Fig. 222.—Persian Archer. From a bas-relief of Persepolis, the ancient capital of Persia (b.c. 560). The long coat, probably of leather, descends to the ankle. The headdress has nothing of the helmet, but nevertheless indicates workmanship in metal.
Fig. 223.—Persian Warrior. From a bas-relief of Persepolis; a cast is in the British Museum. The shield, high enough to rest on, is almost hemispherical; the helmet, with ear and neck coverings in one single piece, differs from the Assyrian.
Fig. 224.—The Persian Cidaris, or Tiara.
Between the bas-reliefs of Khorsabad and those of Persepolis there is the same difference as between the early Egyptian sculptures and the degenerate days of what Macrobius calls the ‘tyranny’ of the Ptolemies.[688] The drawing is less pure, the forms are heavier, the anatomical details are wanting or badly indicated—they are, in fact, clumsy imitations of far higher models.
Herodotus (VII. ch. lx.-lxxxiii.), when reviewing the army of Xerxes (Khshhershe = Ahasuerus[689]) in b.c. 480, numbers forty-five nations, of which only the six (including Colchians and Caspians) wore Swords. The long straight dagger was carried by the Pactyans, by the Paphlagonians, by the Thracians, and by the Sagartians, who spoke Persian, and who were in dress half Persians and half Pactyans (Afghans?).[690] The Sagartian Nomades (chap. lxxxv.) were armed with a short blade and with lassos of plaited thongs ending in a running noose: this denotes that they were cattle-breeders.[691] Chapter liv. again mentions ‘the Persian Sword of the kind which they call ἀκινάκης (Akinakes):’ like the Roman pugio and the modern couteau-de-chasse, it was straight, not curved, as expressly stated by Josephus.[692] The Persian troops wore only these ‘daggers suspended from their girdles along their right thighs.’ Hence Cambyses died of a wound on his right side, and Valerius Flaccus describes a Parthian as—
Insignis manicis, insignis acinace dextro. (Arg. vi. 701.)
Julius Pollux explains it as a περσικὸν ξιφίδιον, τῷ μηρῷ προσηρτημένον (a Persian swordlet fastened to the thigh), and Josephus compares it with the Sica or Sicca.[693] The favourite weapon was the bow, although Darius speaks of the Sword as the instrument of punishment.
