Cruelty also became part of the Persian religion, as indicated by remains of human sacrifices taken from ash-heaps that stood beside Zoroastrian altars. This also caused a degeneration to devil-worship, which in some localities survives to-day. CHAPTER VI PERSIAN ARCHITECTURE =Combination of Style.=--In the days before their supremacy the Persians, as agriculturists and breeders of cattle and horses, preserving their simple existence, had no desire or need of monumental architecture. But when Cyrus had overthrown the domination of the Medes, made himself master of Mesopotamia and extended his conquests to the shores of the Ægean Sea, he too was minded to immortalise in architecture the might of the Persian Empire. Accordingly, as his race had no traditions in building, he borrowed from the methods and styles of the nations he had conquered. Thus Persian architecture represents a mingling of Median, Assyrian, Asiatic Greek and, in a small degree, Egyptian. The boyhood of Cyrus was spent at the court of Astyages the Mede, so that the Median palaces at =Susa= and =Ecbatana= were familiar to him. Those of the latter city, according to Polybius consisted of porticoes and hypostyle halls, the columns being of cedar or cypress, overlaid with plates of silver. These have long since disappeared, and the remains which now exist at =Ecbatana= are of columns of stone, which are supposed to be part of the restoration of the palace under the Persian Kings. For the substitution of stone for wood in the columns distinguishes everywhere the Persian architecture. =Tombs and Palaces; No Temples.=--The remains of Persian architecture comprise tombs and palaces. The [Illustration: TOMB OF DARIUS I EXCAVATED IN THE MOUNTAIN SIDE, PERSEPOLIS. P. 82] [Illustration: PALACE OF DARIUS I, PERSEPOLIS CONJECTURED RESTORATION. OF WHICH THE TOMB FAÇADE WAS AN IMITATION. P. 82] [Illustration: TYPES OF PERSIAN COLUMNS P. 83] [Illustration: HALL OF ONE HUNDRED COLUMNS, PERSEPOLIS CONJECTURED RESTORATION. P. 85] [Illustration: THE PALACES OF PERSEPOLIS CONJECTURED RESTORATION. P. 84] Zoroastrian religion had no use for temples made with hands. Its temple was the universe; the floor of it the mountain tops of Persia from which countless altars, tended continually by the Fire-Kindlers, sent up flames in worship of the element of Fire. Meanwhile it was the desire of every Persian Monarch whom war and government obliged to be absent so much from the homeland, that, when they died, their bodies should be brought home “to the Persians.” Accordingly, when Cyrus erected a palace at =Pasargadae=, the modern Marghab, he also built himself a =Tomb=, which still exists.