Note 91 — Chapter IV · PERSIA.

[It follows from what has already been pointed out in a note respecting the roofs of the Assyrian palaces; if, as is contended by French archæologists, the great halls were vaulted, Mr. Fergusson’s theory respecting the origin of the Persian columns partly falls to the ground; in that case it would seem more probable that the Persians owed their columnar architecture to prototypes of wooden posts, covered with metal plates, such as are described as existing in the Median palaces of Ecbatana, where Cyrus, the first Persian monarch, passed so many years of his life.—Ed.]