use No. 1 as a guide,
since it was only legitimate to conclude that Nos. 2 and 3 represented
translations of No. 1 into two languages, which, by the side of Old
Persian, were spoken by the subjects of the Achaemenian kings. That one
of these languages should have been the current speech of Mesopotamia
was exactly what was to be expected, since Babylonia and Assyria formed
an essential part of the Persian empire.

The beginning was made with proper names, the sound of which would
necessarily be the same or very similar in both, or, for that matter, in
all the three languages of the Persepolitan inscriptions.[11] In this
way, by careful comparisons between the two styles, Nos. 1 and 3, it was
possible to pick out the signs in No. 3 that corresponded to those in
No. 1, and inasmuch as the same sign occurred in various names, it was,
furthermore, possible to assign, at least tentatively, certain values to
the signs in question. With the help of the signs thus determined, the
attempt was made to read other words in style No. 3, in which these
signs occurred, but it was some time before satisfactory results were
obtained. An important advance was made when it was once determined,
that the writing was a mixture of signs used both as words and as
syllables, and that the language on the Assyrian monuments belonged to
the group known as Semitic. The cognate languages--chiefly Hebrew and
Arabic--formed a help towards determining the meaning of the words read
and an explanation of the morphological features they presented. For all
that, the task was one of stupendous proportions, and many were the
obstacles that had to be overcome, before the principles underlying the
cuneiform writing were determined, and the decipherment placed on a firm
and scientific basis. This is not the place to enter upon a detailed
illustration of the method adopted by ingenious scholars,--notably
Edward Hincks, Isidor Loewenstern, Henry Rawlinson, Jules Oppert,--to
whose united efforts the solution of the great problems involved is
due;[12] and it would also take too much space, since in order to make
this method clear, it would be necessary to set forth the key discovered
by Grotefend for reading the Old Persian inscriptions. Suffice it to say
that the guarantee for the soundness of the conclusions reached by
scholars is furnished by the consideration, that it was from small and
most modest beginnings that the decipherment began. Step by step, the
probl