Persepolis griffins at twilight, Persepolis terrace, vicinity of Marvdasht, Province of Fars, Iran, April 2008.

Those grey marble sculptures of diverging twins griffins were constituing the top of the columns carrying the roofs of Achaemenian king palaces at Persepolis, capital of the first Persian empire.

Those figures were inspired by greek mythology as since Cyrus the Great, ionian greeks (minor asia) workers and architects were commited to the elaboration of such thin columns in the Persian empire ( Karl Nylander "ionian at Pasargadae", Studies in Old persian Architecture, Almqvist och Wiksell, Uppsal 1970). Giant lebanon cedar beams or sometime oak beams were placed between the animals joining all the columns and carrying the roofs of giant hypostyle halls. Bulls, lions, or lamassus (androcephalic winged bulls) were also sculpted.