Page:Discovery and Decipherment of the Trilingual Cuneiform Inscriptions.djvu/195

 upon its side; by that means the heads of the wedges that were originally at the top are now all turned to the left, and the inscription that was originally read from top to bottom becomes by its changed position always read from left to right. 'If we turn our perpendicular characters in such a manner as to make them lie in a horizontal direction, the effect will be exactly what takes place in the Persian writing.' This is a remarkable anticipation of a much later discovery.

Hager's book was still going through the press when another important inscription was added to the Paris Library (1802). It is on a stone found by M. Michaux at Tak Kasra below Bagdad. The Vase of Caylus and the Caillon Michaux continued for a time to be the two most celebrated samples of the Persepolitan and Babylonian styles in Europe. Later on, the Persepolitan collection was enriched by the discovery of the 'Suez Stone, published in the 'Travels of Denon,' in 1807. But all these were entirely eclipsed by the long inscription found at Babylon and sent by Sir Harford Jones to the India House. It was long known simply as the India House Inscription, till later knowledge proved it to be the Standard Inscription of Nebuchadnezzar. Shortly afterwards (1808) the Library of Trinity College. Cambridge, received an inscription from Sir John Malcolm of which we hear little till a much later period.

We have said that an inscription published by Hager without commentary in 1801 fell into the hands of Lichtenstein, who made it the subject of a Memoir published in the 'Brunswick Magazine.' This eccentric writer put forward the theory that the bricks