by a number of factions, Afráfiáb, King of B. C. 695. Túrán, a lineal defcendant from Túr, son of Feridún, paffed the Oxus with a formidable. army, and, having defeated the Perfian Monarch, flew him with his own hand. This Invader reigned twelve years in Perfia, but was forced by Zalzer, or The Prince with golden Hair, to repafs the Oxus, and return to his own dominions. It is more than pro'bable, that Afrafiáb was a common name for the Kings of Afiatick Tartary, fince the grandfather of Cyrus, whom we commonly call Aftyages, bore the same name, and we cannot suppose Him to have been the first invader of Perfia*.

It was not long before the Turanians invaded B. C. 667. Iran a fecond time, and, by forcing the great commanders of Perfia to defend their own Principalities, reduced the power of the Perfian Kings to a shadow. Afrafiab, either the monarch above-mentioned, or another of his name, is reckoned the ninth king of Persia. ZAV† was a prince of the royal line, and B. C. €29. was placed on the throne by Zalzer, but en

* The family of Othman, who now reign at Conftantinople, are willing to be reputed defcendants from this King of Turan, and are flattered with the Epithet of Afrafiáb Jáh, or ol≥ Ų! Powerful as Afrafiáb.

رو +

B. C. 639. joyed only the title of King, as the Turanians had overrun great part of his Empire, and kept him in continual alarm. These are the Scythians of our Ancient Hiftories, who are faid about this time to have invaded the kingdom of the Medes; but our best historians are apt to confound them with the Scythians of the North.

B. C. 633.

GERSHASP*, fon of Zav, or KISHTASP, as fome writers call him, reigned but a few years, if it could be called reigning, to have the name of King, and to be more helpless than his fubjects: he was the last prince of the Pishdadians. During the reign of thefe monarchs in Perfia, if we believe our Chronologers, Dido built Carthage, Homer wrote his Poems, which were afterwards brought into Greece by Lycurgus; the Pyramids of Egypt were raised by Cheops, Cephren, and Nitocris; the Affyrians founded a powerful Dynasty; Athens was first governed by Archons; and Sabaco, whom the Perfians call Cús Pildend †, or with the Teeth of an Elephant, because he firft made use of that beast in his wars, became famous in Ethiopia, and spread his arms over all Africa. This warriour was contemporary with Feridun

کوس پیلدند +

کرشاسب

who reigned, as we have feen, feven hundred B. C. 639. and fifty years before Christ, at which time, fays Newton, Sabaco the Ethiopian invaded Egypt. Rome, the rival of Carthage and Athens, was built in the reign of Gershafp.

CHAP. II.

The Caianian Family.

WHILE Zalzer, the most powerful prince of B. C. 610. Perfia, was encamped in his province of Seiftán, the Drangiana of the Greeks, Afrafiab, who had fubdued all Media, confidered himfelf as Sovereign of the Empire. By this time, another fon of Zav, named Cobád, began to distinguish himself in his engagements against the Turanians, and, being asfifted by Zalzer, whose fon Roftam was very young at this time, he was enabled to drive the invaders from Iran, and to place himself upon the throne of his ancestors. Efchylus, who flourished but an hundred years after this event, rightly attributes the recovery of

B. C. 610. the Empire to this prince, whom he calls Mede, in his Tragedy of the Perfians: "The "firft Leader of the army, fays he, was a "Mede; the next, his fon, completed (or "rather promoted) this work, for wisdom

66

guided his mind: the third was Cyrus, a "fortunate Man *." It is evident that these three kings are Cai Cobád †, Cai Cäús, and Cai Cofru or Khofru; whom the Greeks call Cyaxeres, Darius the Mede, and Cyrus. The first fyllable of Cyaxeres is apparently the Cai of the Perfians, which fignifies a Great King, and was prefixed to the names of those three princes, whence the whole race were named Caianians. The Ancients tell us, that Cyaxeres flew the Scythian Chiefs at a feast, to which he had invited them; but the Easterns are filent on this head, and it seems more probable, that the Tartars were compelled by force to repafs the Oxus; our authors make them retire beyond Cholcos and Iberia, confounding, as ufual, the Oriental with the Northern Scythians. Cai Cobád made several wife regulations in his kingdom, and ordered * Μῆδος γὰρ ἦν ὁ πρῶτος ἡγεμὼν σρατό, Αλλος δ' ἐκείνε παῖς τόδ' ἔργον ήνυσε, Φρένες γὰρ αὐτᾶ θυμὸν οἰακοσρόφεν. Τρίτος δ' απ' αὐτῷ Κύρος, εὐδαίμων ἀνήρ.

the publick roads to be divided into parfangs B. C. 610. or spaces of about four miles.

CAI CAUS* is called by our writers B. C. 600. Darius the Mede, and it may here be observed, that Dára, or the Sovereign, was rather an Epithet than a proper name of the Perfian Kings; fo that the Daricks, or pieces of money, which were known at Athens, might have been coined by any Perfian Monarch, and have born that name without the leaft impropriety. We must also remember, that the Afiatick Princes had feveral different names or titles, which circumstance has been the fource of great confufion in our histories of the Eaft. The Perfian writers mention nothing of the Lydian war; they only fay, that Cai Caüs carried his arms into the Lower Afia, and was very fuccessful in his enterprise. The Turanians, led by another Afrafiab, invaded Perfia a third time, and layed wafte the province of Media. Siavesh, fon of Cai Cáüs, being unjustly accused by Sudába, his father's concubine, of an attempt to violate her, went over to Afrafiab, who received him with open arms, and gave him his daughter in marriage. This Princefs was called Firenkis by the Perfians, and Mandane, by