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ues, were inscribed with hieroglyphic inscriptions, all generally executed with great care and finish. The Egyptian edifices were also covered with religious or historical tableaux, sculptured and painted on all the walls; it has been estimated that in one single temple there existed no less than 30,000 square feet of sculpture, and at the sides of these tableaux were innumerable inscriptions, equally composed of ingeniously grouped figurative signs, in explanation of the subjects, and combining with them far more happily than if they had been the finest alphabetical characters in the world. Their study would require more than a lifetime, and we have only space to give a few general hints. We have a much more accurate knowledge of Greek inscriptions than we have of Egyptian palaeography. The Greek alphabet, and all its variations, as well as the language, customs, and history of that illustrious people, are better known to us. Greek inscriptions lead us back to those glorious periods of the Greek people when their heroes and writers made themselves immortal by their illustrious deeds and writings. What emotions must arise in the breast of the archaeologist who finds in a marble worn by time the funereal monument placed by Athens, twenty-three centuries ago, over the grave of its warriors who died before Potidaea. "Their souls high heaven received; their bodies gained, In Potidaea's plains, this hallowed tomb. Their foes unnumbered fell: a few remained Saved by their ramparts from the general doom. The victor city mourns her heroes slain, Foremost in fight, they for her glory died." The most important monumental inscription which presents Greek records, illustrating and establishing the chronology of Greek history, is the Parian chronicle, now preserved among the Arundelian marbles at Oxford. It was so called from the supposition of its having been made in the Island of Paros, B.C. 263. In its perfect state it was a square tablet, of coarse marble, five inches thick; and when Selden first inspected it it measured three feet seven inches by two feet seven inches. On this stone were engraved some of the principal events in the history of ancient Greece, forming a compendium of chronology during a series of 1,318 years, which commenced with the reign of Cecrops, the first King of Athens, B.C. 1582, and ended with the archonship of Diognetus. It was deciphered and published by the lea
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