BABYLON AND PERSIA

-274 MEDIA, BABYLON, AND PERSLA.route of their own, as a separate body and indepen¬dently of the main current of Eranian migrationmore directly making for the west ; or whether theyformed part of that current, and only after reachingthe upper highlands of the Zagros (Aderbeidjan andKurdistan), branched off on a further tramp, and,following the direction of the valleys imbedded be¬tween the seven-fold ridges of the Zagros, settled inthat continuation of it which rounds off to skirt thesweep of the Gulf, and sends out decreasing spurs tomeet those that may be called the outposts of thegreat SULEIMAN range. What speaks most in favorof the latter supposition is that ever since the nameof the Medes(MadaT, Matai, Amadai)makes i^sappearance in the royal annals of Assyria, i. e., asearly as Shalmaneser II., another name almost in¬variably accompanies it, or at least occurs on thesame inscription,that of the land and people ofBarsua or Parsua, which have been located withalmost certainty just beyond the principalities ofUrartu (Armenia), somewhere in Aderbeidjan. Thereis nothing unlikely in the hypothesis of the Parsuashaving first occupied the Zagros highlands jointlywith the Medes, then separated and founded a newand more independent principality^of their own. Atah events they call themselves Aryas, as did theMedes; and one of their mightiest kings, Dareios I.,in his great rock-inscription (of which more fullyhereafter), glories in being " a Persian, son of a Per¬sian, an Arya, of Aryan seed." If theidentity of theBarsuas or Parsuas of the Assyrian inscriptions withthe later Persians be accepted, it may further, be