Major Rawlinson at last succeeded in scaling the heights and making casts of the mystic characters to be taken away and translated. The great inscription is written in three languages, and extends to nearly a thousand lines of cuneiform writing. It is at least four hundred feet above the plain, and this intrepid soldier, during the space of several years, made the perilous ascent a multitude of times, always bringing away, at the peril of his life, some portion of this great historic record. After thirteen years of persistent effort he succeeded in copying the whole inscription, and placing it in such a form that other scholars could assist him in the translation of it. The casts of the Scythic version were given into the care of Mr. E. Norris, the well- known Oriental scholar, who published from them an independent translation in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society. The Persian text was translated by Major Rawlinson, and Dr. Julius Oppert states that he devoted twenty years of his own life to the Median version.
In the subject-matter of this long inscription, King Darius follows the custom of other potentates, and records only his triumphs, though he boastingly tells of the barbarities he practiced upon would-be usurpers. The record opens with a long line of genealogies, giving the names of the kings who reigned before him. “And Darius the king says, on that account we called ourselves Achæmenian of race; from ancient times we have been mighty, from ancient times we have been kings.”[56]
The royal historian then recites the countries over which he reigned, including Assyria, Babylon, Persia, Arabia, and Egypt, besides minor provinces, twenty-three in all, and he says, “These are the provinces that called themselves mine; they brought tribute to me, what was ordered by me unto them, in the night time as well as in the day time, that they executed.”[57]
The history is then given of various pretenders who led revolts against him. The whole account of these rebellions occupies many lines of cuneiform writing, but victory was always gained by the crown, and the usurpers were put to death in the most barbarous manner. Their noses and ears and tongues were cut off, their eyes were put out, and in this pitiable condition they were chained to the palace where “all the people saw” them, and afterward they were carried away and placed upon crosses. The penalty inflicted upon each one is given in detail, but there is a great uniformity in the accounts, although the punishment was sometimes varied by hanging the leader of the revolt, together with his principal followers. Often a decree of extermination was issued against all the people engaged in the rebellion. The great inscription is finished with a pictorial representation of the nine kings which Darius took in battle, one of whom claimed to be Bardes, the son of Cyrus. Another claimed to be the king of Susiana;[58] another led the revolt of the Babylonians; the fourth caused the rebellion of the Medians; the fifth, like the second, proclaimed himself the king of Susiana, while the sixth led the Sagartians in an attack upon their king. “The seventh was a Persian who lied and said, ’I am Smerdis, son of Cyrus, and he caused the revolt of Persia.’”[59] The eighth proclaimed himself king of Babylon, and the ninth claimed to exercise kingly power over the Margians. The first of these is represented by a prostrate figure, upon which the victorious king is trampling, the others are standing in the position of captives, and are branded as imposters by the inscriptions beneath them. The king also recorded the names of the warriors who assisted him in his campaigns, and requested those who might succeed him upon the Persian throne, to “remember to show favor to the descendants of these men.”