"سرد لرحلة إلى موقع مدينة بابل في ١٨١١، طُبعت الآن لأول مرة: مذكرات على الأطلال؛ مع نقوش من الخرائط المدبئية للمؤلف: ملاحظات على طبوغرافية بابل القديمة،بقلم الرائد رينيل؛ في إشارة إلى المذكرات: مذكرات ثانية على الأطلال؛ في إشارة إلى ملاحظات الرائد رينيل: مع سرد لرحلة إلى برسبوليس: طُبعت الآن لأول مرة، مع كتابات مسمارية نسخت في برسبوليس ولم تُنشر من قبل: كتبها الراحل كلوديوس جيمس ريتش، المحترم، المقيم البريطاني السابق لشركة الهند الشرقية في بغداد. حررته أرملته." [‎١‎٨‎٢] (٤٧٤/٢٧٠)

BABYLONIAN ANTIQUES.
[APP.
now propose to speak. Most of them contain spe
cimens of the very curious and primitive system of
ivriting found only in the Babylonian monuments;
and those of Persia of the age of its history.* The
cuneiform, or, as it has sometimes been called, the
arrow-headed, character baffled the ingenuity of the
decipherer, till Dr, Grotefend of Frankfort, unde
terred by the ill success of his predecessors, applied
himself to the task with a judgment and resolution
which secured success. The result, so creditable to
his industry and learning, and the process by which
he obtained it, which he very ingenuously submits
to the public, are to be found partly in Prof. Heeren's
work on the Politics, Intercourse, and Commerce of
the principal Nations of Antiquity,f and partly in
the fourth and fifth volumes of the
but it is to be hoped that he will soon be prevailed
* In the first period of the history of Persia 1 include the whole of
its sovereigns down to the extinction of the native race by the Mace
donian conquest, without any reference to the fanciful divisions of Fer-
dusi in his string of romances, which has by some unaccountably
been entitled an epic poem, and by others, a history. It probably
bears the same relation to the ancient history of Persia as the
romances of Brute and the acts of Arthur's worthies do to that of
Britain. Dr. Grotefend's first efforts have already done something
towards maintaining the veracity of the venerable historians of Greece
against the fictions of Mohammedan Persian literature ; and much
more may be expected, provided we can obtain a more intimate
acquaintance with the Zend and other ancient languages of Persia,
which is an object highly worthy the attention of our learned country
men in India.
t Ideen uber die Politik, den Verkehr und den Handel der
vornehmsten Volker der alien Welt, by Prof. A. H. L. Heeren, 3rd
edition, Gottingen, 1815,—a very interesting work, which ought to be
translated into English.