The name Persepolis was first used by the Greek historiographers who accompanied Alexander the Great, to denote that part only of the vast town in which the tomb of Kyrus was situated, and this gave rise to much confusion.
Passagarda, Isthakr, or Estakar, was situated on the border of one of the richest and most beautiful plains of Central Asia, watered by the Bendemir (the Araxes of the ancients), and surrounded by lofty mountains, ‘whose rugged masses rise from the verdant plain like islands from the ocean.’
The oldest monuments are:—
1. The ruins of the palace now called by the Arabs Tshil-Minar (the forty columns), and two great tombs close by.
2. Four other tombs, about four and a half English miles to the north-west, and in the plains of Murghab the ruins of Passagarda, built by Kyrus to commemorate his victory over Astyages, who came from Hamadan (Ecbatana). Here is situated the pyramidically-constructed tomb of Kyrus, made of white marble blocks. Farther north are the ruins of Bisutun.
Passing to the monuments under the reign of the Sassanides; they consist of reliefs and inscriptions hewn in rock at a distance of about four and a half miles from the ruins of Persepolis. They are called Naksh-i-Rustam (the image of Rustam), because it was assumed that the exploits of this hero were here glorified. De Sacy, in his ‘Mémoires sur diverses Antiquités de la Perse,’ has explained the inscriptions as referring to the kings of the Sassanide dynasty. The reliefs are portraits of these kings, recognisable by their head-dresses.
The distance from Passagarda to Tshil-Minar is about forty-nine English miles, and this space is crowded with Persian monuments. It is most probable that the more recently-made subdivisions did not exist, but that the capital of the ancient Persian empire extended from Passagarda to Tshil-Minar, including Isthakr, Naksh-i-Rustam, and the king’s palace, called by the Greeks Persepolis. The palace was cut out of the beautiful grey marble rock towering over it, and stood on three well-defined, gradually-rising platforms. The arrangement was like that of the Indian, Egyptian, and later Greek temples; the first terrace corresponding to the Pronaos, where the people paid their homage to the king; the second to the Naos, where the ambassadors of the different nations assembled; and the third to the Adytum, where the king had his special temple and private abode. The whole foundation was constructed of bold Kyklopean masonry.
At the gates stood colossal fabulous animals, fantastic representations combined of the lion, the bull, the horse, the wild ass, the rhinoceros, the ostrich, the eagle, the scorpion, and the unicorn. Besides these there were winged and horned animals, and others having the winged body of a lion, the feet of a horse, and the head of a man, with well-curled, long beard and crowned with the tiara—the symbol of the king’s power, endowed with intellect, force, and swiftness. The bull with the Persians was, like Nundi with the Indians, Apis with the Egyptians, and Taurus with the Greeks, a sign of strength and power.
The capitals of Persian columns were not yet made to support a heavy stone weight, but only a light wooden beam. The foundation walls were, like those of Nineveh and Babylon, covered with sculptures, the designs of which were all of textile origin. But in these sculptures, as in those of Kouyunjik and the Palace of Nimrod, the theological, or religious, and symbolical element is entirely left in the background. We have the friends, relations, and servants of the king; tributaries submitting to kings; officers holding fly-flaps of feathers; horses crossing rivers; kings hunting and slaying lions; armies before besieged towns; warriors returning from battle; battering rams; chains to destroy the action of rams; soldiers mining ramparts; infantry with bows and shields; removals of cattle and spoil from captured cities; boats floating on rivers; galleys going to sea; damsels and children with musical instruments; and mathematical tablets with calculations of square roots. We have man active, warring, scientific, and only here and there some scenes of a religious character, and these more frequently in Nineveh and Babylon.
The cause of this phenomenon was the religion of the Zend people. Its founder was Zarathustra, Zerdusht, Σοροάθεος {Soroatheos}, Zoroaster—partly a mythical, partly a real person. His name appears to have been derived from the Sanskrit Sûrya-dêvas, meaning ‘the Sun-god.’ According to Aristotle Zoroaster lived 6,000 years before Plato. The Biblical Abram, Sesostris the Egyptian king, and Moses, were all honoured by this name. Svedius mentions a Zoroaster 500 years before the Trojan war. The historical Zoroaster, the compiler of the religious tenets of the Zend people in the Zend-Avesta, lived about 589 B.C.; he was therefore a contemporary of Confucius, Pythagoras, Jeremiah, and Ezra. He received the holy books from Ormuzd on Mount Elbruz.