General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1850 Original Publisher: Robert Carter Subjects: Iran History / General History / Middle East / General Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million books for free. Excerpt: CHAPTER II. TOPOGRAPHICAL HISTORY OF PERSIA. In the various provinces of the vast empire of Persia, there were a great number of important cities and towns ; but concerning many of them, no detailed information has been handed down to us by ancient writers. All, therefore, that can be done in these pages, is to notice those of which any account, and any remains, have survived the wreck of ages, and which were of the greatest note. Among these stands pre-eminently forward, the city of PEESEPOLIS, which stood within the province of Persia. The city of Persepolis is mentioned by Greek writers, after the era of Alexander, as the capital of Persia. The name, however, does not occur in the writings of Herodotus, Ctesias, Xenophon, or Nehemiah, who were well acquainted with the other principal cities of the Persian empire, and who make frequent mention of Susa, Babylon, and Ecbatana. But this may be accounted for by the fact, that Persepolis never appears to have been a place of residence for the Persian kings, though it was regarded as the capital of their empire in the remotest ages. There has been much dispute respecting the Persian name of Persepolis. According to oriental historians, it was Istak- her, or. Estekhar; and many modern authors suppose that Persepolis and Pasagardoe, the common burial-places of the kings of Persia, are only different names for the same place, and that the latter word is the Greek translation of the former. Their views do not seem to be correct: there are strong reasons, ...