  We examine the modulational and parametric instabilities arising in a
non-autonomous, discrete nonlinear Schr{\"o}dinger equation setting. The
principal motivation for our study stems from the dynamics of Bose-Einstein
condensates trapped in a deep optical lattice. We find that under periodic
variations of the heights of the interwell barriers (or equivalently of the
scattering length), additionally to the modulational instability, a window of
parametric instability becomes available to the system. We explore this
instability through multiple-scale analysis and identify it numerically. Its
principal dynamical characteristic is that, typically, it develops over much
larger times than the modulational instability, a feature that is qualitatively
justified by comparison of the corresponding instability growth rates.
