FIFTH BAS-RELIEF. 
553 
The inscription on this horse, is also written three times over; 
the Greek being between the Pehlivi ones. The upper Pehlivi 
here, corresponds in character with the upper Pehlivi on the 
other horse ; and appears to me to be composed of more diph¬ 
thong letters than the Pehlivic character used in the inscription 
beneath. It is, in consequence, very obscure; the alphabet 
given by the Professor not extending to these varieties. The 
following, in Hebrew letters, is all I have been enabled to place 
in corresponding value : 
•rot-s-rnm-nn •^sns 
Mons. de Sacey also found, on decyphering the Pehlivi letters 
according to their value with the Hebrew, that they produced 
precisely the same meaning. And by all this it seems fully 
proved, that none of the lower range of sculptures at Nakshi- 
Roustam are of Arsacedian origin, which many learned men 
have supposed, but are entirely of Sassanian work. So far their 
general character; and if the sentences on the shoulders of 
the horses, in this particular bas-relief, designate the names of 
their riders, we must regard its design as an emblematical re¬ 
presentation of the restoration of the ancient Persian empire, in 
the person of Ardashir Babigan, the hereditary successor of the 
great Cyrus, its founder. 
Arsaces had put an end to the Greek power in Persia, 
seventy-nine years after the establishment of the Seleucidm. 
His posterity reigned there, giving it the name of the Parthian 
empire, for nearly five hundred years; it beginning about the 
year 250 before Christ, and ending A. D. 223; when a new 
revolution took place in behalf of the ancient royal race and 
name of Persia. 
4 b 
VOL. i. 
