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 134 PARTHENON PARTHIA feet, show that these suppressed organs may be developed into activity ; and this happening in a single flower, or with a single stamen, might, unobserved, produce sufficient pollen to fertilize every ovary on the plant. Though the evidence cited to prove that parthenogene- sis exists in plants may be of doubtful value, there is no good reason why it may not occur ; indeed, analogy with animals, and the methods by which some plants reproduce themselves, indicate that its occurrence is not improbable. In many plants, especially some in high lati- tudes, small bulbs are produced in place of seeds, and in some abnormal flowers buds have been found occupying the place of the ovules, or prospective seeds ; a small bulb, or bulblet, consists of several rudimentary leaves crowded upon a very short stem, and a bud has almost the same structure ; the embryo within the seed is more simple than the bulblet and the bud, as it consists of a minute stem and only two leaves, or sometimes only one; that this embryo always requires the presence of pollen for its formation, while the more highly devel- oped bulblet or bud is produced without it, is assuming more than some of our most eminent physiologists will admit. Until within a com- paratively short time ferns and other cryp- togamous plants were consider-ed perfectly asexual, but it is now known that some if not all have organs corresponding in function to stamens and pistils; in ferns, for example, the spore produces a cellular plate, a sort of in- termediate plant called prothallus, upon the surfaces of which are produced organs called archegonia, which when fertilized by the con- tact of antherozoids, produced by other organs upon the prothallus called antheridia, give birth to a new fern, and the prothallus, having served its purpose, disappears ; here then is a regular sexual contact, and it has been supposed to be essential to the production of a new plant among ferns. Not long ago Prof. "W. G. Far- low, now of Harvard university, discovered minute fern plantlets issuing from a prothallus upon which no antheridia or archegonia were present; and continuing his observations, he found in the same collection of seedlings about 50 which had been developed from prothalli destitute of both sexual organs, and showing very conclusively that in one fern at least asexual production of plants may take place. PARTHENON. See ATHENS. PARTHENOPE, in mythology, a siren, after whom the city of Neapolis in Campania (Na- ples) was believed to have originally borne the same name. The short-lived republic into which the French in 1799 transformed the Neapolitan kingdom was hence named the Par- thenopean. PARTHIA, an ancient country of Asia, which for several hundred years was the seat of an extensive and powerful empire. Parthia prop- er was a territory S. E. of the Caspian sea, now embraced in the northern portion of the Persian province of Khorasan, with an area of about 33,000 sq. m. It was bounded N. W. by Hyrcania, N. by the territory of the Choras- mii (Kharesm or Khiva), N. E. by Margiana, E. by Aria, S. E. by Drangiana or Sarangia, and S. and W. by the territory of the Sagartii. The soil of the valleys is fertile, producing large crops of wheat, barley, rice, and cotton ; the climate is severe in winter and hot in sum- mer. The mountains are extensive, but of no great height, none of them exceeding 6,000 ft. ; and besides many smaller streams there are three rivers of considerable size, including the upper course of the Tedjend. Parthia had no large cities. The chief was Hecatompylos, one of the cities founded by Alexander the Great, which when the Parthian kingdom had ex- panded into an empire was abandoned by the sovereigns, though it always retained to some extent the distinction of being the national capital, and a royal palace was maintained there for the occasional reception of the court. The site of Hecatompylos has not been ascertained, but it is supposed to have been near lat. 37 and Ion. 56 30'. The early history of the Parthians is very obscure. They are not men- tioned at all in the Old Testament, nor in the Zend-Avesta, nor in the Assyrian inscrip- tions. In the inscriptions of Darius Hystas- pis (521-486 B. 0.) Parthia is enumerated among the provinces of the Persian empire. The inhabitants were a brave and hardy peo- ple, of Scythian origin, speaking a language half Scythian, half Aryan, were armed in the Scythian fashion, and displayed extraordinary skill in horsemanship and in archery. Their armies consisted chiefly of cavalry, and their favorite weapon was the bow, with which they fought while in motion, using it as formida- bly in retreating as in advancing. Herodotus speaks of them as a people subject to the Per- sians in the reign of Darius, and as taking part in the expedition of Xerxes against Greece (480 B. C.), armed with bows and with spears. They fought on the Persian side at Arbela against Alexander, and submitted to that con- queror without resistance after the death of Darius III. On the division of Alexander's empire among his chief generals, Parthia came for a time under the rule of Antigonus, and subsequently under that of Seleucus, king of Syria, whose dominion extended from the Med- iterranean to the Indus. His successors Anti- ochus I. and II. were almost constantly engaged in wars with their neighbors in Asia if inor and in Egypt, and paid little attention to the re- mote eastern provinces, which they governed by satraps in the Persian manner. About 255 B. C. the satrap of Bactria, a Greek named Dio- dotus, revolted and proclaimed himself king. Antiochus II. made no effort to subdue him, and the independence of the new kingdom was established without bloodshed. A few year later (in 248, according to an inscription dis covered by George Smith in 1874) Parthif followed the example of Bactria, and becanu independent under a chief named Arsaces, of