[207] Herod. v. 52.
[208] These are the greater and lesser Záb.
[209] Referring, probably, to the numerous canals this great conqueror cut, for purposes of irrigation as well as navigation, between the Euphrates and Tigris.
[210] “Royal stations” were the abodes of the king’s couriers. Cf. Herod. viii. 98. These couriers were very rapid, like the Indian harkâreh of the present day. Strabo (xv. p. 725) states that Alexander’s order for the execution of Parmenio, given near Herât, was conveyed eight hundred and fifty miles in eleven days, to Ecbatana. The present route from Smyrna to Baghdad, is nearly the same as that described by Herodotus, from Sardes to Susa; it turns a little to the N., to avoid the arid deserts about the Upper Euphrates and the Upper Tigris, and passes Sart (Sardes), Allah Shehr (Philadelphia), Kaisariyeh, Malatiyeh, Diarbekr, Mosul, Arbil (Arbela), and Kerkuk (Circesium). If Herodotus went to Babylon, he would have gone by this route as far as the river Gyndes (Diyala), where the route from Babylon to Ecbatana crossed it, as is clear from the account of the march of Cyrus. (Herod. i. 189.)
[211] Strabo, xvi. 766.
[212] 1 Kings ix. 18.
[213] Plin. v. 87. Procop. Bell. Pers. ii. 5. Gibbon, c. xi,
[214] Xenoph. Anab. i. 4, 11.
[215] Plin. vi. 144.
[216] Plin. vi. 28.