DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.26300#0063
3 2
iEGYPTIACA.
PART I.
It is, however, neceffary to fhew that fome reafon ex-
ifted for the ufe of this appellation, as defcriptive of
the Column. Now Bp. Pococke informs us explicitly,
that there Jlill remain fome fragments of granite Pillars,
four feet in diameter, near the Column of Pompeyc:
and we have the moft politive teftimony of the Arabic
writers of the middle ages, a teftimony as much to be
depended on in this inftance as that of any Greek or
Roman writer, that, in the time of Richard Coeur de
Lion, there were more than four hundred of thefe Pil-
lars ftanding in the immediate vicinity of the Column.
So that this magnificent Monument at that time might
evidently be called, with ftngular propriety, “ The
“ Column of the Pillars.”
It appears, therefore, that neither the fufpedted Me-
dal of Vefpaftan, the illegible Infcription on the bafe,
nor the miftaken Verfion of the paffage in Abulfeda, can
afford any fatisfadtory information with refpedt to the
hiftory of the Column. But having now, I truft, re-
moved at leaft fome of the impediments that obftrudted
was fometimes ufed as a local term, may perhaps be inferred from hence,
that the ruins of Perfepolis are to this day called in the language of Perlia,
Chehel Minar, “ The forty Pillars
c Vol. i. p. 8.
* See Niebuhr, tom. ii. p. 99.
iEGYPTIACA.
PART I.
It is, however, neceffary to fhew that fome reafon ex-
ifted for the ufe of this appellation, as defcriptive of
the Column. Now Bp. Pococke informs us explicitly,
that there Jlill remain fome fragments of granite Pillars,
four feet in diameter, near the Column of Pompeyc:
and we have the moft politive teftimony of the Arabic
writers of the middle ages, a teftimony as much to be
depended on in this inftance as that of any Greek or
Roman writer, that, in the time of Richard Coeur de
Lion, there were more than four hundred of thefe Pil-
lars ftanding in the immediate vicinity of the Column.
So that this magnificent Monument at that time might
evidently be called, with ftngular propriety, “ The
“ Column of the Pillars.”
It appears, therefore, that neither the fufpedted Me-
dal of Vefpaftan, the illegible Infcription on the bafe,
nor the miftaken Verfion of the paffage in Abulfeda, can
afford any fatisfadtory information with refpedt to the
hiftory of the Column. But having now, I truft, re-
moved at leaft fome of the impediments that obftrudted
was fometimes ufed as a local term, may perhaps be inferred from hence,
that the ruins of Perfepolis are to this day called in the language of Perlia,
Chehel Minar, “ The forty Pillars
c Vol. i. p. 8.
* See Niebuhr, tom. ii. p. 99.