But the Zend was not of itself sufficient to make out all the words and expressions in the Behistun and other inscriptions. Other languages contemporary with that of the inscription and of the Zend must be sought for, to elucidate many points which it left obscure.[75] The Sanscrit was the only one laying claim to a great antiquity, whose grammatical structure was sufficiently developed to render it useful in this enquiry. A knowledge of this language had previously been acquired by Major Rawlinson, and he was therefore fully prepared for the arduous task he had undertaken. Neither of these, it must be observed, was the language of the inscriptions, which it is believed had ceased to be a living form of speech, at the period when the Sanscrit and Zend were in current use. It is unnecessary to note in detail the difficulties and great labor attending the decyphering of the Behistun tablets, on which Major Rawlinson was occupied from time to time during a space of ten years. His discoveries were announced in London, in a memoir read before the Royal Asiatic Society in 1839, but were not published in extenso until 1846. Briefly to sum up the results of his labors, it will suffice to state that they present "a correct grammatical translation of nearly four hundred lines of cuneiform writing, a memorial of the time of Darius Hystaspes, the greater part of which is in so perfect a state as to afford ample and certain grounds for a minute orthographical and etymological analysis, and the purport of which to the historian, must be of fully equal interest with the peculiarities of the language to the philologist." In a few cases it may be found necessary to alter or modify some of the significations assigned; but there is no doubt but that the general meaning of every paragraph is accurately determined, and that the learned Orientalist has thus been enabled "to exhibit a correct historical outline, possessing the weight of royal and contemporaneous recital, of many great events which preceded the rise and marked the career of one of the most celebrated of the early sovereigns of Persia." Such is the history of this great discovery, which has placed the name of Major Rawlinson among the most distinguished Oriental scholars of the age. He will rank among the laborers in cuneiform writing, where Champollion does among the decypherers of Egyptian hieroglyphics; for though, like Champollion, he did not make the first discoveries in his branch of Palæography, he is certainly entitled to the honor of reducing it to a system, by ascertaining the true powers of a large portion of the alphabet, and by elucidating its grammatical peculiarities, so that future investigators will find little difficulty in translating any inscription in the particular class of characters in question.