amicula exuunt, paulatimque pudorem profanant:  ad ultimum, honos auribus sit, ima corporum velamenta projiciunt.  Nec meretricum hoc dedecus est, sed matronarum virginumque, apud quas comitas habetur vulgati corporis vilitas. Q.  Curtius, lib. v. cap. 1.  And this lewdness of their women, coloured over with the name of civility, was encouraged even by their religion:  for it was the custom for their women once in their life to sit in the Temple of Venus for the use of strangers; which Temple they called Succoth Benoth, the Temple of Women:  and when any woman was once sat there, she was not to depart ’till some stranger threw money into her bosom, took her away and lay with her; and the money being for sacred uses, she was obliged to accept of it how little soever, and follow the stranger.

The Persians being conquered by the Medes about the middle of the Reign of Zedekiah, continued in subjection under them ’till the end of the Reign of Darius the Mede:  and Cyrus, who was of the Royal Family of the Persians, might be Satrapa of Persia, and command a body of their forces under Darius; but was not yet an absolute and independant King:  but after the taking of Babylon, when he had a victorious army at his devotion, and Darius was returned from Babylon into Media, he revolted from Darius, in conjunction with the Persians under him; [431] they being incited thereunto by Harpagus a Mede, whom Xenophon calls Artagerses and Atabazus, and who had assisted Cyrus in conquering Croesus and Asia minor, and had been injured by Darius. Harpagus was sent by Darius with an army against Cyrus, and in the midst of a battel revolted with part of the army to Cyrus:  Darius got up a fresh army, and the next year the two armies fought again:  this last battel was fought at Pasargadae in Persia, according to [432] Strabo; and there Darius was beaten and taken Prisoner by Cyrus, and the Monarchy was by this victory translated to the Persians.  The last King of the Medes is by Xenophon called Cyaxares, and by Herodotus, Astyages the father of Mandane:  but these Kings were dead before, and Daniel lets us know that Darius was the true name of the last King, and Herodotus, [433] that the last King was conquered by Cyrus in the manner above described; and the Darics coined by the last King testify that his name was Darius.