Page:History of Art in Persia.djvu/279

 270 History op Art in Antiquity. (Figs. 71, 72).* Here, however, as far as human feet and talons allow us to judge, the two actors in the scene, instead of looking at each other, as they would have done had they been engaged in a hand>to-hand conflict, moved in the same direction, implying an arrangement somewhat different from what is' witnessed at Persepolis.* The number of pillars is not large ; their dimensions, together with those of the building considered as a whole, do not come near those displayed later at Persepolis and Susa, nor are the walls as thick as on the platform of the Takht-i-Jamshid. If the main lines of the type that was to cumulate in the palaces of the younger capitals are already found here, on the other hand everydiing tells us that we are con- fronted by an art which, with young faltering step, prepares itself for bolder flights. The testimony of the epigraphic texts bears out the impression thus re- ceived ; everywhere on these stones appears the pithy inscription already in- cised in the three languages which the royal chancellery will continue to use; it runs thus : " I am Kurus, king, Achs- menid " (I am King Cyrus, the Achaeme- nidy The Persian text is the most ancient monument of that idiom and mode of writing ; it appears towards the top, on one of the faces of three pillars which form the best-preserved portion of the edifice. Their height is more than five metres.* Each consists of three beautiful blocks of limestone dressed with the utmost nicety (Fig. 23) ; all rest on a substructure more or less visible, half buried in the soil like that of the antx-, but which a few blows of the spade would disengage (iMgs. 132-134). All th(sc foundations are made of freestone, and originally were united together with metal pair of ba» structures. Flandin and CosTK. J'erse atteienne, Plate CXCVII.
 * DiEULAFOY, L Art antique, torn. i. pp. 29, 30.
 * Stolz^ Btmeriungen (relating to Plate CXXXVII., in which are figured the
 * DiEur.AFOY, he. at, torn. i. Plates XIII., XIV.
 * Coste has 5 m. 20 c, and Dieulafoy 7 metres.