[Footnote 117: Ut et Ecbatana pergeret Agarenorumque regiam
everteret .... aiunt enim urbium quae usquam sunt ac toto
orbe existunt felicissimam esse auroque ditissimam, (Leo
Diacon. apud Pagium, tom. iv. p. 34.) This splendid
description suits only with Bagdad, and cannot possibly
apply either to Hamadan, the true Ecbatana, (D'Anville,
Geog. Ancienne, tom. ii. p. 237,) or Tauris, which has been
commonly mistaken for that city. The name of Ecbatana, in
the same indefinite sense, is transferred by a more classic
authority (Cicero pro Lego Manilia, c. 4) to the royal seat
of Mithridates, king of Pontus.]