diverted the Persian “royal road” far to the north of its natural line. This road, in fact, followed an earlier main track whose ultimate objective had been different.
The remains of Boghaz Keui are indubitably pre-Persian and pre-Greek. They consist of a large fortified city on a steep slope enclosed by two deep ravines, and falling to northward over 800 ft. from summit to base. The acropolis was strengthened with a circle of stone redoubts, between which led very narrow gateways, and with internal redoubts as well. Just inside what seems to have been its principal entrance is a rock face inscribed with nine lines of “Hittite” characters, greatly perished (Nishan Tash), and a similar inscription, equally illegible, can be detected on a neighbouring rock. Below the acropolis on the north-east is a residential quarter, containing large ruins of what seems to have been a palace or temple built round a central court. The whole site is surrounded by a strong wall, 14 ft. thick, with towers about 100 ft. apart. The monument, however, which earliest rendered Bogaz Keui famous is the sculptured rock grotto, 1 m. to the east, called Yasili Kaya. Here two hypaethral galleries are adorned with reliefs in panels, the larger gallery showing two processions, which, starting on both walls from the entrance, meet at the head of the grotto. On the left wall are 45 figures, headed by a gigantic male figure, erect on the bent necks of two men. On the right wall he is opposed by a female of almost equal stature standing on a leopard or lioness, and followed by a young male with battle-axe, erect on a similar beast. Behind these are some 20 figures of mitred priests, &c. There can be no doubt that the female is the great Nature goddess of western Asia, attended by her spontaneously-generated son, with whose help she creates the world (see Great Mother of the Gods). Priests or minor divinities follow them. The other procession, according to the analogy of other monuments, should be composed of mortals bearing sacra and headed by their king, who makes offering or dedicates his city to, or engages in some mystic union with, the goddess. The figure following him seems to be that of his high priest. “Hittite” symbols are carved above many of the figures. Besides the processions there are five independent reliefs in the small gallery and its approach, one repeating the figure of the high priest.
In 1906, as the result of the discovery of cuneiform tablets at Boghaz Keui by E. Chantre in 1890, a concession for the excavation of the site was obtained by the Berlin Oriental Society and H. Winckler was sent to make a preliminary examination. He found a number of tablets in two languages, Babylonian and local, the latter being that of the Arzawa letters found at Tell el-Amarna. Among them was a cuneiform copy of the treaty made by Rameses II. in his 20th year with the king of the Kheta, and inscribed on a wall at Karnak. In 1907 Winckler returned with O. Puchstein and others and made regular excavations, laying bare much of the fortifications and two temples, and finding inscribed monuments and many more tablets. From those written in Babylonian Winckler has established the fact that Boghaz Keui was the capital of a powerful Hatti dynasty from the middle of the 16th century B.C. to at least 1200 B.C. He claims further that its ancient name was Hatti. At the height of its power it ruled all Asia Minor down to the Aegean and northern Syria to the headwaters of the Orontes, and was also overlord of the Mitanni and the Amurri (Amarru) in Mesopotamia. It had continual relation on terms of equality with Egypt and Babylonia. The four kings of the Kheta, alluded to by name in Egyptian texts, have been identified with kings of Boghaz Keui. The decline of Hatti power began with the expansion of Assyria after 1100 B.C. and Cappadocia seems to have been inferior to Phrygia after the rise of the Midaean dynasty in the 9th and 8th centuries. It should be added that the identification of Boghaz Keui with the Pteria of Heroditus has not yet been confirmed, and the latter name has been claimed for a primitive site at Ak-alan near Samsun by Th. Makridi Bey, as the result of his excavations for the Constantinople Museum in 1907 (see Hittites).
Authorities.—C. Ritter, Erdkunde, xviii; C. Texier, Descr. de l'Asie Mineure (i., 1843); J. Hamilton, Researches, &c. (1842); H. Barth, Reise von Trapezunt, &c. (Ergänz. Petermann's Geog. Mith.; 1860); G. Perrot and E. Guillaume, Expl. arch. de la Galatie (1862-1872); K. Humann and O. Puchstein, Reisen in Kleinasien u. Nordsyrien (1890); Murray's Guide to Asia Minor (1894): G. Perrot and C. Chipiez, Hist. de l'art (1886) vol. iv.; Lord Warkworth, Notes of a Diary, &c. (1898); E. Chantre, Mission en Cappadocie (1898). (For recent excavations see Hittites.) (D. G. H.)
PTERIDOPHYTA (Gr. πτέρις, fern, and φυτόν plant), or as they are frequently called, the Vascular Cryptogams, the third of the large subdivisions of the vegetable kingdom. The Ferns form the great majority of existing Pteridophytes; the importance and interest of the other groups, of which the Club-mosses and Horsetails are the most familiar examples, depend largely on the fact that they are the surviving representatives of large families of plants which flourished in earlier geological periods. (See Palaeobotany.)
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| Fig. 1.—Diagrammatic sketches of prothalli of— |
a, Equisetum. b, Lycopodium cernuum. c, L. phlegmaria. d, L. clavatum. e, Selaginella. f, Botrychium virginianum. g, Helminthostachys. h, A Fern. i, Salvinia. |
The relation which exists between the two alternating stages or generations, which together constitute the complete life-cycle of all plants higher than the Thallophyta, is perhaps the most Life history. natural characteristic of the Pteridophyta. From the germinated spore of a fern plant, which must not be confused with the “seed” of seed-bearing plants, a small, flat, green organism is developed; this is the prothallus (gametophyte, sexual generation; fig. 7). As the result of fertilization of an ovum produced by this, the fern plant (sporophyte, asexual generation) originates; from it spores are ultimately set free, with the germination of which the life-history again commences. The point common to all Pteridophyta is that from the first the gametophyte is an independent organism, while the sporophyte, though in the first stages of its development it obtains nutriment from the prothallus, becomes physiologically independent when its root develops. This independence of the two generations for the greater part of their lives distinguishes this group on the one hand from the Bryophyta (in which the sporophyte is throughout its life attached to the gametophyte), and on the other hand from the Gymnosperms and Angiosperms (in which the more or less reduced gametophyte remains enclosed within the tissues of the sporophyte). The gametophyte, which is usually dorsiventral, though in some cases radially symmetrical (fig. 1, b), is a small thallus attached to the soil by rhizoids. In structure it is equally simple, being composed of parenchymatous tissue without any clearly marked conducting system. Usually it grows exposed to the light and contains chlorophyll, but subterranean saprophytic prothalli also occur in the Lycopodiaceae and Ophioglossaccae (fig. 1, c, d, f, g). In the heterosporous forms the gametophyte is more or less reduced (fig. 1, e, i). The reproductive organs ultimately produced on the same or on different individuals are of two kinds, the antheridia and archegonia; the origin of both is from single superficial cells of the prothallus. The antheridium (fig. 8) at maturity consists of a layer of cells forming the wall which encloses a group of small cells; from each of the latter a single motile spermatozoid originates. The archegonium (fig. 9) consists of a more or less projecting neck and the venter, which is usually enclosed by the tissue of the prothallus. A central series of cells can be distinguished in it, the lowest of which is the ovum; above this come
