98 
ECBATANA. 
according to the purpose for which it was designed, the most 
interior having battlements of plated silver and gold.” By this, 
I should understand parapets over-laid with those precious me¬ 
tals, in the same style that Diodorus Siculus describes the “ pa¬ 
lisades of copper on the summit of the inner wall, or square cut 
in the mountain, that supported the palace-citadel at Persepolis.” 
When I was there, I myself observed on the edge of the third 
or highest terrace of the great platform, towards its southern face, 
marks in the rock where a strong range of railing, or balustrade 
had been fixed, also deep holes, where the pivots had turned 
which belonged to the gates. This is a point of resemblance 
that cannot fail being striking, and, in both places, these orna¬ 
mental defences crest the wall which immediately surrounded 
the royal habitation and its dependencies. I have already de¬ 
scribed those on the platform of Persepolis ; and, with regard to 
Ecbatana, Herodotus goes on to say, that within those golden 
battlements, stood the palaces, treasury, and other offices of 
state. From the year 709 B. C., when Dejoces began its first 
noted aggrandisement, Ecbatana increased in architectural splen¬ 
dours through the successive sovereigns of Media, till it reached 
its acme with Cyrus the Great; who, having re-united all that 
had ever belonged to Assyrian or Babylonian empire, under the 
one commanding name of the Persian, dispersed his presence 
progressively through all its different kingdoms. These changes 
were made in succession with those of the seasons ; the monarch 
residing at Persepolis, Susa, Babylon, and Ecbatana, accordingly 
as he courted heat or avoided it. Euripides, in his tragedy of 
the Bacchse, briefly and accurately describes the climates and 
scenery of this vast empire, from “ Persia’s plains, unsheltered 
from the sun,” to the “ frozen soil of rocky Media.” In these 
