ORIGIN OF THE LANGUAGE. 55 



or his son, that date being between 530, and 500, 

 B.C. ; we thus arrive at the date of the earliest of 

 these inscriptions, and consequently at the limit 

 on the side of antiquity of the date of the earliest 

 of the inscribed tombs. Leaving, then, the 

 general tenor of the edict out of the question, 

 we find that none of the monuments, charac- 

 terized by these inscriptions, date, in the opinion 

 of the best judge of the structure of the language, 

 further back than the Persian conquest. 



" This would of itself appear a strong presump- 

 tion in favour of the Persian origin of the mo- 

 numents and language. It seems unaccountable 

 that the Lycians, who had hitherto left their dead 

 without inscribed monuments, should be thus 

 suddenly seized with a passion for a new style of 

 architecture, and with a desire to record the 

 names of the dead, and of their relatives. It is 

 quite clear that the uninscribed tombs at Tlos, 

 Armootlee, and in the pass of Dembra, are not 

 of an earlier date than the inscribed ones at 

 Pinara, Corydalla, Antiphellus and elsewhere ; 

 and that whatever may have been the date, how- 

 ever early, of the numberless plain rock-recep- 

 tacles for the dead in the mountain over Pinara 

 and in other places scattered over the country, 



