any sort of persecution of the Christians. Suetonius states that he expelled the Jews from Rome. The reason is not altogether clear, but a very plausible interpretation is that, at this early date Christian converts being mainly Jews, the Government regarded the former merely as a sect of the latter, and the decree was occasioned by disorders arising in the city because of conflicts between non-Christian and Christian Jews, leading to the expulsion of both. The date is uncertain; it has been placed in 52, but may have been earlier (cf. Acts xviii. 2). The ten persecutions as commonly given, with the date fixing approximately either the beginning or period of greatest severity, are: That under Nero, 64; under Domitian, 95; under Trajan, 112-113; under Marcus Aurelius, 177; under Septimius Severus, 202; under Maximinus, 235; under Decius, 250; under Valerian, 257; under Aurelian, 274; under Diocletian and his successors, 303-313. Consult, besides the Church histories: Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chaps. xiii., xiv., and xvi.; Renan, Les origines du christianisme (Paris, 1863-82); Allard, Histoire des persécutions (Paris, 1884-94); id., Le christianisme et l'empire romain (Paris, 1897); Ramsay, The Church in the Roman Empire Before 170 A.D. (London, 1894); Weis, Christenverfolgungen (Marburg, 1901); Hardy, Christianity and the Roman Government (London, 1894). For the sources, consult Preuschen, Analecta (Freiburg, 1893); Translations and Reprints published by the Department of History of the University of Pennsylvania, vol. iv., No. 1 (Philadelphia, 1897). See MARTYR.

PERSEPH'ONE. See PROSERPINA.

PERSEPOLIS (Lat., from Gk. Пepoémoλis, Пepoalπolis, City of the Persians). The Greek name of the capital of the Persian Empire under Darius I. and his successors. The native name is unknown. The locality is identified with the principal group of ruins, the Takhti Jemshed or Throne of Jemshed, the traditional founder of Persepolis, and is called also Tchil Minar or Forty Pillars. The city is supposed to have extended throughout the whole valley of the Medus above its confluence with the Araxes (now the Polvar and the Bendemer respectively), overlooking the beautiful mountain-girt and fertile plain of Murghab, north of Lake Tashk or Nargis. Part of the site was occupied later by the important Sassanian city of Istakhr. The only remains of Persepolis are the ruins of buildings erected by Darius Hystaspis, Xerxes, Artaxerxes, and other Achæmenians, which are scattered throughout the valley of the Polvar, about 30 miles northeast of Shiraz on the road to Ispahan. The ruins comprise three principal groups: (1) Takhti Jemshed, already referred to, situated at the foot of a lofty mountain range, in which, at a considerable elevation, hewn out of the solid rock, are three finely sculptured sepulchres; (2) Nakshi Rustem—the picture of Rustem, so called from the relief adornments-consisting of four similar rock-hewn sepulchres cut in a perpendicular cliff at a considerable height, about six miles to the northeast on the opposite bank of the Polvar; (3) the remains at Haji Abad on the Polvar, about four miles north of Takhti Jemshed, of an ancient fire temple, which was in a perfect state of preservation in the tenth century A.D., and then served as the mosque of the city of

Istakhr. The tombs of Nakshi Rustem are those of Darius I., which bears a long inscription identifying it, and probably of Xerxes I., Artaxerxes I., and Darius II., and those behind Takhti Jemshed once held the bodies of Artaxerxes II., Artaxerxes III., and Darius III.

Takhti Jemshed, the most important of the groups of ruins, is situated on a vast terrace of cyclopean masonry built at the base of and backed by the Mountain of the Tombs. The vast substructure is about 1500 feet north by south, and about 800 feet east by west, and was surrounded, according to Diodorus Siculus, by a triple wall of 16, 32, and 60 cubits respectively. The whole area is further divided into three terraces, the lowest toward the south, the northern about 550 feet long and 35 feet high, the central 800 feet square, and rising 45 feet above the plain. above the plain. No traces of structures are to be found on the lowest platform; the northern supports the Propylæa of Xerxes; and the central platform was occupied by the foremost structures, distinguished as the Great Hall of Xerxes, the Palace of Xerxes, and the Palace of Darius, towering one above the other in successive elevations from the ground. The stone used for the buildings is dark gray marble, cut into gigantic square blocks, and in many cases exquisitely polished. The ascent from the plain to the great northern platform is formed by two double flights, the steps of which are nearly 22 feet wide, 31⁄2 inches high, and 15 inches in the tread, so that travelers have been able to ascend them on horseback. The Propylæa of Xerxes on this platform are two masses of stonework, which probably formed an entrance gateway for foot passengers, paved with gigantic slabs of polished marble. Portals still standing bear figures of animals 15 feet high, closely resembling the Assyrian bulls of Nineveh. The building, conjectured to have been a hall 82 feet square, is, according to the inscription, the work of Xerxes. An expanse of 162 feet divides this platform from the central one, which still bears many of the columns of the Hall of Xerxes, from which the ruins take their subsidiary name. The staircase leading up to the Tchil Minar or Forty Pillars is, if possible, even more magnificent than the first. The walls are more richly decorated with sculptures, representing colossal warriors with spears, gigantic bulls, combats with wild beasts, and processions; while broken capitals, shafts, pillars, and countless fragments of buildings, with cuneiform inscriptions, cover the whole vast space of this platform. The pillars were arranged in four divisions, consisting of a central group six feet deep every way, and an advanced body of twelve in two ranks, the same number flanking the centre. Only thirteen of the columns now remain. Their form is very beautiful. Their height is 60 feet, the circumference of the shaft 16 feet, the length from the capital to the torus 44 feet. The shaft is finely fluted in 52 divisions; at its lower extremity begin a cincture and a torus, the first two inches in depth, and the latter one foot, whence devolves the pedestal, shaped like the cup and leaves of the pendent lotus, the capitals having been surmounted by the double semi-bull. The Great Hall of Xerxes is computed to have been a rectangle of about 300 to 350 feet, and to have consequently covered 22 acres. Behind the Hall of Xerxes was the so-called Hall of a Hundred Columns, to the south of which are indications

of another structure, termed the central edifice. Next along the west front stood the Palace of Darius, and to the south the Palace of Xerxes, measuring about 86 feet square, similarly decorated.

Persepolis replaced Pasargadæ (q.v.) as the capital of Persia under Darius I., by whom and his successors the city was extended and enlarged. It surrendered to Alexander the Great (B.C. 331) after the defeat of Ariobarzanes at the battle of Gaugamela. Ariobarzanes again offered battle, but was killed, whereupon Alexander ordered a general massacre, sacked the city, and, acting-it is doubtfully chronicled-on the suggestion of Thais the courtesan, fired the palaces of Takhti Jemshed. Although fifteen years later Persepolis was still the capital of Persia, it gradually sank into insignificance, until upon its ruins Istakhr rose into prominence about A.D. 200, and for centuries was a considerable centre of administrative, religious, and commercial activity. It was a formidable opponent of the Moslem invasion, suffered severely, and also passed out of existence, but, unlike its great predecessor, left few traces of its ancient glory. Consult: Vaux, Nineveh and Persepolis (London, 1850; 4th ed. 1852); Fergusson, The Palaces of Nineveh and Persepolis Restored (ib., 1851); Rawlinson, The Five Great Monarchies, vol. iii. (ib., 1871); Myers, Remains of Lost Empires (New York, 1875); Stolze, Persepolis (Berlin, 1882); Dieulafoy, L'art antique de la Perse (Paris, 1884-89); Blundell, "Persepolis," in Blundell, "Persepolis," in Transactions of the Congress of Orientalists, vol. ii. (London, 1892); Curzon, Persia and the Persian Question (ib., 1892).

In

PER/SEUS (Lat., from Gk. Пepoeús). Grecian legend, the son of Zeus and Danaë (q.v.) and grandson of Acrisius, King of Argos. As his grandfather had been warned that he would perish by the hand of Danaë's son, he inclosed mother and child in a chest and cast them into the They drifted to the island of Seriphos, where they were cared for by Dictys, brother of the King, Polydectes. The latter fell in love

sea.

with Danaë, and as Perseus, now grown to manhood, interfered with his plans, he sent him to bring the head of Medusa, the Gorgon. Guided by Athena, he found the Grææ, old women with but one eye and one tooth between them, who directed him to the nymphs, from whom he received winged sandals, a pouch, and the cap of Hades, which, like the Tarnhelm of Teutonic story, made the wearer invisible. Hermes provided him with a harpe (άрn) or scimitar, (ap) and Athena with a bronze shield, in which as a mirror he could see the face of Medusa without encountering her glance, which turned all living things to stone. After a long journey, which the poets gradually filled with adventures, he reached the distant home of the Gorgons, found them asleep, identified Medusa, cut off her head, and escaped by the aid of his magic helmet. On his return he rescued Andromeda (q.v.), daughter of King Cepheus of Ethiopia (variously localized in this story), and took her with him to Seriphos, where he found his mother and Dictys suppliants at the altar, for Polydectes had resorted to violence. Medusa's head turned Polydectes and his followers to stone, and Perseus sent his magic weapons to the nymphs by Hermes, and gave the head to Athena, who placed it on her ægis.

Perseus with his wife and mother then returned to Argos, and found that Acrisius had fled to Larissa, in Thessaly. Perseus followed, and accidentally killed his grandfather while throwing the discus during some games. Returning, he exchanged the rule of Argos for that of Tiryns and later founded Midea and Mycena. Perseus is originally the local deity of the spring Perseia by Mycenæ, as Danaë is the ancestor of the Danaans of Argolis. The slaying of Medusa and the rescue of Andromeda were favorite subjects of ancient art, and are found on early vases and Pompeian wall-paintings, as well as in sculpture. They are catalogued and discussed by Knatz, Quomodo Persei Tabulam Artifices Græci et Romani Tractaverint (Bonn, 1893). For the study freely told in English, consult Willian Morris, "The Doom of King Acrisius," in The Earthly Paradise (London, 1868).

PERSEUS (c.212 B.C.-?). The last King of Macedonia, the eldest son of Philip V. He was born about B.C. 212. He was from his earliest years trained to a military life, and, having compassed through intrigue the death of his brother Demetrius, who was a favorite both with the Macedonians and with the Romans, and whom he for that reason regarded as a dangerous rival, he ascended the throne on the death of his father in B.C. 179. A struggle with Rome was inevitable, and Perseus was well prepared for it. His treasury and magazines were full, his army amounted to over 40,000 trained men, his alliances were strong, and he was himself popular with his subjects and neighbors. He sought, however, to postpone the inevitable as long as possible, but matters came to an open rupture in 171. In that year the Consul Publius blunder of the Romans saved Perseus. Crassus Licinius Crassus was sent against him. The was defeated at Callicinus in Thessaly. But Perseus failed to follow up his victory, and the war was continued without decisive result for a number of years. Finally, in the month of March, 168, Lucius Æmilius Paulus arrived in Greece to take command of the Roman forces, and on June 22d of the same year the Macedonian army was utterly defeated in the battle of Pydna. Perseus fled, but afterwards fell with all his treasures into the hands of the

Romans. After gracing the triumph of the consul at Rome, he was held in captivity several years at Alba Fucens, in Italy, where he at length died. Consult: Droysen, Geschichte des History of Federal Government (2d ed., New Hellenismus (2d ed., Gotha, 1877-78); Freeman, York, 1893); Mahaffy, Alexander's Empire (New York, 1888).

PER/SHORE. A market-town in Worcestershire, England, on the Avon, nine miles southeast of Worcester (Map: England, D 4). It is noted for the Church of the Holy Cross, the only remaining portion of the famous abbey founded in 685. Vegetable gardening is largely carried on, and there are manufactures of stockings, and engineering and machine works. Population, in 1891, 9100; in 1901, 8800. Consult Styles, History of Pershore Abbey Church (London, 1839).

PERSIA, per'shȧ or pêr'zhå (Lat. Persia, Persis, from Gk. IIepois, from OPers. Parsa, Pers. Pārs, Ar. Fārs, Persia). A native State of Southwestern Asia, called by the inhabitants Iran, the

name Persia (Farsistan) being applied only to a small province. It extends from latitude 25° N. (Ras Farsa, near the Baluchistan frontier) almost to latitude 40° N. (Aras River on the border of Transcaucasia), and from longitude 44° E. (Armenia) to longitude 63° E. (Baluchistan). A line extending northwest and southeast, nearly bisecting the country, is 1400 miles long. Its greatest north and south extent, from Ras el Kuh on the Strait of Ormuz to its most northern point on the frontier of Russian Turkestan, is 875 miles. The country is bounded on the north by Transcaucasia, the Caspian Sea, and Russian Turkestan, on the south by the Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf, on the east by Russian Turkestan, Afghanistan, and Baluchistan, and on the west by Asiatic Turkey and the Persian Gulf. It is over one-fifth as large as the United States, excluding Alaska, having an area of about 642,000 square miles.

TOPOGRAPHY. Persia is an elevated tableland from 3000 to 5000 feet in general altitude, sinking to the Caspian Sea and the plain of Turkestan in the north and to the Persian Gulf in the south, and embracing the western and larger portion of the great Iranian plateau, which includes Afghanistan and Baluchistan. To reach this plateau great mountain barriers must be crossed on all sides excepting in the east, where the tableland and mountains merge imperceptibly with those of Afghanistan and Baluchistan. On the other three sides great mountain ranges stretch between the interior plateau and the narrow plains which slope to the Caspian Sea on the north, and the Persian Gulf on the south, and merge with the plains of Asiatic Turkey on the west. The plain of the Caspian presents a wonderful contrast to the colorless, waterless, and treeless expanse of the plateau to the south from which it is separated by the Elburz Mountains. It comprises the maritime provinces of Mazanderan and Ghilan, so rich in water that many swamps and lagoons breed miasma, and so abundantly covered with forests and undergrowth that it is often difficult to force a way through the dense vegetation. Furthermore, it possesses a degree of atmospheric humidity that is seldom found outside of the tropics. Most of the towns are among the forests on the lower slopes of the mountains. For purposes of agriculutre and fruit-raising this is the most favored part of Persia. Many large and small plantations have been cleared in the forests, and all the cultivated crops of Southern Europe, including the mulberry for silk manufacture, attain high perfection. This luxuriance of vegetable life is due to the vapor-charged clouds of the Caspian, which are brought south by the prevailing winds, and, impinging upon the northern slopes of the Elburz, descend in mist and rain to the lowlands.

Along the southern maritime border the mountains, low in elevation and extending east and west, often closely approach the sea, and the narrow plains between them and the ocean are dry and barren excepting in certain districts where the rainfall, supplemented by irrigation, suffices for agriculture. Nearly all the mountains of Persia are bleakly sterile in aspect. The most imposing of the mountain ranges is the Elburz, which, continued eastward by the Kuren Dagh, Kopet Dagh, Ala Dagh, and Binalud Kuh, stretches like a mighty mountain wall along the

entire northern border of Persia. The Elburz, from 10 to 30 miles south of the Caspian, may be crossed by a few passes or defiles, some of them at an elevation of over 8000 feet. Its upland valleys, with an average elevation of about 4000 feet, are dominated by peaks rising from 8000 to 11,000 feet above the sea; and towering above them all is Demavend, a nearly extinct volcano, about 18,500 feet high, the culminating point of Persia. From its ice-filled crater, on a clear day, the eye may survey a panorama spread over 50,000 square miles, embracing the Caspian, the mountain ranges of the north and west, and the dry expanse of the tableland with patches of green oases and the outlines of many towns. The wide mountain lands of Western Persia extend in many parallel ranges throughout the whole of that part of the country overlooking the valley of the Tigris and the Persian Gulf. Their trend is from northwest to southeast. They form the mountain barrier between Persia and Turkey and are known collectively as the Zagros Mountains. Some of the peaks are snow-crowned most of the year, and Mount Alijuk, south of Ispahan, is 14,000 feet in elevation. But the culminating range of these highlands is the KuhDinar, extending north of Shiraz, whose highest summit, the Kuh-i-Dena, is over 17,000 feet in elevation, second only to Demavend. Islands along the east coast of the Persian Gulf are merely the partly submerged fragments of the coast ranges.

The tableland of the interior, thus walled in by mountains, is itself intersected by numerous ranges and detached masses of mountains, excepting in Eastern Persia, where great plains and deserts are the main topographic feature. Between these ranges, also extending northwest and southeast, are wide plains and narrow valleys. These plains and valleys would be utterly sterile were it not for the mountains near them, which collect rain and snow. The valleys are more easily irrigated and are thus more fertile than the plains, which are here and there brightened by a patch of green oasis, but for the most part are sandy and barren. The general aspect of the plateau is that of a cheerless and monotonous waste stretching to the base of mountains that are equally bleak and uninviting, and reaching the acme of frightful desolation in the two deserts of the east, the Dasht-i-Kavir or Great Salt Desert, extending between latitudes 33° and 36° N., and from longitude 52° to 57° E., and the more southerly Dasht-i-Lut or Great Sand Desert, extending between latitudes 29° and 32° N., and between longitudes 57° and 60° E. Their combined length is over 500 miles from northwest to southeast, but they are separated between the thirty-second the thirty-second and thirty-fourth parallels by a hilly region through which passes one of the main caravan routes between Central Persia and Meshhed. The origin of the Great Salt Desert is not yet clearly determined. One theory is that it is due to the drainage of saline streams from the surrounding higher lands and the consequent deposition of a white crust or efflorescence; the other theory is that it is the bed of an ancient salt lake. Geologists now incline to the latter explanation. In 1891 a solid bed of rock salt estimated at over 600 square miles in area and several feet in thickness was discovered in this remarkable region. Lieutenant Vaughn and Mr. C. E. Biddulph, who brought to light this sea of solid rock salt,