Two years later (1839) the inscriptions copied by Mr. Rich so far back as 1821 at last saw the light.[511] Several of them were already known by the copies made by Le Bruyn and Niebuhr; but the plates were found to contain the complete text of the Inscription of Artaxerxes, of which Grotefend’s formed the four concluding lines (Pl. 23, Inscr. P). It was taken from the north wall of the palace, now identified as that of Ochus, facing the Palace of Darius. He also was the first to copy the Inscription of Xerxes from the anta of his palace (Pl. 16, Inscr. E). The same inscriptions are frequently repeated, and it was an advantage to have copies of more than one version. Thus Rich gave the celebrated four-line Inscription of Xerxes, copied from the east portal of the palace, which was already so well known from Niebuhr’s copy, taken from the north (Inscr. G, Pl. 18). Rich has also given two versions of the Inscription of Darius—one taken from the anta of the palace and already known from Le Bruyn (131) (Inscr. Cᵃ), the other from the south stairs, which he was himself the first to disinter from the rubbish by which it was hidden (Pl. 20, Cᵇ).[512]

Of greater importance than any of these were the copies taken by the Danish Sanscrit scholar Westergaard. He was commissioned by the Danish Government to visit Persia for the purpose of collecting inscriptions and other matters of archæological interest. He went to Persepolis and Naksh-i-Rustam in 1843, and not only did he carefully recopy all the inscriptions already known, but some others that had hitherto been neglected. Among the latter are the inscriptions over the animals on the great Eastern Porch at Persepolis, and the long inscription upon the tomb at Naksh-i-Rustam. The first is indeed to be found in Mr. Rich’s collection (Pl. 24, 25, 26); but the copy, as we have seen, was made by his Seyid and was found useless for purposes of study. All previous travellers had recoiled before the difficulties of transcribing the tomb inscription, but these were at length surmounted by Westergaard, and his copy is the greatest prize he secured. It was found to be an inscription of Darius, and it served to identify the rock-hewn sepulchre upon which it is inscribed with the tomb of that king. It contained a more complete enumeration of the provinces than the I inscription, and as it was trilingual, it was hoped that so large a number of proper names would at length afford a clue to the values of the signs in the second and third columns, which had as yet remained unknown. Westergaard was the first of the travellers who possessed a competent knowledge of the cuneiform character, before he undertook the difficult task of transcribing them; and consequently his copies are of exceptional value and accuracy. On his return to Bonn he gave Lassen his copies of the first or Persian column; and reserved to himself the study of the second or Susian column. In the following year (1844) the two scholars published the results of their labours in the ‘Zeitschrift,’ and their Memoirs afterwards appeared together in a separate volume under the title ‘Ueber die Keilinschriften der Ersten und Zweiten Gattung, von Chr. Lassen und N. L. Westergaard’ (Bonn, 1845).

Six years had now elapsed since Lassen published his first Memoir. During the interval Beer and Jacquet had made their contributions to the general knowledge; and although Major Rawlinson had not yet published his Memoir on the Behistun inscription, he had been in correspondence with Lassen since 1838, and had already corrected two letters. It is interesting therefore to inquire how far Lassen profited by these investigations. We have seen that he had nine incorrect values in 1836 for the letters in Niebuhr’s list.[513] These were:

16𐎨i
19𐎮k
25𐎤with u = ô
26𐎰(z)
27𐎹h
28𐎩n
32𐎪g
33𐎸g
40𐎽s

By 1844 he corrected the four following:

(1) 25 𐎤 into q, an approximate value for k.

(2) 26 𐎰 into θ, following Jacquet th.

(3) 27 𐎹 into j for y, following Beer and Jacquet.

(4) 40 𐎽 into r, following Jacquet.[514]