CHAP. I.
GOLD AND SILVER IN GREECE.
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forty, by others at fifty thousand talents. Thetreasure of Persepolis is rated at one hundredand twenty thousand talents ; that of Pasagardaat six thousand; and upon the capture of Ec-batana, according to the account preserved inStrabo, one hundred and eighty thousand talentsare said to have been collected from thence,besides six thousand talents which Darius hadwith him, which were taken by his murderers.
Alexander’s profuse expenditure, which hisflatterers called generosity, was in accordancewith the vast sums he seems to have acquired.He gave great rewards to his soldiers, and paidtheir debts, amounting to nine thousand eighthundred talents. He presented to the Thes-salians two thousand talents. The funeral ofHephaestion is said to have cost twelve thousandtalents, and the researches in natural history, forthe works of Aristotle , eight hundred talents.
The wealth of his satraps was also enormous.Harpalus, one of them, is said to have amassedfifty thousand talents, although, when at Athens,he denied the possession of more than nine hun-dred and fifty 1 . The successors of Alexander,also, collected large sums; though, by theirextensive and fierce wars, the greater part wasdissipated.
In Polybius is found a description of Ecba-