The cylinders found by Mr. Rich varied from 1 to 3 in. in length and were of different materials—some of stone, others of paste or composition.[358] They are perforated to admit of the passage of a cord, and were carried about to be used for seals. Rich was among the earliest to recognise that this was their purpose; and he thus accounted for the writing being from right to left, contrary to the invariable custom. He also made the useful suggestion that, as the language of the first Persepolitan was no doubt that of the court of Darius, the languages of the other two columns were in all probability those of Susa and Babylon.[359] Rich exercised considerable influence in Germany by his contributions to periodical literature, and his cordial assent to the opinions of Grotefend was of importance at that time. We have seen that his first Memoir was published in Vienna before it appeared in London; and he continued to write to the ‘Fundgruben des Orients’ to describe the inscriptions he had procured from Babylon and Nineveh. The cylinder from Nineveh is said to have been the earliest specimen brought to light, and it was the first to attract the attention of Grotefend to the Babylonian system of writing.[360] It was published by Dorow in 1820, when inscriptions of that kind were almost unknown. Rich’s secretary, Bellino, was also in constant correspondence with Grotefend down to the period of his early death.[361] He sent him a copy of the first column of one of the inscriptions at Hamadan, which Grotefend presented to the University Library of Tübingen, where Bellino had been educated.[362] He also sent him copies of inscriptions on forty bricks in Mr. Rich’s collection, many of them of service by illustrating slight differences in the writing of words and characters.[363]