Persepolis

1694. The great historical, geographical and poetical dictionary by Louis Moreri.

Persepolis, an ancient City of Persia, which was the Capital of the Kingdom, situated on a River, called by Strabo and Quintus Curtius, Araxes, and by Ptolomy, Rhogomanis, which made it difficult of access. Alexander the Great took it, and at first spar'd it, but afterwards being drunk, and perswaded thereto by Thais, he burnt it. This Thais, an infamous Strumpet, sollicited him to revenge the Greeks, by destroying of this place, which he had before spared with his Arms in his Hand; and that Prince was the first that threw a burning Flambeau into the Palace, almost all built of Cedar; and so was this famous City ruin'd in the 3624 Year of the World, according to Salian. It's generally believ'd, That the Ruins of Persepolis are at Chehil Minara, between Ispahan and Shiras, but there is a great deal of distance between the one and the other, as I have learnt from a learned Man, who has been in those very places. The Geographers that follow Ptolomy place Persepolis in the 91st degree of Longitude, and Chehil Minara in the 96th. This name signifies as much as Forty Pillars, because of the ruines of a Building, where may be seen some Marble Columns, the Inscriptions of which cannot be understood by the Modern Inhabitants, (the Letters are broad below, and form'd like an Obelisk at top) and the magnificent remains of a Palace. Authors are put hard to it to know what this Edifice was: Some thinking it to be that describ'd by Diodorus Siculus; others that spoken of by AElian. Strabo lib. 15. Pliny lib. 6. chap. 26. Quintus Curtius, lib. 5. Diod. Sicul. l. 17. AElian, lib. 1. c. 19. Herbert Journey into Persia.