the high priest of the Persian Magi or worshippers of fire. Darius Hystaspes took upon himself the dignity of Archimagus; for Porphyry tells us he ordered that after his death, among the other titles, it should be engraven on his monument that he had been Master of the Magi. This seems to have been the reason that the kings of Persia were ever afterwards considered to be of the sacerdotal tribe, and were always initiated into the sacred order of the Magi before their coronation.