original coin, after the final a in ZAKA, the Greek monogram B, which apparently represents the ancient province, or provincial capital, of Drangia.1

HERAUS, SAKA KING.

Silver. British Museum. Unique.

Obv. "Bust of a king, right, diademed and draped; border of reels and beads.

Rev. ΤΥΙΑΝΝΟΥΝΤΟΣ ΗΙΑΟΥ

ΣΑΚΑ

ΚΟΠΙΑΝΟΥ.

(Τυραννοῦντος Ηράου Σάκα κοιράνου.)

A king, right, on horseback; behind, NIKE, crowning him. ""

details as to the characteristics of Sikoha:-"The town, . . . which derives its name from three clay or mud hills in its midst, is built in an irregular circular form around the base of the two principal hills. The southernmost of these hills is surmounted by the ark or citadel, an ancient structure known as the citadel of Mir Kuchak Khán. Adjoining this, and connected with it, is the second hill, called the Búrj-i-Falaksar, on which stands the present Governor's house; and about 150 yards to the west is the third hill, not so high as the other two, undefended. The two principal hills thus completely command the town lying at their base, and are connected with one another by a covered way." "Sekuha is quite independent of an extra-mural water supply, as water is always obtainable by digging a few feet below the surface anywhere inside the walls, which are twenty-five feet in height, strongly built.”—Major E. Smith, vol. i. p. 258. 1 The progressive stages of this Monogram are curious. We have the normal -Mionnet, pl. i. No. 12; Lindsay, Coins of the Parthians, pl. xi. No. 7.

Next we have the Bactrian varieties R, B, and B, entered in Prinsep's

Essays, pl. xi. c. No. 53; Num. Chron. vol. xix. o.s. Nos. 48, 52, and vol. viii. N.S. pl. vii. Nos. 71, 72, and 76; and likewise Mionnet's varieties, Nos. 156, 299: Ariana Antiqua, pl. xxii. No. 118.

2 I am indebted to Mr. P. Gardner for this woodcut. I retain his description of the coin as it appeared in the Numismatic Chronicle, 1874, vol. xiv. N.s. p. 161. It will be seen that Mr. Gardner failed to detect the worn outline of the Monogram.

Colonel Pearse, R.A., retains a single example of an exceptionally common class of small silver coins displaying the obverse head in identical form with the outline in the woodcut. The reverse type discloses an ill-defined, erect figure, to the left, similar in disjointed treatment to some of the reverses in the Antiochus-Kodes class,' accompanied by two parallel legends in obscure Greek. The leading line, giving the title, is altogether unintelligible; but its central letters range XIAIINX or □IAIIKX. The second line gives a nearer approach to "Moas" in a possible initial M, followed by the letters ΔΗ=μοιίδης, μοπρης, μοιιαης, etc. All these specimens, in addition to other Kodes associations, give outward signs of debased metal, or the Nickel, which was perchance, in those days, estimated as of equal value with silver.2

The interest in this remarkable coin is not confined to the approximate identifications of time and place, but extends itself to the tenor of the legend, which presents us with the unusual titular prefix of Tupavvoûvтos, which, as a synonym of Βασιλεύοντος, and here employed by an obvious subordinate, may be held to set at rest the disputed purport of the latter term, in opposition to the simple Baotλeus, which has such an important bearing upon the relative positions of the earlier Bactrian Kings. The examples of the use of the term Baσiλevovтos in the preliminary Bactrian series are as follows 3:

1. Agathocles in subordi- } Obv. ΔΙΟΔΟΤΟΥ ΣΩΤΗΡΟΣ.

nation to Diodotus Rev. BAZIAETONTOZ AFAJOKAEOTZ AIKAIOT.

2. Agathocles in subordi- Į Obv. ETOTAHMOT MEOT.

nation to Euthydemus } Rev. ΒΑΣΙΛΕΥΟΝΤΟΣ ΑΓΑΘΟΚΛΕΟΥΣ ΔΙΚΑΙΟΥ.

3. Agathocles in subordi- Obv. ANTIOXOT NIKATOPOZ.

nation to Antiochus / Rev. ΒΑΣΙΛΕΥΟΝΤΟΣ ΑΓΑΘΟΚΛΕΟΥΣ ΔΙΚΑΙΟΥ. 4. Antimachus Theus in obv. ΔΙΟΔΟΤΟΥ ΣΩΤΗΡΟΣ. subordination to Dio

dotus

Rev. ΒΑΣΙΛΕΥΟΝΤΟΣ ΑΝΤΙΜΑΧΟΥ ΘΕΟΥ.

1 Num. Chron. vol. iv. N.s. p. 209, pl. viii. fig. 7.

3 J.R.A.S., Vol. IV. N.s. p. 504; Records of the Gupta Dynasty, p. 38. 3 M. de Bartholomæi, Koehne's Zeitschrift, 1843, p. 67, pl. iii. fig. 2; Reply to M. Droysen, Zeitschrift für Münz, 1846; my papers in Prinsep's Essays (1858), vol. i. p. xvi., vol. ii. pp. 178-183; in the Numismatic Chronicle, vol. ii. 186, p. 186; and Journ. R. A. S., Vol. XX. 1863, p. 126; M. Raoul Rochette, Journal des Savants, 1844, p. 117; Droysen, Geschichte des Hellenismus, Hamburg,

The whole question as to the relative rank of the princes, whose names figure conjointly in the above legends, reduces itself concisely to this contrast, that the sub-king invariably calls himself Baotλeus on his own proper coins, but on these exceptional tributary pieces, where he prefixes the image and superscription of a superior, he describes himself as βασιλεύοντος. These alien Satraps were effective kings within their own domains, but clearly bowed to some acknowledged head of the Bactro-Greek confederation, after the manner of their Indian neighbours, or perchance included subjects, who so especially regarded the gradational import of the supreme Maharajadhirája, in contradistinction to the lesser degrees of regal state implied in the various stages of rája, mahárája, rájádhirája, etc. These binominal pieces are rare, and, numismatically speaking, "occasional," i.e. coined expressly to mark some public event or political incident, like our modern medals; coincident facts, which led me long ago to suggest that they might have been struck as nominal tribute money or fealty pieces, in limited numbers, for submission with the annual nazaráná, or presentation at high State receptions, to the most powerful chief or general of the Græco-Bactrian oligarchy for the time being.

There is a curious feature in these binominal coins, which, as far as I am aware of, has not hitherto been noticed. It is, that the obverse head, representing the portrait of the superior king, seems to have been adopted directly from his own ordinary mint-dies, which in their normal form presented

1843; Lassen, Ind. Alt., 1847; Gen. Cunningham, Numismatic Chronicle, vol. viii. N.s. 1868, p. 278, et seq., ix. 1869, p. 29; Mr. Vaux, Numismatic Chronicle, vol. xv. N.s. p. 15.

1 Journal Royal Asiatic Society, Vol. XX. p. 127; Numismatic Chronicle, N.S. vol. ii. p. 186.

2 I have long imagined that I could trace the likeness of Antiochus Theos on the obverse of the early gold coins of Diodotus (Prinsep's Essays, pl. xlii. 1; Num. Chron. vol. ii. N.s. pl. iv. figs. 1-3). I suppose, however, that in this case the latter monarch used his suzerain's ready-prepared die for the one face of his precipitate and perhaps hesitating coinage, conjoined with a new reverse device bearing his own name, which might have afforded him a loophole of escape on his "right to coin" being challenged. Apart from the similarity of the profile, the contrast between the high Greek art and perfect execution of the obverse head, and the coarse design and superficial tooling of the imitative reverse device, greatly favours the conclusion of an adaptation, though the motive may have been merely to utilize the obverses of existing mint appliances of such high merit.

the profile of the monarch without any surrounding legend, his name and titles being properly reserved for their conventional position on the reverse surface of his current coins. In the novel application of the head of the suzerain to a place on the obverse of a coin bearing the device and designations of his confessed subordinate on the reverse, it became necessary to add to the established obverse-device a specification of the name and titles of the superior, whose identification would otherwise have remained dependent upon the fidelity and the public recognition of the likeness itself. Hence, under the new adaptation, it likewise became requisite to engrave on the old die, around the standard Mint head, the suzerain's superscription in the odd corners and spaces in the field, no provision having been made, in the first instance, for any legend at all, and no room being left for the ordinary circular or perpendicular arrangement of the words, such as would have been spaced out under ordinary circumstances. In the majority of the instances we are able to cite, the Greek letters on the adapted obverse vary materially in their forms and outlines from those of the associated legends on the reverse, which still further proves the independent manipulation applied to the obverses of the compound pieces.

In addition to these indications as bearing upon the Bactrian proper coinage, the title of Tupavvoûvтos is highly suggestive in its partial reappearance on the coins of the leading Sáh Kings Nahapana and Chastana, connecting the Scythic element geographically to the southward with the province of Guzerát, for a full résumé of which I must refer my readers to the Archæological Report of Western India,1 for 1875.

1 See also the short copies of my Essay on the Records of the Gupta Dynasty, London, 1876, p. 31.

22

ART. II.-The Tenses of the Assyrian Verb. By the Rev. A. H. SAYCE, M.A.

DR. HINCKS once spoke of Assyrian as the Sanskrit of the Semitic languages, and the progress of cuneiform decipherment has tended to show that his words were not greatly exaggerated. It is true that Assyrian belongs to the northern branch of the Semitic family, which includes Hebrew and Aramaic, and not to the southern, which comprises Arabic and Ethiopic; it is true, also, that it bears a closer relationship to Hebrew and Phoenician than to any other Semitic idiom; but it is no less true that it has thrown an unexpected light on several of the problems of general Semitic philology. The reasons of this are clear enough. We possess contemporaneous monuments of the language from a very remote date, far beyond the antiquity which can be ascribed to any other record of Semitic speech; the language, even at that time, was already a literary one, and so stereotyped certain early grammatical forms that have been lost or obscured in the other dialects which did not become literary until at a much later period of growth; the syllabic character of the writing has preserved the vowels exactly as they were pronounced; and the monuments were inscribed while the speech of the people was still a living one, and not handed down through the doubtful channels of tradition and copyists. To this we may add that the literary character of Assyrian brought about an artificial perfection—not unlike that of classical Sanskrit - which enables us to see very clearly the natural tendencies of Semitic speech; and the agglutinative tongue of ancient Accad, which was to the Assyrian what Latin was to the scholar of the Middle Ages, not only gives us the origin of much that has hitherto