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Βαβ. καὶ τῆς λοιπῆς Ἀσσυρίης. H. here as always (cf. i. 178. 1 n.) unites Babylonia and Assyria; they are distinguished in the inscriptions. Assyria was properly the district on the east (i.e. left) bank of the Tigris, which H. calls Matiene (v. 52). He seems to include all Mesopotamia (a name first found in Polyb. v. 44) in the Assyrian satrapy; probably this was the arrangement of Darius (cf. C. F. Lehmann, Woch. für Kl. Ph., 1900, p. 962, n. 6), which lasted till Xerxes, on his return from Greece (Arr. Anab. vii. 17. 2), punished Babylon for revolt (i. 183. 3 n.). Perhaps the huge size of the satrapy was a special honour to its first satrap, Zopyrus (160. 2). For its importance cf. i. 192; it fed the Great King and his army for two-thirds of the year.

For the Paricanii, 94. 1 n., probably the Παρητακηνοί should be read here, whom H. calls a Median tribe (i. 101. 1). They lived (near the modern Ispahan) in the mountains separating Persia and Susiana from Media, and forming the watershed of the Choaspes (cf. Strabo 744 for their position and predatory character). The name of the Ὀρθοκορυβάντιοι (otherwise unknown) is explained by some as ‘dwellers in the mountain’.

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