'Transactions of the Bombay Geographical Society, from January 1847 to May 1849. Edited by the Secretary. Volume VIII.' [‎305] (414/496)

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appearance ill according with the time that has elapsed since the days
of Khusrn Par viz.* This is attributable, however, to its sheltered posi
tion. Major Ravvlinson supposes the excavated scarp was intended to
receive, or to form, the back wall of a temple or palace; and the nume
rous aligned slabs, of a massive character, that lie in disordered array
on the slope at the foot of the hill, would confirm the supposition, and
at the same time mark it as an unfinished structure that, from some
cause, had met with interruption a short time after the design was com
menced. The facade of the building was to have been approached from
the plain by a terraced-way built on the debris at the base of the mountain,
and a few well-executed capitals at the back of the Khan, of an oriental
order, attest it as a work of a Sassanian age. These capitals have carved
on two of their sides the figures of a male and female, whose heads are
surrounded by a halo-like ring, and may represent Khusru Parviz and
his beautiful Shirin. The other sides bear, in graceful foliation, the
elegant-shaped design of a “ thyrsus,” and are wrought in a coarse
species of marble. In many parts, however, of the more recent work,
we can trace, by its blackened and worn appearance, the chisel of an
anterior period ; and it is to this circumstance, and to the visible remains
of the <&aXkoi f that lie extended in broken fragments in front of the
scarp, we may identify it not only as the spot on which Semiramis
established the worship of the fructifying principle as instituted by Isis,
but as the actual site of the tablet on which she caused her own likeness,
and those of a hundred of her guards,J to be portrayed by the statuary.
In the time of the Isidore of Charax, the remains of a magnificent palace,§
probably a memorial of the visit of the Babylonian Queen, still existed ;
* Royal Geographical Journal, Vol. IX., Part I., 1830.
t Diodorus Siculus, Book IV. Chap. 1, described the divine honors that Isis
caused to be paid to the unfound portion of Osiris’s mutilated remains after his
massacre by the Titans. The Greeks afterwards imitated the Egyptians in this
form of worship, and perhaps excelled them in the debaucheries prescribed for the
QaXkiK entertainments; and at the present time, on the Huli festivals of the Hin
doos, instead of the dregs of wine, a more filthy composition is bespattered over
the persons and dress of those celebrating the orgies, and even on those unconnected
with this singular creed.
The Greek dmXXos 1 and Latin Phallus appear to be cognotes of the Arabic
Fahl, signifying either Ci vir,” 11 viritis,'” or “ virllitas, 5, and equivalent to
the generative Lingam of the Hindie mythology.
X Diod. Sic., Book II. Chap. 1.
§ Note from Isidore, Major Rawlinson’s Journal, R. G» Soc., Vol. IX., page 112.