BABYLON AND PERSIA

300 MEDIA, BABYLON, AND PERSIA.own clan-city Pasargadse. He built a palacethere, and a treasury, and his body rested therein death.A great sacredness attached to the placein consequence, and every Akhaemenian king wentthere for his inauguration.But it did not possessthe conditions that go to make a thriving, popu¬louscentre, and became neglected as a residence.It is now represented by a knot of ruins, not verystriking or numerous, in the valley of MURGHAB,watered by the PULWAR, a scant and insignificantstream, formerly named after the great king himself,Kyros ;it is uninteresting and short-lived, as mostwatercourses of this arid region, and after receivinga single tributary, ends in a salt lake.A few trun¬cated columns, andmany more bases without col¬umns, a few gate-pillars, and a platform with a casingof very fine stone masonry, are all that remains ofthese constructions. Interesting as they are, theyare eclipsed by two relics which appeal more power¬fully to the fancy^of the beholder: one is a square,isolated, and very massive stone pillar, bearing a basreliefrepresenting a human figure with four unfoldedwings and a most peculiar head-dress (see ill. 41). Thatthis strange figure is meant for Kyros is placed be¬yond doubt by the inscription which we read at somehei"ht above its head.But there is some reasonabledoubt as to whether it was intended for the livingking, or riither for an ideal representation of his glor¬ified Fravashi after death. The other relic is the greatking's tomb, or rather grave-chamber, which standswell preserved, but open and empty, on its base ofseven retreating stages or high steps, all of solid