-HISTORY OF PERSIA.
TI1E early history of this country is involved in great obscu rity. The only knowledge which we have of its transactions is derived chiefly from the Dabistan, or An Account of Twelve Religions," and the celebrated poem of Ferdosi, entitled the " Shah Namah," or book of kings; the one written by a Mahomedan traveller about a century and a half ago, and professedly compiled from the writings of the ancient Guebres, or worshippers of fire ; and the other from the remains of the Persian annals, which had been saved from the fury of their Arabian conquerors. Little dependence, however, can be placed on any of these histo ries. Truth is so mixed up with fable, that it is impossi ble to ascertain where the one ends and the other begins; and the judgment of the annalist is evidently sacrificed to the imagination of the poet. Their chronology is equally extravagant, and is founded entirely on the vague tradi tion of the duration of each monarch's reign. To some of their princes they assign a hundred, and to others a thousand years; but in these uncertain and remarkable periods scarcely two of their historians agree. It would be vain, therefore, to attempt any connected series of events, or offer any dates, before the commencement of the Grecian histories; and we shall merely give a short abstract of the transactions of that early period ; and for our knowledge of Persian history we are chiefly indebted to the able work of Sir John Malcolm.
Sir William Jones divides the ancient history of the Per sians into three distinct periods: The " dark and fabu lous," comprehending the ages preceding the Kaianian dynasty ; the " heroic and poetical," commencing with the Kaianian dynasty and terminating with the accession of Ardisheer Babigan ; and the "historical," which in cludes the reigns of the Sassanian kings.
The Dabistan traces back the history of this country to antediluvian times, and Mahabad is represented as the first king and father of the present race of men. The ancient Persians alleged that it was beyond the know ledge of man to ascertain who were the first parents of the human race. They believed that time was divided
into a succession of cycles or periods, to each of which was allotted its own people ; and that a male and female were left at the end of every cycle, to produce the popu lation of the succeeding one. Mahabad and his wife, therefore, were the only pair that survived the former cycle, and were blessed with a numerous offspring, to peo ple the new world. Their first habitations were caves and the clefts of the rocks. They were strangers both to cial order and to the comforts and luxuries of life ; but 1\ l a habad, aided by divine power, instructed them in many of the useful arts, and introduced among them the blessings of civilization. He had thirteen successors, who were deemed prophets, and were at once the high priests and monarchs of the country. During their reigns the world en joyed a golden age, which, however, was disturbed by the abdication of Azer•abad, the last prince of the Mahabad ian dynasty ; when his subjects, left to the free indulgence of their passions, without law or restraint, indulged in evei y species of excess. In the hyperbolical language of the Dabistan " the mills, from which men were led, were turned by the torrents of blood which flowed from the veins of their brethren; the human race became as beasts of prey, and returned to their former abodes in caverns and mountains." From this state of anarchy and desolation they were delivered by Jy-affram, who revived the neglect TT ed laws and institutions of Mahabad. He was the founder of the Jyanian dynasty, to which succeeded the dynasties of Kulcev and Yessan, which altogether comprehended a period of many thousand millions of years. The human race is then described as having again fallen into such ex cess of wickedness, that God made their mutual animos ity the means of divine vengeance till they became nearly extinct, and the few that remained had retired to the woods and rocks. While thus sunk in savage barbarity, Kaiomurs arose to reclaim and civilize them.