Discoveries among the Ruins of Nineveh and Babylon

That's French for "the ancient system," as in the ancient system of feudal privileges and the exercise of autocratic power over the peasants. The ancien regime never goes away, like vampires and dinosaur bones they are always hidden in the earth, exercising a mysterious influence. It is not paranoia to believe that the elites scheme against the common man. Inform yourself about their schemes here.

Re: Discoveries among the Ruins of Nineveh and Babylon

Postby admin » Wed Apr 13, 2022 7:46 am

Part 2 of 2

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Entrance to Temple, High Mound (Nimroud)  

To the right of this entrance, and apparently outside the walls of the temple, was discovered one of the finest specimens of Assyrian sculpture brought to this country. It represents the early Nimroud king in high relief, carved on a solid block of limestone, cut into the shape of an arched frame, in the form of the rock tablets of Bavian and the Nahr-el-Kelb. The monarch wears his sacrificial robes, and carries the sacred mace in his left hand. Round his neck are hung the four sacred signs, the crescent, the star or sun, the trident, and the cross. His waist is encircled by the knotted cord, and in his girdle are three daggers. Above his head are the mythic symbols of Assyrian worship, the winged globe, the crescent, the star, the bident, and the horned cap. The entire slab, 8 ft. 8 in. high, by 4 ft. 6 in. broad, and 1 ft 3 in. thick, is covered, behind and before, except where the sculpture intervenes, with an inscription, in small and admirably formed arrow-headed characters. It was fixed on a plain square pedestal and stood isolated from the building. In front of it was an altar of stone supported on lions' feet, very much resembling in shape the tripod of the Greeks.

It would seem from the altar before this figure, that the Assyrians, like other nations of old, were in the habit of deifying the heroes of their race, and that the king who extended the bounds of the empire to distant lands, and raised temples to the gods, received after his death divine honors.

Unfortunately, the heat of the fire which had consumed the building, had also broken this monument into two pieces. From the carelessness shown in its transport to England, this fine specimen of Assyrian sculpture sustained still further injury, and the lower part is now almost destroyed.

The inscription must have contained when entire several hundred lines, and is divided on the back of the slabs into two columns. It commences with an invocation to the god Ashur, the supreme lord, the king of the circle of the twelve great gods. Then follow the names of these deities. They are the same as those on the black obelisk belonging to the son of the king represented on this slab, although they are not placed in the same order, which is so far important as it enables us to determine the exact name and title of each. These divinities may preside over the twelve months, corresponding with the same circle in the Egyptian mythology, with which it is possible they may hereafter, to a certain extent, be identified. The first-named is Anu (?), the last Ishtar, probably Astarte, or the moon, and not Venus, as some have believed.* [This is evident from Lucian's "De Dea Syra," c. 4.; and see Gesenius's "Thesaurus" in voce "Ashtoreth." (1 Kings, xi. 5. 33. 2 Kings, xxiii. 13.) Quaere, whether the bull's horns placed on the head of this divinity were not originally the horns of the moon's crescent?]

After this invocation occurs the name of the founder of the north-west palace, read by Dr. Hincks, Assaracbal, and by Colonel Rawlinson, Sardanapalus, with a long exordium, apparently of a religious nature, which has not yet been satisfactorily deciphered. Then follows a full account of his various campaigns and wars, of which I will give extracts, when I describe similar inscriptions on other monuments discovered in the same building.  

The lion entrance led into a chamber 46 ft. by 19 ft. Its walls of sundried brick were coated with plaster, on which the remains of figures and ornaments in color could still be faintly traced.† [B. ch. a. Plan 2.] Nearly opposite to the entrance was a doorway ‡ [Ent. 3. B. same Plan.] panelled with slabs sculptured with winged figures carrying maces. Flanking it on the four sides were priests wearing garlands.

The inner door led into a chamber 47 ft. by 31ft. § [B. ch. b. same Plan.], ending in a recess paved with one enormous alabaster slab, no less than 21 ft. by 16 ft. 7 in., and 1 ft. 1 in. thick. This monolith had been broken into several pieces probably by the falling in of the roof of the building, and had in several places been reduced to lime by the burning beams of the ceiling. The whole of its surface, as well as the side facing the chamber, was occupied by one inscription, 325 lines in length, divided into two parallel horizontal columns, and carved with the greatest sharpness and care. On subsequently raising the detached pieces, I found that the back of the slab, resting on a solid mass of sundried bricks, was also covered with cuneiform writing, occupying three columns. It is difficult to understand why so much labor should have been apparently thrown away upon an inscription which would remain unseen until the edifice itself was utterly destroyed. Still more curious is the fact, that whilst this inscription contains all the historical details of that on the opposite side, the records of two or three more years are added, and that the upper inscription stops abruptly in the middle of a sentence. It is possible that the builders of the temple, foreseeing its ruin, had determined that if their enemies should through malice deface their annals, there should still remain another record, inaccessible and unknown, which would preserve the history of their greatness and glory unto all time.

The inscription on this great monolith appears to have been similar in its historical details to that on the king in the frame. I shall quote some specimens, translated by Dr. Hincks, to show the minuteness with which the Assyrian kings chronicled every event of their reign, and the consequent value of their historical records. It is to be remarked that, although these inscriptions are in the form of annals, the years are not mentioned. The king generally sets out on his campaigns in one particular month, the name of which is given; probably in the autumn, when the heats of summer were over. In the beginning of his reign he collected his army, and made his first expedition into the country of Nummi, or Numi, probably Elam or Susiana, subsequently, as we shall find, called Numaki or Nuvaki. He took many cities, towns, and districts whose names have not been identified. He slew their women, their slaves, and their children, and carried away their cattle and flocks. Their fighting men escaped to a hill fort (?). "Their houses he burned like stubble" (?). Many other countries to the south and south-east of Assyria, some of which are mentioned on the obelisk, were conquered during this campaign. The city of Nishtun (?) is particularly described as one of considerable importance. He seized its king or governor, whose name reads Babou, the son of Baboua, and imprisoned him in Babylon. "At that time the cities of Nerib (their position is doubtful), their principal cities, he destroyed. From Nerib he departed to the city of Tushka .... A palace for his dwelling he made there, and placed pillars (?) * [Perhaps inscribed pillars, such as Darius set up when he crossed the Bosphorus. (Herod iv. 87.)] at the gates, and put a statue of ... . (probably some kind of stone) .... and set up tablets, and made a place for them in the citadel. † [Similar tablets appear to have been frequently put up by the Assyrian kings, as we see from a bas-relief at Khorsabad, representing Sargon besieging a castle, on the walls of which there is a tablet of himself, or one of his predecessors.]

He appears subsequently to have turned his arms to the north, and to have received tribute from the kings of Nahiri (the country between the head waters of the Euphrates and Tigris) consisting of chariots (?), horses . . . (probably some other animal), silver, gold, various objects of copper, oxen, sheep, and asses (?); he then placed an officer of his own over the conquered people.

An account follows of the building of the north-west palace of Nimroud, which, when deciphered, will be of considerable interest, and may enable us to restore that edifice. It had been founded by one of his forefathers, but had been deserted and allowed to fall into ruins. He now rebuilt it, raising pillars of wood (?) and of some other material, and setting up thrones, and three other objects always mentioned in connection with the thrones, but the precise nature of which has not as yet been determined. The inhabitants of the countries over whom he ruled sent things of gold, silver, copper, and iron (?), for the new palace. He also built two cities on the Euphrates, one on each bank (?), calling one after his own name, and the other after the name of the great god Ashur.

Numerous expeditions to countries to the north, west, and south of Assyria are then related in detail. Amongst them one to Carchemish, where he received the tribute of Sangara, king of the Khatti (the Hittites or people of Syria), including a great variety of gold and silver ornaments, some apparently to be recognised by their pure Hebrew names. As few of the cities and countries conquered and visited by this king have yet been identified, and a mere repetition of the same dry details would scarcely interest the reader, I will merely give literal versions, as far as they can be given, of the history of two of the most important campaigns. They will show the style of these remarkable chronicles, and the minuteness with which events were recorded.

The first paragraph relates to the campaign of the king on the borders of the Euphrates.

"On the 22nd day of the month .... I departed from Calah (the quarter of Nineveh now called Nimroud). I crossed the Tigris. On the banks of the Tigris I received much tribute. In the city of Tabit I halted. I occupied the banks of the river Karma (? the Hermus, or eastern confluent of the Khabour). In the city of Megarice I halted. From the city of Megarice I departed. I occupied the banks of the Khabour (Chaboras). I halted at the city of Sadikanni (? or Kar-dikanni). I received the tribute of Sadikanni. From Sadikanni I departed. In Kedni I halted. I received the tribute of the city of Kedni. From Kedni I departed to the city of . . . lemmi. In the city of . . . lemmi I halted. From the city of . . . lemmi I departed. In the city of Beth- Khilapi I halted. The tribute of Beth-Khilapi I received, gold, silver," and many other articles, amongst which are apparently objects of clothing, or embroidered stuffs. Then follow his marches day by day to the cities of Sirki, Tzufri, Naqua-rabani, and Kindani, from each of which he received tribute in gold, silver, several objects not identified, cattle, and sheep. The inscription goes on — "The city of Kindani stands on the right bank of the river Euphrates. From Eandani I departed: on a mountain, by the side of the Euphrates, I halted. From the mountain I departed. In Beth-She-baiya, over against Karid, I halted. The city of Karid stands on the right bank of the river Euphrates. From Bath-Shebaiya I departed: on the top of (or above) Anat I halted. Anat stands in the middle of the Euphrates" (agreeing with the position of the modern town of Ana). He then attacked and took the principal city of Shadu (?), of the country of Suka, and the city of Tzur (?) the capital of Shadu (?), whose inhabitants were assisted by the soldiers of Bishi (a nation also alluded to in the second year of the annals of Sennacherib). Nebo-Baladan, king of Kar-Duniyas, is then mentioned, showing that the campaign was carried down the banks of the Euphrates far to the south of Babylon.

The second extract is from the records of a campaign in northern Syria. Having first crossed the Euphrates:

"From Kunulua, the capital of Lubarna, the Sharutinian * [This city, one apparently of considerable size and importance, must have stood somewhere near Antioch, or between Antioch and Aleppo. The Sharutinians may probably be identified with the Shairetana of the Egyptian monuments, at one time the allies, and at another the enemies, of Egypt. Few travellers are aware that, above the city of Antioch, carved in the rock, are colossal figures of an Egyptian sphinx and two priests. I have been informed that there are other similar monuments in the neighbouring mountains.], I departed. The Arantu (Orontes) I crossed. On the banks of the Arantu I encamped. From the banks of the Arantu I departed. Between the countries of Saraban and Tapan (?) I occupied the country. By the seashore I encamped. To the city of Ariboua (?), a principal city of Lubarna, the Sharutinian, I returned. ... (undeciphered passage). I caused some men of Assyria to dwell in his palace (?). Whilst I was in Ariboua the cities of Lukuta I took. I slew many of their men. I overthrew and burned their cities. Their fighting men (or ? the deserters from my army) I laid hold of. On stakes over against their city I impaled them. † [This barbarous practice, frequently represented in the bas-reliefs, seems, therefore, to have prevailed from the earliest times in the East. Darius impaled 3000 Babylonians when he took their city. (Herod. iii. 159.) The last instance with which I am acquainted of this punishment having been inflicted in Turkey, was at Baghdad, where, about ten years ago, Nejib Pasha impaled four rebel Arab Sheikhs, one at each corner of the bridge. They survived for many hours. It is said that, unless they drink water, when they instantly die, persons so treated will live even for two or three days.] At that time the countries that are upon Lebanon I took possession of, to the great sea of the country of Akkari (the Mediterranean). On the great sea I put my servants (?). Sacrifices to the gods I offered. The tribute of the kings of the people who dwelt near the sea, of the Tyrians, the Sidonians, the Kubalians, the Mahalatai (?)f the Ma . . . . ai, the Kha . . . . , and the Akkarians (all nations to the north of Tyre), and of the city of Arvad, which is in the middle of the sea — silver and gold pieces, rings (?) of copper, ingots (?) of copper, two kinds of clothing (?) (perhaps the dyed cloth of Tyre, or embroideries such as are frequently mentioned in the Bible), great 'pagouti' and small 'pagouti' (meaning not determined), some wooden objects, apparently of cedar, and pearls (?), from the rivers at or between the sea.* [Might this word, translated conjecturally pearls, mean the shell fish from which the Tyrian dye was extracted?] I went to the mountain of Kamana (the Camanus, in the north of Syria). I sacrificed to the gods. I made bridges (or beams), and pillars (?). From Kamana I brought them to Bithkara, for my own house, for the temple of San, for the temple of the sun. I went to the forests and cut them down, and made bridges (?) (or roofs or beams) of the wood, for Ishtar, mistress of the city of Nineveh, my protectress."† [The whole of the last passage is very obscure; the translation is partly conjectural.]  

The chief events of the reign of this king are briefly alluded to in the standard and other inscriptions discovered in the northwest palace at Nimroud; but in the records just described we have a minuteness of geographical detail, which enables us to trace the course of his expeditions with great certainty. The forms of expression in these chronicles differ from those on later monuments. There even appears to be an occasional attempt at poetical illustration: for instance, instead of giving the exact amount of spoil taken from a conquered country, the king declares that "it exceeded the stars of heaven;" and when speaking of the destruction of enemy's cities, he likens it to "the burning of stubble" (?). His expeditions seem to have been attended by great cruelties and sacrifice of human life, and he celebrates the burning of innumerable women and children. The evidence of the populous state of Mesopotamia at that period quite corresponds with the vast number of artificial mounds, the ruins of ancient settlements, still existing in that country, and described in the foregoing pages.

Opening into the recess paved with this great monolith was a small room, or rather closet, 13 feet by 3, which may have been used to keep the sacrificial utensils and the garments of the priests,

The entrance formed by the good spirit driving out the evil principle led into a chamber * [Several specimens are now in the British Museum. B. Chamber C, Plan II.] connected by separate doorways with the two rooms last described. The walls were simply plastered, and there were no remains found in it but the fragments of an inscribed slab.

Standing one day on a distant part of the mound, I smelt the sweet smell of burning cedar. The Arab workmen, excavating in the small temple, had dug out a beam, and, the weather being cold, had at once made a fire to warm themselves. The wood was cedar; probably one of the very beams mentioned in the inscription as brought from the forests of Lebanon by the king who built the edifice. After a lapse of nearly three thousand years, it had retained its original fragrance. Many other such beams were discovered * [Several specimens are now in the British Museum. B. Chamber C, Plan II.], and the greater part of the rubbish in which the ruin was buried, consisted of charcoal of the same wood. It is likely that the whole superstructure, as well as the roof and floor of the building, like those of the temple and palace of Solomon, were of this precious material.

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Fragment in blue Clay (Nimroud).

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Eye in black Marble and Ivory (Nimroud).

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Box in Chalcedony (Nimroud).

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Box in Porcelain? (Nimroud).

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Fragment in Porcelain? (Nimroud).

In these ruins was also found a mass of lead melted by the fire, for embedded in it was the iron head of a hatchet. Amongst the various small objects collected were.

Figures of winged deities, &c., of clay, colored in the mass with a blue derived from copper; eyes, beards, hair, and ornaments in enamel, probably belonging to figures of wood, metal, or ivory, resembling the cryselaphantine statues of the Greeks; eyes of black marble inlaid with ivory, with the eye-balls of a bright blue enamel, belonging to similar statues; and arms, legs, and other parts of figures in charred wood. A box of chalcedony probably used for some precious ointment. Another box of the same shape in porcelain (?) has holes round the rim, and was originally inlaid with gold, traces of which still remain.

Fragments of porcelain (?), parts of a cup or vase, with carvings in low relief, representing a castle with women on the walls, the hind legs of a camel, and a captive carrying a cauldron. An inscription appears to have described the event represented, and to have contained the name of a king. Only a few characters remain.

Several inscribed fragments of agate, lapis-lazuli, cornelian, and Other precious materials, beads, cylinders, and one or two clay tablets with inscriptions and impressions of seals, complete the list of small objects discovered in this temple.

The inscriptions across the sculptured slabs are nearly the same as the standard inscription in the northwest palace; those at the back also contain the name of the founder of that edifice, who, it thus appears, was likewise the builder of the temple.

About one hundred feet to the east of the building last described, and on the very edge of the artificial platform, I discovered a second temple. Its principal entrance, faced the south, and was on the same level as the north-west palace. This gateway was formed by two colossal lions with extended jaws, gathered up lips and nostrils, flowing manes, and ruffs of bristly hair. The heads, though to a certain extent conventional in form, were designed with that vigor so remarkably displayed by the Assyrian sculptor in the delineation of animals. The limbs conveyed the idea of strength and power, the veins and muscles were accurately portrayed, and the outline of the body was not deficient in grace and truth. But the front of the animal, which was in full, was narrow and cramped, and unequal in dignity to the side. In the general treatment the whole sculpture had much of that peculiar feeling and character that mark the archaic monuments of Greece, and it was on this account peculiarly interesting. In it, indeed, we may perhaps trace those conventional forms from which the Greek artist first derived his ideal Lion.* [Plate 2, 2nd series of Monuments of Nineveh.] The sculptor has given five legs to the animal for the same reason that he gave them to the sphinxes, that they might offer a complete front and side view.

This gateway, about eight feet wide, was paved with one inscribed slab. The height of the lions was about eight feet, and their length thirteen. An inscription was carved across them. In front of them, in the corners formed by walls projecting at right angles with the entrance, were two altars, hollow at the top, and ornamented with gradines resembling the battlements of a castle. † [An altar nearly similar in shape is seen on the top of a hill, in a bas-relief at Khorsabad, Botta, plate 16.] The exterior walls appeared to have been adorned with enamelled bricks, many of which still remained.

Unfortunately, one of these lions had been too much injured by fire to bear removal. The other, although cracked in several places when discovered, and consequently moved in pieces, has been preserved, and is now in the British Museum.
 
The Lion portal led into a chamber 57 feet by 25.‡ [C. Plan II.] At one end was a recess similar to that in the opposite temple, and also paved with one great alabaster slab, inscribed on both sides. This monolith, 19-1/2 ft. by 12 ft., was likewise broken into several pieces, and had been injured in parts by fire.

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Entrance to a small Temple (Nimroud).

The inscription on the upper side, divided into two columns, and containing 230 lines, was nearly the same as that on the king in the frame and on the monolith in the other temple. It was also a record of the wars and campaigns of the early Nimroud king, and was important as enabling us to restore such parts of the other inscriptions as are wanting, and as furnishing various readings of the same text. The inscription on the under part was a mere abridgment of the other.

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Statue of King, from Temple (Nimroud).

Nearly in the centre of the principal chamber were two small slabs joined together. On each was the same inscription, merely containing passages from the standard inscription.

The other rooms in the same building contained no inscriptions, sculptures, or other objects of interest. The walls had been plastered and painted.

In the earth above the great inscribed slab, was found an interesting figure, 3 feet 4 inches high, and cut in a hard, compact limestone. It appeared to represent the king himself attired as high priest in his sacrificial robes. In his right hand he held an instrument resembling a sickle, and in his left the sacred mace. Round his waist was the knotted girdle; and his left arm, like that of the king in the opposite temple, was partly concealed by an outer robe. His garments descended to his feet, the toes alone projecting from them. The beard and hair were elaborately curled. The features were majestic, and the general proportions of the statue not altogether incorrect, with the exception of a want of breadth in the side view peculiar to Assyrian works of art of this nature. It was, however, chiefly remarkable as being the only entire statue "in the round" of this period, hitherto discovered in the ruins of Nineveh.

On the breast is an inscription nearly in these words: — After the name and titles of the king, "The conqueror from the upper passage of the Tigris to Lebanon and the Great Sea, who all countries, from the rising of the sun to the going down thereof has reduced under his authority." The statue was, therefore, probably raised after his return from the campaign in Syria described, as we have seen, on the monoliths, and alluded to in the standard inscription.

This statue originally stood on a pedestal of reddish limestone, which, with the figure itself, was found broken into several pieces. They have been restored, and are now in the British Museum.* [Plate 52, of 2nd series of the Monuments of Nineveh.]

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Head in Gypsum, from small Temple (Nimroud).

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Ivory Head from small Temple (Nimroud).

Amongst the smaller objects discovered whilst removing the earth from the chambers in this edifice were several rudely carved heads in alabaster, which may have been parts of a throne or altar, or of some architectural ornament; fragments of enamel belonging to wooden or ivory figures; and the head of a griffin or mythic animal in ivory, most probably belonging to a wooden figure, or to the top of a staff, as there are holes for the nails by which it was fastened.

The two interesting buildings just described, the only undoubted remains of temples hitherto found at Nimroud, complete the discoveries at the northern extremity of the mound. They enable us, as will hereafter be seen, to restore part of the group of edifices raised on the grand platform in this quarter of Nineveh.  
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Re: Discoveries among the Ruins of Nineveh and Babylon

Postby admin » Wed Apr 13, 2022 7:46 am

CHAPTER XVII. THE SUMMER.—ENCAMPMENT AT KOUYUNJIK.—VISITORS.—MODE OF LIFE.—DEPARTURE FOR THE MOUNTAINS.—AKRA.—ROCK-TABLETS AT GUNDUK.—DISTRICT OF ZIBARI.—NAMET AGHA.—DISTRICT OF SHIRWAN—OF BARADOST—OF GHERDI—OF SHEMDINA.—MOUSA BEY.—NESTORIAN BISHOP.—CONTENT OF MAR HANANISHO.—DIZZA.—AN ALBANIAN FRIEND.—BASH-KALAH.—IZZET PASHA.—A JEWISH ENCAMPMENT.—HIGH MOUNTAIN PASS.—MAHMOUDIYAH.—FIRST VIEW OF WAN.

The difficulties and delay in crossing the Tigris, now swollen by the melting of the mountain snows, induced me to pitch my tents on the mound of Kouyunjik, and to reside there with all my party, instead of daily passing to and fro in the rude ferry-boats to the ruins. The small European community at Mosul was increased in June by the arrival of a large party of travellers. Two English gentlemen and their wives, who passed through on their way to Baghdad: the Hon. Mr. Walpole, who has since published an account of his adventures in the East; the Rev. Mr. Malan, to whom I am indebted for many beautiful sketches; the Rev. Mr. Bowen, an English clergyman, on a tour of inspection to the Eastern churches, with whom[Pg 301] I spent many agreeable and profitable hours amongst the ruins of Nineveh and Babylon, and his companion, Mr. Sandresky, were our visitors, and were most of them my guests.

Our tents were pitched at the northern corner of Kouyunjik. The spring was now fast passing away; the heat became daily greater; the corn was cut, and the plains and hills put on their summer clothing of dull parched yellow. “The pasture is withered, the tender herb faileth, the green herb is no more.”[154] It was the season, too, of the sherghis, or burning winds from the south, which occasionally sweep over the face of the country, driving, in their short-lived fury, everything before them. Their coming was foretold by a sudden fall in the barometer, which rose again as soon as they had passed.

At Nimroud the excavations had been almost stopped: at Kouyunjik they were still carried on as actively as my means would permit. I was now occupied in moving and packing sculptures from both ruins. From Nimroud the beautiful bas-relief of the king in the arched frame, described in the previous chapter, the good spirit driving out the evil principle, the fish-god, the colossal lion from the small temple, and several other interesting sculptures, were taken to the river-bank, and sent on rafts to Busrah. At Kouyunjik none of the slabs could be removed entire. I could only pack in fragments several of the bas-reliefs. The cases were dragged in carts to the Tigris, unloaded below the piers of the ancient bridge, and there placed on rafts prepared to receive them.

During the day, when not otherwise occupied, I made drawings of the bas-reliefs discovered in the subterranean passages. My guests, choosing some convenient place[Pg 302] underground near the parties who were at work, spread their carpets beneath the crumbling sculptures. We all went below soon after the sun had risen, and remained there, without again seeking the open air, until it was far down in the western horizon. The temperature in the dark tunnels was cool and agreeable, nearly twenty degrees of Fahrenheit lower than that in the shade above but I found it unwholesome, the sudden change in going in and out causing intermittent fever.

After the sun had set we dined outside the tents, and afterwards reclined on our carpets to enjoy the cool balmy air of an Eastern night. We slept under the open sky, making our beds in the field.

July had set in, and we were now in “the eye of the summer.” My companions had been unable to resist its heat. One by one we dropped off with fever. The Doctor, after long suffering, had gone with Mr. Walpole to the cooler regions of the Kurdish hills, there to wait until the state of the excavations might enable me to join them. Mr. Cooper, too, had so much declined in health that I sent him to the convent of Mar Metti, on the summit of the Gebel Makloub. Mr. Hormuzd Rassam and myself struggled on the longest, but at length we also gave way. Fortunately our ague attacks did not coincide. We were prostrate alternate days, and were, therefore, able to take charge alternately of the works. By the 11th of July I had sent to Busrah the first collection of sculptures from Kouyunjik, and on that day, in the middle of the hot stage of fever, and half delirious, I left Mosul for the mountains.

While necessarily absent, I determined to visit those parts of central Kurdistan not yet explored by European travellers, to devote some days to the examination of the ruins and cuneiform inscriptions in and near the city of[Pg 303] Wan, and then to return to Mosul through the unexplored uplands to the south of the lake of Wan, and by such of the Nestorian valleys as I had not seen during my former journey in the mountains. I should then spend the hottest part of the summer in the cool regions of Kurdistan, and be again at Nineveh by September, when the heats begin to decline.

As few European travellers can brave the perpendicular rays of an Assyrian sun, we struck our tents late in the afternoon, and got upon our horses at the foot of the mound of Kouyunjik as the sun went down. With me were Hormuzd, my old servants, and the faithful Bairakdar. Mr. Cooper was to join us on the following day, and we were to seek the Doctor and Mr. Walpole at Akra.

Five hours’ ride over the plain brought us to the small Turcoman village of Bir Hillan (the well of stone), which stands on the south-eastern spur of the Makloub hills. After two hours’ rest we continued our journey, and crossed this spur before morning dawned. Leaving the Gebel Makloub, we descended into a broad plain, stretching from it to the first Kurdish range, and soon found ourselves on the banks of the Ghazir, here a clear sparkling stream clothed with tall oleanders, now bending under their rosy blossoms. We sought the shade of some spreading walnut-trees, during the heat of the day, near the small Kurdish village of Kaimawa.

Here Mr. Cooper joined us, and we were again on our way in the afternoon. Instead of striking for the mountains by the direct path across the plain of Navkur, we rode along the foot of a range of low hills, forming its western boundary, to the large Kurdish village of Bardaresh. Having rested for a few hours, we descended in the middle of the night into a plain receiving the drainage of the surrounding highlands, and during the rainy season[Pg 304] almost impassable from mud. Artificial mounds, the remains of ancient civilisation, but of small size when compared with the great ruins of Assyria, rise amongst the hovels of the Kurdish peasants.

After we had crossed the parched and burning plain we entered a valley in the Kurdish hills, watered by a stream called Melik or Gherasin. We had to climb over much broken ground—rocky ridge and ravine—before reaching the slope of the mountain covered with the gardens and orchards of Akra. We tarried for a moment at a cool spring rising in a natural grotto, and collected into two large basins.

We had no difficulty in finding our European fellow-travellers. The first Kurd we met pointed towards a well-wooded garden; above its trees peered their white tents. As we rode into it, however, no one came out to welcome us. I entered the first tent, and there, stretched on their carpets, in a state of half-consciousness, the prey to countless flies, lay the Doctor and Mr. Walpole. It was with difficulty I could rouse them to learn the history of their fever. The whole party were in the same state; the servants prostrate like their masters. I lost no time in enforcing a system of diet, and placing my patients under a course of treatment for ague, with which long experience had given me some acquaintance.

Some days elapsed before my companions were able to journey. I took advantage of the delay to visit some bas-reliefs near the neighbouring village of Gunduk. There are two sculptured tablets in the rocks above Gunduk. They have been carved at the mouth of a spacious natural cavern, whose roof is fretted with stalactites, and down whose sides trickles cool clear water, and hang dank ferns and creeping plants. It is called Guppa d’Mar Yohanna, or the cure of St. John, and near it is an ancient Nestorian[Pg 305] church dedicated to Saint Audishio. The bas-reliefs are Assyrian. The upper represents a man slaying a wild goat with a spear. In the lower, as far as I could distinguish the sculpture, which is high on the rock and much injured, are two women facing each other, and seated on stools. Each holds a child above a kind of basin or circular vessel, as if in the act of baptizing it. Behind the seated female to the left, a figure bears a third child, and is followed by a woman. On the opposite side is a group of three persons, apparently sacrificing an animal. There are no traces of inscriptions on or near the tablets.

On the 17th July my companions were able to move to the higher mountains. We all longed for a cooler climate, and we rejoiced as at sunrise we left our garden. A precipitous and difficult path leads up the mountain. From the summit of the pass, the eye wanders over the plains of Navkur and Sheikhan, the broken hill country around Arbil, and the windings of the Zab and the Ghazir. On the opposite side is a deep valley dividing the Akra hills from a second and loftier range. Through the valley ran a broad clear stream, one of the confluents of the Zab, called by the Kurds Durusho or Bairaisho.[155] We rode along its banks for nearly an hour, and then struck into a narrow gorge thickly wooded with oak. Another stony and precipitous pass was between us and the principal district of Zibari. Descending into the low country we[Pg 306] rode by the village of Birikapra, the residence of Mustafa Agha, the former head of the Zibari tribes. The present chief, Namet Agha, dwells at Heren, about two miles beyond. He had lately been at Mosul to receive from the Pasha his cloak of investiture, and during his visit had been my guest. His abilities and acquirements were above the ordinary Kurdish standard, which indeed is low enough; for, as the Arab proverb declares, “Be the Kurd a Kurd or a prophet, he will still be a bear.” He spoke Persian with fluency, and was not ignorant of Arabic. As he was well acquainted with the geography of Kurdistan, I learnt from him many interesting particulars relating to the less-known districts of the mountains.

The chief welcomed me with friendly warmth; and, although forbidden to eat himself, he did not leave his guests uncared for. The breakfast brought to us from his harem comprised a variety of sweetmeats and savoury dishes, which did credit to the skill of the Kurdish ladies.

I was the bearer of a letter to him from the Pasha: no acceptable communication, however, as it treated of new taxes, a subject very generally disagreeable, upon tobacco, cotton, and fruit, which the Zibari Kurds were now called upon for the first time to pay. The salian, too, a kind of property tax, was raised from twenty-five to sixty thousand piastres (about 550l.). The late successful expeditions against the chiefs of Bohtan and Hakkiari had encouraged the Porte to ask money of the previously independent tribes under Namet Agha; and although no Turkish troops had yet entered their mountains, the Kurds deemed it advisable to comply for the present with the demand rather than run the risk of an invasion, and a still more dreaded evil, the conscription.

Namet Agha’s authority extended over Zibari, Shirwan, Gherdi, Baradost, and Shemdeena, from Akra to the[Pg 307] Persian frontier. These districts are occupied by different Kurdish tribes, each having its own chief; but they had then submitted to the Agha of Zibari, and paid their tribute through him to the governor of Mosul. Namet placed me under the protection of his cousin, Mullah Agha, who was ordered to escort us to the borders of the pashalic of Hakkiari, now occupied by the Turkish troops. Our guide was a tall sinewy mountaineer, dressed in the many-colored loose garments, and huge red and black turban folded round the high conical felt cap, which gives a peculiar and ungainly appearance to the inhabitants of central Kurdistan. He was accompanied by three attendants, and all were on foot, the precipitous and rocky pathways of the mountains being scarcely practicable for horses, which are rarely kept but by the chiefs. They carried their long rifles across their shoulders, and enormous daggers in their girdles.

We left Heren early on the morning of the 19th, and soon reaching the Zab rode for two hours along its banks, to a spot where a small raft had been made ready for us to cross the stream. We had some difficulty in crossing, and were compelled to pass the night in the small village of Rizan, near the ferry, as one of the baggage-mules refused to swim the stream, and was not forced over until near dawn of the following morning.

We now entered the tract which has probably been followed for ages by the mountain clans in their periodical migrations. Besides the sedentary population of these districts, there are certain nomade Kurdish tribe called Kochers, who subsist entirely by their flocks. They are notorious petty thieves and robbers, and during their annual migrations commit serious depredations upon the settled inhabitants of the district on their way, and more especially upon the Christians. As they [Pg 308]possess vast flocks of sheep and herds of cattle, their track has in most places the appearance of a beaten road, and is, consequently, well-fitted for beasts of burden.

On the 21st July, crossing a high ridge, we left the district of Zibari, and entered that of Shirwan, whose chief, Miran Bey, came out to meet us at the head of his armed retainers. He led us to the large village of Bersiyah, situated beneath a bold and lofty peak called Piran. Most of the villages in these mountains have small mud forts, with either four or six towers,—the places of refuge and defence of the numerous petty chiefs during their frequent broils and blood-feuds. We met a few Jewish families who wander from village to village. The men are pedlars and goldsmiths, and are not unwelcome guests, even in the intolerant families of the Kurds, as they make and refashion the ornaments of the ladies.

On one of the many towering peaks, is the large village of Khan-i-resh, with its orchards and gardens, the residence of the chief of the district of Baradost. We reached it by a very rapid ascent in an hour and a half.[156]

We were received by the Mir, Fezullah Bey,[157] in a spacious chamber, supported by wooden pillars, and completely open on the side facing the valley, over which it commanded an extensive and beautiful prospect. Though quite restive under the Turkish control, he received Mullah Agha with civility, and read the letters of introduction from Namet Agha, of which I was the bearer. Like most of the mountain chiefs, he spoke Persian, the language used in Kurdistan for all written communications, and in books, except the Koran and a few pious works,[Pg 309] which are in Arabic. The Kurdish dialects are mere corruptions of the Persian, and are not, with rare exceptions, employed in writing.

The Mir pressed me to pass the night with him as his guest; but after partaking of his breakfast, I continued my journey, and reached, by sunset, the small turreted stronghold of Beygishni.

The next morning we crossed one of the shoulders of the lofty peak of Ser-i-Resh, into the valley of Chappata. We were met on the way by a party of Nestorians, who had come out to see me, headed by the brother of the Bishop of Gherdi. He walked by me as far as Zernin, the castle of the Kurdish chief, and then left a relation to guide us to the dwelling of the Bishop of Shemesdin or Shemdeena. As usual, he complained of bitter oppression and injustice from the Kurdish Mirs, who had lately driven a large part of the Christian population across the frontiers into Persia.

After enjoying the hospitality of Iahya Bey, the Mir of Gherdi, at the village of Rua, we left the naked hills which skirt the Assyrian plains, and entered the wooded districts of Kurdistan. On the following day we journeyed through a valley thick with walnuts and other large trees, and followed the windings of a stream, called by the Kurds Shambo, one of the principal confluents of the Zab. We crossed it, backwards and forwards, by wicker suspension bridges, until we ascended, through a forest of orchards watered by innumerable streamlets, to Nera, the village of Mousa Bey, the chief of Shemdina. We pitched our tents near some springs on an open lawn, and waited the return of an aged servant who had been disturbed by the noise of our caravan, and had undertaken to announce our arrival to his master.

We had evidently to deal with a man of civilisation[Pg 310] and luxury, for the old Kurd shortly returned followed by numerous attendants, bearing sherbets and various Persian delicacies, in china bowls. Mousa Bey himself came to us in the afternoon, and his manners and conversation confirmed the impression that his breakfast had produced. Intercourse with Persia, beyond whose frontiers his own tribe sometimes wandered, had taught him the manners and language of his neighbours. He told me that he was descended from one of the most ancient of Kurdish families, whose records for many hundred years still exist; and he boasted that Sheikh Tahar, the great saint, had deemed him the only chief worthy, from his independence of the infidel government of the Sultan, to receive so holy a personage as himself after the downfall of Beder Khan Bey. This Sheikh Tahar, who as the main instigator of many atrocious massacres of the Christians, and especially of the Nestorians, ought to have been pursued into the uttermost parts of the mountains by the Turkish troops, and hanged as a public example, was now suffering from fever. He sent to me for medicine; but as his sanctity would not permit him to see, face to face, an unbelieving Frank, and as he wished to have a remedy without going through the usual form of an interview with the Doctor, I declined giving him any help in the matter.

Mousa Bey was at this time almost the only chief in Kurdistan who had not yet made a formal submission to the Turkish government. His territories were, therefore, a place of refuge for those fugitives who, less fortunate than himself, had been driven from their strongholds by the arms or intrigues of the Porte. He bewailed the discords which severed the tribes, and made them an easy prey to the Osmanli. The Turks, wise in their generation, have pursued their usual policy successfully in [Pg 311]Kurdistan; the dissensions of the chiefs have been fomented, and, thus divided, they have fallen one by one victims to treachery or to force.

We rose early on the following day, and left Nera long before the population was stirring, by a very steep pathway, winding over the face of a precipice, and completely overhanging the village. Reaching the top of the pass we came upon a natural carpet of Alpine flowers of every hue, spread over the eastern declivity of the mountain. Leaving the caravan to proceed to our night’s resting-place, I turned down the valley with my companions to visit the bishop of Shemisden at his convent[158] of Mar Hananisho.

A ride of three quarters of an hour brought us to the episcopal residence.[159] Mar Isho, the bishop, met me at some distance from it. He was shabbily dressed, and not of prepossessing appearance; but he appeared to be good-natured, and to have a fair stock of common sense. After we had exchanged the common salutations, seated on a bank of wild thyme, he led the way to the porch of the church. Ragged carpets and felts had been spread in the dark vestibule, in the midst of sacks of corn, bourghoul, and other provisions for the bishop’s establishment. Various rude agricultural instruments, and spinning wheels, almost filled up the rest of the room; for these primitive Christians rely on the sanctity of their places of worship for the protection of their temporal stores. The title of the bishop is “Metropolitan of Roustak,” a name of which[Pg 312] I could not learn the origin. His jurisdiction extends over many Nestorian villages chiefly in the valley of Shemisden. Half of this district is within the Persian territories, and from the convent we could see the frontier dominions of the Shah. It is in the high road of the periodical migrations of the great tribe of Herki, who pass like a locust-cloud twice a year over the settlements of the unfortunate Christians, driving before them the flocks, spoiling the granaries, and carrying away even the miserable furniture of the hovels. It is in vain that the sufferers carry their complaints to their Kurdish master; he takes from them double the lawful taxes and tithes. The Turkish government has in this part of the mountains no power, if it had the inclination, to protect its Christian subjects.

After we had partaken of the frugal breakfast of milk, honey, and fruit prepared for us by the bishop, we turned again into the high road to Bash-Kalah. We had another pass to cross before descending into the valley of Harouna, where our caravan had encamped for the night. On the mountain top were several Nestorian families crouching, half naked, for shelter beneath a projecting rock. They seized the bridles of our horses as we rode by, beseeching us to help them to recover their little property, which, but a few hours before, had been swept away by a party of Herki Kurds. I could do nothing for these poor people, who seemed in the last stage of misery.

From the summit of the pass we looked down into two deep and well-wooded valleys, hemmed in by mountains of singularly picturesque form. We descended into the more northern valley, and passing the miserable Nestorian hamlet of Sourasor, and the ruined church and deserted Christian village of Tellana, reached our tents about sunset. They were pitched near Harouna, whose Nestorian[Pg 313] inhabitants were too poor to furnish us with even the common coarse black bread of barley.

We had now quitted the semi-independent Kurdish valleys, and had entered the newly created province of Hakkiari, governed by a Pasha, who resides at Bash-Kalah. The adjacent plain of Ghaour is, however, exposed to the depredations of the Herki Kurds, who, when pursued by the Turkish troops, seek a secure retreat in their rocky fastnesses, beyond the limits of the pashalic.

The district contains many villages, inhabited by a hardy and industrious race of Nestorian Christians. The American missionaries of Ooroomiyah have crossed the frontier since my visit, and have, I am informed, opened schools in them with encouraging prospects of success. Ghaour is a Nestorian bishopric.

A ride of six hours and a-half brought us to the large village of Dizza, the chief place of the district, and the residence of a Turkish Mudir, or petty governor. This office was filled by one Adel Bey, with whom I found my old friend Ismail Agha of Tepelin, who had shown me hospitality three years before in the ruined castle of Amadiyah.[160] He was now in command of the Albanian troops forming part of the garrison. A change had come over him since we last met. The jacket and arms which had once glittered with gold, were now greasy and dull. His face was as worn as his garments. After a cordial greeting he made me a long speech on his fortunes, and on that of Albanian irregulars in general. “Ah! Bey,” said he, “the power and wealth of the Osmanlis is at an end. The Sultan has no longer any authority. The accursed Tanzimat (Reform) has been the ruin of all good men. Why, see Bey, I am obliged to live upon my pay;[Pg 314] I cannot eat from the treasury, nor can I squeeze a piastre—what do I say, a piastre? not a miserable half-starved fowl, out of the villagers, even though they be Christians. Forsooth they must talk to me about reform, and ask for money! The Albanian’s occupation is gone. Even Tafil-Bousi (a celebrated Albanian condottiere) smokes his pipe, and becomes fat like a Turk. It is the will of God. I have forsworn raki, I believe in the Koran, and I keep Ramazan.”

The night was exceedingly cold. The change from the heat of the plains to the cool nights of the mountains had made havoc amongst our party. Nearly all our servants were laid up with fever, as well as the Doctor and Mr. Walpole, who had rarely been free from its attacks during the journey. I could not, however, delay, and on the following morning our sickly caravan was again toiling over the hills. We had now entered the Armenian districts. The Christian inhabitants of Dizza are of that race and faith. We encamped for the night at the Kurdish village of Perauniss.

Next day we forded a branch of the Zab, and entered the valley of this great confluent of the Tigris, its principal source being but a few miles to the north of us, near the frontiers of Persia. The land is so heavy, that the rude plough of the country requires frequently as many as eight pairs of oxen. The Armenian ploughmen sit on the yokes, and whilst guiding or urging the beasts with a long iron-pointed goad, chant a monotonous ditty to which the animals appear so well accustomed, that when the driver ceases from his dirge, they also stop from their labors.

A dell near our path was pointed out to me as the spot where the unfortunate traveller Schulz was murdered by Nur Ullah Bey, the Kurdish chief of Hakkiari.[Pg 315] Turning up a narrow valley towards the high mountains, we suddenly came in sight of the castle of Bash-Kalah, one of the ancient strongholds of Kurdistan. Its position is remarkably picturesque. It stands on a lofty rock, jutting out from the mountains which rise in a perpendicular wall behind it. At the foot are grouped the houses of a village. I found Izzet Pasha encamped at a considerable elevation in the rocky ravine[161], which we reached, guided by cawasses carrying huge glass lanterns, by a very precipitous and difficult track. I remained with him until the night was far advanced, and then returned to our encampment. He informed me that there was a direct road from Bash-Kalah to Mosul of forty hours, through Beit-Shebbet, Daoudiyah, and Dohuk, which, with very little labor and expense, could be made practicable for guns.

Bash-Kalah was formerly the dwelling-place of Nur Ullah Bey, a Kurdish chief well-known for his rapacious and blood-thirsty character, and as the murderer of Schulz. He joined Beder Khan Bey in the great massacres of the Nestorians, and for many years sorely vexed those Christians who were within his rule. After a long resistance to the troops of the Sultan, he was captured about two years before my visit, and banished for life to the island of Candia.

My companions and servants being much in want of rest, I stopped a day at Bash-Kalah. On resuming our journey we took a direct though difficult track to Wan only open in the middle of summer. Following a small stream, we entered a ravine leading into the very heart of the mountains. Three hours’ ride, always rapidly [Pg 316]ascending along the banks of the rivulet, brought us to a large encampment. The features of the women and of the men, who came out of their tents as we rode up, as well as the tongue in which they addressed one another, showed at once that they were not Kurds. They were Jews, shepherds and wanderers, of the stock, may be, of those who, with their high priest, Hyrcanus, were carried away captive from Jerusalem by Tigranes in the second century of our era, and placed in the city and neighbourhood of Wan. Their descendants, two hundred years after, were already so numerous that Shapour (Sapores) II. destroyed no less than 10,000 families in Wan alone.

We encamped near the Jewish nomades, and I visited their tents, but could learn nothing of their history. They fed their flocks, as their fathers had done before them, in these hills, and paid taxes to the governor of Bash-Kalah.

We had now reached the higher regions of Kurdistan.[162] Next morning we soon left the narrow flowery valley and the brawling stream, and entered an undulating upland covered with deep snow, considerably more than ten thousand feet above the level of the sea. On all sides of us were towering peaks, and to the west a perfect sea of mountains, including the lofty ranges of Hakkiari and Bohtan. Far away to the north was the azure basin of Lake Wan, and beyond it rose the solitary white cone of the Subhan Dagh.

Descending rapidly, and passing, near the foot of the mountain, one or two miserable, half-deserted Kurdish hamlets, we entered a long narrow ravine, shut in by perpendicular cliffs of sandstone and conglomerate. This outlet of the mountain streams opens into the valley of[Pg 317] Mahmoudiyah, in the centre of which rises an isolated rock crowned by the picturesque castle of Kosh-Ab.

We pitched our tents on a green lawn, near the bank of the foaming stream which sweeps round the foot of the castellated rock. Soon after our arrival a Kurdish Bey, of venerable appearance, a descendant of the hereditary chiefs of Mahmoudiyah, called upon me. He had once been the owner of the castle, but it had been wrested from him by two brothers, named Khan Murad and Khan Abdal, mere mountain robbers. In this stronghold the brothers long defied the Turkish government, levying black-mail upon such caravans as ventured to pass through their territories, and oppressing with fines and forced conversions their Christian subjects. It was but the year before our visit that they had yielded to the troops sent against them, and had been sent into banishment, with the rest of the rebel chiefs, to Candia.

With the Kurdish Bey came one Ahmed Agha, a chief of the large border tribe of Mogri, an intelligent man, who conversed freely on the state of the country, and gave me some interesting information regarding the frontiers. The fear of the conscription has driven many families into Persia, and into the more independent districts of Kurdistan. On the whole, the wandering tribes are becoming less formidable to the Porte than they formerly were.

To the east of the district of Mahmoudiyah, and in that of Karasou, are many Yezidi villages and a considerable Jewish population.[163] Both races are much oppressed by the Kurdish chiefs, who take their property,[Pg 318] and even their lives, with perfect indifference, “the Cadis,” as Ahmed Agha informed me, “having given fetwahs (decrees) that both were lawful to the true believer.”

We rose early next morning, and went up to the castle. It is falling into ruins, though its towers still rise boldly from the edge of the precipice, overhanging at a giddy height the valley below. In them, open to the cool breezes of the mountain, are the dwelling-rooms of the old Kurdish chiefs, adorned with tasteful lattice-work, and with the painted panellings and gilded cornices of Persia. They are now tenanted by the Turkish troops, whose bright arms and highly-polished kitchen utensils hang on the gaudy walls. After drinking coffee and smoking pipes with the captain of the guard, we walked down the narrow pathway leading to the valley, and, mounting our horses, joined the caravan, which had preceded us on the road to Wan.

On the following morning we crossed this valley to Nourtchouk, at the outskirts of which I was met by the priest at the head of the inhabitants. A range of low hills now separated us from the plain and lake of Wan. We soon reached their crest, and a landscape of surpassing beauty was before us. At our feet, intensely blue and sparkling in the rays of the sun, was the inland sea, with the sublime peak of the Subhan Dagh, mirrored in its transparent waters. The city, with its castle-crowned rock and its embattled walls and towers, lay embowered in orchards and gardens. To our right a rugged snow-capped mountain opened midway into an amphitheatre, in which, amidst lofty trees, stood the Armenian convent of Yedi Klissia (the seven churches). To the west of the lake was the Nimroud Dagh, and the highlands nourishing the sources of the great rivers of Mesopotamia.[Pg 319] The hills forming the foreground of our picture were carpeted with the brightest flowers, over which wandered the flocks, whilst the gaily dressed shepherds gathered around us as we halted to contemplate the enchanting scene.

We now descended rapidly towards Wan, and as we issued into the plain, a party of horsemen galloped towards us. I soon recognised amongst them my friend Mr. Bowen; with him were the Cawass-Bashi and a troop of irregular cavalry, sent out by the Pasha to escort me into the city. Nor did the governor’s kindness end with this display of welcome. After winding for nearly an hour through orchards and gardens, whose trees were bending under the weight of fruit, and then through the narrow and crowded streets, we were led to his serai or palace, which, such as it was, had been made ready for our use, and where his treasurer was waiting to receive us. Notwithstanding the fast, an abundant breakfast of various meats and sweet messes, cooked after the Turkish fashion, had been prepared for us, and we soon found repose upon a spacious divan, surrounded by all the luxuries of Eastern life.
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CHAPTER XVIII. MEHEMET PASHA.—DESCRIPTION OF WAN.—ITS HISTORY.—IMPROVEMENT IN ITS CONDITION.—THE ARMENIAN BISHOP.—THE CUNEIFORM INSCRIPTIONS.—THE CAVES OF KHORKHOR.—THE MEHER KAPOUSI.—A TRADITION.—OBSERVATIONS ON THE INSCRIPTIONS.—THE BAIRAM.—AN ARMENIAN SCHOOL.—THE AMERICAN MISSIONS.—PROTESTANT MOVEMENT IN TURKEY.—AMIKH.—THE CONVENT OF YEDI KLISSIA.

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Kurds of Wan.

Mehemet Pasha was living during the fast of Ramazan in a kiosk in one of the gardens outside the city walls. We had scarcely eaten, before he came himself to welcome us to Wan. He was the son of the last Bostandji-Bashi of Constantinople, and having been brought up from a child in the imperial palace, was a man of pleasing and dignified manners, and of considerable[Pg 321] information. Although he had never left his native country, he was not ignorant of the habits and customs of Europe. He had long served the Sultan in difficult and responsible posts, and to his discretion and sagacity was chiefly to be attributed the subjugation of Beder-Khan Bey and the rebel Kurdish tribes. His rule was mild and conciliating, and he possessed those qualities so rare in a Turkish governor, yet so indispensable to the civilisation and well-being of the empire,—a strict honesty in the administration of the revenues of his province, and a sense of justice beyond the reach of bribes. From Christians and Kurds we had received during our journey through his pashalic, the highest testimony to his tolerance and integrity.

In the evening I returned his visit, and found him surrounded by the chiefs and elders of the city, and by the officers of his household. I sat with him till midnight, the time passing in that agreeable conversation which a well-educated Turk so well knows how to sustain.

I remained a week at Wan, chiefly engaged in copying the cuneiform inscriptions, and in examining its numerous remarkable monuments of antiquity.

The city is of very ancient date. It stands on the borders of a large and beautiful lake, a site eminently suited to a prosperous community. The lofty mountains bordering the inland sea to the east, here recede in the form of an amphitheatre, leaving a rich plain five or six miles in breadth, in the midst of which rises an isolated calcareous rock. To the summit of this natural stronghold, there is no approach, except on the western side, where a gradual but narrow ascent is defended by the walls and bastions. From the earliest ages it has consequently been the acropolis of the city, and no position could be stronger before the discovery of the engines of[Pg 322] modern warfare. The fortifications and castle, of a comparatively recent date, are now in ruins, and are scarcely defensible, with their few rusty guns, against the attacks of the neighbouring Kurds.

According to Armenian history, the Assyrian queen Semiramis founded the city; it having fallen to decay, it is said to have been rebuilt, shortly before the invasion of Alexander the Great, by an Armenian king named Wan, after whom it was subsequently called. It appears to have been again abandoned, for we find that it was once more raised from its foundations in the second century b. c. by Vagharschag, the first king of the Arsacian dynasty of Armenia, who made it the strongest city in the kingdom. In the eleventh century it was ceded by the royal family of the Ardz-rounis to the Greek emperors, from whom it was taken by the Seljuk Turks. It fell, in 1392, into the hands of Timourlane, who, according to his custom, gave the inhabitants over to the sword. Even in his day, the great monuments of solid stone, raised by the Assyrian queen, were still shown to the stranger.

Moses of Chorene, the early historian of Armenia, has faithfully described its position and its antiquities; the isolated hill, rising in the midst of a broad plain covered with flourishing villages, and watered by innumerable streams; the chapels, chambers, treasuries, and caverns cut in the living rock, and the great inscriptions written, as it were, on the face of the precipice, as pages are written with a pen on wax.

The first traveller who, in modern times, examined the remarkable remains of antiquity at Wan was the unfortunate Schulz. He visited the place in 1827. The cuneiform inscriptions carved on the rock were known to exist long before his day, but he was the first to copy them, and from his copies they have been published by the[Pg 323] Asiatic Society of France. Since the time of Schulz, the city has undergone many changes. It was seized by the rebel Kurdish chief, Khan Mahmoud; but after many vain attempts made to recover the place, it finally yielded two years before my journey. Under the mild rule of Mehemet Pasha it was rapidly rising to prosperity. The protection he had given to the Armenians had encouraged that enterprising and industrious people to enlarge their commerce, and to build warehouses for trade. Two handsome khans, with bazars attached, were nearly finished. Shops for the sale of European articles of clothing and of luxury had been opened; and, what was of still more importance, several native schools had already been established. These improvements were chiefly due to one Sharân, an Armenian merchant and a man of liberal and enlightened views, who had seconded with energy and liberality the desire of the Pasha to ameliorate the social condition of the Christian population.[164]

Shortly after my arrival, the Armenian bishop called upon me. He was dressed in the peculiar costume of his order,—long black robes and a capacious black hood almost concealing his head,—and was accompanied by the priests and principal laymen of his diocese. On his breast he wore the rich diamond crescent and star of the[Pg 324] Turkish order of merit, of which he was justly proud. Although he had been duly elected several years before to his episcopal dignity, he still wanted the formal consecration of the patriarch of his church, owing to difficulties connected with the political position of the patriarch; he was now, however, on the eve of his departure to receive that consecration which was essential to his due admission into the Armenian hierarchy.

The modern town of Wan stands at the foot, and to the south of, the isolated rock. Its streets and bazars are small, narrow, and dirty; but its houses are not ill built. It is surrounded by fruitful gardens and orchards, irrigated by artificial rivulets derived from the streams rising in the Yedi Klissia mountains. It may contain between twelve and fifteen thousand inhabitants. The whole pashalic at the time of my visit paid an annual sum of six thousand purses (about 27,000l.) to the Turkish treasury. In the town there was a garrison of a thousand foot and five hundred horse, and the commander of the troops in the district and in the adjoining province of Hakkiari was at the head of five thousand men.[165]

The old hereditary pashas of Wan, as well as the principal families, were of Turkish origin, and came, I was informed by some of their descendants, from Konia (Iconium), about three hundred years ago. The chiefs, however, of the surrounding districts are Kurds. Two families, named the Topchi-oglus and the Timour-oglus, divided the town into opposite factions, which were continually at war, and carried their bloody feuds almost daily into the streets. The Timour-oglus were the most powerful, and it was through their means that Khan Mahmoud possessed himself of the place.

[Pg 325]The inscriptions of Wan are of two distinct periods, though all of the cuneiform writing. The most ancient are in a character identical with that on the oldest monuments of Assyria. The earliest inscriptions are found on two square stones built into a wall near the western gateway of the city, and immediately beneath the only entrance to the castle. The language of these inscriptions appears to be Assyrian, whilst that of all the others is peculiar to Wan. Nevertheless the names of the kings in them can be genealogically connected with those on the other monuments.

But the most important records at Wan are carved on the southern face of the isolated rock, round the entrance to a set of excavated chambers, probably once serving as tombs. As those inscriptions record the victories and deeds of a monarch, it is highly probable that they were placed over royal sepulchres.

A flight of twenty narrow steps cut in the perpendicular face of the precipice, and partly destroyed, so as to be somewhat difficult and dangerous, leads to a narrow ledge, above which the rock has been carefully smoothed, and is still covered with inscriptions in the cuneiform character. Here an entrance, about 7 feet deep, opens into a hall, 34½ feet long, by nearly 21 wide and 12 high, leading by four doorways into as many distinct chambers. Around its walls are window-like recesses, and between them, and on each side of the doorways, are ornamental niches, with holes in the centre, which may have held metal lamps. The floor has been excavated in two places into squares a few inches deep; I cannot conjecture for what purpose.

The door to the left on entering leads into a small chamber, 11 ft. 8 in., by 9 ft. 8 in., surrounded by similar window-like recesses. In it is a second doorway opening[Pg 326] upon a well or pit, filled to within a few feet of the mouth with stones and rubbish. There were no means of ascertaining its depth or original use without removing the contents. The three other doors in the entrance hall lead to square rooms, surrounded by niches, but without other ornament. The excavations are sometimes called by the Turks “Khorkhor Mugaralari,” the caves of Khorkhor, from a garden of that name below them.

The inscriptions on the face of the rock around the outer entrance to these chambers are contained in eight parallel columns, including in all above 300 lines and thirteen consecutive paragraphs. The letters are large and admirably carved, and the writing is divided by horizontal lines. These rock-tablets are the records of a king whose name, according to Dr. Hincks, is Arghistis. He invokes the gods of his nation, and celebrates the conquest of various peoples or tribes, whose names still require to be identified, but who probably inhabited countries to the north of Armenia; he describes the burning of their temples and palaces, and the carrying away of captives and of an immense spoil of horses, camels, cattle, and sheep, the numbers of each being given with apparent exactness. The name of the region in which these conquests were chiefly made, seems to read Mana.

The remaining inscriptions are on the northern face of the rock. They are five in number. The longest and most important contains twenty-nine lines, and is on the side wall to the left on entering an artificial vaulted recess. It has been partly destroyed by a rude cross cut by the Armenians across the tablet. The cave is called the “Khazana Kapousi,” or the treasure gate, and is held to be a sacred spot by Christians and Mussulmans.

An inscription of seventeen lines is carved at the entrance to a second artificial chamber, and on tablets cut[Pg 327] in the rock are three more, each of nineteen lines, word for word alike, but with orthographical variations in the royal name.

Four of these inscriptions belong to the father of the king, who recorded his conquests on the southern face of the rock. His name, according to Dr. Hincks, may be read Minuas. They merely contain the royal titles and invocations to the gods. The long inscription in the vaulted recess is of the grandson of Minuas, the latest king mentioned on the monuments of Wan. It is of considerable interest as containing the name of a country, which Dr. Hincks identifies with Babylon, and as enumerating, first in detail, the amount of booty taken from three different countries, and afterwards giving the total amount of the whole. By this double account, the one checking the other, a clue was afforded to the signs representing numerals in the Assyrian inscriptions, as well as to their respective values, a discovery for which we are indebted to the sagacity of Dr. Hincks.

The Pasha had kindly placed the “Mimar Bashi,” or architect in chief of the town, an honest Armenian, named Nikòos, under my orders during my researches at Wan. The excavations, however, which were made came to no result worth mentioning.

About a mile and a half to the east of the town, near a small village in the gardens of Wan, is a recess in the rock 15 feet 8 inches high, and 6 feet 7 inches broad, containing a long cuneiform inscription. The inscription is called Meher Kapousi, which, according to the people of Wan, means the Shepherd’s Gate, from a tradition that a shepherd, having fallen asleep beneath it, was told in a dream the magic word that opened the spell-bound portal. He awoke and straightway tried the talisman. The stone doors flew apart, disclosing to his wondering eyes a[Pg 328] vast hall filled with inexhaustible treasures; but as he entered they shut again behind him. He filled with gold the bag in which, as he tended his flocks, he carried his daily food. After repeating the magic summons, he was permitted to issue into the open air. But he had left his crook, and must return for it. The doors were once more unclosed at his bidding. He sought to retrace his steps, but had forgotten the talisman. His faithful dog waited outside until nightfall. As its master did not come back, it then took up the bag of gold and carrying it to the shepherd’s wife, led her to the gates of the cave. She could hear the cries of her husband, and they are heard to this day, but none can give him help.

The inscription of the Meher Kapousi originally consisted of ninety-five lines, comprising the same record twice repeated. Only about sixty are now legible. Near the Shepherd’s Gate the rocks are excavated into a vast number of caves. In some places long flights of steps lead nowhere, but finish abruptly in the face of the perpendicular precipice; in others the cliff is scarped to a great height without any apparent object. A singular shaft, with stairs, leading into a cavern, is called Zimzim. It is difficult to account for the use and origin of these singular excavations; their height from the plain and their inaccessible position almost preclude the idea of their having been quarries.

Several slabs of black basalt, inscribed with cuneiform characters, have been built into the interior walls of two ancient Armenian churches within the town of Wan. In the church of St. Peter and St. Paul I found parts of four legends, which are historical, containing a record of the capture of many cities, and of the amount of spoil carried away from conquered countries. In the church of Surp Sahak I was able to transcribe two [Pg 329]inscriptions, one under the altar, the other in the vestibule beneath the level of the floor, which had to be broken up and removed before I could reach the stone. The longest consists of forty lines, the other of twenty-seven. The beginning and ending of the lines in both are wanting.

The only inscription at Wan that I could not copy was the trilingual tablet of Xerxes. It is on the most inaccessible part of the rock, about seventy or eighty feet above the plain. Not having a glass of sufficient power, I was unable to distinguish the characters from below. As it had been accurately transcribed by Schulz, and resembles those of the same king at Persepolis and Hamadan, I did not think it necessary to incur any risk or expense in reaching it by means of ropes or scaffolding.[166]

In the rock there are numerous excavated chambers, some even exceeding in dimensions those I have described; but, with the exception of a simple seat or bench of stone, about two and a half feet high on one side of them, they are perfectly plain and unornamented. They appear to have been used as tombs. Some are approached by flights of steps cut in the precipice; others are altogether inaccessible except by ropes from above.

It is yet doubtful to what family of languages the Wan inscriptions must be assigned. Some believe it to be a Tatar dialect; Dr. Hincks, on the contrary, is of opinion that it is Indo-Germanic. Two of the inscriptions, and the earliest in date, as I have already observed, are in pure Assyrian.

With regard to the date of the monuments there appears to be a clue which may enable us to fix it with some degree of certainty. In an inscription from Khorsabad, amongst the kings conquered by Sargon one is[Pg 330] mentioned whose name corresponds with Arghistis, the fifth in the Wan dynasty. Supposing the two, therefore, to be the same, and there is no reason to doubt their being so, we may assume that the monarchs of the Wan records reigned from about the middle of the eighth century before Christ to the end of the seventh; and the evidence afforded by the forms of the characters leads to this conjecture.

At sunrise, on the 8th August, the roaring of cannon, re-echoed by the lofty rock, announced the end of Ramazan, and the beginning of the periodical festivities of the Bairam. Early in the morning the Pasha, glittering with gold and jewels, and surrounded by the members of his household, the officers of the garrison, and the gaily-dressed chiefs of the irregular troops, rode in procession through the streets of the town. As it is customary he received in the palace the visits of the cadi, mollahs, and principal Mussulman inhabitants of Wan, as well as of the bishop, clergy, and elders of the Armenian church. The population, rejoicing at their release from a fast almost intolerable in summer, decked themselves in holiday garments, and made merry in the houses and highways. The sounds of music and revelry issued from the coffee-houses and places of public resort. The children repaired to swings, merry-go-rounds, and stalls of sweetmeats, which had been raised in the open spaces within the walls. The Christians add the feast to their own festivals, already too numerous,[167] and, like their Mussulman neighbours, pay visits of compliment and ceremony. Their women, who[Pg 331] are said to be handsome, but are even more rigidly concealed than the Mohammedan ladies, crept through the streets in their long white veils.

I called in the evening on the bishop, and next morning, at his invitation, visited the principal schools. Five have been established since the fall of the Kurdish Beys, and the enjoyment of comparative protection by the Christian population. Only one had been opened within the walls; the rest were in the gardens, which are thickly inhabited by Armenians, and form extensive suburbs to Wan. More than two hundred children of all ages were assembled. They went through their exercises and devotions at the sound of a bell with great order and precision, alternately standing and squatting on their hams on small cushions placed in rows across the hall. An outer room held basins and towels for washing, and the cloaks and shoes taken off on entering. Books were scarce. There were not more than a score in the whole school. The first class, which had made some progress, had a few elementary works on astronomy and history, published by the Armenian press at Constantinople and Smyrna, but only one copy of each. The boys, at my request, sang and chanted their prayers, and repeated their simple lessons.

Such schools, imperfect though they be, are proofs of a great and increasing improvement in the Christian communities of Turkey.[168] A change of considerable [Pg 332]importance, and which, it is to be hoped, may lead to the most beneficial results, is now taking place in the Armenian Church. It is undoubtedly to be attributed to the judicious, earnest, and zealous exertions of the American missionaries; their establishments, scattered over nearly the whole Turkish empire, have awakened amongst the Christians, and principally amongst the Armenians, a spirit of inquiry and a desire for the reform of abuses, and for the cultivation of their minds, which must ultimately tend to raise their political, as well as their social, position in the human scale. It is scarcely fifteen years since the first institution for Christian instruction on Protestant (independent) principles was opened by those excellent men in Constantinople. By a wise selection of youths from different parts of the empire, who from their character and abilities were deemed worthy of the choice, they were shortly enabled to send into the provinces those who could sow the seeds of truth and knowledge, without incurring the suspicions attaching to strangers, and without laboring under that ignorance of the manners and languages of those amongst whom they mix, which must always prove so serious an obstacle to foreigners in their intercourse with the natives. A movement of this nature could scarcely escape persecution. The Armenian clergy, not unfavorable to the darkness and bigotry which had for centuries disgraced their Church, and exercising an uncontrolled power over an ignorant and simple people, soon raised a cry against the “Evangelists,” as they were contemptuously called. By such misrepresentations and calumnies as are always ready at hand to the enemies of progress and reform, they were able to enlist in their favor the Turkish authorities at the capital and in the provinces. Unfortunately, four sects alone, the Roman Catholic, the Armenian, the Greek, and the Copt, were [Pg 333]recognised by the Porte amongst their Christian subjects. The reformed Armenian Church was consequently without an acknowledged head, and unable, to communicate directly with the government, to make known its tenets, or to complain of the acts of injustice and persecution to which it was exposed. Many persons fell victims to their opinions. Some were cruelly tortured in the house of the Patriarch himself, and others were imprisoned or utterly ruined in Constantinople and the provinces. Through the exertions of the English minister at Constantinople, a firman was obtained from the Sultan, placing the new Protestant community on the same footing as the other Churches of the empire, assigning to it a head, or agent, through whom it could apply directly to the ministers, and extending to it other privileges enjoyed by the Roman Catholics and Greeks. Fortunately for the cause, many men of irreproachable character, and of undoubted sincerity from the Armenian nation have been associated with it, and its success has not been endangered, like that of so many other movements of the same kind, by interested, or hasty conversions.

The influence of this spirit of inquiry, fostered by the American missions, has not been alone confined to those who have been cut off from their own community. The Armenian clergy have found it their true interest to promote reform in their own Church. Schools in opposition to the American establishments have been opened in the capital and in most of the large towns of Asia Minor; and elementary and theological works, of a far more liberal character than any hitherto published in Turkey, have been printed by Armenian printing-presses in Constantinople and Smyrna, or introduced into the country from Venice.

Whilst on this subject, and connected as I have been[Pg 334] with the Nestorians, I must not omit a tribute of praise to the admirable establishments of the American missions amongst the Chaldæans of Ooroomiyah in Persia, under the able direction of the Rev. Mr. Perkins.[169] It was with much regret that I was compelled to give up the plan I had formed of visiting that small colony from the New World. The Rev. Mr. Bowen, who crossed the frontiers from Wan, has in a true Christian spirit borne witness in the English Church to the enlightened and liberal spirit in which their labors are carried on. Forty or fifty schools have been opened in the town of Ooroomiyah and surrounding villages. The abuses that have crept into this primitive and highly interesting Church are being reformed, and the ignorance of its simple clergy gradually dispelled. A printing-press, for which type has been purposely cut, now publishes for general circulation the Scriptures and works of education in the dialect and character peculiar to the mountain tribes. The English language has been planted in the heart of Asia, and the benefits of knowledge are extended to a race which, a few years ago, was almost unknown even by name to Europe.

The Armenian bishop of Wan was not wanting in [Pg 335]intelligence and in liberal feeling; but, like most of his order, he was profoundly ignorant. The convents of Wan and of the neighbourhood, he said, were once rich in ancient manuscripts, but they had been carried away by camel-loads some two hundred years before by the Persians, and were believed still to be preserved in Isfahan. With the exception of a few printed copies of the Scriptures, and some religious works for the use of the churches, there are now no books in the city. He received with pleasure from Mr. Bowen a copy of the New Testament in the vulgar Armenian tongue, remarking that it would be a great advantage to the common people to have a version of the Scriptures in a language which they could understand. He was probably not aware that the head of his church had utterly condemned its use, and had anathematised all those who received it.

My companions had been compelled, from ill health, to leave the plain, and had taken refuge in the convent of Yedi Klissia, from the sultry heats of the plain. Before joining them, I visited the village of Amikh, where, according to my Armenian guide, Nikòos, an inscription was engraved on the rocks. I left the city on the 10th of August; but the time and labor bestowed resulted only in disappointment.

From Amikh I rode across the country in a direct line to the monastery of Yedi Klissia, whose gardens on the side of the lofty mountain of Wurrak are visible from most parts of the plain. I stopped for an hour at the church of Kormawor before ascending to the convent. An aged priest, with beard white as snow, and wearing a melon-shaped cap, and long black robes, was the guardian of the place. He led me into an arcade surrounding the inner court of the building. Seeing that I was a Frank, he fancied at once that I was searching for inscriptions,[Pg 336] and pointed to a circular stone, the base of a wooden column, which, he said, he had shown many years before to a traveller, meaning Schulz. It bears three imperfect lines of cuneiform writing, part of an inscription belonging to one of the Wan kings, whose name Dr. Hincks read Minuas. It appears to record the foundation of a temple. A second inscription on a black stone, and several fragments with the same royal name, are built into the walls.

Eight hours’ ride from Amikh brought me to the large Armenian convent of Yedi Klissia, or the seven churches, built of substantial stone masonry, and inclosing a spacious courtyard planted with trees. It has more the appearance of a caravanserai than that of a place of religious retreat, and is beautifully situated near the mouth of a wooded ravine, half-way up a bold mountain, which ends in snowy peaks. Spread beneath it is a blue lake and a smiling plain, and the city, with its bold castellated rock, and its turreted walls half hid in gardens and orchards.

The church, a substantial modern edifice, stands within the courtyard. Its walls are covered with pictures as primitive in design as in execution. There is a victorious St. George blowing out the brains of a formidable dragon with a bright brass blunderbuss, and saints, attired in the traditionary garments of Europe, performing extravagant miracles. The intelligence of the good priest at the head of the convent was pretty well on a par with his illustrated church history. He was a specimen of the Armenian clergy of Asia Minor. As he described each subject to me, he spoke of the Nestorians as heretics, because they were allowed, by the canons of their church, to marry their mothers and grandmothers; of the Protestants as freemasons or atheists; and of the great nations of[Pg 337] Europe as the Portuguese, the Inglese, the Muscovs, and the Abbash (Abyssinians).

I found two short cuneiform inscriptions; one on a stone amongst the ruins of the old church, the other built into the walls of the new. They also belong to Minuas, and merely contain the name and titles of the king.
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Re: Discoveries among the Ruins of Nineveh and Babylon

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CHAPTER XIX. LEAVE WAN.—THE ARMENIAN PATRIARCH.—THE ISLAND OF AKHTAMAR.—AN ARMENIAN CHURCH.—HISTORY OF THE CONVENT.—PASS INTO MUKUS.—THE DISTRICT OF MUKUS.—OF SHATTAK.—OF NOURDOOZ.—A NESTORIAN VILLAGE.—ENCAMPMENTS.—MOUNT ARARAT.—MAR SHAMOUN.—JULAMERIK.—VALLEY OF DIZ.—PASS INTO JELU.—NESTORIAN DISTRICT OF JELU.—AN ANCIENT CHURCH.—THE BISHOP.—DISTRICT OF BAZ.—OF TKHOMA.—RETURN TO MOSUL.

Sickness had overcome both Dr. Sandwith and Mr. Cooper. A return to the burning plains of Assyria might have proved fatal, and I advised them to seek, without further delay, the cooler climate of Europe. Mr. Walpole, too, who had been long suffering from fever, now determined upon quitting my party and taking the direct road to Erzeroom.

In the afternoon of the 12th August I left the gates of the convent of Yedi Klissia with Mr. Hormuzd Rassam. Once more I was alone with my faithful friend, and we trod together the winding pathway which led down the mountain side. We had both been suffering from fever, but we still had strength to meet its attacks, and to bear cheerfully, now unhindered, the difficulties and anxieties of our wandering life.

[Pg 338]We made a short journey of three and a half hours to the pleasant village of Artamit or Adremit, and encamped beneath its fruit trees in a garden near the lake. Our path on the following day led through a hilly district, sometimes edging a deep bay, then again winding over a rocky promontory. We crossed by a bridge the large stream which we had seen at Mahmoudiyah, and which here discharges itself into the lake.

On the shores of the lake we found many encampments of gipsies; the men to be distinguished by their swarthy countenances, the women and children by their taste for begging.

We passed through Vastan; in the eleventh century the residence of the royal Armenian family of Ardzrouni, but now a mere village. The convent boat was on the beach, three miles above the usual landing-place. Four sturdy monks were about to row it back to the island. As they offered to take me with them, I left the caravan to journey onwards to our night’s encamping place, and with Mr. Rassam and the Bairakdar, we were soon gliding over the calm surface of the lake. Not a breeze rippled the blue expanse. The burning rays of the sun were still full upon us, and the panting boatmen were nearly two hours before they reached the convent.

In the absence of the Patriarch we were received by an intelligent and courteous monk named Kirikor. His hair, as well as his beard, had never known the scissors, and fell in long luxuriant curls over his shoulders. It was of jetty black, for he was still a young man, although he had already passed twenty years of a monastic life. He led us through an arched doorway into the spacious courtyard of the convent, and thence into an upper room furnished with comfortable divans for the reception of guests. Tea was brought to us after the Persian fashion,[Pg 339] and afterwards a more substantial breakfast, in which the dried fish of the lake formed the principal dish. Kirikor had visited Jerusalem and Constantinople, had read many of the works issued by the Venetian press, and was a man of superior acquirements for an Armenian monk of the orthodox faith.

The church, which is within the convent walls, is built of the sandstone of a rich deep red color that has been quarried for the turbehs of Akhlat. Like other religious edifices of the same period and of the same nation, it is in the form of a cross, with a small hexagonal tower, ending in a conical roof, rising above the centre. The interior is simple. A few rude pictures of saints and miracles adorn the walls, and a gilded throne for the Patriarch stands near the altar. The exterior, however, is elaborately ornamented with friezes and broad bands of sculptured figures and scroll work, the upper part being almost covered with bas-reliefs, giving to the whole building a very striking and original appearance. I know of no similar specimen of Armenian architecture, and I regret that time would not allow me to make detailed drawings of the edifice.

In a grave-yard outside the church are several most elaborately carved tombstones belonging to the early Armenian patriarchs. That of Zachariah, who died in the fourteenth century, and who was for one year patriarch at Echmiadsin and for nine years at Akhtamar, is especially worthy of notice for the richness and elegance of its ornaments.

The convent and church are built on a small rocky island about five miles from the shore. On an adjacent islet are the ruined walls of a castle partly covered by the rising waters of the lake. Intercourse with the main land is carried on by the one crank boat which, whenever the weather permits, goes backwards and forwards daily[Pg 340] for such provisions as are required by the inmates of the monastery. Khan Mahmoud took the place by collecting together the vessels belonging to Wan for the transport of his troops.

Late in the afternoon, accompanied by the monk Kirikor, I was rowed to the farm and garden belonging to the convent, near the village of Ashayansk. A few monks live on the farm, and tend the property of the convent, supplying the Patriarch with the produce of the dairy and orchards. They received us very hospitably. Kirikor rode with me on the following morning as far as the large Armenian village of Narek, in which there is a church dedicated to St. George, much frequented in pilgrimage by the Christians of Wan and the surrounding country. It is a strong solid building, of the same red sandstone as the tombs of Akhlat.

We had now left the lake of Wan, and our track led up a deep ravine, which gradually became more narrow as we drew nigh to the high mountains that separated us from the unexplored districts of Mukus and Bohtan. We passed a large Armenian village named Pagwantz, near which, on the summit of a precipitous rock, stands the ruined castle of Khan Mahmoud, the rebel chief. He was the eldest of seven brothers, all of whom governed under him different districts on the borders of the lake, and sorely oppressed the Christian inhabitants. Five were captured and are in banishment.

Ere long we entered a rocky barren tract, patched here and there with fragrant Alpine flowers. After climbing up a steep declivity of loose stones like the moraine of a Swiss glacier, and dragging our horses with much difficulty after us, we found ourselves amidst eternal snow, over which we toiled for nearly two hours, until we reached the crest of the mountain, and looked down[Pg 341] into the deep valley of Mukus. This is considered one of the highest passes in Kurdistan, and one of the most difficult for beasts of burden. The descent was even more rapid and precipitous than the ascent, and we could scarcely prevent our weary horses from rolling down into the ravine with the stones which we put into motion at every step. At the foot of the pass is a small Armenian church called Khorous Klissia, or “the church of the cock,” because a black cock is said to warn the traveller when the snowdrifts hide the mountain tracks.

A ride of eight hours brought us to the large scattered village of Mukus, the principal place of the district of the same name. We were met, as we drew near, by the Mudir or governor, an active bustling Turk, who had already chosen, with the usual taste of an Eastern, the prettiest spot, a lawn on the banks of the river, for our tents, and had collected provisions for ourselves and our horses. The good Pasha of Wan had sent to the different chiefs on our way, and had ordered preparation to be everywhere made for our reception. The Tigris is here a deep stream, and is crossed by a stone bridge.

The district of Mukus, anciently Mogkh, and one of the provinces of the Armenian kingdom, had only lately been brought under the authority of the Sultan. Of its sixty villages forty are inhabited by Christian Armenians. The revenues amounted the year of my visit to little more than 100,000 piastres (about 910l.), of which the village of Mukus contributed 42,000. The garrison consisted of only forty regular soldiers and forty Albanians, so completely had the seizure of their chiefs discouraged the wild Kurdish tribes who dwell in the mountains, and were formerly in open rebellion against the Porte. This nomade race forms the principal part of the Mussulman population, and is the most fierce and independent in Kurdistan.

[Pg 342]The Mudir showed the greatest anxiety for our welfare during the night, continually visiting our tents to see that the Albanians he had placed as guards over our property did not sleep, as the village swarmed with Bohtan thieves.

The principal Armenians of Mukus with their priests spent a morning with me. They knew of no ruins or inscriptions in the district, and I found them even more ignorant than their fellow-countrymen of the districts around Wan, whose stupidity has passed into a Turkish proverb.

We left Mukus early in the afternoon, accompanied by the Mudir. The path following the course of the river, leads to Sert Jezireh and the Assyrian plains. Next day we crossed a high mountain ridge covered in some places with snow, separating the district of Mukus from that of Shattak. Its northern and western slopes are the summer pastures of the Miran Kurds, whose flocks were still feeding on the green lawns and in the flowery glens. On the opposite side of the pass we found an encampment of Hartushi Kurds, under one Omar Agha, a noble old chieftain, who welcomed us with unbounded hospitality, and set before me every luxury that he possessed. Shattak, the Mudir of which village had prepared for our reception, is a small town, rather than a village. It is chiefly inhabited by Armenians, an industrious and hardy race, cultivating the sides of the mountains, on which are built their villages, and weaving in considerable quantities the gay-colored woollen stuffs so much esteemed by the Kurds. In nearly every house was a loom, and the rattle of the shuttle came from almost every door. The mountains produce galls, wool (some of which has the same silky texture as that of Angora), the small under-wool of the goat called teftik (a valuable article of export), and minerals. In the bazar at Shattak I saw a few [Pg 343]English prints, and other European wares brought for sale from Wan.

The priests and principal Armenians of the place came to me soon after my arrival, and I learnt from them that efforts had already been made to improve the condition of the Christian community, now that the oppressive rule of the Kurdish hereditary chiefs had been succeeded by the more tolerant government of the Sultan. A school had been opened, chiefly by the help of Sheran, the active and liberal Armenian banker of Wan.

The town itself is called by the Armenians Tauk, by the Kurds Shokh, and when spoken of together with the numerous villages that surround it, Shattak. It stands near the junction of two considerable streams, forming one of the head-waters of the eastern Tigris, and uniting with the Bohtan-Su. The largest comes from the district of Albagh. These streams, as well as that of Mukus, abound in trout of the most delicious flavor. The entire district contains fifty villages and numerous mezras or hamlets. The revenues are about the same as those of Mukus.

We left Shokh on the 17th August by a bridge crossing the principal stream. The Mudir rode with us up a steep mountain, rising on the very outskirts of the town. After a long and difficult ascent we came to a broad green platform called Tagu, the pastures of the people of Shattak, and now covered with their tents and flocks. This high ground overlooked the deep valleys, through which wound the two streams, and on whose sides were many smiling gardens and villages.

Crossing a high mountain pass, on which snow still lingered, we descended into a deep valley like that of Shattak, chiefly cultivated by Armenians. We crossed a small stream, and ascended on the opposite side to Ashkaun,[Pg 344] whose inhabitants were outside the village, near a clear spring, washing and shearing their sheep. We had now entered Nourdooz, a district under a Mudir appointed by the Pasha of Wan, and living at a large village called Pir-bedelan.

Our ride on the following day was over upland pastures of great richness, and through narrow valleys watered by numerous streams. Here and there were villages inhabited by Kurds and Armenians. We were now approaching the Nestorian districts. The first man of the tribe we met was an aged buffalo-keeper, who, in answer to a question in Kurdish, spoke to me in the Chaldee dialect of the mountains. Hormuzd and my servants rejoiced at the prospect of leaving the Armenian settlements, whose inhabitants, they declared, were for stupidity worse than Kurds, and for rapacity worse than Jews. Chilghiri was the first Nestorian village on our way. The men, with their handsome wives and healthful children, came out to meet us. We did not stop there, but continued our journey to Merwanen, which we found deserted by its inhabitants for the Zomas, or summer pastures. Although poor and needy, the people of Merwanen were not less hospitable than other Nestorians I had met with. They brought us as the sun went down smoking messes of millet boiled in sour milk and mixed with mountain herbs.

The next day we came to a large encampment of Hartushi Kurds, near the outlet of a green valley, watered by many streams, forming the most easterly sources of the Tigris.[170] Abd-ur-Rahman, the chief, was absent from his tents collecting the annual salian or revenue of the tribe.[Pg 345] In his absence we were very hospitably treated, and were witnesses of the activity and industry of the Kurdish community.

The mountain rising above us was the boundary between the pashalics of Wan and Hakkiari and the watershed of the Tigris and Zab. On the opposite side the streams uniting their waters flowed towards the latter river. The first district we entered was that of Lewen, inhabited chiefly by Nestorians. The whole population with their flocks had deserted their villages for the Zomas. We ascended to the encampment of the people of Billi, a wretched assemblage of dirty hovels, half tent and half cabin, built of stones and black canvas. Behind it towered, amidst eternal snows, a bold and majestic peak, called Karnessa-ou-Daoleh.[171] Round the base of this mountain, over loose stones and sharp rocks, and through ravines deep in snow, we dragged our weary horses next day. The Kurdish shepherds that wander there, a wild and hardy race, have no tents, but, during the summer months, live in the open fields with their flocks, without any covering whatever.

After a wearisome and indeed dangerous ride, we found ourselves on a snowy platform variegated with Alpine plants. The tiny streams which trickled through the ice were edged with forget-me-nots of the tenderest blue, and with many well-remembered European flowers. I climbed up a solitary rock to take bearings of the principal peaks around us. A sight as magnificent as unexpected awaited me. Far to the north, and high above the dark mountain ranges which spread like a troubled sea beneath my feet, rose one solitary cone of unspotted white sparkling in the rays of the sun. Its form could[Pg 346] not be mistaken; it was Mount Ararat. My Nestorian guide knew no more of this stately mountain, to him a kind of mythic land far beyond the reach of human travel, than that it was within the territories of the Muscovites, and that the Christians called it Bashut-tama-hamda. From this point alone was it visible, and we saw it no more during our journey.[172]

We descended rapidly by a difficult track, passing here and there encampments of Kurds and the tents and flocks of the people of Julamerik. To the green pastures succeeded the region of cultivated fields, and we seemed to approach more settled habitations. Following a precipitous pathway, and mounted on a tall and sturdy mule, we spied an aged man with long robes, black turban, and a white beard which fell almost to his girdle. We at once recognised the features of Mar Shamoun, the Patriarch of the Nestorians, or, as he proudly terms himself, “of the Chaldæans of the East.” He had not known of our coming, and he shed tears of joy as he embraced us. Kochhannes, his residence, was not far distant, and he turned back with us to the village. Since I had seen him misfortune and grief, more than age, had worn deep furrows in his brow, and had turned his hair and beard to silvery grey.

The garments of the Patriarch were worn and ragged. Even the miserable allowance of 300 piastres (about 21. 10s.), which the Porte had promised to pay him monthly on his return to the mountains, was long in arrears, and he was supported entirely by the contributions of his faithful but poverty-stricken flock. Kochhannes was,[Pg 347] moreover, still a heap of ruins. At the time of the massacre Mar Shamoun sacredly saved himself by a precipitous flight before the ferocious Kurds of Beder Khan Bey entered the village and slew those who still lingered in it, and were from age or infirmities unable to escape.

Mar Shamoun, at the time of my visit, had no less cause to bewail the misfortunes of his people than his personal sufferings. The latter were perhaps partly to be attributed to his own want of prudence and foresight. Old influences, which I could not but deeply deplore, and to which I do not in Christian charity wish further to allude[173], had been at work, and I found him even more bitter in his speech against the American missionaries than against his Turkish or Kurdish oppressors. He had been taught, and it is to be regretted that his teachers were of the Church of England, that those who were endeavoring to civilise and instruct his flock were seceders from the orthodox community of Christians, heretical in doctrine, rejecting all the sacraments and ordinances of the true faith, and intent upon reducing the Nestorians to their own hopeless condition of infidelity. His fears were worked on by the assurance that, ere long, through their means and teaching, his spiritual as well as his temporal authority would be entirely destroyed. I found him bent upon deeds of violence and intolerant persecution, which might have endangered, for the second time, the safety of this people as well as his own. I strove, and I[Pg 348] trust not without success, to set before the old man his true interest in regard to educating his clergy and people, circulating the Scriptures, reforming abuses, &c.

The Nestorian community had greater wrongs to complain of than their Patriarch. The Turkish government, so far from fulfilling the pledges given to the British embassy, had sent officers to the mountains who had grievously ill-treated and oppressed the Christian inhabitants; and they had suffered all kinds of outrage and oppression which the rapacious Turks could inflict. There was no tribunal to which they could apply for redress. A deputation sent to the Pasha had been ill-treated, and some of its members were still in prison. There was no one in authority to plead for them. They had even suffered less under the sway of their old oppressors, for, as a priest touchingly remarked to me, “The Kurds took away our lives, but the Turks take away wherewith we have to live.”

We remained a day with the Patriarch, and then took the road to Julamerik, three caravan hours distant from Kochhannes. This town has been more than once visited and described by English travellers.

Near Julamerik we met many poor Nestorians flying, with their wives and children, they knew not whither, from the oppression of the Turkish governors.

The direct road by Tiyari to Mosul is carried along the river Zab, through ravines scarcely practicable to beasts of burden. It issues into the lower valleys near the village of Lizan. On the banks of the Zab, I found the remains of an ancient road, cut in many places in the solid rock. It probably led from the Assyrian plains into the upper provinces of Armenia. There are no inscriptions or ruins to show the period of its construction; but, from the greatness of the work, I am inclined to attribute it to the Assyrians.

[Pg 349]We picked our way over the slippery pavement as long as we could find some footing for ourselves and our beasts, but in many places, where it had been entirely destroyed, we were compelled to drag our horses by main force over the steep rocks and loose detritus, which sloped to the very edge of the river. Before reaching the first Nestorian village in the valley of Diz, we had to ford an impetuous torrent boiling and foaming over smooth rocks, and reaching above our saddle-girths. One of the baggage mules lost its footing. The eddying waters hurried it along and soon hurled it into the midst of the Zab. The animal having, at length, relieved itself from its burden, swam to the bank. Unfortunately it bore my own trunks; my notes and inscriptions, the fruits of my labors at Wan, together with the little property I possessed, were carried far away by the stream. After the men from the village had long searched in vain, the lost load was found about midnight, stopped by a rock some miles down the river.

We passed the night in the miserable village of Rabban Audishio. On the opposite side of the valley, but high in the mountains, was the village of Seramus. The pathway to it being precipitous, and inaccessible even to mules, we turned to Madis, the residence of the Melek, or chief, of the district of Diz. The villages of Diz, like those of the Nestorian valleys in general, stand in the midst of orchards and cultivated terraces. They were laid waste, and the houses burnt, during the first massacre. Diz was the first Christian district attacked by Beder Khan Bey. The inhabitants made a long and determined resistance, but were at length overpowered by numbers.

We continued our journey through a deep and narrow valley hemmed in by high mountains and by perpendicular cliffs. The Melek met us on the road near the village[Pg 350] of Cherichereh, or Klissa. The old man had the too common tale to tell us, of oppression and wrong on the part of the Turks. Melek Beniamen implored me to help him in his difficulties; but I could do no more than offer words of sympathy and consolation. Leaving the Melek to pursue his tax-gathering, we rode through a magnificent valley, now narrowing into a wild gorge walled with precipitous cliffs, then opening into an amphitheatre of rocks encircling a village imbedded in trees. The valley at length was abruptly closed by the towering peaks and precipices of the Jelu mountain. At its foot is the village of Khouresin, where we encamped for the night. The inhabitants were, for the most part, like the other people of Diz, in the Zomas, or summer pastures.

Not far from the Zomas of Diz were the tents of the villagers of Jelu. They also had encamped on the very verge of eternal snow, but within the boundaries of Diz, as there were no pastures on the other side of the pass in their own district. They were better clothed, and showed more signs of comfort, if not of wealth, than their unfortunate neighbours. Many of the men spoke a little Arabic, and even Turkish, learnt during their yearly visits as basket-makers to the low country.

We were still separated from the valley of Jelu by a shoulder jutting from the lofty Soppa-Durek mountain. Before reaching this rocky ridge, we had to cross a broad tract of deep snow, over which we had much difficulty in dragging our heavily laden mules. When on the crest of the pass we found ourselves surrounded on all sides by rugged peaks, the highest being that known as the Toura Jelu, of which we had scarcely lost sight from the day we had left Mosul. It is probably the highest mountain in central Kurdistan, and cannot be under, if it be not indeed above, 15,000 feet. The pass we crossed before descending into the valley of Jelu is considered the highest[Pg 351] in the Nestorian country, and is probably more than 11,000 feet above the level of the sea.

From the top of the pass we looked down into a deep abyss. The pathway was fearfully dangerous, and over steep and slippery rocks. Down this terrible descent we had to drag our jaded horses, leaving our track marked in blood. I have had some experience in bad mountain roads, but I do not remember to have seen any much worse than that leading into Jelu. After numerous accidents and great labor we left a rocky gully, and found ourselves on a slope ending, at a dizzy depth, in a torrent scarcely visible from our path. The yielding soil offered even a more difficult footing for our beasts than the polished rocks.

The wild mountain ravine was now changed for the smiling valley of Jelu. Villages, embowered in trees, filled every nook and sheltered place. We descended to Zerin or Zerayni, the principal settlement, and the residence of the Melek. To our left were two other villages, Alzan and Meedee.

As my large caravan descended the hill-side, the inhabitants of Zerin took us at once for Turks, whose appearance is the signal for a general panic. The women hide in the innermost recesses to save themselves from insult; the men slink into their houses, and offer a vain protest against the seizure of their property. When, at last, we had satisfied the trembling people of Zerin that we were not Mussulmans, they insisted upon our being Americans, of whom they had, at that moment, for certain religious reasons, almost as great a distrust. At length they made out that I was the Balios[174] of Mosul, and the Melek arriving[Pg 352] at this crisis, we were received with due hospitality. Our baggage was carried to the roof of a house, and provisions were brought to us without delay.

Although, during his expedition into Tiyari, Beder Khan Bey had seized the flocks of the people of Jelu, and had compelled them, moreover, to pay large contributions in money and in kind, he had not been able to enter their deep and well-guarded valleys.

The Nestorians of Jelu have no trade to add to their wealth. Many of the men, however, wander during the winter into Asia Minor, and even into Syria and Palestine, following the trade of basket-making, in which they are very expert; but their travels, and their intercourse with the rest of the Christian world have not improved their morals, their habits, or their faith.

The district of Jelu is under a bishop whose spiritual jurisdiction also extends over Baz. He resides at Martha d’Umra (the village of the church) separated by a bold rocky ridge from Zerin. It was Sunday as we descended through orchards, by a precipitous pathway, to his dwelling. The bishop was away. He had gone lower down the valley to celebrate divine service for a distant congregation. The inhabitants of the village were gathered round the church in their holiday attire, and received us kindly and hospitably. From a belfry issued the silvery tones of a bell, which echoed through the valley, and gave an inexpressible charm to the scene. It is not often that such sounds break upon the traveller’s ear in the far East, to awaken a thousand pleasant thoughts, and to recall to memory many a happy hour.

This church is said to be the oldest in the Nestorian mountains, and is a plain, substantial, square building, with a very small entrance. To me it was peculiarly interesting, as having been the only one that had escaped[Pg 353] the ravages of the Kurds, and as containing therefore its ancient furniture and ornaments. Both the church and the dark vestibule were so thickly hung with relics of the most singular and motley description, that the ceiling was completely concealed by them. Notwithstanding the undoubted antiquity of the church and its escape from plunder, I searched in vain for ancient manuscripts.

We followed the valley to the village of Nara, where the bishop was resting after his morning duties. A young man of lofty stature and handsome countenance, dressed in the red-striped loose garments of the Kurds, and only distinguished by a turban of black silk from those around him, came out to meet us. A less episcopal figure could scarcely be imagined; but, although he seemed some Kurdish hunter or warrior, he gave us his benediction as he drew near.

It was difficult to determine whom the poor bishop feared most, the Turks or the American missionaries; the first, he declared, threatened his temporal, the others his spiritual, authority. I gave him the best advice I was able on both subjects, and urged him not to reject the offer that had been made to instruct his people, but identify himself with a progress on which might be founded the only reasonable hope for the regeneration of his creed and race. Unfortunately, as in the case of Mar Shamoun, strange influences had been at work to prejudice the mind of the bishop.

We were now in the track I had followed during my former visit to the mountains.[175] Crossing the precipitous pass to the west of Baz, which, since my first visit, had been the scene of one of the bloodiest episodes of the Nestorian massacre, we entered the long narrow ravine[Pg 354] leading into the valley of Tkhoma. We stopped at Gunduktha, where, four years before, I had taken leave of the good priest Bodaka, who had been amongst the first victims of the fury of the Kurdish invaders. The Kasha, who now ministered to the spiritual wants of the people, the Rais of the village, and the principal inhabitants, came to us as we stopped in the churchyard. But they were no longer the gaily dressed and well-armed men who had welcomed me on my first journey. Their garments were tattered and worn, and their countenances haggard and wan. The church, too, was in ruins; around were the charred remains of the burnt cottages, and the neglected orchards overgrown with weeds. A body of Turkish troops had lately visited the village, and had destroyed the little that had been restored since the Kurdish invasion. The same taxes had been collected three times, and even four times, over. The relations of those who had ran away to escape from these exactions had been compelled to pay for the fugitives. The chief had been thrown, with his arms tied behind his back, on a heap of burning straw, and compelled to disclose where a little money that had been saved by the villagers had been buried. The priest had been torn from the altar, and beaten before his congregation. Men showed me the marks of torture on their body, and of iron fetters round their limbs. For the sake of wringing a few piastres from this poverty-stricken people, all these deeds of violence had been committed by officers sent by the Porte to protect the Christian subjects of the Sultan, whom they pretended to have released from the misrule of the Kurdish chiefs.

The smiling villages described in the account of my previous journey were now a heap of ruins. From four of them alone 770 persons had been slain. Beder Khan[Pg 355] Bey had driven off, according to the returns made by the Meleks, 24,000 sheep, 300 mules, and 10,000 head of cattle; and the confederate chiefs had each taken a proportionate share of the property of the Christians. No flocks were left by which they might raise money wherewith to pay the taxes now levied upon them, and even the beasts of burden, which could have carried to the markets of more wealthy districts the produce of their valley, had been taken away.[176]

We remained a night in Tkhoma to see the Meleks who came to us from Tkhoma Gowaia. Leaving the valley, we crossed the high mountain inclosing Tkhoma to the south, and passed through Pinianish into Chaal, a district inhabited by Mussulmans, and which had consequently not suffered from the ravages of the Kurdish chiefs. It presented, with its still flourishing villages surrounded by gardens and vineyards, a vivid contrast to the unfortunate Christian valley we had just left.

A rapid descent through a rocky gorge brought us to the Zab, over which there were still the remains of a bridge, consisting of two poles fastened together by osier bands placed across the stone piers. It almost required the steady foot and practised head of a mountaineer to cross the roaring stream by this perilous structure. The horses and mules were with much trouble and delay driven into the river, and after buffeting with the whirlpools and eddies reached, almost exhausted, the opposite bank.

We now entered the valley of Berwari, and, crossing the pass of Amadiyah, took the road to Mosul, through a[Pg 356] country I had already more than once visited. Leaving the caravan and our jaded horses, I hastened onwards with Hormuzd, and travelling through a night reached Mosul in the afternoon of the 30th of August, after an absence of seven weeks.
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Re: Discoveries among the Ruins of Nineveh and Babylon

Postby admin » Wed Apr 13, 2022 7:48 am

CHAPTER XX. DISCOVERIES AT KOUYUNJIK DURING THE SUMMER.—DESCRIPTION OF THE SCULPTURES.—CAPTURE OF CITIES ON A GREAT RIVER.—POMP OF ASSYRIAN KING.—ALABASTER PAVEMENT.—CONQUEST OF TRIBES INHABITING A MARSH.—THEIR WEALTH.—CHAMBERS WITH SCULPTURES BELONGING TO A NEW KING.—DESCRIPTION OF THE SCULPTURES.—CONQUEST OF THE PEOPLE OF SUSIANA.—PORTRAIT OF THE KING.—HIS GUARDS AND ATTENDANTS.—THE CITY OF SHUSHAN.—CAPTIVE PRINCE.—MUSICIANS.—CAPTIVES PUT TO THE TORTURE.—ARTISTIC CHARACTER OF THE SCULPTURES.—AN INCLINED PASSAGE.—TWO SMALL CHAMBERS.—COLOSSAL FIGURES.—MORE SCULPTURES.

Whilst I had been absent in the mountains the excavations had been continued at Kouyunjik, notwithstanding the summer heats. Nearly all the Arabs employed in the spring at Nimroud had been removed to these ruins, and considerable progress had consequently been made in clearing the earth from them. Several chambers, discovered before I left Mosul, had been emptied, and new rooms with interesting sculptures had been explored.

It has been seen that the narrow passage leading out of the south-west corner of the great hall containing the bas-reliefs representing the moving of the winged bulls turned to the left, and by another gallery connected this[Pg 357] part of the edifice with a second hall of even larger proportions than that first discovered.

The sculptures panelling the western wall were for the most part still entire. They recorded, as usual, a campaign and a victory, and were probably but a portion of one continuous subject carried round the entire hall. The conquered country appeared to have been traversed by a great river, the representation of which took up a third of the bas-relief.

Next came the siege and capture of a city standing on the opposite bank of the same great river, and surrounded by a ditch edged with lofty reeds. The Assyrian footmen and cavalry had already crossed this dike, and were closely pressing the besieged, who, no longer seeking to defend themselves, were asking for quarter. On the other side of the river, Sennacherib in his gorgeous war chariot, and surrounded by his guards, received the captives and the spoil. It is remarkable that this was almost the only figure of the king which had not been wantonly mutilated, probably by those who overthrew the Assyrian empire, burned its palaces, and levelled its cities with the dust.[177]

In this bas-relief the furniture of the horses was particularly rich and elaborate. Above the yoke rose a semicircular ornament, set round with stars, and containing the image of a deity. The chariot of the Assyrian monarch, his retinue, and his attire, accurately corresponded with the descriptions given by Xenophon of those of Cyrus, when he marched out of his palace in procession, and by Quintus Curtius of those of Darius, when he went to battle in the midst of his army. The Greek general had seen the pomp of the Persian kings, and[Pg 358] could describe it as an eye-witness.[178] The description of Quintus Curtius is no less illustrative of the Assyrian monuments. “The doryphori (a chosen body of spearmen) preceded the chariot, on either side of which were the effigies of the gods in gold and silver. The yoke was inlaid with the rarest jewels. From it projected two golden figures of Ninus and Belus, each a cubit in length.... The king was distinguished from all those who surrounded him, by the magnificence of his robes, and by the cidaris or mitre upon his head. By his side walked two hundred of his relations. Ten thousand warriors bearing spears, whose staffs were of silver and heads of gold, followed the royal chariot. The king’s led horses, forty in number, concluded the procession.”[179] Allowing for a little exaggeration on the part of the historian, and for the conventional numbers used by the Assyrian sculptor to represent large bodies of footmen and cavalry, we might suppose that Quintus Curtius had seen the very bas-reliefs I am describing, so completely do they tally with his description of the appearance and retinue of the Persian king.

The captives, bearing skins probably containing water and flour to nourish them during a long and harassing march, were fettered in pairs, and urged onwards by their guards. The women were partly on foot, and partly with their children on mules and in carts drawn by oxen. Mothers were represented holding the water-skins for their young ones to quench their thirst, whilst in some instances fathers had placed their weary children on their[Pg 359] shoulders, for they were marching during the heat of a Mesopotamian summer, as the sculptor had shown by introducing large clusters of dates on the palms. Thus were driven the inhabitants of Samaria through the Desert to Halah and Habor, by the river of Gozan and the cities of the Medes,[180] and we may see in these bas-reliefs a picture of the hardships and sufferings to which the captive people of Israel were exposed when their cities fell into the hands of the Assyrian king, and their inhabitants were sent to colonise the distant provinces of his empire.

On the south side of the hall, parts of four slabs only had been preserved; the sculpture upon the others had been so completely destroyed, that even the subject could no longer be ascertained. The fragments still remaining, graphically depicted the passage of the river by the great king. The bas-reliefs represented very accurately a scene that may be daily witnessed, without the royal warrior, on the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates.

Not a fragment of inscription remained to identify the country represented in the bas-reliefs I have just described. From the size of the river, far exceeding that of any other seen in the sculptures of Kouyunjik, I am inclined to believe that it must have been the combined waters of the Euphrates and Tigris, now known as the Shat-el-Arab.

In the south side of the hall a centre portal flanked by winged bulls, and two small entrances, formed by gigantic figures, opened into a long chamber, whose sculptured walls had been burnt to lime. To judge from the fragments that remained of this series of sculptures, the most skilful artist of the day must have been employed in its execution. At both ends of the chamber, doors, guarded[Pg 360] by colossal figures, led into smaller apartments, in which the bas-reliefs had been almost entirely destroyed.

Returning to the great hall we found an entrance formed by colossal figures leading into a long narrow chamber, about 70 feet by 12, whose walls had partly escaped the general wreck. It appeared to be the remains of an entrance into the palace, like that on the western face, or a gallery leading to the outer terrace, which probably surrounded the building. On its alabaster panels were sculptured the conquest of some of those tribes which inhabited, from the remotest period, the vast marshes formed by the Euphrates and Tigris in Chaldæa Babylonia.

Although the people represented in these bas-reliefs dwelt in the swampy districts of Chaldæa, unless, indeed, they had only taken refuge in them to escape the vengeance of the Assyrian king, they appear to have been as rich, if not richer, than any others conquered by Sennacherib. With the exception of three slabs and part of a fourth, containing the battle in the marsh, the entire walls of the chamber were sculptured with the captives and spoil brought by the victorious troops to their king. Unfortunately the image of Sennacherib himself in his chariot, which, to judge from a fragment or two found in the rubbish, must have exceeded all others in the palace, both in size and in the finish and richness of the details, had been entirely destroyed.

Returning to the great hall, from which this gallery led, I found on its western side three other entrances, corresponding with those on the southern, the centre formed by a pair of winged bulls in a fossiliferous limestone. They led into a chamber 58 feet by 34, panelled with unsculptured slabs of the same material as the colossi at the principal portal. Three similar doorways[Pg 361] opened into a parallel chamber of the same length, though rather narrower. Its walls had been ornamented with carved alabaster slabs, of which a few fragments remained.

Three doorways on the western side of this chamber, similar to those on the eastern, led into as many distinct rooms, unconnected with each other. There were thus three magnificent portals, one behind the other, each formed by winged bulls facing the same way, and all looking towards the great hall; the largest colossi, those in front, being above 18 feet high, and the smallest, those leading into the inner chamber, about 12. It would be difficult to conceive any interior architectural arrangement more imposing than this triple group of gigantic forms, as seen in perspective by those who stood in the centre of the hall, dimly lighted from above, and harmoniously colored or overlaid, like the cherubims in the temple of Solomon, with gold.

At the upper or southern ends of the two parallel chambers just described, were entrances opening into a room 82 feet by 24, whose walls were of the same unsculptured limestone. From it a portal formed by winged lions in the same material, led into an apartment 76 feet by 26, standing on the edge of the mound, and consequently one of the last on this side of the palace. Only six slabs, neither of them entire, remained against its walls; the rest had been purposely destroyed and the fragments used for the foundations of a building raised over the Assyrian ruins. They were covered from top to bottom with small figures, most elaborately carved, and designed with great spirit. Although bearing a general resemblance to the bas-reliefs of Kouyunjik, there was sufficient in the style of art and in the details, to show that they were not of exactly the same period. [Pg 362]Fortunately several epigraphs still remained over the principal groups, and enable us to determine to what monarch the sculptures belong, and to identify the events and incidents they portray.

The three slabs to the right of the winged lions on entering, were occupied by a highly curious representation of a battle. The subject was incomplete, and could not be restored; and from the number of figures introduced, and the complicated nature of the action, it is difficult to describe these important bas-reliefs intelligibly. Above one of the groups of figures was an epigraph, unfortunately much mutilated, which recorded the slaughter of a king, whose name was (? Tiranish), and who, we learn from other inscriptions on the same sculptures, reigned over Elam, or Susiana. The lines being incomplete, the meaning of the whole inscription is not quite clear.

Behind the cart with the Assyrian warriors, was the tent of the registrar, to which had been led a captive chief and his two attendants. Within were collected a heap of human heads, whilst warriors were bringing more of these bloody trophies to the appointed scribes. Several of the captives were apparently about to undergo some dreadful torture; with their hands manacled in iron fetters, they knelt over an object which might be a chafing-dish with hot coals or a vessel to receive their blood. One of the torturers held his victim by a collar round his neck; whilst a second, seizing the unfortunate prisoner by the hair, was about to strike him with ah iron-headed mace.

The epigraphs declare that the war recorded by these sculptures was undertaken by an Assyrian king, whose image was represented on a slab not yet described, against the people of Elam or Susiana. It is of considerable [Pg 363]importance thus to identify the conquered people, and to be able to ascertain the costume, the arms, and the mode of warfare of a nation well known in ancient history.

Amongst the captives were men clothed in fringed robes and a short under-tunic: these were probably the lords of the land. The women wore their hair in curls, falling on their shoulders, and bound above the temples by a band or fillet. Some had one long ringlet on each side of the face. Their children were either naked or clothed in simple shirts.

The Assyrian troops were divided into cavalry and foot. The horsemen carried the bow and spear, and wore coats of mail, high greaves, and the pointed helmet, that characteristic part of the Assyrian military costume from the earliest period. Their horses were covered with clothes, and even, it would seem, with a kind of leather armour, reaching from the head to the tail, to protect them from the arrows of the enemy.[181] The costumes of the footmen, as in the bas-reliefs of Sennacherib, varied according to their arms. The archers, probably auxiliaries from different tribes in alliance with the Assyrians, were dressed in very short tunics scarcely covering the thigh. A broad belt, with the fringed ornament peculiar to the later Assyrian period, encircled their waist, and over their shoulders they wore a cross belt, of chequered cloth, resembling a Scottish plaid, to support the quiver. Their hair, confined by a plain fillet, was rolled up behind in one large curl. All the spearmen had the pointed helmet; but some wore coats of mail and metal greaves, and others a simple tunic, without any covering to their legs. Their shields protected nearly the whole[Pg 364] person, and were rounded at the top and straight at the bottom. Some appear to have been faced with small square pieces of leather, others to have been made entirely of metal, with embossed edges. For the first time we see in these bas-reliefs, the Assyrians using the battle-axe and the mace in battle.

On the opposite side of the lion-entrance were also three slabs, but better preserved than those I have just described. They formed part of the same subject, which had evidently been carried round the four walls of the chamber. They represented the triumph of the Assyrian king, and, like the battle scenes, were divided by horizontal lines into several bands or friezes. The monarch stood in his chariot, surrounded by his body-guard. Unfortunately his face, with those of the charioteer and the eunuch bearing the parasol, had been purposely defaced, like that of Sennacherib on his monuments, probably when the united armies of the Medes and Babylonians destroyed the palace. The royal robes were profusely adorned with rosettes and fringes.

In front of the chariot were two warriors or guards in embroidered robes and greaves. Their long hair was bound by a fillet, whose tasselled ends fell loose behind. They were preceded by two remarkable figures, both eunuchs, and probably intended for portraits of some well-known officers of the royal household. One was old and corpulent; his forehead was high and ample; his nose curved and small, and his chin round and double. The wrinkles of the brow, the shaggy eyebrows, and the bloated cheeks, with the stubble beard peculiar to beings of his class, were very faithfully represented. His short hair was tied with a fillet. His companion was younger, and had not the same marked features. He carried before him a square object resembling a closed box or book,[Pg 365] perhaps a clay tablet containing some decree or register, such as were discovered in the ruins. Both wore long plain shirts, and round their waists a simple cord, in which was fixed a whip, probably a sign of their office.

Above this remarkable group was an inscription in eight lines fortunately almost entire. From it we learn the name of the king, whose deeds were thus recorded. He was the son of Essarhaddon, and the grandson of Sennacherib, and the conqueror of Susiana. He was the Assordanes of the chronological tables, and his name begins with the monogram for the Assyrian deity, Asshur.

These bas-reliefs record his conquest of the country of (Nuvaki ?), a name by which Susiana or Elymais was anciently known; as we also find from the inscriptions at Khorsabad, as well as from those of Bisutun.

It is highly probable that we have, in the bas-relief, a representation of the city of Susa or Shusan. Its position between two rivers well agrees with that of existing ruins generally believed to mark its site. The smaller stream would be the Shapour, and the larger the Eulœus or river of Dizful. The city was surrounded by a wall, with equidistant towers and gateways. The houses were flat roofed, and some had one tower or upper chamber, and others two. They had no windows, and their doors were square. Thus, in general form, and probably in the interior arrangements, they closely resembled the common dwellings of the Egyptians, of which a very interesting model is now in the British Museum.[182] Nor were they unlike the meaner houses of the modern town of Shushter, the representative of ancient Susa.

The adjoining slab was divided into eight bands or friezes, by parallel lines, and the next slab into seven.[Pg 366] On both were represented the Assyrian army returning from its victorious campaign, and bringing to the king the captives and the spoil. The prisoners, who were probably considered rather rebels to his authority than enemies, were being cruelly tortured in his presence. The principal group was that of the eunuch general, or Tartan, leading a chief or prince of the conquered people. Above him was an inscription unfortunately much mutilated. It appears to have declared that he was one of the sons or chiefs of the Susianian monarch, defeated and slain in battle near the district of Madaktu (the name over the city on the adjoining slab), and near the city of Shushan; and that the Assyrian king had placed one of his own generals on the conquered throne.[183]

Before the captive prince were gathered a number of the Susianians, probably the subjects of the slaughtered king, who had come to surrender to the Assyrian general, for they still carried their arms, and were not led by the victorious warriors. Some of them knelt, some bowed to the ground, and others, stretched at full length, rubbed their heads in the dust, all signs of grief and submission still practised in the East. The Assyrian generals were welcomed by bands of men and women, dancing, singing, and playing on instruments of music. Thus, “when David was returned from the slaughter of the Philistines, the women came out of all the cities of Israel, singing[Pg 367] and dancing to meet Saul, with tabrets, with joy, and with instruments of music.”[184] We find from various passages in the Scriptures, that the instruments of music chiefly used on such triumphant occasions were the harp, one with ten strings (rendered viol or lyre in some versions, but probably a kind of dulcimer), the tabor and the pipe[185], precisely those represented in the bas-reliefs.

The whole scene was curiously illustrative of modern Eastern customs. The musicians portrayed in the bas-reliefs were probably of that class of public performers who appear in Turkey and Egypt at marriages, and on other occasions of rejoicing.

Above the Assyrian warriors were the captives and their torturers. The former differed in costume from the Susianian fighting-men represented in the adjoining bas-reliefs. They were distinguished by the smallness of their stature, and by a very marked Jewish countenance—a sharp, hooked nose, short bushy beard, and long narrow eyes. Could they have belonged to the Hebrew tribes which were carried away from Samaria and Jerusalem, and placed by Shalmaneser, Sennacherib, or Essarhaddon, as colonists in the distant regions of Elam, and who, having become powerful in their new settlements, had revolted against their Assyrian rulers, and were once again subdued? Some in iron fetters were being led before the king, for judgment or[Pg 368] pardon. Others had been condemned to the torture, and were already in the hands of the executioners. Two were stretched naked at full length on the ground, and whilst their limbs were held apart by pegs and cords they were being flayed alive. Beneath them were other unfortunate victims, undergoing abominable punishments. The brains of one were apparently being beaten out with an iron mace, whilst an officer held him by the beard. A torturer was wrenching the tongue out of the mouth of a second wretch who had been pinioned to the ground. The bleeding heads of the slain were tied round the necks of the living, who seemed reserved for still more barbarous tortures.

Above these groups was a short epigraph, commencing by two determinative signs of proper names, each followed by a blank space, which the sculptor probably left to be filled up with the names of the principal victims. It then declares that these men, having spoken blasphemies (?) against Asshur, the great god of the Assyrians, their tongues had been pulled out (Lishaneshunu eshlup, both words being almost purely Hebrew), and that they had afterwards been put to death (or tortured). The inscription, therefore, corresponds with the sculpture beneath. It is by such confirmatory evidence that the accuracy of the translations of the cuneiform characters may be tested.

These highly interesting bas-reliefs had been exposed, like all the other sculptures of Kouyunjik, to the fire which had destroyed the palace. Although each slab was cracked into many pieces, the sculptures themselves had suffered less injury than any others discovered in the same ruins, the hard fossiliferous limestone not having become calcined by the heat like the alabaster. The outline was still sharp, and the details perfectly preserved.[Pg 369] Considerable care was required to move them. But the pieces were at length packed, and since their arrival in England have been admirably restored.

Some bas-reliefs sculptured by order of the son and successor of Essarhaddon, have been discovered at Kouyunjik and Nebbi Yunus. These bas-reliefs prove that many changes had taken place in the arts and dress of the people of Assyria between the reign of Sennacherib and that of his grandson. The later sculptures are principally distinguished by their minute finish, the sharpness of the outline, and the very correct delineation of the animals, and especially of the horses. We now approach the period of the fall of the Assyrian empire and of the rise of the kingdoms of Babylon and Persia. The arts passed from Assyria to the sister nations and to Ionia. There is much in the bas-reliefs I have just described to remind us of the early works of the Greeks immediately after the Persian war, and to illustrate a remark of the illustrious Niebuhr, that “a critical history of Greek art would show how late the Greeks commenced to practise the arts. After the Persian war a new world opens at once, and from that time they advanced with great strides. But everything that was produced before the Persian war—a few of those works are still extant—was, if we judge of it without prejudice, altogether barbarous.”[186]

The chamber containing these sculptures had an entrance opening upon the edge of the mound. Of this doorway there only remained, on each side, a block of plain limestone, which may, however, have been the base of a sphinx or other figure. The outer walls to which it led had been panelled with the usual alabaster slabs, with bas-reliefs of a campaign in a country already represented[Pg 370] in another part of the palace, and distinguished by the same deep valley watered by a river, the vineyards and wooded mountains. Over one of the castles captured and destroyed by the Assyrians was written, “Sennacherib, King of Assyria. The city of Bit-Kubitalmi I took, the spoil I carried away, (the city) I burned.”

Whether these walls belonged to a chamber or formed part of the southern face of the palace could not now be determined, as they were on the very brink of the platform. At right angles to them, to the west, a pair of winged bulls opened upon another wall, of which there were scarcely any remains, and midway between the two entrances was a deep doorway, flanked on both sides by four colossal mythic figures, amongst which were the fish god and the deity with the lion’s head and eagle’s feet. It led to an inclined or ascending passage, nine feet wide in the narrowest part and ten in the broadest, and forty-four feet in length to where it turned at right angles to the left. It was paved with hard lime or plaster about an inch and a half thick. The walls were built of the finest sundried bricks, admirably fitted together, and still perfectly preserved.

This inclined way probably led to the upper chambers of the palace, or to the galleries which may have been carried round the principal chambers and halls.

I have only to describe two more rooms discovered in this part of the ruins during the summer. They opened into the chamber parallel with that containing the sculptured records of the son of Essarhaddon. The entrances to both were formed by two pairs of colossal figures, each pair consisting of a man wearing the horned cap surmounted by a fleur-de-lis, and a lion-headed and eagle-footed human figure raising a dagger in one hand, and holding a mace in the other. These sculptures were [Pg 371]remarkable for the boldness of the relief and their high finish.

The bas-reliefs on the walls of the two chambers recorded the same campaign against a nation dwelling amidst a wooded and mountainous country, and in strongly fortified cities, which the Assyrians took by assault, using battering rams to make breaches in the walls and scaling ladders to mount to the assault. The besieged defended themselves with arrows and stones, but their strongholds were captured, and a vast amount of spoil and captives fell into the hands of the conquerors. The men had short, bushy hair and beards, and wore an inner garment reaching to the knee, an outer cloak of skins or fur, and gaiters laced in front. The robes of the women were short; their hair hung low down their backs, and was then gathered up into one large curl.

Such were the discoveries made at Kouyunjik during the summer. At Nimroud the excavations had been almost suspended. I have already described those parts of the high mound or tower, and of the adjoining small temples which were explored by the few workmen who still remained amongst the ruins, rather to retain possession of the place than to carry on extensive operations.

I was engaged until the middle of October in moving and packing bas-reliefs from Kouyunjik; a task of considerable trouble, and demanding much time and labor, as the slabs, split into a thousand fragments by the fire, had to be taken completely to pieces, and then arranged and numbered, with a view to their future restoration. Nearly a hundred cases containing these remains were at length dragged to the river side, to wait the rafts by which they were to be forwarded to Busrah, where a vessel was shortly expected to transport them to England.
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Re: Discoveries among the Ruins of Nineveh and Babylon

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CHAPTER XXI. PREPARATIONS FOR LEAVING NINEVEH.—DEPARTURE FOR BABYLON.—DESCENT OF THE RIVER.—TEKRIT.—THE STATE OF THE RIVERS OF MESOPOTAMIA.—COMMERCE UPON THEM.—TURKISH ROADS.—THE PLAIN OF DURA.—THE NAHARWAN.—SAMARRAH.—KADESIA.—PALM GROVES.—KATHIMAIN.—APPROACH TO BAGHDAD.—THE CITY.—ARRIVAL.—DR. ROSS.—A BRITISH STEAMER.—MODERN BAGHDAD.—TEL MOHAMMED.—DEPARTURE FOR BABYLON.—A PERSIAN PRINCE.—ABDE PASHA’S CAMP.—EASTERN FALCONRY.—HAWKING THE GAZELLE.—APPROACH TO BABYLON.—THE RUINS.—ARRIVAL AT HILLAH.

The winter was now drawing near, and the season was favorable for examining the remains of ancient cities in Babylonia. The Trustees of the British Museum had partly sanctioned a plan submitted to them for excavations amongst ruins, no less important and vast, and of no less biblical and historical interest than those of Nineveh. I had included, in my original scheme, many remarkable sites both in Chaldæa and Susiana, but, as I have before observed, my limited means did not permit me to carry out my plan to its fullest extent. As the operations at Nimroud were now, however, suspended, I determined to employ fewer men at Kouyunjik, and to devote myself, during the cold weather, to researches amongst the great mounds of Southern Mesopotamia.

My Jebours were now so skilled and experienced in excavating, that I deemed it more economical to take a party of them with me than to engage new workmen on the various sites that I might visit. At the same time, having thus my own men, I should be independent of the people of the country, who might either be unwilling to[Pg 373] labor, or might require exorbitant pay. I accordingly selected about thirty of the best Arabs employed in the excavations at Nineveh, to accompany me on the rafts which bore the sculptures.

Having again entrusted Toma Shisman with the superintendence of the excavations, and given him all necessary directions for carrying on the work, I quitted Mosul on the 18th of October, accompanied by Hormuzd and Mr. Romaine, an English traveller, on his way to India. There were cases enough containing sculptures from Kouyunjik to load a raft of considerable size. Hormuzd, who had met with a severe accident, was placed in a bed on a small kellek; Mr. Romaine occupied with me another of the same size. The servants and cooking apparatus were on the large raft, and we all kept close company for convenience and mutual protection.

There were still some arrangements connected with the excavations to be made at Nimroud, and it was not until the 20th that we fairly began our voyage. The navigation of the river as far as Kalah Sherghat was so insecure, that I deemed it prudent, in order to avoid a collision with the Arabs, to engage a Bedouin chief to accompany us. We engaged one Awaythe, a Sheikh of the Fedagha Shammar, to give us his protection until we had passed the danger. Placing one of his sons on his mare, and ordering him to follow us along the banks of the river, he stepped upon my raft, where he spent his time in giving us accounts of wars and ghazous, smoking his pipe and pounding coffee.

We reached Tekrit in three days without accident or adventure. Bedouin tents and moving swarms of men and animals were occasionally seen on the river banks, but under the protection of our Sheikh we met with no hindrance. Tekrit is almost the only permanent settlement[Pg 374] of any importance between Mosul and Baghdad. It is now a small town, but was once a place of some size and strength. Tekrit is chiefly famous as the birthplace of the celebrated Saleh-ed-din, better known to the English reader as Saladin, the hero of the crusades, and the magnanimous enemy of our Richard Cœur-de-Lion. His father, Ayub, a chief of a Kurdish tribe of Rahwanduz, was governor of its castle for the Seljukian monarchs of Persia. Mosul itself sustained a siege from Saladin, who was repulsed by its Atabeg, or hereditary prince. Military expeditions into the Sinjar and other parts of Mesopotamia were amongst the exploits of this great Mussulman hero.

Tekrit is now inhabited by a few Arabs, who carry on, as raftsmen, the traffic of the river between Mosul and Baghdad.

Nothing marks more completely the results of the unjust and injurious system pursued by the Porte in its Arabian territories than the almost entire absence of permanent settlements and of commercial intercourse on the banks of the Euphrates and Tigris. Two of the finest rivers of Asia, reaching into the very heart of the Turkish dominions, spreading fertility through districts almost unequalled for the richness of their soil and for the varied nature of their produce, and navigable one for nearly 850 miles from the sea, the other for nearly 600 miles, are of no account whatever to the State upon which nature has conferred such eminent advantages. The depredations of the Arabs, unchecked by the government, and the rapacity and dishonesty of the Turkish authorities, who levy illegal and exorbitant taxes upon every mode of transit whether by land or water, and who make monopolies of all articles of produce and of merchandise, effectually check the efforts of the natives themselves, by no[Pg 375] means deficient in commercial activity and enterprise, to engage in trade, or to navigate the rivers. Even the European merchant, with privileges secured by treaties, and protection afforded by consuls and diplomatic agency, is scarcely able to struggle against the insecurity of the country through which he must convey his goods, and against the black-mail exacted by Arab Sheikhs, secretly encouraged or abetted by the Turkish governors. From the most wanton and disgraceful neglect, the Tigris and Euphrates, in the lower part of their course, are breaking from their natural beds, forming vast marshes, turning fertile districts into a wilderness, and becoming unnavigable to vessels of even the smallest burden.

The very high-way from Mosul, and, consequently, from the capital, to Baghdad, in order to avoid the restless Bedouin, is carried along the foot of the Kurdish hills, leaving the river, adding many days to the journey, and exposing caravans to long delays from swollen streams. Even this road is no longer secure, for the utter negligence and dishonesty that have of late marked the conduct of the Turkish authorities in Southern Turkey have led to the interruption of this channel of commerce.

The direct road to Baghdad from the north would be across Mesopotamia, and along the banks of the Tigris, through a country uninterrupted by a single stream of any size, or by a single hill. Whilst caravans are now frequently nearly six weeks on their way from Mosul to Baghdad, they would scarcely be as many days by the Desert. A few military posts on the river, a proper system of police, encouragement to the cultivating tribes to settle in villages, and the construction of a common cart-road, would soon lead to perfect security and to the establishment of considerable trade. This is not the place to discuss the relative merits of the various routes to India,[Pg 376] but it may be observed that the time is probably not far distant, when a more direct and speedy communication than hitherto exists with that empire, will be sought by the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates, where railways and steam navigation can both be advantageously brought into operation. The navigation of the Persian Gulf is, at all times, open and safe; and a glance at the map will show that a line through the Mediterranean, the port of Suedia, Aleppo, Mosul, Baghdad, Busrah, and the Indian Ocean to Bombay is as direct as can well be desired. This must be the second Indian route before extended civilisation and Christianity can afford a reasonable basis for those gigantic schemes which would carry a line of iron through countries almost unknown, and scarcely yet visited by a solitary European traveller.

Between Tekrit and Baghdad there is much to interest the traveller who for the first time floats down a river winding through the great alluvial plains of Chaldæa. The country has, however, been so frequently described[187], that I will not detain the reader with more than a general sketch of it. Our rafts glided noiselessly onwards, without furrowing with a ripple the quiet surface of the stream. Leaving Tekrit, we first passed a small whitewashed Mussulman tomb, rising on the left or eastern bank, in a plain that still bears the name of Dura. It was here, as some believe, that “Nebuchadnezzar the king made an image of gold, whose height was threescore cubits and breadth six cubits, and called together the princes, the governors, and the captains, the judges, the treasurers, the counsellors, the sheriffs, and all the rulers of the provinces to its dedication, and that certain Jews would not[Pg 377] serve his gods, nor fall down and worship the golden image that he had set up.”[188] It is now a wilderness, with here end there a shapeless mound, the remains of some ancient habitation. The place is not otherwise unknown to history, for it was here that, after the death of the Emperor Julian, his successor Jovian concluded a disgraceful peace with the Persian king Sapores (Shapour), and saved the Roman army by yielding to the enemy the five great provinces to the east of the Tigris. It was here, too, that he crossed the Tigris, a broad and deep stream, and commenced his disastrous retreat through Mesopotamia.

Not far below, and on the same side of the river, the great canal of the Naharwan, the wonder of Arab geographers, robbed the Tigris of a large portion of its waters.

Below the Naharwan, ruins, walls, and dwellings, built chiefly of large pebbles, united by a strong cement, a mode of construction peculiar to the Sassanian and early Arab periods, stand on the alluvial cliffs. They are called Eski, or old, Baghdad; the Arabs, as usual, assigning a more ancient site to the modern city.

A tower, about two hundred feet high, now rises above the eastern bank of the river. An ascending way winds round it on the outside like the spiral of a screw, reminding the traveller of the common ideal pictures of the Tower of Babel. It marks the site of the ancient city of Samarrah, where the Roman army under Jovian rested after marching and fighting a long summer’s day. It subsequently became the capital of Motassem Billah, the eighth caliph of the Abbasside dynasty. Weary of the frequent seditions of the turbulent inhabitants of Baghdad, he resolved to change the seat of government, and chose[Pg 378] Samarrah as his residence. If he did not build, he beautified, the city, and displayed in it great magnificence. The modern town, inhabited by Arabs, consists of a few falling houses surrounded by a mud wall, defended by bastions and towers.

On both sides of the river, as the raft is carried gently along by the now sluggish current, the traveller sees huge masses of brick work jutting out from the falling banks, or overhanging the precipice of earth which hems in the stream. Here and there one sees the remains of the palaces and castles of the last Persian kings and of the first Caliphs. The place is still called Gadesia or Kadesia, and near it was fought that great battle which gave to the new nation issuing from the wilds of Arabia the dominion of the Eastern world.

Remains of an earlier period are not wanting. A huge mound abutting on the west bank of the river, and still within sight of Samarrah, is known to the Arabs as the Sidd-ul-Nimroud, the wall or rampart of Nimroud. The current becomes more gentle at every broad reach, until the raft scarcely glides past the low banks. The water has lost its clearness and its purity; tinged by the alluvial soil it has turned to a pale yellow color. The river at length widens into a noble stream. Groups of half-naked Arabs gather together on the banks to gaze at the travellers. A solitary raft of firewood for Baghdad floats, like ourselves, almost imperceptibly along.

We are now amidst the date groves. If it be autumn, clusters of golden fruit hang beneath the fan-like leaves; if spring, the odor of orange blossoms fills the air. The cooing of the doves that flutter amongst the branches, begets a pleasing melancholy, and a feeling of listlessness and repose.

The raft creeps round a projecting bank and two gilded[Pg 379] domes and four stately minarets, all glittering in the rays of an eastern sun, suddenly rise high above the dense bed of palms. They are of the mosque of Kathimain, which covers the tombs of two of the Imaums or holy saints of the Sheeah sect.

The low banks swarm with Arabs,—men, women, and naked children. Mud hovels screened by yellow mats, and groaning water-wheels worked by the patient ox, are seen beneath the palms. The Tigris becomes wider and wider, and the stream is almost motionless. Circular boats, of reeds coated with bitumen, skim over the water. Horsemen, and riders on white asses,[189] hurry along the river side. Turks in flowing robes and white turbans, Persians in high black caps and close-fitting tunics, the Bokhara pilgrim in his white head-dress and way-worn garments, the Bedouin chief in his tasseled keffieh and striped aba, Baghdad ladies with their scarlet and white draperies fretted with threads of gold, and their black horsehair veils, concealing even their wanton eyes, Persian women wrapped in their sightless garments, and Arab girls in their simple blue shirts, are all mingled together in one motley crowd. A busy stream of travellers flows without ceasing from the gates of the western suburb of Baghdad to the sacred precincts of Kathimain.

A pine-shaped cone of snowy whiteness rises to the right; near it are one or two drooping palms, that seem fast falling to decay, like the building over which they can no longer throw their shade. This is the tomb of Zobeide, the lovely queen of Haroun-al-Reshid, a name[Pg 380] that raises many a pleasant association, and recalls to memory a thousand romantic dreams of early youth.

We pass the palace of the governor, an edifice of mean materials and proportions. At its windows the pasha himself and the various officers of his household may be seen reclining on their divans, amidst wreaths of smoke. A crazy bridge of boats crosses the stream, and appears to bar all further progress. At length the chains are loosened, two or three of the rude vessels are withdrawn, and the rafts glide gently through. A few minutes more, and we are anchored beneath the spreading folds of the British flag, opposite a handsome building, not crumbling into ruins like its neighbours, but kept in repair with European neatness. A small iron steamer floats motionless before it. We have arrived at the dwelling of the English Consul-general and political agent of the East India Company at Baghdad.

It was early in the morning of the 26th October that I landed at the well-remembered quay of the British residency. In the absence of Colonel Rawlinson, then in England, his political duties had been confided to Captain Kemball, now the East India Company’s Resident at Bushire. He received me with great kindness, and I acknowledge with gratitude the hospitality and effective assistance I invariably experienced from him during my sojourn at Baghdad, and my researches in Babylonia.

More than ten years had passed since my first visit to the city. Time had worked its changes amongst those who then formed the happy and hospitable English society of Baghdad. Dr. Ross was no more. In him Arab as well as European, rich as well as poor, Mohammedan as well as Christian, had lost a generous and faithful friend.

Twelve years ago four steamers floated on the Tigris, and were engaged in exploring the then almost unknown[Pg 381] rivers of Mesopotamia and Susiana. Their officers formed a small English colony in Baghdad. Three of those vessels had long been withdrawn, one alone having been left to keep up a monthly communication between this city and Busrah. It is to be regretted, however, that a vessel better suited to the navigation of the rivers has not been selected.

The expedition under Col. Chesney, and the subsequent ascent of the Euphrates, by far the most arduous undertaking connected with its navigation, but accomplished with great skill by Captain Campbell of the East India Company’s service, have proved that for ordinary purposes this river in its present condition is not navigable even in the lower part of its course. The neglect to keep up the embankments has increased the obstacles, and it is doubtful whether a steamer of even the smallest useful size, could now find its way through the great marshes that absorb the waters of the Euphrates for nearly 200 miles above its confluence with the Tigris at Korna. The latter river is, for the present, navigable from the Persian Gulf to vessels drawing from three to four feet water almost as far as Tekrit, and probably, for vessels purposely constructed, as far as Nimroud. The usual negligence and indifference of the Turkish government are, however, bringing about the same changes in the course and condition of this stream as in those of the Euphrates.

Baghdad, with its long vaulted bazars rich with the produce and merchandise of every clime, its mixed population of Turks, Arabs, Persians, Indians, and men of all Eastern nations, its palm groves and gardens, its painted palaces and unsightly hovels, its present misery and its former magnificence, have been so frequently described, that I will not detain the reader with any minute account of this celebrated city. Tyranny, disease, and [Pg 382]inundations have brought it very low. Nearly half of the space inclosed within its walls is now covered by heaps of ruins, and the population is daily decreasing, without the hope of change. During my residence in Baghdad no one could go far beyond the gates without the risk of falling into the hands of wandering Arabs, who prowled unchecked over the plains, keeping the city itself almost in a continual state of siege. Notwithstanding these drawbacks, the importance of its position is so great that Baghdad must at all times command a considerable trade. It is a link between the East and the West; it is the store-house from which the tribes of the Desert obtain their clothing and their supplies, and it is the key to the holy places annually sought by thousands upon thousands of Persian pilgrims of the Sheeah sect.[190]

The only remains of the Babylonian period hitherto discovered within the city walls are the ruins of an enormous drain or subterranean passage, built of large square bricks bearing the name of Nebuchadnezzar; the lofty pile of sundried bricks, intermixed with layers of reeds, called Akker-Kuf, which now rises in the midst of a marsh to the west of the Tigris, about four or five miles from the city gates, has frequently been described. During my visit to Baghdad it was not easy to reach this ruin on account of the swamp, and as it is merely a solid mass of mud masonry, excavations in it would scarcely have led to results of any interest or importance.

I found the country around Baghdad so overrun with Bedouins and other tribes in open revolt against the government, that it was some time before I could venture to[Pg 383] leave the city for the ruins of Babylon. Not to lose time, I employed the Jebours who had accompanied me from Mosul in excavating some mounds not far from the gates of the city, on the eastern bank of the Tigris. The largest was called Tel Mohammed, and was about four miles from Baghdad, near the Arab village of Gherara. The only objects of any interest discovered there were several hollow bronze balls, with the name of a king engraved upon them in Babylonian cuneiform characters; a few rude images of the Assyrian Venus in baked clay, such as are found in most ruins of the same period; a pair of bronze ankle-rings, some terracotta vases, and other relics of the same nature. Foundations in brick masonry were also uncovered, but there were no traces of sculpture or inscriptions.

Image
Figures of Assyrian Venus in baked Clay.

It was not until the 5th of December that I was able to leave Baghdad. I had been struggling with my old enemy, intermittent fever, and the surrounding country was still in the hands of the Arabs, two reasons for remaining within the gates. At length Abde Pasha, the governor of the province, placed himself at the head of his troops, and marched against the rebellious tribes. Before beginning his campaign, however, he had to dam the mouth of a large canal called the Hindiyah, in order to drain the vast marshes to the west of Babylon. Into these inaccessible swamps the Arabs had driven their buffaloes, and there they defied the Turkish troops.

[Pg 384]Before going to Hillah I determined to visit the governor, and to make acquaintance with several Sheikhs of the southern tribes friendly to the Turkish government who were in his camp. I accordingly left Baghdad, accompanied by M. Aristarki, an accomplished Greek gentleman in the service of the Porte, and by one Ahmed-al-Khod, a highly intelligent, active and faithful Arab of the tribe of the Agayl, who had long been in the service of Captain Jones. His acquaintance with the country, and his connection by marriage with Ferhan the Shammar chief, rendered him a very useful guide and companion in a journey through the Desert.

Leaving Baghdad, after fording ditches and wading through water and deep mud, in three hours’ time we came to the caravanserai of Khan-i-Zad, where we found Timour Mirza, one of the exiled Persian princes. He was surrounded by hawks of various kinds standing on perches fixed in the ground, and by numerous attendants, each bearing a falcon on his wrist. Amongst his own countrymen and the Arabs the prince held the first place as a sportsman; his gun was unerring in its aim, his falcons were unequalled for their training, and he knew every hunting-ground within many days’ journey of Baghdad. He was no less famed for courage in war than for skill in the chase, and his exploits in both are equally notorious among the tribes of Mesopotamia.

The plains between Khan-i-Zad and the Euphrates are covered with a perfect network of ancient canals and watercourses; but “a drought is upon the waters of Babylon, and they were dried.”[191] Their lofty embankments, stretching on every side in long lines until they are lost in the hazy distance, or magnified by the mirage into[Pg 385] mountains, still defy the hand of time, and seem rather the work of nature than of man. The face of the country, too, is dotted with mounds and shapeless heaps, the remains of ancient towns and villages. A long ride of ten hours through this scene of solitude and desolation brought us to the tents of the Pasha of Baghdad, pitched on the western bank of the Euphrates, below the village of Musseiyib, and on the inlet of the Hindiyah canal. A string of boats had been placed across the river to connect the camp of the governor with Baghdad. As we approached we heard a loud hum of human voices; but the whole encampment was concealed by dense clouds of dust. Once over the bridge we found ourselves in the midst of a crowd of Turkish soldiers, Arabs, and workmen of every kind hurrying to and fro in wild disorder; some bearing earth and mud in baskets, or in their cloaks, others bending under the weight of bundles of brushwood, mats, and ropes. Women and girls were mingled with the men, and as they labored they chanted in a monotonous tone verses on the Pasha and their chiefs, improvised for the occasion.

This busy throng was building up the dam which was to shut out the waters of the Euphrates from the canal, dry the marshes, and bring the rebellious tribes to obedience. The nature of the materials and of the work did not, however, promise a very favorable or speedy result. They had indeed no sooner raised half their frail barrier of earth and fascines, than the impetuous current washed away in a night the fruits of a month’s toil. The Pasha had summoned to his aid all the tribes that still owned his authority; his tents were crowded with Arab Sheikhs from the plains, and Kurdish Beys from the mountains. About two thousand regular troops and a large body of irregular horse and foot completed the[Pg 386] motley army he had gathered round him at the Hindiyah.

I spent the following day with Abde Pasha, who was an ardent sportsman, and entertained me with hawking. The Arab and Kurdish chiefs, who were in his camp, were summoned at dawn to accompany him. We formed altogether a very gay and goodly company. Bustards, hares, gazelles, francolins, and several wild animals abounded in the jungle and the plains, and before we returned in the afternoon scarcely a horseman was without some trophy of the chase dangling from his saddle.

The hawk most valued by Eastern sportsmen is the Shaheen, a variety of the northern peregrine falcon, and esteemed the most noble of the race. Although the smallest in size, it is celebrated for its courage and daring, and is constantly the theme of Persian verse. Those from the Gebel Shammar, in Nedjd, are the most prized, but being only brought by occasional pilgrims from Mecca, are very rare. The next best are said to come from Tokat, in Asia Minor. The Shaheen should be caught and trained when young. It strikes its quarry in the air, and may be taught to attack even the largest eagle.

The next in value is the Balaban, which can be trained to strike its quarry either in the air or on the ground. It is found in the neighbourhood of Baghdad and in other parts of Mesopotamia; is caught and trained when full grown, and is flown at gazelles, hares, cranes, bustards, partridges, and francolins.

The Baz and Shah Baz (? Astur palumbarius, the goshawk, and the Falco lanarius) is remarkable for the beauty of its speckled plumage and for its size. It strikes in the air and on the ground, and, if well trained, may take cranes and other large game.

[Pg 387]The Chark (? Falco cervialis), the usual falcon of the Bedouins, always strikes its quarry on the ground, except the eagle, which it may be trained to fly at in the air. It is chiefly used for gazelles and bustards, but will also take hares and other game.

The bird usually hawked by the Arabs is the middle-sized bustard, or houbara. It is almost always captured on the ground, and defends itself vigorously with wings and beak against its assailant, which is often disabled in the encounter. The falcon is generally trained to this quarry with a fowl. The method pursued is very simple. It is first taught to take its raw meat from a man, or from the ground, the distance being daily increased by the falconer. When the habit is acquired, the flesh is tied to the back of a fowl; the falcon will at once seize its usual food, and receives also the liver of the fowl, which is immediately killed. A bustard is then, if possible, captured alive, and used in the same way. In a few days the training is complete, and the hawk may be flown at any large bird on the ground.

The falconry, however, in which Easterns take most delight, is that of the gazelle. For this very noble and exciting sport, the falcon and greyhound must be trained to hunt together by a process unfortunately somewhat cruel. In the first place, the bird is taught to eat its daily ration of raw meat fastened on the stuffed head of a gazelle. The next step is to accustom it to look for its food between the horns of a tame gazelle. The distance between the animal and the falconer is daily increased, until the hawk will seek its meat when about half a mile off. A greyhound is now loosed upon the gazelle, the falcon being flown at the same. When the animal is seized, which of course soon takes place, its throat is cut, and the hawk is fed with a part of its flesh. After[Pg 388] thus sacrificing three gazelles, the education of the falcon and greyhound is declared to be complete. The chief art in training is to teach the two to single out the same gazelle, and the dog not to injure the falcon when struggling on the ground with the quarry. The greyhound, however, soon learns to watch the movements of its companion, without whose assistance it could not capture its prey.

The falcon, when loosed from its jesses, flies steadily and near the ground towards the retreating gazelles, and marking one, soon separates it from the herd. It then darts at the head of the affrighted animal, throws it to the ground, or only checks it in its rapid course. The greyhound rarely comes up before the blow has been more than once repeated. The falconer then hastens to secure the quarry. Should the dog not succeed in capturing the gazelle after it has been struck for the third or fourth time, the hawk will generally sulk and refuse to hunt any longer. I once saw a very powerful falcon belonging to Abde Pasha hold a gazelle until the horsemen succeeded in spearing the animal. The fleetness of the gazelle is so great, that, without the aid of the hawk, very few dogs can overtake it, unless the ground be heavy after rain.

The pursuit of the gazelle with the falcon and hound over the boundless plains of Assyria and Babylonia is one of the most exhilarating and graceful of sports, displaying equally the noble qualities of the horse, the dog, and the bird.

The time of day best suited for hawking is very early in the morning, before the eagles and kites are soaring in the sky. The falcon should not be fed for several hours before it is taken to the chase. When not hunting, the Arabs give it meat only once a day. Some hawks require[Pg 389] to be hooded, such as the Chark and the Shaheen; others need no covering for the eyes. The hood is generally made of colored leather, with eyes worked on it in beads, and gold and variegated threads. Tassels and ornaments of various kinds are added, and the great chiefs frequently adorn a favourite bird with pearls and precious stones. To the legs are sometimes fastened small bells. Few hawks will return to the falconer without the lure, which consists of the wing of a bustard or fowl, or of a piece of meat attached to a string, and swung round in the air. The Eastern huntsman has a different call for each variety of falcon. A good chark will sometimes take as many as eight or ten bustards or five or six gazelles in the course of a morning.

I have introduced these remarks on falconry, founded on personal experience, as this noble science is probably of the greatest antiquity, and is still the favorite pursuit of the Eastern warrior.

Before leaving the camp I obtained letters to the principal chiefs of the southern tribes from the Pasha as well as from Wadi, the Sheikh of the Zobeide, and other influential Sheikhs. After riding about four hours we perceived a huge hill to the south. As we drew nearer, its flat table-like top and perpendicular sides, rising abruptly from an alluvial plain, showed that it was the work of man, and not a natural elevation. At length we could plainly distinguish around it great embankments, the remains of walls and canals. Gradually, as the caravan slowly advanced, the ruin assumed a definite shape. It was the mound of Babel, better known to travellers as the Mujelibé, a name not now given to it by the Arab inhabitants of the surrounding country.

This is the first great ruin seen on approaching ancient Babylon from the north. Beyond it long lines of palms[Pg 390] hem in the Euphrates, which now winds through the midst of the ancient city. To the vast mound of Babel succeed long undulating heaps of earth, bricks, and pottery. A solitary mass of brickwork, rising from the summit of the largest mound, marks the remains known to the Arabs as the “Mujelibé,” or the “overturned.”[192]

Other shapeless heaps of rubbish cover for many an acre the face of the land. On all sides, fragments of glass, marble, pottery, and inscribed brick are mingled with that peculiar nitrous and blanched soil, which, bred from the remains of ancient habitations, checks or destroys vegetation, and renders the site of Babylon a naked and hideous waste. Owls start from the scanty thickets, and the foul jackal skulks through the furrows. Truly “the glory of kingdoms and the beauty of the Chaldees’ excellency is as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah. Wild beasts of the desert lie there; and their houses are full of doleful creatures; and owls dwell there, and satyrs dance there. And the wild beasts of the islands cry in their desolate houses, and dragons in their pleasant palaces,” for her day has come.[193]

A few black tents and flocks of sheep and camels were scattered over the yellow plain. They belonged chiefly to the Zobeide, an ancient tribe, renowned in the history of the conquering Arabs under their first caliphs, and now pasturing their flocks in the wilds of Babylonia.[194] From Amran, the last of the great mounds, a broad and [Pg 391]well-trodden track winds through thick groves of palms. About an hour’s ride beneath a pleasant shade brings the traveller to the falling gateway of the town of Hillah. A mean bazar, crowded with Arabs, camels, and asses, leads to a bridge of boats across the Euphrates. The principal part of the town, containing the fort and the residence of the governor, is on the opposite side of the river. We turned off, however, to the left, as our quarters had been made ready on the western bank. A party of irregular troops sent out to meet me, conducted my caravan to a spacious house standing on the very edge of the stream, and belonging to one of the principal families of the place. It had once contained rich furniture, and handsomely decorated rooms in the Persian style, but was now fast falling into utter ruin. The cold wind whistled through the rotten wooden panels of the windows, for there was no glass, and the crumbling ceiling and floor threatened to give way together. In this frail dwelling we prepared to pass a part of our winter in Babylonia.
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Re: Discoveries among the Ruins of Nineveh and Babylon

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CHAPTER XXII. THE CHIEFS OF HILLAH.—PRESENT OF LIONS.—THE SON OF THE GOVERNOR.—DESCRIPTION OF THE TOWN.—ZAID.—THE RUINS OF BABYLON.—CHANGES IN THE COURSE OF THE EUPHRATES.—THE WALLS.—VISIT TO THE BIRS NIMROUD.—DESCRIPTION OF THE RUIN.—VIEW FROM IT.—EXCAVATIONS AND DISCOVERIES IN THE MOUND OF BABEL.—IN THE MUJELIBÉ OR KASR.—THE TREE ATHELÉ.—EXCAVATIONS IN THE RUIN OF AMRAN.—BOWLS, WITH INSCRIPTIONS IN HEBREW AND SYRIAC CHARACTERS.—THE JEWS OF BABYLONIA.

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The Mujelibé or Kasr (from Rich).

My first care on arriving at Hillah was to establish friendly relations with the principal inhabitants of the town as well as with the Turkish officer in command of the small[Pg 393] garrison that guarded its mud fort. Osman Pasha, the general, received me with courtesy and kindness, and during the remainder of my stay gave me all the help I could require. On my first visit he presented me with two lions. One was nearly of fall size, and was well known in the bazars and thoroughfares of Hillah, through which he was allowed to wander unrestrained. He was accustomed to help himself at the stalls of the butchers, and from the wicker boats of the fishermen; and when full, he allowed the boys to play their pranks upon him. He was taller and larger than a St. Bernard dog, and, like the lion, generally found on the banks of the rivers of Mesopotamia, was without the dark and shaggy mane of the African species. The other lion was but a cub, and had recently been found by an Arab in the Hindiyah marshes. Unfortunately it fell ill of the mange, to which the animal when confined is very liable, and soon after died. The other was too old to be sent to England by land, and I was thus unable to procure specimens for this country of the Babylonian lion, which has not, I believe, been seen in Europe.

The Mudir, or governor of Hillah, was Shabib Agha, the head of one of the principal families of the town. He claimed a kind of hereditary right to this office. He was aged and infirm, suffering from asthma, and little able to manage public affairs, which were chiefly confided to his youngest and favorite son, a boy of about twelve years old. It was with this child that, in common with the inhabitants of Hillah, I transacted business. He received and paid visits with wonderful dignity and decorum. His notes and his inquiries after my health and wants were couched in the most eloquent and suitable terms. He showed a warm and affectionate interest in my welfare and in the success of my undertakings which[Pg 394] was quite touching. Every morning he crossed the river with a crowd of secretaries, slaves, and attendants, to ascertain by personal inspection whether I needed any help. He was a noble boy, with black sparkling eyes, and a bright olive complexion. He wore the long silken robes of a town Arab, with the fringed keffieh or striped headkerchief of the Bedouin falling over his shoulders. On the whole, he made as good and active a governor as I have often met with in an Eastern town, and was an instance of that precocity which is frequently seen in Eastern children. A cordial friendship was soon established between us, and, during my stay at Hillah, Azeez Agha, for such was his name, was my constant guest.

From the principal people of Hillah, as well as from Shabib Agha (the father of Azeez), I received every help. Like most towns in this part of Turkey, it is peopled by Arabs, once belonging to different tribes, but now forgetting their clanships in a sedentary life. They maintain, however, a friendly intercourse with the Bedouins and with the wild inhabitants of the marshes, being always ready to unite with them in throwing off their obedience to the Sultan, and frequently maintaining for some time their independence.

At the time of my visit, its inhabitants were anxiously waiting the result of the expedition of Abde Pasha against the rebellious tribes. Their allegiance to the Turkish governor and the consequent payment of taxes depended upon its success. If the Pasha were beaten they would declare openly in favor of the Arabs, with whom, it was suspected, they were already in communication. The Hindiyah marshes are within sight of the town, and the Kazail (the tribe that dwell in them) ravaged the country to its gates. I was consequently unable to do more than visit the celebrated ruin of the Birs Nimroud. To [Pg 395]excavate in it in the then disturbed state of the country was impossible.

Hillah may contain about eight or nine thousand inhabitants. The Euphrates flows through the town, and is about two hundred yards wide and fifteen feet deep; a noble stream, with a gentle current, admirably fitted for steam navigation. The houses, chiefly built of bricks taken from the ruins of ancient Babylon, are small and mean. Around the town, and above and below it for some miles, are groves of palm trees, forming a broad belt on both sides of the river. In the plain beyond them a few canals bear water to plots cultivated with wheat, barley and rice.

Amongst the inhabitants of Hillah with whom I became acquainted was one Zaid, a Sheikh of the Agayl, a very worthy, hospitable fellow. He lived in Hillah, where his house, open to every traveller, was a place of meeting for the Arabs of the Desert from Nejd to the Sinjar. To keep up this unbounded hospitality he had a date grove and a few sheep, and cultivated a little land outside the walls of the town. He was thus supplied with nearly all that was necessary for an Arab entertainment.[195] He usually accompanied me in my expeditions, and proved an invaluable guide. With one Ali, also a chief of the Agayl, a man of wit and anecdote, though somewhat of a buffoon, and with other Sheikhs, he usually spent the evening with me, relating Arab stories, and describing distant regions and tribes, until the night was far spent.

Having thus established relations with the principal inhabitants of the town, who could assist or interrupt me,[Pg 396] as they were well or ill disposed, I could venture to commence excavations in the most important ruins on the site of Babylon. Half concealed among the palm trees on the eastern banks of the Euphrates above Hillah, are a few hamlets belonging to Arabs, who till the soil. From them I was able to procure workmen, and thus to make up, with the addition of my Jebours, several parties of excavators. They were placed under the superintendence of Latiff Agha and an intelligent Chaldæan Christian of Baghdad, who had entered my service.

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Plan of Part of the Ruins of Babylon on the Eastern Bank of the Euphrates.

The ruins of Babylon have been frequently described[196], so that I shall here only give a general sketch of them, without entering into accurate details of measurements[Pg 397] and distances; at the same time referring my reader to the accompanying plan, which will enable him to understand the position of the principal mounds.

The road from Baghdad to Hillah crosses, near the village of Mohawill, a wide and deep canal still carrying water to distant gardens. On the southern bank of this artificial stream is a line of earthen ramparts, which are generally believed to be the most northern remains of the ancient city of Babylon. From their summit the traveller scans a boundless plain, through which winds the Euphrates, with its dark belt of evergreen palms. Rising in the distance, high above all surrounding objects, is the one square mound, in form and size more like a natural hill than the work of men’s hands. This is the first great ruin to the east of the river, and the Arab, as I have said, names it “Babel.”

The traveller, before reaching this ruin, still about four miles distant, follows a beaten track winding amidst low mounds, and crossing the embankments of canals long since dry, or avoiding the heaps of drifted earth which cover the walls and foundations of buildings. Some have here traced the lines of the streets, and the divisions between the inhabited quarters of ancient Babylon. As yet no traces whatever have been discovered of that great wall of earth rising, according to Herodotus, to the height of 200 royal cubits, and no less than fifty cubits broad; nor of the ditch that encompassed it. The mounds seem to be scattered without order, and to be gradually lost in the vast plains to the eastward.

But southward of Babel, for the distance of nearly three miles, there is almost an uninterrupted line of mounds, the ruins of vast edifices, collected together as in the heart of a great city. They are inclosed by earthen ramparts, the remains of a line of walls which, leaving[Pg 398] the foot of Babel, stretched inland about two miles and a half from the present bed of the Euphrates, and then turning nearly at right angles completed the defences on the southern side of the principal buildings that mark the site of Babylon, on the eastern bank of the river. Between its most southern point and Hillah, as between Mohawill and Babel, can only be traced low heaps and embankments, scattered irregularly over the plain.

It is evident that the space inclosed within this continuous rampart, could not have contained the whole of that mighty city, whose magnificence and extent were the wonder of the ancient world. The walls of Babylon, according to Herodotus, measured 120 stadia on each side, and formed a perfect square of 480 stadia, or nearly sixty miles. Several later writers have repeated his statement. Strabo and Diodorus Siculus have however reduced the circuit of the city to 385 and 360 stadia; and such, according to Clitarchus, were its dimensions when it yielded to Alexander.

The existing remains within the rampart agree as little in form as in size with the descriptions of Babylon; for the city was a perfect square. Mr. Rich, in order to explain these difficulties, was the first to suggest that the vast ruin to the west of the Euphrates, called the Birs Nimroud, should be included within the limits of Babylon. There is no doubt that, by imagining a square large enough to include the smaller mounds scattered over the plains from Mohawill to below Hillah on one side of the river, and the Birs Nimroud at its south-western angle on the other, the site of a city of the dimensions attributed to Babylon might be satisfactorily determined. But then it must be assumed, that neither the outer wall nor the ditch so minutely described by Herodotus ever existed.

According to the united testimony of ancient authors,[Pg 399] the city was divided by the Euphrates into two parts. The principal existing ruins are to the east side of the river; there are very few remains to the west, between Hillah and the Birs Nimroud. Indeed, in some parts of the plain, there are none at all. This fact might, to a certain extent, be explained in the following manner. To this day the Euphrates has a tendency to change its course and to lose itself in marshes to the west of its actual bed. We find that the low country on that side was subject to continual inundations from the earliest periods, and that, according to a tradition, Semiramis built embankments to restrain the river.

The changes in its course to which the Euphrates was thus liable, appear only to have taken place to the west of its present bed. After the most careful examination of the country, I could find no traces whatever of its having at any time flowed much further than it now does to the east, although during unusual floods it occasionally spreads over the plain on that side. The great mounds still rising on the eastern bank prove this. Supposing, therefore, the river from different causes to have advanced and receded during many centuries, between the Hindiyah marshes and its present channel, it will easily be understood how the ruins, which may once have stood on the western bank, have gradually been washed away, and how the existing flat alluvial plain has taken their place. In this manner the complete disappearance of the principal part of the western division of the city may, I think, be accounted for.

It is more difficult to explain the total absence of all traces of the external wall and ditch so fully and minutely described by Herodotus and other ancient writers, and, according to their concurrent accounts, of such enormous dimensions. If a vast line of fortifications, with its gates,[Pg 400] and equidistant towers, all of stupendous height and thickness, did once exist, it is scarcely to be believed that no part whatever of it should now remain. Darius and other conquerors, it is true, are said to have pulled down and destroyed these defences; but it is surely impossible that any human labor could have obliterated their very traces. Even supposing that the ruins around Hillah do not represent the site of ancient Babylon, there are no remains elsewhere in Mesopotamia to correspond with those great ramparts. If there had been, they could not have escaped the researches of modern travellers.

But Herodotus states that, in the midst of each division of the city, there was a circular space surrounded by a lofty wall: one contained the royal palace; the other, the temple of Belus. There can be little difficulty in admitting that the mounds within the earthen rampart on the eastern bank of the river might represent the first of these fortified inclosures, which we know to have been on that side of the Euphrates. It is not impossible, as Rich has suggested, that the Birs Nimroud—around which—as it will be seen—there are still the traces of a regular wall, may be the remains of the second; or that the gradual changes in the course of the river just described, may have completely destroyed all traces of it.

It may be inferred, I think, from the descriptions of Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus, that Babylon was built on the same general plan as Nineveh. It must not be forgotten, also, that the outer walls of Nineveh as well as those of Babylon have entirely disappeared. Are we to suppose that the historians in their descriptions confounded them with those surrounding the temples and palaces; and that these exterior fortifications were mere ramparts of mud and brushwood, such as are still raised round modern Eastern cities? Such defences, when once neglected,[Pg 401] would soon fall to dust, and leave no traces behind. I confess that I can see no other way of accounting for the entire disappearance of these exterior walls.[197]

I will now describe the results of my researches amongst the ruins near Hillah. Parties of workmen were placed at once on the two most important mounds, the Babel of the Arabs (the Mujelibé of Rich) and the Mujelibé (the Kasr of the same traveller). I was compelled, as I have stated, to abandon my plan of excavating in the Birs Nimroud. This great pile of masonry is about six miles to the south-west of Hillah. It stands on the very edge of the vast marsh, formed by the waters of the Hindiyah canal, and by the periodical floods of the Euphrates. The plain between it and the town is, in times of quiet, under cultivation, and is irrigated by a canal derived from the Euphrates near the village of Anana.

Shortly after my arrival at Hillah I visited the Birs Nimroud, accompanied by Zaid, and a party of well-armed Agayls. This was unfortunately the only opportunity I had of examining these remarkable ruins during my residence in Babylonia.[198] The country became daily more disturbed, and no Arabs could be induced to pitch their tents near the mounds, or to work there.

The Birs Nimroud, “the palace of Nimrod” of the Arabs, and “the prison of Nebuchadnezzar” of the Jews; by old travellers believed to be the very ruins of the[Pg 402] tower of Babel; by some, again, supposed to represent the temple of Belus, the wonder of the ancient world; and, by others, to mark the site of Borsippa, a city celebrated as the highplace of the Chaldean worship, is a vast heap of bricks, slag, and broken pottery. The dry nitrous earth of the parched plain, driven before the furious south wind, has thrown over the huge mass a thin covering of soil in which no herb or green thing can find nourishment or take root. Thus, unlike the grass-clothed mounds of the more fertile districts of Assyria, the Birs Nimroud is ever a bare and yellow heap. It rises to the height of 198 feet, and has on its summit a compact mass of brickwork, 37 feet high by 28 broad,[199] the whole being thus 235 in perpendicular height. Neither the original form or object of the edifice, of which it is the ruin, have hitherto been determined. It is too solid for the walls of a building, and its shape is not that of the remains of a tower. It is pierced by square holes, apparently made to admit air through the compact structure. On one side of it, beneath the crowning masonry, lie huge fragments torn from the pile itself. The calcined and vitreous surface of the bricks fused into rock-like masses, show that their fall may have been caused by lighting; and, as the ruin is rent almost from top to bottom, early Christian travellers, as well as some of more recent date, have not hesitated to recognise in them proofs of that divine vengeance, which, according to tradition, arrested by fire from heaven the impious attempt of the first descendants of Noah. Even the Jews, as it would appear, from Benjamin of Tudela, at one time identified the Birs Nimroud with the Tower of Babel.

[Pg 403]Whatever may have been the original edifice, of which the Birs Nimroud is the ruin, or whoever its founder, it is certain that as yet no remains have been discovered there more ancient than of the time of Nebuchadnezzar. Every inscribed brick taken from it—and there are thousands and tens of thousands—bear the name of this king. It must, however, be remembered, that this fact is no proof that he actually founded the building. He may have merely added to, or rebuilt an earlier edifice. Thus, although it would appear by the inscriptions from Nimroud, that the north-west palace was originally raised by a king who lived long before him whose name occurs on the walls of that monument, yet not one fragment has been found of the time of that earlier monarch. Such is the case in other Assyrian ruins. It is, therefore, not impossible that at some future time more ancient remains may be discovered at the Birs.

I will now describe the ruins. It must be first observed, that they are divided into two distinct parts, undoubtedly the remains of two different buildings. A rampart or wall, the remains of which are marked by mounds of earth, appears to have inclosed both of them. To the west of the high mound, topped by the tower-like pile of masonry, is a second, which is larger but lower, and in shape more like the ruins on the eastern bank of the Euphrates. It is traversed by ravines and water-courses, and strewed over it are the usual fragments of stone, brick, and pottery. Upon its summit are two small Mohammedan chapels, one of which, the Arabs declare, is built over the spot where Nimroud cast the patriarch Abraham into the fiery furnace, according to the common Eastern tradition. Not having been able to excavate in this mound, I could not ascertain whether it covers the remains of any ancient building.

[Pg 404]Travellers, as far as I am aware, have hitherto failed in suggesting any satisfactory restoration of the Birs. It is generally represented, without sufficient accuracy, as a mere shapeless mass. But if examined from the summit of the adjoining mound, its outline would at once strike any one acquainted with the ruins to the west of Mosul, described in a former of this work.[200] The similarity between them will be recognised, and it will be seen that they are all the remains of edifices built upon very nearly, if not precisely, the same plan. The best published representations of the Birs Nimroud appear to me to be those contained in a memoir of that accurate and observing traveller, the late Mr. Rich.

The mound rises abruptly from the plain on one face, the western, and falls to its level by a series of gradations on the opposite. Such is precisely the case with the ruins of Mokhamour, Abou-Khameera, and Tel Ermah. The brickwork still visible in the lower parts of the mound, as well as in the upper, shows the sides of several distinct stages or terraces. I believe the isolated mass of masonry to be the remains of one of the highest terraces, if not the highest, and the whole edifice to have consisted, on the eastern or south-eastern side, of a series of stages rising one above the other, and, on the western or north-western, of one solid perpendicular wall. The back of the building may have been painted, as, according to Diodorus Siculus,[201] were the palaces of Babylon, with hunting or sacred scenes, and may have been decorated with cornices or other architectural ornaments. There were no means of ascent to it. Nor was it accessible in any part unless narrow galleries were carried round it at different elevations.

It is probable that the ascents from terrace to terrace[Pg 405] consisted of broad flights of steps, or of inclined ways, carried up the centre of each stage. Such we may judge, from the descriptions of Diodorus, was the form of some of the great buildings at Babylon. The ascents to the different terraces of the hanging gardens, he says, were like the gradines of a theatre.[202] There are certainly traces of them in the mounds in the Desert west of Mosul, if not in the Birs Nimroud. Herodotus states that the temple of Belus at Babylon consisted of a series of towers. His description is not very clear, but it may be inferred that the various parts of the structure were nearly square. The base was undoubtedly so, and so also may have been the upper stories, although generally represented as round. There is nothing in the word used by Herodotus (πύργος) to show that they were circular, and that they were solid masses of masonry appears to me to be evident, for upon the upper one, was constructed the temple of the god. The ascent, too, was on the outside. Without, however, venturing to identify the Birs Nimroud with the ruins of this temple, it may be observed that it is highly probable one uniform system of building was adopted in the East, for sacred purposes, and that these ascending and receding platforms formed the general type of the Chaldæan and Assyrian temples.

The edifice, of which this remarkable ruin is the remains, was built of kiln-burnt bricks. Fragments of stone, marble, and basalt, scattered amongst the rubbish, show that it was adorned with other materials. The cement by which the bricks were united is of so tenacious a quality, that it is almost impossible to detach one from[Pg 406] the mass entire. The ruin is a specimen of the perfection of the Babylonian masonry.

I will not enter into the many disputed questions connected with the topography of Babylon, nor will I endeavor to identify the various existing ruins with the magnificent edifices described by ancient authors. The subject was fully investigated by the late Mr. Rich, and the published controversy between him and Major Rennell, has left little to be added. A theory, first I believe put forward by Col. Rawlinson, that the ruins around Hillah do not mark the site of the first Babylon, which must be sought for further to the south, as far even as Niffer, has, I presume, been abandoned. There cannot, however, be a doubt that Nebuchadnezzar almost entirely rebuilt the city, and perhaps not exactly on the ancient site; a conjecture, as I have shown, perfectly in accordance with Scripture and with Eastern customs.[203] An accurate survey of the ruins is now chiefly required. Recent travellers are of opinion that the Birs Nimroud cannot be identified, as conjectured by Rich, with the temple of Belus, but that it marks the site of the celebrated Chaldæan city of Borsippa, which Rich traced four leagues to the south of Hillah, in some mounds called Boursa by the Arabs. Until more authentic information be obtained from inscriptions and actual remains, the question cannot, I think, be considered as settled.

From the summit of the Birs Nimroud I gazed over a vast marsh, for Babylon is made “a possession for the bittern and pools of water.”[204] In the midst of the swamps could be faintly distinguished the Arab settlements which showed the activity of a hive of bees. Light boats were skimming to and fro over the shallow water, whilst men[Pg 407] and women urged onwards their flocks and laden cattle. The booming of the cannons of the Turkish army, directed against the fort of Hawaina, resounded in the distance; and the inhabitants of the marsh were already hurrying with their property to safer retreats in anticipation of the fall of their stronghold.

To the south-west, in the extreme distance, rose the palm-trees of Kifil, casting their scanty shade over a small dome, the tomb of Ezekiel. To this spot annually flock in crowds, as their forefathers have done for centuries, the Jews of Baghdad, Hillah, and other cities of Chaldæa, the descendants of the captives of Jerusalem, who still linger in the land of their exile. Although tradition alone may place in the neighbourhood of Babylon the tomb of the prophet, yet from a very early period the spot appears to have been sought in pilgrimage by the pious Hebrew. I visited the edifice some years ago. It is now but a plain building, despoiled of the ornaments and manuscripts which it once appears to have contained. Benjamin of Tudela, gives a curious and interesting description of it, which the reader will find well worth examining.[205]

We galloped back from the Birs Nimroud to Hillah, crossing the dreary and deserted plain without meeting any of those marauders who were wandering over the face of the country.

[Pg 408]I remained in Hillah until the 19th December, riding every day to the ruins on the eastern bank of the river, and personally superintending the excavations. The first trenches were opened in the great mound of Babel, about five miles from the gate of Hillah, and three quarters of a mile from the river. I sought the subterranean passage opened and described by Mr. Rich, and on removing the rubbish I soon came to “the quadrangular funnel, about thirteen feet square, of burnt brick and bitumen,” which he had discovered. After the lapse of forty years, it had been once more completely filled with earth. The workmen again entered the underground chamber in which Mr. Rich found a coffin of wood, containing a skeleton still well preserved.

Beneath this masonry were found several entire coffins, precisely similar to that discovered by Mr. Rich. They still held skeletons, more or less entire, which fell to pieces as soon as exposed to the air. No relic or ornament had been buried with the bodies. The wood of the coffins was in the last stage of decay, and could only be taken out piecemeal. A foul and unbearable stench issued from these loathsome remains, and from the passages which had become the dens of wild beasts, who had worked their way into them from above. It was almost impossible to stay for many minutes under ground. Even the Arabs were compelled to leave their work after a few days.

On the northern side of the mound, above these places of sepulture, are the remains of a massive wall of sun-dried brick. The masonry is not united by bituminous cement, as in the vaults, but apparently by simple mud, as in modern Arab buildings, and between each course of bricks are spread thin layers of reeds still perfectly preserved.

The coffins discovered at Babel are of a comparatively recent period, and are not pure Babylonian. At the very[Pg 409] earliest they may be of the time of the Seleucidæ, but I am inclined to think that they are even of a still later date. It is evident that they were buried after the destruction of the edifice covered by the mound.

Numerous deep trenches opened on the surface of the mound, and several tunnels carried into its sides at different levels, led to no other discovery than that of numerous relics of a doubtful period, such as are found in large numbers, in a more or less perfect state, amongst all Babylonian ruins, especially after heavy rains have washed away the loose soil, or have deepened the ravines. The most interesting were arrowheads in bronze and iron, small glass bottles, some colored, others ribbed and otherwise ornamented, and vases of earthenware of various forms and sizes, sometimes glazed with a rich blue color. These, and in general what travellers have found, may be set down as of the time of the Greek occupation, and some as late as the sixth or seventh century of the Christian era.

Image
Jug of Soapstone, from the Mound of Babel.

At Babel was also found, at some depth below the[Pg 410] surface, a curious jug, which I should have been inclined to believe altogether modern, had there not been one nearly similar in form, and of the same substance, in Mr. Rich’s collection in the British Museum, and consequently, it may be presumed, obtained from the same ruins. It is of soapstone, rudely carved and ornamented, and resembles in shape the vessels still used by the Arabs for ablutions.

Scattered over the mound, and at a little depth beneath the surface, were numerous bricks, bearing the usual superscription of Nebuchadnezzar. No ancient masonry was, however, discovered, from which these bricks had been detached.

It was thus evident that the remains of the original edifice, if any still existed, were to be sought far beneath the surface, and I accordingly opened tunnels at the very foot of the mound nearly on a level with the plain. A few days labor enabled me to ascertain that we had at last found the ancient building. On the eastern side the workmen soon reached solid piers and walls of brick masonry, buried under an enormous mass of loose bricks, earth, and rubbish. We uncovered eight or ten piers and several walls branching in various directions, but I failed to trace any plan, or to discover any remains whatever of sculptured stone or painted plaster.

During the remainder of my stay in Babylonia, workmen continued to excavate in this part of the mound, uncovering a confused heap of ruins and standing masonry. The enormous accumulation of loose rubbish above them, not a hard compact mass, as at Nineveh, but continually crumbling and falling in, exposed the men to a risk scarcely warranted by the results of their labors. I much doubt whether even more extensive excavations would lead to any important discoveries. It is possible, [Pg 411]however, that detached inscriptions or sculptured slabs might be obtained.

On the western and southern sides of the mound were also discovered, at the very base, remains of solid masonry. The bricks bore the usual superscription of Nebuchadnezzar, and were firmly cemented together with fine white mortar. It is thus evident that a vast edifice once stood either on the level of the plain, or raised upon enormous piers and buttresses of brickwork, and that the tombs, and any traces of building that may exist on or near the present surface of the mound, are of a more recent period. I will not attempt to decide whether Babel be the remains of a great palace of Nebuchadnezzar, of the celebrated hanging gardens, or of a temple.

The only remains of building not covered by soil and sand, but still standing above ground, on the site of Babylon, and part of the ancient city, are about one mile to the south of the mound last described. It is the Kasr, or Palace, of Rich, a name by which it is now generally known to travellers, but the Arabs call it the Mujelibé, or the “overturned.” It rises on the river bank, and is about seven hundred yards square. The principal part of this great ruin consists of loose bricks, tiles, and fragments of stone; but nearly in the centre a solid mass of masonry, still entire, and even retaining traces of architectural ornament, protrudes from the confused heap of rubbish. Piers, buttresses, and pilasters may be traced; but the work of destruction has been too complete to allow us to determine whether they belong to the interior or exterior of a palace. I sought in vain for some clue to the general plan of the edifice. Upon nearly every brick is clearly and deeply stamped the name and titles of Nebuchadnezzar, and the inscribed face is always placed downwards. This wonderful piece of masonry is so perfect, and of so fresh a pale yellow color, that it seems but the[Pg 412] work of yesterday, although it is undoubtedly part of a building which stood in the midst of old Babylon.

This ruin has for ages been the mine from which the builders of cities rising after the fall of Babylon have obtained their materials. To this day there are men who have no other trade than that of gathering bricks from this vast heap and taking them for sale to the neighbouring towns and villages, and even to Baghdad. There is scarcely a house in Hillah which is not almost entirely built with them; and as the traveller passes through the narrow streets, he sees in the walls of every hovel a record of the glory and power of Nebuchadnezzar.

A large number of the fragments of brick found in this ruin are covered with a thick enamel or glaze. The colors have resisted the effects of time, and preserve their original brightness. Parts of figures and ornaments may still be traced on many specimens. The principal colors are a brilliant blue, red, a deep yellow, white, and black. We learn from ancient authors that the walls of the palaces of Babylon were painted with the figures of men and animals, and there can be no doubt that these enamelled bricks are from the walls of an edifice. Fragments of glass, Babylonian gems and cylinders, small bronze figures, and other relics of this nature are occasionally found on the mound by the Arabs, and are bought by the Jews of Hillah, who sell them again to European travellers.

The huge lion described by Rich still exists half buried in the rubbish. The animal stands over a man with outstretched arms, which has led some imaginative travellers to see in the group a representation of Daniel in the lions’ den. The figures are in black basalt, either so barbarously executed as to show very little progress in art, or left unfinished by the sculptor. It would scarcely be worth removal.

Near the northern edge of the ruin is the solitary tree[Pg 413] Athelé, well-known to the Arabs, and the source of various traditions. It is said to have stood in the hanging gardens of Babylon, and to have been saved by God from the general destruction which overwhelmed the impious city, that Ali might tie his horse to its trunk after the defeat of the enemies of the Prophet in the great battle of Hillah. No other tree of the same kind exists, according to the same tradition, in the whole world. It is, however, I believe, a species of tamarisk, whose long feathery branches tremble in the breeze with a melancholy murmur well suited to the desolate heap over which it may have waved for a thousand years.

It was a hopeless task to excavate in a shapeless heap of rubbish of such vast extent, which had already been explored in every direction. With the exception of the solitary pile of masonry rising in the centre, the ruin consisted of little else than of shattered brickwork. I continued, however, a few of the tunnels already opened, but the falling rubbish, which had more than once overwhelmed the seekers after bricks, soon compelled me to desist. The only relic of any interest I was fortunate enough to discover was a fragment of limestone, on which were parts of two figures, undoubtedly those of gods. The name of one deity is added in Babylonian characters to its sculptured image. It is probably only a small portion of a slab or frieze containing a series of similar figures; but I was unable, after a careful and prolonged search, to find any other pieces. The fragment, however, is interesting, as showing that the Babylonians portrayed their divinities in the same manner as the Assyrians. They wear the same high head-dress ornamented with feathers and rosettes, the long curled hair and beard, and the embroidered garments, and they hold the same staff with a ring as the gods in the rock sculptures of Bavian.

[Pg 414]With the exception of a few rudely engraved gems and enamelled bricks, this was the only relic I obtained from the Mujelibé.

Excavations were carried on for some days in the smaller mounds scattered over the plain between Babel and the ruin last described, but without any results, except the discovery of the remains of brick masonry, of a few earthen vases, and of some fragments of glass.

The last ruin I examined was a mound of great extent, sometimes called by the Arabs Jumjuma, from a neighbouring village of that name, and sometimes, as stated by Rich, Amran ben Ali, from a Koubbé, or small domed tomb, of a Mohammedan saint on its summit. No masonry is here seen as in the Mujelibé. All remains of buildings, if there be any still existing, are deeply buried beneath the loose nitrous earth. It is traversed by innumerable ravines, and its form and level are equally irregular. I opened trenches in various parts, but could find no traces of an edifice of any kind. Some small objects of considerable interest, were, however, discovered. Although not of the true Babylonian epoch, they are, on more than one account, highly important.

The mound of Amran, as well as nearly all those in Babylonia, had been used as a place of burial for the dead long after the destruction of the great edifices whose ruins it covers. Some specimens of glass, and several terracotta figures, lamps, and jars, dug out of it, are evidently of the time of the Seleucidæ or of the Greek occupation. With these relics were five cups or bowls of earthenware, and fragments of others, covered on the inner surface with letters written in a kind of ink. Similar objects had already been found in other Babylonian ruins. Two from the collection of the late Mr. Stewart had been deposited in the British Museum, and amongst[Pg 415] the antiquities recently purchased by the Trustees from Colonel Rawlinson are eight specimens, obtained at Baghdad, where they are sometimes offered for sale by the Arabs; but it is not known from what sites they were brought. The characters upon them are in form not unlike the Hebrew, and on some they resembled the Sabæan and Syriac. These bowls had not attracted notice, nor had the inscriptions upon them been fully examined before they were placed in the hands of Mr. Thomas Ellis, of the manuscript department in the British Museum, a gentleman of great learning and ingenuity as a Hebrew scholar. Mr. E. has succeeded, after much labor, in deciphering the inscriptions.[206]

Little doubt can, I think, exist as to the Jewish origin of these bowls: and such being the case, there is no reason to question their having belonged to the descendants of those Jews who were carried captive by Nebuchadnezzar to Babylon and the surrounding cities. These strangers appear to have clung with a tenacity peculiar to their race to the land of their exile. We can trace them about Babylon from almost the time of their deportation down to the twelfth century of the Christian era, when the Hebrew traveller, Benjamin of Tudela, wandered over the regions of the East and among the cities of the captivity to seek the remnant of his ancient nation. During the Persian dominion in Mesopotamia we find them enduring tortures and persecutions rather than help to rebuild a temple dedicated to a false god.[207] In the time of the Roman supremacy in the East they appear to[Pg 416] have been a turbulent race, rebelling against their rulers and waging civil war amongst themselves. They had celebrated schools in many cities of Assyria and Chaldæa.

As early as the third century Hebrew travellers visited Babylon, and some of them have left records of the state of their countrymen. The Babylonian Talmud, compiled in the beginning of the sixth century, contains many valuable notices of the condition of the Jewish colonies in Babylonia, and enumerates more than two hundred Babylonian towns then under the Persian rule, inhabited by Jewish families. In manuscripts of the eighth and ninth centuries we have further mention of these colonies.

In the twelfth century, Benjamin of Tudela found no less than twenty thousand Jews dwelling within twenty miles of Babylon, and worshipping in the synagogue, built, according to tradition, by the prophet Daniel himself. In Hillah alone were ten thousand persons and four synagogues, and he gives the number of families and of their places of worship, in every town he visited, keeping during his journey an exact daily itinerary, which includes nearly all the stations on the modern caravan routes. Allowing for some exaggeration on the part of this traveller, it is still evident that a very considerable Jewish population lived in the cities of Babylonia. It has greatly diminished, and in some places has entirely disappeared. A few families still linger at Hillah, and in Baghdad the principal native trade and money transactions are carried on by Jews, who are the bankers and brokers of the governors of the city, as they no doubt anciently were of the Abasside Caliphs.

According to their own tradition these Hebrew families were descended from the Jews of the captivity. They still preserved their pedigrees, and traced their lineage to the princes and prophets of Judah. Their chief resided[Pg 417] at Baghdad, and his title was “Lord Prince of the Captivity.” He was lineally descended, according to his people, from king David himself. Even Mohammedans acknowledged his claim to this noble birth, and called him “Our Lord, the Son of David.” His authority extended over the countries of the East as far as Thibet and Hisdostan. He was treated on all occasions with the greatest honor and respect, and when he appeared in public he wore robes of embroidered silk, and a white turban encircled by a diadem of gold.[208]

We may then safely conclude, that these earthen bowls belonged to Jews of Babylonia and Chaldæa. Similar relics have been found as I have stated in many ruins near Babylon. I discovered an entire bowl, as well as many fragments, at Niffer. Nearly at the same time, several were dug out of a mound about half-way between Baghdad and Hillah, but they were unfortunately dispersed or destroyed before I could obtain possession of them. On all these sites during the first centuries of the Christian era, dwelt Jewish families.

As no date whatever is found in the inscriptions, it is difficult to determine the exact time when they were written. We must endeavour to form some opinion upon such internal evidence as they may afford. Mr. Ellis remarks, that, “as this is the first time anything of the kind has been examined in Europe, he can only hazard a conjecture from the forms of the letters, which are, certainly, the most ancient known specimens of the Chaldæan, and appear to have been invented for the purpose of writing the cuneiform character in a more cursive and expeditious manner.”[209] In support of this conjecture he[Pg 418] cites the language of the Assyrian inscriptions as closely resembling that on the bowls. The relics, however, are evidently of different dates. The most ancient might be referred to the second or third century before Christ, but may be of a later period. Others are undoubtedly of a more recent date, and might even have been written as late as the fifth century of our era. The Syriac characters on the latter bowl appear to have marks of a Sabæan or Mendean origin, and on a bowl from Mr. Stewart’s collection there is an inscription, unfortunately almost destroyed and no longer decipherable, in that peculiar character still used by the Sabæans of Susiana.

In the forms of expression and in the names of the angels, these inscriptions bear a striking analogy to the apocryphal book of Enoch, which is supposed to have been written by a Jew of the captivity, shortly before the Christian era. That singular rhapsody also mentions the “sorceries, incantations, and dividing of roots and trees,” which appear to have been practised by the Jews at that period, and to be alluded to on the bowls.[210]

As to the original use of these vessels it is not improbable, as conjectured by Mr. Ellis, that the writing was to be dissolved in water, to be drank as a cure against disease, or a precaution against the arts of witchcraft and magic. Similar remedies are still resorted to in the East in cases of obstinate illness, and there are[Pg 419] Mullahs who make the preparation of such charms their peculiar profession. The modern inscriptions generally consist of sentences from the Koran, interspersed with various mystic signs and letters. But if such was their object, it is evident that they could not have been used for that purpose, as the writing upon them is perfectly fresh, and it is essential that it should be entirely washed into the water to make the remedy efficacious. As they were found at a considerable depth beneath the surface in mounds which had undoubtedly been used as places of sepulture, I am rather inclined to believe that they were charms buried with the dead, or employed for some purpose at funeral ceremonies, and afterwards placed in the grave.
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Re: Discoveries among the Ruins of Nineveh and Babylon

Postby admin » Wed Apr 13, 2022 7:50 am

CHAPTER XXIII. STATE OF THE RUINS OF BABYLON.—CAUSE OF THE DISAPPEARANCE OF BUILDINGS.—NATURE OF ORIGINAL EDIFICES.—BABYLONIAN BRICKS.—THE HISTORY OF BABYLON.—ITS FALL.—ITS REMARKABLE POSITION.—COMMERCE.—CANALS AND ROADS.—SKILL OF BABYLONIANS IN THE ARTS.—ENGRAVED GEMS.—CORRUPTION OF MANNERS, AND CONSEQUENT FALL OF THE CITY.—THE MECCA PILGRIMAGE.—SHEIKH IBN RESHID.—THE GEBEL SHAMMAR.—THE MOUNDS OF EL HYMER.—OF ANANA.

Such then were the discoveries amongst the ruins of ancient Babylon. They were far less numerous and important than I could have anticipated, nor did they tend to prove that there were remains beneath the heaps of earth and rubbish which would reward more extensive excavations. It was not even possible to trace the general plan of any one edifice; only shapeless piles of [Pg 420]masonry, and isolated walls and piers, were brought to light—giving no clue whatever to the original form of the buildings to which they belonged. If the tradition be true that Xerxes, to punish the Babylonians and humiliate their priests, ordered them utterly to destroy their temples and other great public edifices, and that Alexander the Great employed 10,000 men in vain to clear away the rubbish from the temple of Belus alone,[211] it is not surprising that with a small band of Arabs little progress should have been made in uncovering any part of the ancient buildings.

No sculptures or inscribed slabs, the panelling of the walls of palaces, have been discovered amongst the ruins of Babylon as in those of Nineveh. Scarcely a detached figure in stone, or a solitary tablet, has been dug out of the vast heaps of rubbish. “Babylon is fallen, is fallen; and all the graven images of her gods he hath broken unto the ground.”[212]

The complete absence of such remains is to be explained by the nature of the materials used in the erection of even the most costly edifices. In the immediate vicinity of Babylon there were no quarries of alabaster, or of limestone, such as existed near Nineveh. The city was built in the midst of an alluvial country, far removed from the hills. Consequently stone for building purposes could only be obtained from a distance. The black basalt, a favorite material amongst the Babylonians for carving detached figures, and for architectural ornaments, as appears from numerous fragments found amongst the ruins, came from the Kurdish mountains, or from the north of Mesopotamia. It was probably floated down the Euphrates[Pg 421] and Tigris on rafts from those districts. The Assyrian alabaster could have been brought from Nineveh, and the water communication by the rivers and canals offered great facilities for transport; yet enormous labor and expense would have been required to supply such materials in sufficient quantities to construct an entire edifice, or even to panel the walls of its chambers.

The Babylonians were, therefore, content to avail themselves of the building materials which they found on the spot. With the tenacious mud of their alluvial plains, mixed with chopped straw, they made bricks, whilst bitumen and other substances collected from the immediate neighborhood furnished them with an excellent cement. A knowledge of the art of manufacturing glaze, and of compounding colors, enabled them to cover their bricks with a rich enamel, thereby rendering them equally ornamental for the exterior and interior of their edifices. The walls of their palaces and temples were also coated, as we learn from several passages in the Bible, with mortar and plaster, which, judging from their cement, must have been of very fine quality. The fingers of the man’s hand wrote the words of condemnation of the Babylonian empire “upon the plaster of the wall of the king’s palace.”[213] Upon those walls were painted historical and religious subjects, and various ornaments, and, according to Diodorus Siculus, the bricks were enamelled with the figures of men and animals. Images of stone were no doubt introduced into the buildings. We learn from the Bible that figures of the gods in this material, as well as in metal, were kept in the Babylonian temples. But such sculptures were not common, otherwise more remains of them must have been discovered in the ruins.

[Pg 422]On one of the most important Babylonian relics brought to this country we have some highly curious notices of the architecture of the Babylonians. They are contained in tablets inscribed upon a black stone, and divided into ten columns. The inscription commences according to Dr. Hincks, with the name and titles of Nebuchadnezzar the Great, whose reign began, it may be inferred from Ptolemy’s Canon, b. c. 604. He is called “Nabukudurruchur, king of Babylon, son of Nabubaluchun, king of Babylon.” We may infer that his grandfather was not a king from the omission of his name. The subsequent part of the inscription contains no notice of any foreign conquests, but speaks of the building of various temples and palaces in addition to the walls of Babylon and Borsippa. If the tablets could be completely deciphered, and the meaning of many doubtful words accurately ascertained, much information would be obtained relating to Babylonian architecture. The walls were built of burned bricks and bitumen lined with gypsum and other materials. Some seem to have been wainscotted. Over these walls was woodwork, and on the top an awning sustained by poles, like “the white, green, and blue hangings, fastened with cords of fine linen and purple to silver rings, and pillars of marble,” in Ahasuerus’ palace at Shushan.[214] Some of the woodwork is said to have been gilt, other parts silvered: and a large portion of it was brought from Lebanon.

Marduk appears in this inscription as the principal deity of Babylon, holding the place that Ashur does on the monuments of Nineveh. He is called “the great Lord,” “Lord of Lord,” “Elder of the Gods,” &c. Nebu seems to hold the second rank. The king offers him[Pg 423] thanksgiving for what he has already done, and prays for his blessing on himself and his house.[215]

It may be conjectured that in their general plan the Babylonian palaces and temples resembled those of Assyria. We know that the arts, the religion, the customs, and the laws of the two kindred people were nearly identical. They spoke, also, the same language, and used, very nearly, the same written characters. One appears to have borrowed from the other; and, without attempting to decide the question of priority of independent existence as a nation and of civilisation, it can be admitted that they had to a certain extent a common origin, and that they maintained for many centuries an intimate connection. We find no remains of columns at Babylon, as none have been found at Nineveh. If such architectural ornaments were used, they must have been either of wood or of brick. The massy pillars, with Egyptian-like capitals, usually chosen by artists for the restoration of Belshazzar’s palaces and temples, are the mere creations of fancy, and are not warranted by any existing remains whatever. The Babylonian column more probably resembled, in form and proportions, that of Nineveh and Persepolis. It may have been a modification of the Assyrian which afterwards gave birth to the Persian, for it was through Babylon that the arts appear to have penetrated partly, if not entirely, into Persia.

Although the building materials thus used in the great edifices of Babylon may seem extremely mean when compared with those employed in the stupendous palace temples of Egypt, and even in the less massive edifices of Assyria, yet the Babylonians appear to have raised,[Pg 424] with them alone, structures which excited the wonder and admiration of the most famous travellers of antiquity. The profuse use of color, and the taste displayed in its combination, and in the ornamental designs, together with the solidity and vastness of the immense substructure upon which the buildings proudly stood, may have chiefly contributed to produce this effect upon the minds of strangers. The palaces and temples, like those of Nineveh, were erected upon lofty platforms of brickwork. The origin of Assyrian architecture, which I have elsewhere described,[216] was especially that of Babylon. The bricks, as in Assyria, were either simply baked in the sun, or were burnt in the kiln. The latter are of more than one shape and quality. Some are square; others are oblong.[217] Those from the Birs Nimroud are generally of a dark red color, whilst those from the Mujelibé are mostly of a light yellow. Specimens have been frequently brought to this country, and are to be found in many public and private collections. The Babylonian inscribed bricks long excited the curiosity of the learned, and gave rise to a variety of ingenious speculations as to their use and meaning. By some they were believed to be public documents; others saw in the writing dedications to the gods, or registers of gifts to temples. The question has now been entirely set at rest by the discovery made by Dr. Hincks, that almost every brick hitherto obtained from the ruins of Babylon bears the same inscription, with the exception of one or two unimportant words, and that they record the building of the city of Nebuchadnezzar the son of Nabubaluchun (?)

[Pg 425]A few inscribed tablets of stone and baked clay, figures in bronze and terracotta, metal objects of various kinds, and engraved cylinders and gems, have been almost the only undoubted Babylonian antiquities hitherto brought to Europe. Such relics are preserved in many cabinets. The small original collection in the British Museum belonged partly to Sir Robert Ker Porter, and partly to Mr. Rich.

It may not be out of place to add a few remarks upon the history of Babylon. The time of the foundation of this celebrated city is still a question which does not admit of a satisfactory determination, and into which I will not enter. Some believe it to have taken place at a comparatively recent date; but if, as Egyptian scholars assert, the name of Babylon is found on monuments of the eighteenth Egyptian dynasty, we have positive evidence of its existence at least in the fifteenth century before Christ.[218] After the rise of the Assyrian empire, it appears to have been at one time under the direct rule of the kings of Nineveh, and at another to have been governed by its own independent chiefs. Expeditions against Babylonia are recorded in the earliest inscriptions yet discovered in Assyria; and, as it has been seen, even in the time of Sennacherib and his immediate predecessors, large armies were still frequently sent against its rebellious inhabitants. The Babylonian kingdom was, however, almost absorbed in that of Assyria, the dominant power of the East. When this great empire began to decline, Babylon rose for the last time. Media and Persia were equally ready to throw off the Assyrian yoke, and at length the allied armies of Cyaxares and the father of[Pg 426] Nebuchadnezzar captured and destroyed the capital of the Eastern world.

Babylon now rapidly succeeded to that proud position so long held by Nineveh. Under Nebuchadnezzar she acquired the power forfeited by her rival. The bounds of the city were extended; buildings of extraordinary size and magnificence were erected; her victorious armies conquered Syria and Palestine, and penetrated into Egypt. Her commerce, too, had now spread far and wide, from the east to the west, and she became “a land of traffic and a city of merchants.”[219]

But her greatness as an independent nation was short-lived. The neighbouring kingdoms of Media and Persia, united under one monarch, had profited, no less than Babylon, by the ruin of the Assyrian empire, and were ready to dispute with her the dominion of Asia. Scarcely half a century had elapsed from the fall of Nineveh, when “Belshazzar, the king of the Chaldæeans, was slain, and Darius, the Median, took the kingdom.”[220] From that time Babylonia sank into a mere province of Persia.

After the defeat of Darius and the overthrow of the Persian supremacy, Babylon opened its gates to Alexander, who deemed the city not unworthy to become the capital of his mighty empire. On his return from India he wished to rebuild the temple of Belus, which had fallen into ruins, and in that great work he had intended to employ his army, now no longer needed for war. The priests, however, who had appropriated the revenues of this sacred shrine, and feared lest they would have again[Pg 427] to apply them to their rightful purposes, appear to have prevented him from carrying out his design.[221]

The last blow to the prosperity and even existence of Babylon was given by Seleucus when he laid the foundation of his new capital on the banks of the Tigris (b. c. 322). Already Patrocles, his general, had compelled a large number of the inhabitants to abandon their homes, and to take refuge in the Desert, and in the province of Susiana. The city, exhausted by the neighbourhood of Seleucia, returned to its ancient solitude. According to some authors, neither the walls nor the temple of Belus existed any longer, and only a few Chaldæans continued to dwell around the ruins of their sacred edifices.

Still, however, a part of the population appears to have returned to their former seats, for in the early part of the second century of the Christian era we find the Parthian king, Evemerus, sending numerous families from Babylon into Media to be sold as slaves, and burning many great and beautiful edifices still standing in the city.

In the time of Augustus, the city is said to have been entirely deserted, except by a few Jews who still lingered amongst the ruins. St. Cyril, of Alexandria, declares, that in his day, about the beginning of the fifth century, in consequence of the choking up of the great canals derived from the Euphrates, Babylon had become a vast marsh: and fifty years later the river is described as having changed its course, leaving only a small channel to mark its ancient bed. Then were verified the prophecies[Pg 428] of Isaiah and Jeremiah, that the mighty Babylon should be but “pools of water,” “that the sea should come upon her, and that she should be covered with the multitude of the waves thereof.”[222]

In the beginning of the seventh century, at the time of the Arab invasion, the ancient cities of Babylonia were “a desolation, a dry land, and a wilderness.” Amidst the heaps that marked the site of Babylon herself there rose the small town of Hillah.[223]

Long before Babylon had overcome her rival Nineveh she was famous for the extent and importance of her commerce. No position could have then been more favourable than hers for carrying on a trade with all the regions of the known world. Even only moderate skill and enterprise could scarcely fail to make Babylon, not only the emporium of the Eastern world, but the main link of commercial intercourse between the East and the West.

The inhabitants did not neglect the advantages bestowed upon them by nature. A system of navigable canals that may excite the admiration of even the modern engineer, connected together the Euphrates and Tigris, those great arteries of her commerce. With a skill, showing no common knowledge of the art of surveying, and of the principles of hydraulics, the Babylonians took advantage of the different levels in the plains, and of the periodical rises in the two rivers, to complete the water communication between all parts of the province, and to fertilise by artificial irrigation an otherwise barren and unproductive soil. Alexander, after he had transferred[Pg 429] the seat of his empire to the East, so fully understood the importance of these great works, that he ordered them to be cleansed and repaired, and superintended the work in person, steering his boat with his own hand through the channels.

High-roads and causeways across the Desert united Syria and Palestine with Babylonia. Fortified stations protected the merchant from the wandering tribes of Arabia, walled cities served as resting-places and store-houses, and wells at regular intervals gave an abundant supply of water during the hottest season of the year. One of those highways was carried through the centre of Mesopotamia, and crossing the Euphrates near the town of Anthemusia led into central Syria. A second appears to have left Babylon by the western quarter of the city, and entered Idumæa, after passing through the country of the Nabathæans. Others branched off to Tadmor, and to cities which were built in the midst of the Desert almost solely for purposes of trade.

To the east of Babylonia was the celebrated military and commercial road described by Herodotus. It led from Sardis to Susa in ninety days journey, and was furnished, at intervals of about fifteen miles, with stations and public hostelries, probably resembling the modern caravanserais of Persia.

Merchandise and travellers descended the rivers upon rafts of skins, as well as in boats built of reeds coated with bitumen, or of more solid materials. The land trade was no doubt principally carried on, as at the present day, by caravans of merchants, who loaded their goods on the backs of camels, horses, and asses.

It is difficult to determine to how far the Babylonians may have navigated in vessels the Indian Ocean. Of the various articles of merchandise stored in Babylon, the[Pg 430] produce of the islands and shores of the Persian Gulf, and even of India, formed no inconsiderable part. Pearls, from the fisheries of Bahrein, which still supply Arabia, Persia, and Turkey, and perhaps even from Ceylon; cotton, spices, frankincense, precious stones, ivory, ebony, silks, and dyes, were amongst the objects of trade brought to her markets. They could only have been obtained from the southern coasts of Arabia, and directly or indirectly from the Indian peninsula. We learn from the Kouyunjik inscriptions that the people inhabiting the country at the mouths of the united waters of the Tigris and Euphrates possessed vessels in which, when defeated by the Assyrians, they took refuge on the sea. The prophet Isaiah also alludes to the ships of the Chaldæans.[224] Timber for shipbuilding could have been floated with ease from the mountains of Armenia to the very quays of Babylon, or to her ports at the head of the Persian Gulf.

A race of dogs, much prized by the Babylonians, was brought from India. A satrap of Babylon is declared to have devoted the revenues of four cities, to the support of a number of these animals. On a small terracotta tablet in the British Museum, from Col. Rawlinson’s collection, obtained, I believe, at Baghdad, but probably found in some ancient ruin in the neighbourhood, is the figure of a man leading a large and powerful dog, which has been identified with a species still existing in Thibet.

Tin, cedar-wood, and various articles, were brought from Phœnicia and other parts of Syria, which were in return supplied with the produce of India and the Persian Gulf, through Babylon.[225]

Whilst the Babylonians thus imported the produce of the East and West, they also supplied foreign countries[Pg 431] with many valuable articles of trade. Corn, which according to tradition first grew wild in Mesopotamia, and was there first eaten by man, was cultivated to a great extent, and was sent to distant provinces. The Babylonian carpets, silks, and woollen fabrics, woven or embroidered with figures of mythic animals and with exquisite designs, were not less famous for the beauty of their texture and workmanship, than for the richness and variety of their colors. The much-prized Sindones, or flowing garments, were the work of the looms of Babylon even long after she had ceased to be a city.[226]

The engraved gems and cylinders discovered in the ruins bear ample witness to the skill of the Babylonian lapidaries. Many of these relics exist in European collections, and, during my residence at Hillah, I was able to obtain several interesting specimens from the Arabs, who usually pick them up on the mounds after rain. The most remarkable of them is a cylinder of spotted sienite, upon which are incised seven figures, and a few Babylonian characters. The letters of the inscription are rudely formed, and have not yet been deciphered.

Another interesting gem obtained by me at Babylon is an agate cone, upon the base of which is engraved a[Pg 432] winged priest or deity, standing in an attitude of prayer before a cock on an altar. Above this group is the crescent moon. The Hebrew commentators conjecture that Nergal, the idol of the men of Cuth, had the form of a cock.[227]

The vast trade, that rendered Babylon the gathering-place of men from all parts of the known world, and supplied her with luxuries from the remotest climes, had at the same time the effect of corrupting the manners of her people, and producing that general profligacy and those effeminate customs which mainly contributed to her fall. The description given by Herodotus of the state of the population of the city when under the dominion of the Persian kings, is fully sufficient to explain the cause of her speedy decay and ultimate ruin. The account of the Greek historian fully tallies with the denunciations of the Hebrew prophets against the sin and wickedness of Babylon. Her inhabitants had gradually lost their warlike character. When the Persians broke into their city they were revelling in debauchery and lust; and when the Macedonian conqueror appeared at their gates, they received with indifference the yoke of a new master.

It is not difficult to account for the rapid decay of the country around Babylon. As the inhabitants deserted the city, the canals were neglected. When once those great sources of fertility were choked up, the plains became a wilderness. Upon the waters conveyed by their channels to the innermost parts of Mesopotamia depended not only the harvests, the gardens, and the palm groves,[Pg 433] but the very existence of the numerous towns and villages far removed from the river banks. They soon turned to mere heaps of earth and rubbish. Vegetation ceased, and the plains, parched by the burning heat of the sun, were ere long once again a vast arid waste.

Such has been the history of Babylon. Her career was equally short and splendid; and although she has thus perished from the face of the earth, her ruins are still classic, indeed sacred, ground. The traveller visits, with no common emotion, those shapeless heaps, the scene of so many great and solemn events. In this plain, according to tradition, the primitive families of our race first found a resting-place. Here Nebuchadnezzar boasted of the glories of his city, and was punished for his pride. To these deserted halls were brought the captives of Judæa. In them Daniel, undazzled by the glories around him, remained steadfast to his faith, rose to be a governor amongst his rulers, and prophesied the downfall of the kingdom. There was held Belshazzar’s feast, and was seen the writing upon the wall. Between those crumbling mounds Cyrus entered the neglected gates. Those massive ruins cover the spot where Alexander died.

Soon after my arrival at Hillah, the caravan of the Hadj, or annual pilgrimage to Mecca, passed through the town on its way to Baghdad. The holy places had this year been visited by the cholera, and of the many who had crossed the Desert few had survived. In the crowd that had assembled on the high road were mingled scenes of grief and joy. The mournful wail of the women was heard above the merry laugh of those who had again found their friends. The wild Bedouins of Nejd, who had guided and protected the pilgrims during their arduous journey, passed through the throng on their weary dromedaries.

[Pg 434]After a lapse of some years the annual hadj from the south of Turkey and Persia had been able to follow the direct road to Mecca across the desert of Nejd and the interior of Arabia. Since, Ibn Reshid, a chief of the Gebel Shammar, has by his courage and abilities acquired the whole of that district; and has rendered himself sufficiently powerful to hold in check the various tribes which surround it. Pilgrims under his protection could, therefore, again venture to take the shortest road to Mecca. He undertook to furnish them with camels, and to answer for their safety from Hillah to the holy cities and back.

The chief punctually fulfilled his engagement, and the caravan I have described was the first that had crossed the Desert for many years without accident or molestation. It was under the charge of Abd-ur-Rahman, a relation of Ibn Reshid. I frequently saw this Sheikh during his short residence at Hillah, and he urged me to return with him to the Gebel Shammar. Zaid and several other Agayls offered to accompany me; and it was with great regret that I felt unable, on various accounts, to undertake a journey into a country so little known, and so interesting, as central Arabia. A better opportunity could scarcely have occurred for entering Nedjd.

Sheikh Abd-ur-Rahman described the Gebel Shammar as abounding in fertile valleys, where the Arabs had villages and cultivated lands. The inhabitants are of the same great tribe of Shammar as those who wander over the plains of Mesopotamia. Suttum told me that his family still possessed their gardens in the hills; and although, from long absence, their produce had been gathered by strangers, yet that he could by law at any time return and claim them.

Ibn Reshid was described to me as a powerful, and[Pg 435] for an Arab, an enlightened chief, who had restored security to the country, and who desired to encourage trade and the passage of caravans through his territories. His mares and horses, collected from the tribes of central Arabia, were declared to excel all those of the Desert in beauty and in blood. Hawking and hunting are his favorite amusements, and game abounds in the hills and plains. Amongst the wild animals are lions, leopards, deer, and a kind of ox or large antelope, I could not learn exactly which, called Wothaiyah, said to have long spiral horns, and to be exceedingly fierce and dangerous.

I was assured that in the Gebel Shammar there are ruins of large cities, attributed by the Arabs to the Jews. Inscriptions in an unknown character are also said to exist on slabs of stone and on rocks. They may be that class called Himyari, found in other parts of the Arabian peninsula.

About two hours and a half, or eight miles to the north-east of Hillah, a mound, scarcely inferior in size to those of Babylon, rises in the plain. It is called El Hymer, meaning, according to the Arabs, the red, from its color. The ruin has assumed a pyramidal form, but it is evidently the remains of a solid square structure, consisting, like the Birs Nimroud, of a series of terraces or platforms. It may be conjectured, therefore, that it was a sacred edifice built upon the same general plan as all the temples of Babylonia and Assyria. The basement or substructure appears to have been of sun-dried brick; the upper part, and probably the casing of the lower, of bricks burnt in the kiln. Many of the latter are inscribed with the name and titles of Nebuchadnezzar. Although the masonry is solid and firmly bound together, it is not united by a white cement like that of the Mujelibé. The same tenacious mud that was used for making the bricks[Pg 436] has been daubed, as far as I could ascertain, between each layer. The ruin is traversed like the Birs by square holes to admit air.

Around the centre structure are scattered smaller mounds and heaps of rubbish, covered with the usual fragments of pottery, glass and bricks.

Opposite to the Mujelibé (or Kasr), on the western bank of the Euphrates, is a village called Anana, and near it a quadrangle of earthen ramparts, like the remains of a fortified inclosure. A large mass of brick masonry is still seen in the river bed when the stream is low. The inhabitants of the village brought me a fragment of black stone with a rosette ornament upon it, very Assyrian in character. With the exception of these remains, and the Birs Nimroud, there are scarcely any ruins of ancient buildings on the Arabian side of the Euphrates.

On the eastern bank low mounds covered with broken pottery and glass are found in almost every direction. One resembles another, and there is nothing either in their appearance or in their contents, as far as they have hitherto been ascertained, deserving of particular description. They only prove how vast and thriving the population of this part of Mesopotamia must at one time have been, and how complete is the destruction that has fallen upon this devoted land.
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Re: Discoveries among the Ruins of Nineveh and Babylon

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CHAPTER XXIV. RUINS IN SOUTHERN MESOPOTAMIA.—DEPARTURE FROM HILLAH.—SAND-HILLS.—VILLAGES IN THE JEZIREH.—SHEIKH KARBOUL.—RUINS.—FIRST VIEW OF NIFFER.—THE MARSHES.—ARAB BOATS.—ARRIVE AT SOUK-EL-AFAIJ.—SHEIKH AGAB.—TOWN OF THE AFAIJ.—DESCRIPTION OF THE RUINS OF NIFFER.—EXCAVATIONS IN THE MOUNDS.—DISCOVERY OF COFFINS.—OF VARIOUS RELICS.—MR. LOFTUS’ DISCOVERIES AT WURKA.—THE ARAB TRIBES.—WILD BEASTS.—LIONS.—CUSTOMS OF THE AFAIJ.—LEAVE THE MARSHES.—RETURN TO BAGHDAD.—A MIRAGE.

The south of Mesopotamia abounds in extensive and important ruins, of which little is known. The country around them is inhabited by Arabs of the tribes of Rubbiyah and Ahl Maidan, notorious for their lawlessness, and scarcely more intelligent or human than the buffaloes which they tend. One or two travellers have passed these remains of ancient civilisation when journeying through the Jezireh, or have received descriptions of them from natives of the country. Mr. Loftus was the first to explore the most important. Being attached, as geologist, to the mission for the settlement of the boundaries between Persia and Turkey, he went by land from Baghdad to Busrah to join its other members. As he was accompanied by an escort of troops he was able to visit the principal ruins on the way without risk. He found the tribes well-disposed towards Europeans, though very hostile to the Turks. Taking advantage of this favorable feeling, and relying upon the protection of the Arab Sheikhs, Mr. Loftus returned a second time alone, and was able to excavate in some of the larger mounds. He obtained during this expedition the highly interesting[Pg 438] collection of antiquities from Wurka, now in the British Museum.

All these ruins are best reached from Hillah. The Sheikhs of the Arab tribes living near them are usually in friendly communication with the principal people of that town. Owing, however, to the present disturbed state of the country, I was compelled to ask for safe conduct from Agab, the Sheikh of the Afaij.

The Afaij dwell in the midst of extensive marshes formed by the Euphrates, about fifty miles below Hillah. On the eastern border of these swamps rise the great ruins of Niffer, which I was first desirous of examining. After some discussion, it was finally settled that we were to go by land, keeping as much as possible in the centre of Mesopotamia, and thus avoiding the neighbourhood of the Euphrates, as the Arabs were now congregated along the banks of the river. Zaid, with an Agayl of his acquaintance, agreed to accompany me. My own Jebours were, of course, of the party. Having hired mules and laid in a proper stock of provisions, tools, and packing cases to hold any antiquities that might be discovered, we began our journey on Wednesday, the 15th of January.

The weather was bright and intensely cold. The sky was cloudless, but a biting north wind swept across the plain. It was the middle of the Babylonian winter, and a hard frost daily whitened the ground. We left Hillah by the Baghdad gate. The Bairakdar was with me, with the rest of my Mosul servants. My huntsman, old Seyyid Jasim, wrapt up in his thick Arab cloak, bore his favorite hawk on his wrist. He was followed, as usual, by the greyhounds. The Jebours went partly on foot, riding by turns on the baggage horses. Mr. Hormuzd Rassam was wanting to complete our party. He had been kept in Baghdad by severe illness almost since our arrival,[Pg 439] and for the first time during my wanderings in Mesopotamia he was not with me.

We followed a track leading towards the centre of the Mesopotamian Desert. Our course was nearly due east. About six miles from the town we found ourselves amidst moving sand-hills, extending far and wide on all sides. The fine sand shifts with every breeze, and the wrinkled heaps are like the rippled surface of a lake. When the furious southerly wind sweeps over them, it raises a dense suffocating dust, blinding the wayfaring Arab, and leaving him to perish in the trackless labyrinth.

After four hours’ ride we left the sand-heaps, and again came in sight of the black belt of palm trees. After stopping to drink water we proceeded to a small hamlet called Allak, and took up our quarters for the night in the museef of its Sheikh, who, notwithstanding his poverty, received us very hospitably. He related to me how from the numerous artificial mounds in the surrounding plains were frequently taken, after rain had washed away the soil, earthen jars and coffins containing ornaments of gold and silver.

As we continued our journey during the following day, still keeping in the Desert, we passed one or two small encampments of the Zobeide tribe. The Arabs, alarmed at the approach of so large a party, and believing us to be horsemen on a foray, sallied forth to meet us at some distance from their tents, flourishing their weapons and chanting their wild war-cry. The plain, although now without any stationary population, was once thickly inhabited. The lion, the hyena, the wolf, the jackal, the wild boar, the fox, and the porcupine now alone break the solitude of a wilderness once the seat of the most luxurious and civilised nation of the East.

[Pg 440]It would be needless to describe the few deserted villages we passed during our day’s journey; their mud walls, once a protection against the wandering Arab, are unable to resist the encroaching sand, which has already overwhelmed the empty dwellings. In this region the habitations of men are turned almost in a day to mere heaps of earth. The district is called Shomali.

After a ride of six hours we reached an ancient mound of considerable size, called Haroun. On its summit was a ruined Imaum-zadeh (Mussulman oratory). It was a sacred place to the Arab, and on this account had been used as a burying-place. The grave of the wandering Arab is rarely far beneath the surface of the soil, and the wild beasts of the Desert soon scrape away the scanty earth. Human skulls and remains, scarcely yet bleached by the sun, were scattered over the ruins, mingled with bricks, pottery, broken glass, and other relics of ancient population.

We had scarcely passed Haroun when a party of Arabs on horseback and on foot suddenly came forth from behind the lofty banks of a dry canal. They had seen our caravan from afar, and had waylaid us. After they had followed us for some distance they turned back to their tribe, deeming it prudent not to venture an attack, as we were fully prepared for them.

Shortly after their departure, a gazelle rose from a thicket, and bounded across the plain. Seyyid Jasim unloosed his hawk, and I pursued with the dogs. The sight of horsemen galloping to and fro alarmed an Arab settlement gathered round a small mud fort belonging to a chief called Karboul. The men armed themselves and came out against us. Our Afaij guides, however, soon made themselves known to them, and they then escorted our caravan to their tents, dancing a wild dance, shouting[Pg 441] their war-cries, singing war-songs, and firing their matchlocks. Most of them had no other clothing than the shirt taken off their shoulders and tied round their loins. Their countenances were singularly ferocious, their bright eyes and white teeth making them even more hideous. Long black matted hair was scattered over their heads in horrid confusion, and their bodies were tanned by the burning sun to the color and substance of old leather.

Their Sheikh, Karboul, was scarcely less savage in his appearance, though somewhat better clothed. However ill-disposed he might have been towards Europeans, or travellers in general, he acknowledged the protection that had been extended to us by the Afaij chief, and led me with words of welcome to his spacious tent. His followers, excited by the late alarm, and now full of warlike enthusiasm, were not, however, to be dismissed until they had satisfied themselves by performing various warlike dances. They did so in circles before the tent, raising a few tattered flags, and deafening me by their shouts and barbarous songs.

These wild beings, little better than mere beasts, lived in hovels made of mats and brushwood. They fed large herds of buffaloes; but the greater part of their sheep and cattle had been driven away by the Bedouins. Their tribe was the Shabaneh, a branch of the Ahl Ukra.

Next morning Karboul sent his son and a party of horsemen to escort us for some distance on our road. We had to make a considerable circuit to the east to encompass the marsh, which has now spread over the lower part of the Mesopotamian plain. We passed numerous artificial mounds, covered with fragments of bricks, pottery, glazed tiles, richly-colored glass and other relics that mark the site of Babylonian ruins. Canals, too, no longer fed by the Euphrates, everywhere crossed our path, and[Pg 442] limited our view. The parched soil outside the swamp has become fine sand, amidst which small tufts of the hardy tamarisk form the only vegetation.

After two hours’ ride, we emerged from the labyrinth of dry canals, and ascending a heap of rubbish covering some ancient ruin, we beheld, looming on the horizon like a distant mountain, the principal object of my journey—the mounds of Niffer. They were still nearly ten miles from us. Magnified as they were by the mirage they appeared far to exceed in size and height any artificial elevation that I had hitherto seen.

To the east of us rose another great ruin, called Zibbliyah, a lofty, square mass, apparently of sundried brick. It resembled in form, and was scarcely less in size than the well-known remains of Akkerkuf, near Baghdad.

Between us and Niffer were still many mounds and ancient canals. The largest of the former, covered with bricks and pottery, was called by our Arab guides El Hamra, “the red.” The principal canal, whose waters had once been confined between two enormous embankments, ran in a direct line towards the ruins. It is now dry, but appears to have once supplied the city.

After a journey of five hours we reached the ruins of Niffer. They differ in general form from the great mounds of Assyria, with which my descriptions may have familiarised the reader. Although at their north-east corner is a cone similar to those of Nimroud and Kalah-Sherghat, yet, in their broken outline and in their division into several distinct parts, they have more the appearance of the remains of different buildings than that of one regular platform surrounded by walls. In this respect they are not unlike the Mujelibé (Kasr) and the Amran of Babylon. The mounds cover altogether a very considerable area of ground, and stand on the edge of the marsh, which is[Pg 443] gradually encroaching upon them, and which occasionally during high floods of the Euphrates completely surrounds them. They are strewed with the usual fragments of brick, glazed and unglazed pottery, and glass. A loose nitrous soil, into which the feet sink above the ankles, forms a coating about a yard deep over a harder and more compact soil. In the ravines large earthen jars and portions of brick masonry are occasionally uncovered by the rains. Commencing my search after antiquities as soon as we had reached the summit of the principal mound, it was not long before I discovered, in one of these newly-formed ruts, a perfect vase, about five feet high, containing human remains. Other objects of the same kind were found by the Arabs who were with me. But I left more careful researches to the time when I could commence excavations below the surface. Leaving, therefore, the ruins, I hastened to the place where my tents were pitched about two miles beyond the ruins on the margin of the marsh. In front of the encampment was a small lake or pond, from which the reeds seemed to have been carefully cleared.

We had sent one of our Afaij guides to inform Sheikh Agab of our approach. I had not been long seated in my tent when suddenly a number of black boats, each bearing a party of Arabs, darted from the reeds and approached the shore. They were of various sizes. In the bottom of some, eight or ten persons sat crouched on their hams; in others, only one or two. Men standing at the head and stern with long bamboo poles of great lightness guided and impelled them. The largest were built of teakwood, but the others consisted simply of a very narrow frame-work of rushes covered with bitumen, resembling probably “the vessels of bulrushes” mentioned by Isaiah.[228][Pg 444] They skimmed over the surface of the water with great rapidity.

The tiradas, for so these boats are called by the Arabs, drew up along the bank in the open basin before our tents. The largest evidently contained three chiefs, who landed and advanced towards me. They were the sons of the Sheikh of the Afaij. Their father had sent them to welcome me to his territories. They brought with them provisions for my caravan, as their village, they said, was still far distant, and it would be impossible to transport our baggage and lead our horses thither before nightfall. The young men were handsome, well-dressed and well-armed, and very courteous. The complexion of these marsh Arabs, from constant exposure to the intense heat of the sun, is almost black, with the usual contrast of eyes of extraordinary brilliancy, and teeth of the whiteness of pearls. They wear their hair in long, well-greased plaits.

The young Sheikhs had been ordered by their father to remain with me during the night, and to place a proper guard round the tents, as the outskirts of the marsh were infested, we were assured, by roving Bedouins and midnight thieves. I gained, as other travellers had done before me, some credit for wisdom and superhuman knowledge by predicting, through the aid of an almanack, a partial eclipse of the moon. It duly took place to the great dismay of my guests, who well nigh knocked out the bottoms of all my kitchen utensils in their endeavor to frighten away the Jins who had thus laid hold of the planet.[229]

[Pg 445]Soon after sunrise the Sheikh’s own tirada issued from the reeds into the open space. It had been spread with carpets and silken cushions for my reception. The baggage was placed in other boats, but the unfortunate horses, under the guidance of a party of naked Arabs, had to swim the stream, and to struggle through the swamp as they best could. The armed men entered their various vessels, and we all left the shore together.

The tirada in which I sat was skilfully managed by two Arabs with long bamboo poles. It skimmed rapidly over the small lake, and then turned into a broad street cut through green reeds rising fourteen or fifteen feet on both sides of us. The current, where the vegetation had thus been cleared away, ran at the rate of about two miles an hour, and, as we were going towards the Euphrates, was against us. We passed the entrances to many lanes branching off to the right and to the left. From them came black boats filled with Arab men and women carrying the produce of their buffalo herds to the Souk or market.

Herds of buffaloes here and there struggled and splashed amongst the rushes, their unwieldy bodies completely concealed under water, and their hideous heads just visible upon the surface. Occasionally a small plot of ground, scarcely an inch above the level of the marsh, and itself half a swamp, was covered with huts built of reeds, canes, and bright yellow mats. These were the dwellings of the Afaij, and, as we passed by, troops of half-naked men, women, and children issued from them, and stood on the bank to gaze at the strangers.

[Pg 446]The lanes now became more crowded with tiradas. The boatmen, however, darted by the heavier vessels, turned the sharp corners, and managed their frail barks with great skill and ease. The openings in the reeds began to be more numerous, and it required a perfect knowledge of the various windings and streets to follow the right way. This singular scene recalled vividly to my mind the sculptures of Kouyunjik representing the Assyrian wars in marshes of the same nature, and probably formed by the waters of the same river. The streets through the reeds, and the tiradas or boats of rushes smeared with bitumen, are faithfully delineated in the bas-reliefs, showing how little the barbarous inhabitants of these great swamps have changed after the lapse of nearly three thousand years. If we may judge, however, from the spoil of furniture and of vessels of metal, probably of gold and silver, carried away from them by the conquerors, the ancient tribes appear to have been more wealthy and more ingenious than their descendants.

Soon after entering a narrow canal, we stopped near some larger and better built huts than any we had yet seen. Before them, at the water’s edge, and waiting to receive us, were drawn up a number of armed men, at the head of whom stood a tall, handsome Arab. He was attired in a long robe of scarlet silk of Damascus, over which he wore one of those cloaks richly embroidered in gold thread down the back and one arm, peculiar to Baghdad. This was Agab, Sheikh of the Afaij. As I stepped out of the tirada he threw his arms round my neck, and gave me the usual embrace of welcome.

The chief led us at once to the museef. The guesthouse was built of the same materials as the smaller cabins, but they were far more tastefully put together. It resembled in shape the boiler of some enormous [Pg 447]steam-engine. Reeds bound together, were bent into arches at regular intervals, and formed a series of ribs, upon which were stretched the choicest mats. About fifty persons could conveniently sit in this hut. In the centre was the usual array of bright pots and tiny cups ranged in circular trays, round a smouldering fire. A hideous black slave, crouching upon his haunches, was roasting coffee and pounding the fragrant beans in an iron mortar. Down both sides were spread carpets and mats; soft cushions of figured silk were specially prepared for the European guest.

The museef stood at a short distance from the other huts, and in a corner formed by two water-streets branching off at right angles. In front of it was the harem of the Sheikh. It consisted of several cabins in an enclosure formed entirely by walls of reeds and mats. Beyond was a great collection of huts, and in the middle of them the bazars, consisting of double rows of shops, all of the same frail materials. So that this Arab town was built entirely of mats and reeds.

Agab received me in the most friendly manner, and entered at once into my plans for excavating, describing the ruins existing in the neighbourhood. He ordered his people to raise a hut for my servants and the Jebour workmen, and to pitch my tents in the open space opposite the museef. Building is not a lengthy or difficult process where the materials are so simple. Within an hour the mats had been dragged from the harem, the bundles of reeds turned into graceful arches, and the cabin duly covered in. As a dwelling-place, however, the small island on which the Sheikh of the Afaij had thought fit to erect his moveable capital was not perhaps the most desirable in the world. Had the Euphrates risen by any sudden flood we should have been[Pg 448] completely under water. My proposition to encamp on the mounds of Niffer was negatived by Agab, on account of the dangers from the Bedouins, evil spirits, beasts of prey, and the like. So I made up my mind to remain at the Souk.

The Sheikh believing I was in search of gold, was always my attendant with his followers. He knew so many authentic instances of enormous wealth having been dug up at Niffer, that it was useless to argue with him upon the subject. He related to me in the usual expressive manner of the Arabs, the following story:—In the time of Hatab, the uncle of Wadi, Sheikh of the Zobeide, a cameleer of that tribe chanced to be at Damascus with his camels. As he was walking one day in the bazar, an aged man accosted him. “O Sheikh of the Caravan,” said he, “I know that thou art from the southern Jezireh, and from the land of the Zobeide. God be praised for sending thee to me! Now there is in that country a great mound, that marks the site of an ancient city of the Unbelievers, called Niffer. Go, dig in the dry bed of the Shat-el-Neel, in the midst of the ruins, and thou wilt find a stone white as milk; bring it to me, and thou shalt have for a reward double the usual hire for thy camels both there and back.” The cameleer was at a loss to guess how the old man knew of the stone, but he did as he had been asked, and in the place described to him he found the white stone, which was just a camel’s burden. He took it to Damascus, and gave it to the Sheikh, who first paid him his just reward, and then broke the stone into pieces before him. It was, of course, full of gold, and the philosopher had learned where it was to be found in the books of the Infidels.

Being thus compelled to remain at the Souk, I fitted up my tent and cabins as well as I was able. The weather[Pg 449] was intensely cold, and it was the middle of the rainy season. By the help of mats we were able to keep out the water to a certain extent. The excavations were carried on until the 3rd of February, and I will describe at once their general results.

Niffer, as I have already observed, consists rather of a collection of mounds of unequal height, and irregular form, than of one compact platform, like the principal ruins of Assyria. They may be divided into four distinct groups, each surrounded, and separated from the others, by deep ravines, which have the appearance of ancient streets. The high cone at the north-east corner is probably the remains of a square tower constructed entirely of large sundried bricks. Beneath the cone masonry of sundried and kiln-burnt bricks protrudes from the sides of the ravines. The bricks are generally smaller in dimensions than those from Babylon, and long and narrow in shape. Many of them are stamped with inscriptions in the Babylonian character, containing the name of a king and of the city.

My workmen were divided into gangs, or karkhanehs, as they are called by the Arabs, and were placed in different parts of the ruins. On the first day some cells or recesses containing human remains were discovered.

During the two subsequent days we found many vases and jars of earthenware, some glazed and others plain. With these relics was a bowl, unfortunately much broken, covered with ancient Hebrew characters, similar to those discovered at Babylon. Fragments of similar vessels were afterwards dug out of the ruins.

On the mound of Niffer, as on other ruins of the same period in this part of Mesopotamia, are found numerous fragments of highly-glazed pottery, of a rich blue color, but very coarse and fragile in texture. I was at a loss to[Pg 450] conjecture the nature of the objects of which they had originally formed part, until, on the fourth day of the excavations, a party of workmen uncovered a coffin or sarcophagus, of precisely the same material. Within it were human remains, which crumbled to dust almost as soon as exposed to the air. The earthenware was so ill-burnt, and had suffered so much from age, that I was unable to remove this coffin entire. It fell to pieces as soon as I endeavored to detach it from the soil by which it was surrounded. But beneath it was found a second, and subsequently scarcely a day elapsed without the discovery of four or five similar coffins. The largest were about six feet long; some, containing the remains of children, scarcely exceeded three. They were all of nearly the same shape; an oval, about two feet wide, for the head and shoulders of the corpse, joined to a narrow box for the legs and feet. The oval was closed by a detached flat lid; the rest of the coffin was covered, and there was a small hole at the very end. The body must, consequently, have been forced into the sarcophagus from the top or open part.

All these coffins were covered with bright greenish, blue glaze-colored with copper, like that on pottery and bricks from the ruins of Babylon. Some were ornamented with scroll work and other designs; others, with rude figures of men and animals in relief. They were all of the same fragile material. The clay, moreover, having been only partially burnt, had been exposed to the action of the nitre so abundant in the soil. Without considerable care it was impossible to remove any entire, although the surrounding earth was easily detached from them.

Human remains, more or less perfect, were found in all these sarcophagi. Sometimes, as the lid was carefully removed, I could almost distinguish the body, wrapped[Pg 451] in its grave clothes, and still lying in its narrow resting-place. But no sooner did the outer air reach the empty crust of humanity than it fell away into dust, leaving only the skull and great bones of the arms and legs to show what these now empty cases had once contained. One or two small cups or vases in the same glazed pottery, and a few beads and engraved gems, were occasionally gathered from the crumbling remains; but no ornaments of gold or silver were discovered at Niffer, though it appears that the Arabs frequently find them in similar coffins from other ruins in southern Mesopotamia. It is remarkable, however, that there were no ornaments whatever in metal in nearly a hundred coffins which I opened at Niffer.

It is impossible to estimate the number of these earthen coffins; the upper part of the mound in some places appeared to consist almost entirely of them. They generally rested one upon the other, but in some cases were separated by a layer of flat bricks or tiles. As fast as the fragments of one were removed a second appeared beneath it; and notwithstanding the number thus taken away, I did not penetrate many feet beneath the surface. In the lower part of Mesopotamia are many ruins in which similar remains are equally abundant. Fragments of glazed pottery, broken from them, are seen on every ancient site to the south of Babylon. According to Mr. Loftus, the vast mound of Wurka is built almost entirely of such coffins, piled one above the other, and consequently many thousands, or rather hundreds of thousands must exist in it alone.

It is difficult to arrive at a very satisfactory conclusion as to the precise date of these remains. My own impression is that they are comparatively modern; that is, that they are to be attributed to a period subsequent to the fall of[Pg 452] the Babylonian empire, extending from the second or first century before the Christian era to even the time of the Arab invasion. Colonel Rawlinson entertains, I believe, a different opinion, and would attribute them to a much earlier period. If the great mounds of Niffer be the remains of a Babylonian city, as they probably are, it is evident that that city must have been completely destroyed, and its ruins covered with earth long before a people, afterwards inhabiting the country, could have buried their dead above them.

In one part of the mound, in a kind of recess or small chamber of brick masonry, was discovered a heap of pottery of a yellow color, very thin and fragile, much resembling that still made at Baghdad to hold water in hot weather. Many vases and cups were still entire. With them were fragments of glass bottles, jars, and other vessels; and several highly glazed or enamelled dishes. These relics appeared to be of the same period as the sarcophagi. A large number of coarse jars or urns, some nearly six feet high, were dug out of various parts of the mound. They contained bones of men and animals, and their mouths had been carefully closed by a tile or brick plastered with bitumen.

Although many deep trenches were opened in the ruins, and in the conical mound at the north-east corner, no other remains or relics were discovered. With the exception of a few massive foundations, and the bricks bearing a cuneiform superscription, I much doubt whether anything found at Niffer was of the true Babylonian period. The Arabs have a story that a great black stone exists somewhere in the ruins. I had once conjectured that it might be the identical obelisk said to have been brought by Semiramis from Armenia to Babylon.[230] After I had[Pg 453] searched in vain for it, I was assured that it was near some mounds several miles to the east of Niffer. I sent a party of workmen to the spot, but with no better success. On the whole, I am much inclined to question whether extensive excavations carried on at Niffer would produce any very important or interesting results.

In the Afaij bazar I was able to purchase a few relics from the Arabs; they consisted chiefly of cylinders and engraved gems. But even such remains were far more scarce than I had anticipated. A ram in baked clay, with three holes for holding colors or ointments, apparently Babylonian, and a pebble of white marble, on which are rudely engraved two goats before the sacred tree, and a few cuneiform characters, were brought to me from some neighboring ruin. Such were all the antiquities I obtained during my visit to Niffer. With the pottery collected at the mound they are now in the British Museum.

One of my principal objects in journeying into these wild tracts of southern Mesopotamia, was to visit and explore the great mound of Wurka. These remains had already been partly examined, as I have stated, by Mr. Loftus. A highly interesting collection of relics, comprising inscribed clay tablets, glazed pottery, ornaments in metal, and engraved gems, had been obtained by that gentleman during his short residence among the ruins. They are now in the British Museum. Amongst them, and deserving particular notice, are the fragments of a shell, on which are engraved the heads of two horses, apparently part of a subject representing a warrior in his chariot. The outline upon them is not without spirit, but they are principally remarkable for being almost identical with a similar engraved shell found in an Etruscan tomb, and now in the British Museum. This is not the only [Pg 454]instance, as it has been seen, of relics from Assyria and Etruria being of the same character,—showing a close connection between the two countries either direct, or by mutual intercourse with some intermediate nation.

Unfortunately the state of the country to the south of the marshes was such that I was unable even to make an attempt to reach the remarkable ruins of Wurka. The great Arab tribe of Montefik, dwelling on the banks of the lower Euphrates, and exercising a certain control over all the smaller tribes inhabiting the southern part of Mesopotamia, was split into opposite factions on account of the rival pretensions of two chiefs. Much blood had already been spilt, and the war was now extending to the Afaij. The surrounding tribes taking advantage of the general confusion and of the unsuccessful attempt of the Pasha to subdue the Maidan Arabs, had openly rebelled against the government, and were laying waste the province and plundering each other. It was, indeed, scarcely possible even to leave the Afaij territory, and Agab, who, like all other Arab Sheikhs, was not without his rival, began to fear an outbreak amongst his own people. He had already been summoned to take part in the war between the two Montefik chiefs, and he was anxious that I should be on safe ground before his troubles commenced. He, therefore, seriously urged me to return to Baghdad.

The Sheikh, with other chiefs of his tribe, was accustomed to pass the evening in my tent. He would on those occasions describe the unsettled and dangerous state of the country, and lament the insecurity caused by the misrule of the Turkish authorities.

At the same time he would entertain me with accounts of the districts to the south of the Afaij, their productions, and the manners of the curious populations inhabiting those vast marshes.

[Pg 455]The greater part of the country below ancient Babylon has now been for centuries one great swamp. It is, indeed, what the prophet foretold it should be, “a desert of the sea.”[231] The embankments of the rivers, utterly neglected, have broken away, and the waters have spread over the face of the land. The best known of these marshes are the Lemlud, formed by the Euphrates above its confluence with the Tigris at Korna. But they now only form a part of those which are yearly increasing, and threaten to cover the whole of southern Mesopotamia.

The Arab tribes inhabiting them are, as I have already observed, amongst the most wild and ignorant that can be found in this part of Asia. The relations between them and the Porte have generally consisted of little more than a trial of treachery and deceit; and, whilst the Turk looks upon these Arabs as mere wild beasts, they in return have lost all confidence in the faith and honor of the Ottoman government. But it is not so with respect to the English, who have always treated them honorably and kindly, and whom consequently they have allowed to pass to and fro without harm. This respect for the British name is mainly to be attributed to the admirable conduct and management of Captain Jones during the time he has commanded the steamer on the Tigris.

These Arabs are of the Sheeah sect of Mussulmans, and belong to the great tribes of Rubbiyah and Ahl Maidan. Each tribe has innumerable subdivisions, with distinct names and separate and independent Sheikhs. They live in mat huts and in small black tents. Their chief wealth consists in vast herds of buffaloes, and they are, on the whole, notwithstanding the wretched appearance of their[Pg 456] dwellings and the scanty clothing of both men and women, richer than most Arab tribes. This is to be attributed to their having hitherto been able, in their almost inaccessible retreats, to defy the Turkish authorities.

Their buffaloes supply them with large quantities of butter and milk; the former is exported, and is a considerable article of trade. These hideous animals appear to thrive in the marshy lands, and some districts actually swarm with them. They are generally inoffensive and easily managed.

These tribes have also flocks of sheep and goats, but the animals are small, and their wool thin, and generally too coarse to form an article of commerce. They raise very little corn and barley; rice, of an inferior quality, forms their principal food.

The marshes and the jungles near the rivers are the retreats of many kinds of wild animals. Lions abound. I have seen them frequently, and during the excavations at Niffer we found fresh traces of their footsteps almost daily amongst the ruins. The Maidan Arabs boast of capturing them in the following manner, and trustworthy persons have assured me that they have seen the feat performed. A man, having bound his right arm with strips of tamarisk, and holding in his hand a strong piece of the same wood, about a foot or more in length, hardened in the fire and sharpened at both ends, will advance boldly into the animal’s lair. When the lion springs upon him, he forces the wood into the animal’s extended jaws, which will then be held open whilst he can dispatch the astonished beast at his leisure with the pistol that he holds in his left hand.

In the jungles are also found leopards, lynxes, wild cats, wolves, hyenas, jackals, deer, porcupines, boars in vast numbers, and other animals. Wild fowl, cranes, and[Pg 457] bustards abound, and that beautiful game-bird the francolin, or black partridge, swarms in the low brushwood. The Arabs shoot them with ball. The marshes are full of fish, which attain a considerable size. They are chiefly, I believe, a kind of barbel. Their flesh is coarse and full of bones, but they afford the Arabs a constant supply of food. They are generally taken by the spear.

Although the inhabitants of the marshes recognise some of the laws of the Bedouins, they are wanting in many of the virtues of the Arabs of the Desert. They have, however, several customs relating to the duties of hospitality, which are rigidly adhered to. To say of a Maidan “that he has sold bread,” is to offer him the greatest of insults. To part with a loaf for money is accounted an act bringing disgrace not only upon the perpetrator, but upon his whole family. I found this peculiar custom exceedingly inconvenient during my residence amongst the Afaij. Sheikh Agab insisted upon giving daily to my large party their supplies of bread; and it was impossible to obtain it in any other manner. Even its sale in the public market was forbidden. I was, at length, compelled to send to a considerable distance for flour, and then to employ my own workmen in baking it. The same scruples do not exist with regard to other articles of food. They are sold in the bazar, as in all Eastern towns.

In the souk or bazar, of the Afaij tribe, were exposed for sale a few common Manchester prints—those world-wide evidences of the extent of British trade—English stuffs (printed and dyed at Baghdad called tangebs), keffiehs, Damascus silks, striped abas, dates, rice, coffee, spices, powder and arms, the usual stores of an Eastern market. A few Christian jewellers fashion gold and silver ornaments for the women, and an occasional[Pg 458] pedlar from Hillah or Baghdad excites the admiration of the Arabs by the display of a stock of coarse knives, and common European hardware.

The dampness of the soil upon which my tent was pitched, and the unwholesome air of the surrounding marshes, brought on a severe attack of pleurisy and fever. I was soon unable to move from my bed, and was reduced at length to a state of extreme weakness. Fortunately it occurred to me to use a blistering fluid given to me for an injured horse, or I should probably not again have left the Afaij swamps. Notwithstanding the severity of the remedy it gave me immediate relief, and when Hormuzd joined me on the 28th of January, I resolved to make an attempt, without further delay, to reach Baghdad, where I could obtain medical aid. To add to our misfortunes, the rain fell in unceasing torrents for four days, and of course soon made its way through our tents. The waters of the marsh began to rise perceptibly, and the Afaij were preparing to abandon their mat huts, and to seek, in their light tiradas, a safer retreat.

Some days elapsed, however, before I could rise from my carpet. The state of affairs was daily getting worse. Abde Pasha had been suddenly deprived of his government by the Porte on account of the failure of his expedition against the Kazail Arabs, and his fall had increased the general anarchy. It was only by joining a large party of horsemen on their way to the seat of war in the south that Hormuzd had been able to reach Niffer. I found that it was quite impossible to penetrate further into Mesopotamia, and that by remaining much longer amongst the Afaij we ran the risk of being cut off from Baghdad altogether. I determined, therefore, to strike once more into the Desert, where we were less likely to meet with hostile Arabs than in the beaten tracks, and to[Pg 459] make a forced march to some village in the neighbourhood of Hillah.

Fortunately I had my own riding horse with me, and his easy paces enabled me to undertake the journey although in a state of complete exhaustion. On the 2d of February, I took leave of Agab, and pitched my tents for the night beneath the mounds of Niffer. Before dawn on the following morning we were urging our horses over the desert plains of the centre of Mesopotamia. Two armed adherents of the Sheikh were with us, rather to act as guides than to protect us from enemies. We travelled without any cause for alarm as far as the great ruin of Zibbliyah. A large body of horsemen then suddenly appeared in the distance. We ascended the mound, and prepared to defend ourselves from this elevated position. But either the Arabs did not perceive us, or were bent upon some warlike expedition which did not admit of delay, for they passed onwards, and left us to continue our journey.

Zibbliyah closely resembles the celebrated ruin of Akkerkuf near Baghdad. It rises from a heap of rubbish in the centre of the Desert, and consists of a solid mass of large, crumbling, sundried bricks, between the courses of which, at certain intervals, are layers of reeds as in many of the Babylonian buildings.

We saw no human habitation until long after nightfall, when we reached the small Arab hamlet of Bashayi. It was surrounded, for defence, by a low mud wall, and some time was spent in a parley and explanation before the timid inhabitants would open their gates to so large a company of strangers. I could hardly remain in my saddle until their fears were set at rest, and we were admitted within the inclosure. At length I tottered into a hovel, thick with smoke, and sank down exhausted,[Pg 460] after a ride of fourteen hours and a fortnight’s complete abstinence from food.

My poor Jebour workmen being on foot had been unable to keep up with the caravan during our forced march. They did not reach the village until daybreak, and then in a very sorry plight, for they were stript to the skin. They had approached, in search of water, the tents of some Arabs, and falling in with a plundering party had been robbed of every thing, and left naked in the Desert.

Next morning I had scarcely strength to mount my horse. Hormuzd turned off to Hillah to put a stop to the excavations at Babylon. With the caravan I made another forced march in the beaten track to Baghdad, and reached the khan of Iskanderiyah.

We were now within a few hours of the end of our journey, and leaving the servants and baggage to follow at leisure, I quitted the khan with the Bairakdar before dawn to canter into Baghdad. As the sun rose from the sea-like plain, the great ruin of Ctesiphon appeared above the eastern horizon.

This ruin, with a few mounds and heaps of rubbish scattered around it, is all that now remains of the capital of the Parthian empire. On the opposite bank of the Tigris long lines of earthen ramparts, forming a quadrangle and inclosing the usual signs of former habitations, mark the site of the city built by Seleucus after the last fall of Babylon.

The victorious Arabs, under Saad, the general of the Caliph Omar, pillaged Ctesiphon after they had overthrown the Persian armies in the decisive battle of Cadesia, in the sixteenth year of the Hegira. They found in the palace the throne, the crown, and the standard of the Persian kings, together with a carpet which covered the floor of[Pg 461] the great hall, and was of such extraordinary beauty and value that it excited the wonder of the conquerors, and was considered amongst the most precious spoil taken from their enemies.

Ctesiphon and Seleucia received from the Arabs the name of Al Madain, or the twin cities. When Baghdad was founded on the Tigris, a few miles above them, the Caliph Al Mansour wished to pull down the palace of Chosroes for materials to build his own capital. His vizir, who had recently turned from the Magian religion, endeavored to dissuade him. The caliph upbraided him for being but an insincere convert to Islam, and for sympathising with those who still professed his former faith, and whose monuments he therefore wished to preserve. The attempt to destroy the vast edifice was fruitless; but when it was about to be abandoned, the vizir urged his master to persevere, exclaiming, “that if he now ceased to pull down the palace, history would say that Al Mansour with all his power was unable to overthrow that which another prince had built.”

I did not visit Ctesiphon on this occasion; the river separated me from the ruins, and I only mention them in this place to describe a remarkable effect of mirage which I witnessed as I rode towards Baghdad. As the quivering sun rose in unclouded splendor, the palace was transformed into a vast arcade of enormous arches resting upon columns and masses of masonry. Gradually this arcade was, as it were, compressed like the slides of a telescope, but the building gained in height what it lost in length, and one arch slowly appeared above the other, until the ruin assumed the shape of a tower reaching to the sky, and pierced from the base to the summit by innumerable arches. In a few minutes this strange edifice began to melt away into the air, and I saw a magnified, though [Pg 462]perfect image of the palace; but upon it was its exact counterpart upside down. Other equally singular changes succeeded until the sun was high in the heavens, and the ruin at length disappeared in the distance. The small bushes of camel-thorn scattered over the Desert were during this time turned into forest trees, and a transparent lake imaged for a fleeting hour in its counterfeit waters the varying forms of the unsubstantial edifice. Although I have seen many extraordinary effects of mirage during my wanderings in the East, I scarcely remember to have witnessed one more striking or more beautiful than that near the ruins of Ctesiphon.

I had just strength left me to reach the gates of Baghdad. Once in the city, under the friendly care of Dr. Hyslop, I soon recovered my health, and was ready to start on fresh adventures.
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Re: Discoveries among the Ruins of Nineveh and Babylon

Postby admin » Wed Apr 13, 2022 7:52 am

CHAPTER XXV. PREPARATIONS FOR DEPARTURE.—SAHIMAN.—PLUNDER OF HIS CAMELS.—LEAVE BAGHDAD.—JOURNEY THROUGH MESOPOTAMIA.—EARLY ARAB REMAINS.—THE MEDIAN WALL.—TEKRIT.—HORSES STOLEN.—INSTANCES OF BEDOUIN HONESTY.—EXCAVATIONS AT KALAH SHERGHAT.—REACH MOSUL.—DISCOVERIES DURING ABSENCE.—NEW CHAMBERS AT KOUYUNJIK.—DESCRIPTION OF BAS-RELIEFS.—EXTENT OF THE RUINS EXPLORED.—BASES OF PILLARS.—SMALL OBJECTS.—ROMAN COINS STRUCK AT NINEVEH.—HOARD OF DENARII.—GREEK RELICS.—ABSENCE OF ASSYRIAN TOMBS.—FRAGMENT WITH EGYPTIAN CHARACTERS.—ASSYRIAN RELICS.—REMAINS BENEATH THE TOMB OF JONAH.—DISCOVERIES AT SHEREEF-KHAN—AT NIMROUD.—ASSYRIAN WEIGHTS.—ENGRAVED CYLINDERS.

There was no hope of improvement in the state of the country round Baghdad. The Pasha had left the dam of the Hindiyah, which shortly after again gave way, and afforded fresh retreats to the Arabs. Under these circumstances, and for other reasons, I deemed it prudent to give up for the time the excavations in the ruins of Babylonia. When tranquillity had been to some extent restored in the pashalic, an expedition might be undertaken either by myself, or by some other traveller, with better prospects of success.

The Shammar Bedouins were now moving northwards towards their spring and summer pastures. I had been in continual communication with the sons of Rishwan. Suttum, whose wife’s imperious temper still kept him apart from his family, had encamped during the winter with another branch of the tribe in the neighbourhood of Tekrit. It was suspected that he had been privy to[Pg 464] more than one successful attack on the Turkish post, and on certain treasure convoys belonging to the government. The roads between Baghdad and Mosul were completely closed by bands of Bedouins, who plundered every caravan that came within their reach. Sahiman and Mijwell had accompanied their father to the plains of southern Babylonia. The latter had been severely wounded in some affray.

As Sahiman was journeying northwards with the rest of his tribe, I thought this a good opportunity of following under his protection the direct track to Mosul through the Desert and along the western bank of the Tigris. He at once consented to escort me, only stipulating that I should obtain permission from the Pasha for his camels and flocks to pass through the suburbs of Baghdad, instead of following the longer and more difficult road through the marshes, like those of the rest of the tribe. The request was granted, and a guarantee was given to me by the governor and the commander in chief of the troops, that my Bedouin friend, with his family and property, should cross the city in safety. They had no sooner, however, entered the gates, than they were fallen upon by the inhabitants of the quarter, aided by a body of irregular troops and Agayls. Abandoning nearly eight hundred camels, Sahiman and his brother Arabs fled into the Desert.

Warmly supported by Capt. Kemball, I remonstrated indignantly against this act of treachery. The Turkish authorities declared that it was an accident beyond their control, and at length adopted means to recover the stolen camels. It was, however, with some difficulty, that I was able to find Sahiman, and then to induce him to return to Baghdad. Eventually the greater part of his property was restored to him. It is thus that the Bedouins are [Pg 465]encouraged in continual enmity to the Porte, and that their reliance on the good faith of the Turks and of the inhabitants of towns has been completely destroyed.

This untimely occurrence, as well as repeated attacks of fever, delayed my departure for some days, and it was not until the 27th of February that, bidding adieu to my good friends of Baghdad, I crossed the Tigris by the crazy bridge of boats, and took the crowded road to Kathimain. There I passed the night beneath the hospitable roof of the Nawab of Oude. At daybreak on the following morning, under the guidance of Sahiman, and accompanied by Hormuzd, the Jebours, and my servants, I left the sacred suburb, and followed a beaten track leading to the Desert. In order to avoid the windings of the river, we struck across the barren plain. The low houses of Kathimain soon disappeared from our sight, but for some miles we watched the gilded domes and minarets of the tombs of the Imaums, rising above the dark belt of palms, and glittering in the rays of the morning sun. At last they too vanished, and I had looked for the last time upon Baghdad. We were now in as complete a wilderness as if we had been wandering in the midst of Arabia, and not within a few miles of a great city. Not a living creature broke the solitude. Here and there we saw the sites of former encampments, but the Arabs had long since left them, either to move further into the Desert, or to seek security from an enemy amongst the date groves on the banks of the river.

We travelled with speed over the plain. After a ride of nine hours we found ourselves in the midst of the palm trees of a village called Summaichah, formerly a town of some importance, and still watered by the Dujail, a wide and deep canal of the time of the Caliphs, derived from the Tigris. The inhabitants seeing horsemen in the [Pg 466]distance mistook us for enemies; but finding that we were travellers and friends they escorted us to the house of their Sheikh, Hashem, who immediately slew a sheep, and made other hospitable preparations for our entertainment. This chief, although now ruling over a stationary tribe who till the soil, is of Shammar descent, and is married to a Bedouin lady. As his wife, however, will not condescend to live within four walls, he is obliged to compromise matters by passing one half of the year under her tent, and the other in his hovel amongst his own people. As we expected to fall in with her tribe during our journey northwards, he entrusted me with a bundle of embroidered cloaks and colored kerchiefs as presents to her and her kin. His museef was crowded with Bedouins, for amongst the Arabs the hospitality of Hashem had become a proverb. Summaichah, too, being on the edge of the Desert, is convenient for hearing news from the town, and as a place of meeting before or after plundering expeditions, although a Turkish mudir, with a garrison of a dozen half-starved Albanians, resides within the walls of its ruined serai.

The plain on all sides is intersected by the remains of innumerable canals and watercourses, derived from the Tigris and the Dujail. Their lofty banks narrow the view, and it was only as we passed over them, after quitting Summaichah, that we saw the distant palm groves of the large village of Belled. We left the village to the right, and passed through the ruins of an Arab town of the time of the Caliphs. Beyond it we crossed the Dujail, by a falling bridge of four large arches, with a small arch between each. The beauty of the masonry, the ornamental inscriptions, and rich tracery of this ruin, showed that it was of the best period of Arab architecture.

[Pg 467]To the north of the Dujail we wound through a perfect maze of ancient canals now dry. It required the practised eye of the Bedouin to follow the sand-covered track. About eight miles beyond the bridge the embankments suddenly ceased. A high rampart of earth then stretched as far as the eye could see, to the right and to the left. At certain distances were mounds, forming square inclosures, like ruined outworks. A few hundred yards in advance was a second rampart, much lower and narrower than the first. We had reached what some believe to be the famous Median wall, one of the many wonders of Babylonia, built by the Babylonians from river to river across Mesopotamia, to guard their wealthy city and thickly peopled provinces against invasion from the north. Captain Jones, however, who has examined these remains with more care and for a greater distance than any other traveller, or than I could do during a hasty journey, is of opinion that they are not those of a wall of defence, but merely of an embankment, stretching for miles inland, and originally raised to protect the lower country from inundations, and to regulate its irrigation. I confess that my own impression, even after this explanation, was in favor of the rampart. At any rate, if this be not the Median wall, no traces of which have been as yet found in any other part of Mesopotamia, it appeared to me to be a regular line of fortification. It is called by the Arabs, at the place we crossed it, Farriyah; elsewhere, the Sidr al Nimroud, or the rampart of Nimrod.

Beyond the Median wall we entered upon undulating gravelly downs, furrowed by deep ravines, and occasionally rising into low hills. With the rich alluvial soil of Babylonia, we had left the boundaries of the ancient province. The banks of the Tigris are here, in general, too high, and the face of the country too unequal, to admit[Pg 468] of artificial irrigation being carried far inland by watercourses derived from the river.

The spiral tower, the dome, and the minarets of Samarrah at length appeared above the eastern horizon, and we rode towards them. After nine hours and a half’s journey we encamped for the night on the Tigris opposite to the town. As the sun went down we watched the women who, on the other side of the river, came to fetch their evening supplies of water, and gracefully bearing their pitchers on their heads returned to the gates. But on our bank the solitude was only broken by a lonely hyæna coming to drink at the stream, and the hungry jackals that prowled round our tents. The ruins of an early Arab town, called Ashik, stood on a hill in the distance, and near our camping place were the deserted walls of a more recent settlement.

On the third day of our journey another ride of nine hours and a half, along the banks of the Tigris, brought us to Tekrit. The Arabs were keeping the small town of Tekrit in a state of siege, and its supplies having been cut off, we had some difficulty in getting provisions for ourselves and our horses. We were not sorry to leave Tekrit, whose inhabitants did not belie a notoriously bad character. Next morning we struck inland, in order to avoid the precipitous hills of Makhoul, at whose very feet sweeps the Tigris. They form part of a long isolated limestone range which commences with the Sinjar, runs through the centre of Mesopotamia, crosses the river near Khan Karnaineh, then takes the name of Hamrin, and approaching the mountains of Luristan continues parallel with them to the Persian province of Fars. In the Makhoul hills are several ruins. Some falling walls and towers hanging over the Tigris, and once, probably, the stronghold of a freebooter, who levied blackmail on travellers,[Pg 469] are called by the Arabs the “Castle of the Giants,” and are said to be the dwelling-place of jins and various other supernatural beings.

Our track led through a perfect wilderness. We found no water, nor saw any moving thing. When, after a long ride of about eleven hours, we reached some brackish springs, called Belaliss, the complete solitude lulled us into a feeling of security, and we all slept without keeping the accustomed watch. I was awoke in the middle of the night by an unusual noise close to my tent. I immediately gave the alarm, but it was too late. Two of our horses had been stolen, and in the darkness we could not pursue the thieves. Sahiman broke out in reproaches of himself as the cause of our mishap, and wandered about until dawn in search of some clue to the authors of the theft. At length he tracked them, declared unhesitatingly that they were of the Shammar, pointed out, from marks almost imperceptible to any eye but to that of a Bedouin, that they were four in number, had left their delouls at some distance from our tents, and had already journeyed far before they had been drawn by our fires to the encampment. These indications were enough. He swore an oath that he would follow and bring back our stolen horses wherever they might be, for it was a shame upon him and his tribe that, whilst under his protection in the Desert, we had lost anything belonging to us. And he religiously kept his oath. When we parted at the end of our journey, he began at once to trace the animals. After six weeks’ search, during which he went as far as Ana on the Euphrates, where one had been sold to an Arab of the town, he brought them to Mosul. I was away at the time, but he left them with Mr. Rassam, and returned to the Desert without asking a reward for performing an act of duty imperative on a Bedouin. Such[Pg 470] instances of honesty and good faith are not uncommon amongst the wandering Arabs, as I can bear witness, from personal experience.

Mr. Rassam frequently sent Suttum across the Desert with as much as five or six hundred pounds in money, and always with the most complete confidence. His only reward was an occasional silk dress, or one or two camel loads of corn for his family, the whole of the value of a few shillings.[232] Of late years the wool of the Bedouin sheep has been in considerable demand in the European markets, and a large trade in this article has already been opened with the Shammar. Money is generally advanced some months before the sheep are sheared, to enable the Arabs to buy their winter stock of provisions. Mr. Rassam has thus paid beforehand several thousand pounds without any written or other guarantee whatever. The tribes leave the neighbourhood of the town, and are not again heard of until their long strings of camels are seen bringing the promised wool. I remember a Bedouin coming all the way alone from the neighbourhood of Baghdad to pay Mr. Rassam a trifling sum, I think between three and four shillings, the balance of a wool account between them.

A youth of the great tribe of the Aneyza having quarrelled with his parents, ran away and came to Mosul, when he entered as a student in a college. He became a Mullah, and had almost forgotten his early friends, when the tribe, driven by a famine from the Syrian desert, crossed the Euphrates, and encamped near the town to buy corn. Ibn Gayshish, their Sheikh, hearing by chance that the fugitive was still alive, and now a [Pg 471]member of the priesthood, sent a messenger to him to say, that since he had quitted his tents his father had died, and had left a certain number of camels, which had been divided according to the law amongst his family. Those allotted to him had been in the safe keeping of the tribe, and had increased yearly. The chief was now ready to do with them as their rightful owner might direct.

Mr. Rassam had, at my request, sent a party of Jebours to renew the excavations at Kalah Sherghat, which had been very imperfectly examined. The springs of Belaliss are separated from the shoulder of the Gebel Makhoul, which overhangs the ruins, by a wild rocky valley, called Wadi Jehannem, the Valley of Hell. We crossed it and the hills in about three hours and a half, and came suddenly upon the workmen, who, of course, took us for Bedouin plunderers, and prepared to defend themselves. They had opened trenches in various parts of the great mound, but had made no discoveries of any importance, and I am inclined to doubt whether an edifice containing any number of sculptures or inscriptions ever existed on the platform. Fragments of a winged bull in the alabaster of the Nineveh palaces, part of a statue in black stone with a few cuneiform characters, and pieces of a large inscribed slab of copper, were found in the ruins; I collected also the fragments of a large inscribed cylinder in baked clay[233], and a copper cup, a few vases in common pottery, and some beads.

We encamped in the jungle to the north of the ruins, and were visited by fifteen men of the Albou Mohammed, who frankly confessed that they were thieves, out on[Pg 472] their vocation. As the tribe does not bear a very good character for honesty, and as it might have struck our guests that they had no need of going further to fulfil the object of their journey, we violated the duties of hospitality, and put some of them in irons for the night, as a guarantee for the good conduct of the rest.

I ordered the Jebours to leave Kalah Sherghat, and to return with us to Mosul, which we reached the following day. Mr. Bell, who had been sent to Assyria by the Trustees of the British Museum to succeed Mr. Cooper as artist to the expedition, had arrived in the town two days before. I rode with him without delay to Kouyunjik, to examine the excavations made during my absence. I will now describe the sculptures uncovered whilst I was at Baghdad and after my return to Mosul, previous to my departure for England.

To the north of the great centre hall four new chambers had been discovered. The first was 96 feet by 23. On its walls were represented the return of an Assyrian army from war, with their spoil of captives and cattle. The prisoners were distinguished by a cap turned back at the top, not unlike the Phrygian bonnet reversed, short tunics, and a broad belt. The women had long curls falling over their shoulders, and were clothed in fringed robes. The fighting-men of the conquered tribe wore a simple fillet round their short hair; a tunic, falling in front to the knee, and behind, to the calf of the leg; a wavy girdle, and a cross-belt round their breasts, ending in two large tassels. A kneeling camel, receiving its load, was designed with considerable truth and spirit. The legs bent under, the tail raised, the foot of the man on the neck of the animal to keep it from rising, whilst a second adjusts the burden from behind, form a group seen every day in the Desert and in an Eastern town. The[Pg 473] camel saddle, too, nearly resembled that still used by the Arabs.

This chamber opened at one end into a small room, 23 feet by 13. On its walls were represented a captive tribe, dressed in short tunics, a skin falling from their shoulders, boots laced up in front, and cross-bands round their legs; they had short, bushy hair and beards.

In the outer chamber two doorways opposite the grand entrances into the great hall, led into a parallel apartment, 62 feet by 16 feet. On its walls was represented the conquest of the same people, wearing the reversed Phrygian bonnet. There were long lines of prisoners; some in carts, others on foot. The fighting-men, armed with bows and quivers, were made to bear part of the spoil. In the costumes of the warriors and captives, and in the forms of the waggons and war-carts, these bas-reliefs bore a striking resemblance to the sculptures of the son of Essarhaddon, described in a previous chapter.[234] It may, therefore, be inferred that the conquest of the same nation was celebrated in both, and that on these walls we have recorded the successful wars of Sennacherib in the country of Susiana or Elam.

This chamber, like the one parallel to it, led at one end into a small room 17 feet square. On its walls, the campaign recorded in the adjoining chamber had been continued. These rooms completed the discoveries on the southern side of the palace. On the northern side of the same edifice, and on the river-face of the platform, one wall of a third great hall had been uncovered; the other walls had not been excavated at the time of my departure from Mosul. From the very ruinous state of this part of the building, and from the small accumulation of[Pg 474] earth above the level of the foundations, it is doubtful whether any sculptures still exist in it. The standing wall had three entrances, the centre formed by winged lions, and the others by fish gods. Of the bas-reliefs only fragments now remained. In one set was depictured the conquest of another tribe dwelling in the marshes of southern Mesopotamia. The Assyrians pursued their enemies in wicker boats, such as I have described in my account of the Afaij Arabs; and on the islands formed by the small streams flowing through the morass, were Assyrian warriors on horseback.

On the same side of the hall was represented the conquest of a second nation, whose men were clothed in long garments, and whose women wore turbans, with veils falling to their feet. The Assyrians had plundered their temples, and were seen carrying away their idols. “Of a truth, Lord, the kings of Assyria have laid waste all the nations and their countries, and have cast their gods into the fire; for they were no gods, but the work of men’s hands, wood and stone; therefore they have destroyed them.”[235] Unfortunately the bas-reliefs were so much injured that the nature of these images could not be satisfactorily ascertained. The figures appeared to be beardless, with the exception of one, which is that of a man raising his right arm, and bearing a mace.

The three entrances led into one chamber 86 feet by 24. On its calcined walls were only the faint traces of bas-reliefs. I could distinguish a line of chariots in a ravine between mountains, warriors throwing logs on a great burning pile of wood, castles on the tops of hills, Assyrians carrying away spoil, amongst which was a royal umbrella, and the king on his throne receiving his army on their return from battle with the captives and booty.

[Pg 475]Opposite to and corresponding with the three entrances from the hall were three other doorways leading into a parallel chamber of somewhat smaller dimensions. Parts of four slabs were the only sculptures sufficiently well preserved to be drawn: they represented the siege of a great city, whose many-towered walls were defended by slingers, archers, and spearmen. The king himself in his chariot was present at the attack. Around him were his warriors and his led-horses.

Three more chambers were discovered in this part of the building. They were on the very edge of the river-face of the mound. The walls of the outer room had been almost entirely destroyed. An entrance, formed by colossal winged figures, led from it into a second chamber, about 24 feet square, in which the sculptures were still partly preserved. Amongst the bas-reliefs was another battle in a marsh. The Assyrian warriors were seen fighting in boats, and bringing their captives to the shore, one of the vessels being towed by a man swimming on an inflated skin. Sennacherib himself, in his chariot, in the midst of a grove of palm-trees, received the prisoners, and the heads of the slain. Above him was a short epigraph, which appears to read, “Sennacherib, king of the country of Assyria, the spoil of the river Agammi, from the city of Sakrina” (the last line not interpreted). Although the name of this city has not yet been found, as far as I know, in the records on the bulls and on other monuments of the same king, yet the mention of the river enables us to recognise in the bas-reliefs a representation of part of the campaign, undertaken by Sennacherib, in the fourth year of his reign, against Susubira the Chaldæan: whose capital was Bittul, on the same stream. Although the river itself has not as yet been identified, it is evidently either a part of the Tigris[Pg 476] or Euphrates, or one of their confluents, near the Persian Gulf. We have no difficulty, indeed, in determining the site of the country whose conquest is depictured. The marshes and palm-trees show that it must have been in southern Mesopotamia, or in the districts watered by the Shat el Arab.

A great retinue of charioteers and horsemen appear to have followed Sennacherib to this war. Large circular shields were fixed to the sides of the chariots represented in the sculptures.

The third chamber, entered from that last described through a doorway guarded by colossal eagle-footed figures, contained the sculptured records of the conquest of part of Babylonia, or of some other district to the south of it. Long lines of chariots, horsemen and warriors, divided into companies according to their arms and their costume, accompanied the king. The Assyrians having taken the principal city of the invaded country, cut down the palm-trees within and without its walls. Men beating drums, such as are still seen in the same country, and women clapping their hands in cadence to their song, came out to greet the conquerors. Beneath the walls was represented a great caldron, which appears to have been supported upon metal images of oxen; perhaps a vessel resembling the brazen sea of the temple of Solomon.[236]

Such were the discoveries in the ruined palace of Sennacherib at the time of my departure for Europe. In this magnificent edifice I had opened no less than seventy-one halls, chambers, and passages, whose walls, almost[Pg 477] without an exception, had been panelled with slabs of sculptured alabaster recording the wars, the triumphs, and the great deeds of the Assyrian king. By a rough calculation, about 9880 feet, or nearly two miles, of bas-reliefs, with twenty-seven portals, formed by colossal winged bulls and lion-sphinxes, were uncovered in that part alone of the building explored during my researches. The greatest length of the excavations was about 720 feet, the greatest breadth about 600 feet.[237] The pavement of the chambers was from 20 to 35 feet below the surface of the mound.

Only a part, however, of the palace has been explored, and much still remains underground of this enormous structure. Since my return to Europe other rooms and sculptures have been discovered.

Image
Assyrian Pedestal, from Kouyunjik.

The excavations were not limited to the corner of Kouyunjik containing the palace. Deep trenches and tunnels were opened, and experimental shafts sunk in various parts of the mound. Enormous walls and foundations of brick masonry, fragments of sculptured and unsculptured alabaster, inscribed bricks,[Pg 478] numerous small objects, and various other remains, were discovered.[238] To the north of the ruins on the same level, and resting upon a pavement of limestone slabs, were found four circular pedestals. They appeared to form a part of a double line of similar objects, extending from the edge of the platform to an entrance to the palace, and may have supported the wooden columns of a covered way, or have served as bases to an avenue of statues.[239] The earth not having been sufficiently cleared away around them, I was unable to ascertain whether there was more than a double row. They were amongst the very few architectural remains dug out at Nineveh. The ornament upon them is not inelegant, and is somewhat Saracenic in its character.

I will now describe some of the most interesting small objects discovered in the earth and rubbish during the excavations at Kouyunjik. It must be borne in mind that the mound within which was the buried palace, was used more than once, and by more than one distinct people, for the site of a castle, if not of a town. We know that Nineveh was utterly destroyed by the united armies of the Medes and Babylonians; yet we find Meherdates taking the castle of Ninos, and the same place is mentioned by several later authors.[240]

[Pg 479]Coins of more than one Roman emperor were, according to the superscription, struck at Nineveh. One bears the head of Trajan, and, on the reverse, the legend AUG. FELI. NINI. CLAV. (col.), round an eagle with expanded wings between two military standards. Another has on one side the head of the Emperor Maximinus, and on the reverse a naked figure holding an object resembling a bull’s head in one hand, with the legend COL. NINIVA CLAVD. It would appear from these coins that Claudius, who established many colonies in the East, was the founder of one called after him Niniva Claudiopolis.

As buildings thus appear to have been erected at various times on the mound, we accordingly find in the rubbish remains of various periods. Amongst the relics occasionally brought to me by the workmen were a few fragments of pottery, and coins, and ill-cut gems with inscriptions in the Pehlevi character, of the time of the Sassanian kings of Persia, that is, from the first half of the third to the seventh century after Christ. Of the Roman period we have terracotta figures and lamps, and a hoard of eighty-nine silver denarii of the Emperors Vespasian, Titus, Domitian, Trajan, Antoninus Pius, Marcus Aurelius, Lucius Verus, Commodus, and Septimius Severus, according to the dates on the coins themselves, from a. d. 74 to a. d. 201. Mr. R. Stuart Poole, of the British Museum,—to whom I am indebted for a list and description of these coins,—conjectures, with much probability, that they were buried by a Roman soldier during the second expedition undertaken by Severus against the Arabs of Mesopotamia (a. d. 202), or during the Parthian war, carried on by the same emperor. The number of coins of Commodus, and the fact that there are none of any emperor after Severus, lead to the belief that the hoard was buried about this time. It is worthy of remark, too,[Pg 480] that the latest have few, if any, marks of having been in circulation. Unfortunately there are no coins amongst them actually struck at Nineveh, although they mostly belong to Eastern cities.

Of the time of the Seleucidæ and of the Greek occupation of Assyria and Babylonia, we have several relics: amongst them a small head of Hercules, with the eyes inlaid in ivory, one or two figures in terracotta, some copper and glass vessels, and various objects in pottery and bronze. To this period I am now inclined to attribute the earthen sarcophagi, the great jars, and other sepulchral remains found at Nimroud, Kalah Sherghat, Kouyunjik, and in other Assyrian mounds, which, when my former work was written, I believed to belong to a much earlier epoch. Since my return to England, Mr. Vice-consul Rassam has discovered at Kouyunjik several tombs built of slabs of stone, and apparently of even a later date, for in one of them, I understand, was found a gold coin of the Emperor Maximinus. They contained, however, very interesting relics in the same precious metal and in glass.

It is remarkable that, notwithstanding the most careful search, in all parts of the country around Mosul, I have been unable to find one undoubted Assyrian tomb, nor can I conjecture how or where the people of Nineveh buried their dead. The sepulchral chambers in the hills, so frequently described in these pages, are unquestionably of a comparatively late period. The rocky gullies outside and between the inclosure walls of Kouyunjik have been examined over and over again with the greatest care for traces of tombs, but in vain. In the numerous isolated conical mounds scattered over the face of the country, I have detected nothing to show that they were places of sepulture. It must, however, be confessed that they have not yet been sufficiently excavated. Further experiments[Pg 481] should be made in them, and tunnels opened into their very foundations. The only Assyrian sepulchre hitherto discovered is probably the vaulted chamber in the high mound of Nimroud, which may have once contained the remains of the royal builder of the north-west palace. Did the Assyrians, like the fire-worshippers of Persia, expose their dead until nought remained but the bleached bones, or did they burn them and then scatter their ashes to the winds? Not a clue is given to their customs in this matter by any bas-relief or monument hitherto discovered. The Assyrians appear to have avoided all allusions to their dead and to their funeral rites; unlike the Egyptians, who portrayed the ceremonies observed after death, and even the events of a future state, upon the walls of almost every temple and tomb.

The only relics found at Kouyunjik which I can refer to the Achæmenian Persian period, are the remains of several dishes and vases in serpentine and marble. One fragment of this nature is inscribed with Egyptian hieroglyphs, characteristic, according to Mr. Birch, of the time of the Ptolemies.

Image
Part of Colossal Head, from Kouyunjik.

Of Assyrian relics obtained from the ruins, the most interesting are

A colossal beardless head in limestone, remarkable for[Pg 482] the boldness of the style. It is, probably, part of a lion-sphinx.

Handles in the form of the heads of lions, and other fragments of vases and dishes.

A fragment of striped marble, carved with figures in relief, and bearing an inscription with the genealogy and titles of Essarhaddon.

A gold ear-ring adorned with pearls, resembling those still in common use amongst Arab women.

A rude circular vessel in limestone, ornamented on the outside with figures in relief of the Assyrian Hercules struggling with the lion.

Moulds for casting ear-rings and other ornaments in gold and silver. The forms upon them are all purely Assyrian, as the lion-headed deity, the cone, the bull’s head, and the sacred signs seen in the Nimroud sculptures round the neck of the king. The largest mould is in limestone, the others in serpentine. They are precisely such as are used to this day by Arab goldsmiths.

Various copper instruments (one in the shape of a sickle), a key,[241] a comb, and other objects, such as the heads of spears and arrows, in iron; glass bottles, pottery, fragments of terracotta, and marble with inscriptions, and many other relics, all of which, with those above enumerated, are now in the British Museum.

I had long been desirous of making some experiments in the mound on which stands the so-called tomb of the prophet Jonah. It forms part of the great group of ruins opposite Mosul, and is, like Kouyunjik, in the line of the inclosure walls. Some have believed it to represent the real site of ancient Nineveh, Kouyunjik being the remains of a palace added to the city at a later period. It was[Pg 483] important, therefore, to ascertain the nature and probable date of the edifice covered by the mound. The sanctity of the place prevented any attempt to excavate openly, and it was necessary to carry on my researches without exciting the suspicion of the Mussulman inhabitants of the neighbourhood.

A village has risen round the mosque containing the tomb. The rest of the mound is occupied by a burying ground, thickly set with Mussulman gravestones. True believers from the surrounding country bring their dead to this sacred spot, and to disturb a grave on Nebbi Yunus would cause a tumult which might lead to no agreeable results. The pretended tomb itself is in a dark inner room. None but Mussulmans should be admitted within the holy precincts, but I have more than once visited the shrine, with the sanction of my good friend, Mullah Sultan, a guardian of the mosque. A square plaster or wooden sarcophagus, entirely concealed by a green cloth embroidered with sentences from the Koran, stands in the centre of an apartment spread with a common European carpet. A few ostrich eggs and colored tassels, such as are seen in similar Mohammedan buildings, hang from the ceiling. A small grated window looks into the hall, where the true believers assemble for prayer. A staircase leads into the holy chamber. It is needless to repeat that the tradition which places the tomb on this spot is a mere fable.[242]

The village of Nebbi Yunus is inhabited by Turcoman families. Some of their dwellings occupy a considerable space. Hearing that the owner of one of the largest wished to make serdaubs, or underground apartments for[Pg 484] summer, I offered, through my agent, Toma Shishman, to dig them for him, on condition that I should have all the relics and sculptures discovered during the excavations. By these means I was able to examine a small part of the mound.

After a few days’ labor, the workmen came to the walls of a chamber. They were panelled with inscribed, but unsculptured, alabaster slabs. The inscriptions merely contained the name, titles, and genealogy of Essarhaddon, such as were found on the bulls and sphinxes of the south-west palace at Nimroud. Several bricks and fragments of stone were also obtained from the ruins, but they all bore the same inscription. No remains whatever of more ancient building, and no relics of an earlier period were discovered during my residence at Mosul in the mound of the Prophet Jonah.

Since my return to England an inhabitant of the village, whilst digging the foundations of his house, uncovered a pair of colossal human-headed bulls, and two figures of the Assyrian Hercules slaying the lion, similar to those in the Louvre. He communicated his discovery at once to the English Vice-consul, who informed Mr. Hodder, the artist sent out by the Trustees of the British Museum. Through some neglect these interesting specimens were not visited and secured before others became acquainted with their existence, and endeavored to obtain possession of them. The Turkish authorities, of course, settled the claims of the rival antiquaries by seizing the sculptures for themselves. On several grounds this is much to be regretted. These remains will, however, probably prove to be of the time of Essarhaddon.

Three miles to the north of the inclosure of Kouyunjik, and on the bank of the Tigris, is a village called Shereef-Khan. Near it are several mounds. The largest, though[Pg 485] much inferior in size to the great ruins of Assyria, is distinguished, like those of Nimroud and Khorsabad, by a conical heap at one corner. For some time excavations were carried on in this mound under my superintendence, and discoveries of interest were made in it. At a small depth beneath the surface of the soil are the remains of a building. The walls of the chambers are of sun-dried bricks, but several slabs of alabaster, and painted and inscribed bricks were found in the ruins. A broad flight of alabaster steps appeared to connect an upper with a lower part of the edifice.

The inscriptions upon the bricks contain the names of Sargon and Sennacherib. Those of the former king read, “Sargon, king of Assyria, the city (or place) of the mound of the fort of Sargon I called it; a temple of the sun ... near it I built.” Other bricks mention a temple dedicated to Mars, or some other Assyrian deity.[243] There are several smaller mounds in the neighbourhood, which have not been explored.

At Nimroud the excavations had been almost suspended. A few Arabs, still working in the centre of the mound, had found the remains of sculptured walls, forming part of the edifice previously discovered there. The lower half of several colossal figures, amongst them winged men struggling with lions and mythic animals, had been preserved.

A few small objects of interest were discovered in different parts of the ruins, and some additional rooms were explored in the north-west and south-east palaces. In none of them, however, were there sculptures, or even inscriptions, except such as were impressed on bricks. The[Pg 486] bricks found amongst its ruins prove that it was built by the grandson of Essarhaddon, who must consequently have been one of the last of the Assyrian kings.

Several tombs containing vases, beads and ornaments, were discovered above the centre palace. A few large earthen jars from different parts of the mound, a number of small cups of peculiar shape from the ruins of the upper chambers, other pottery of various kinds, and some rude figures in baked clay, were the principal relics found during the excavations at Nimroud.

In the north-west palace was also discovered a duck, with its head turned upon its back, in greenstone, similar to that in white marble engraved in the first series of the Monuments of Nineveh. These two objects are of considerable interest, as we learn from short inscriptions upon them, deciphered by Dr. Hincks, that they are weights of thirty mana, or half a Babylonian talent.

They have been examined at the mint, and are found to weigh 40 lb. 4 oz. 4 dwt. 4 gr. and 39 lb. 1 oz. 1 dwt. 6 gr. The difference between them is owing to the head of one having been broken off.[244]

It may be inferred that two similar figures in baked clay, inscribed with Assyrian numerals, from the same ruins, and others of small size in agate, onyx, and other hard materials, are likewise weights, probably parts of the talent or of the mana. It is also highly probable that the curious series of bronze lions discovered at Nimroud[Pg 487] during my first researches were used for a like purpose. Since the coating of green rust has been removed from them, they are found in several instances to bear two short inscriptions, one in cuneiform characters with the name of Sennacherib, the other in Phœnician, or cursive Semetic letters, accompanied by parallel lines or notches cut in the bronze. Dr. Lepsius has recently published a bas-relief from an Egyptian tomb, representing a man weighing rings of gold or silver, with weights in the form of a bull’s head, and of a seated lion with a ring on its back, precisely similar to those from Nineveh, now in the British Museum.

The engraved cylinders or gems, of which a large collection was brought by me to England, form an important as well as an interesting class of Assyrian and Babylonian antiquities. They vary in size, from about two inches to a quarter of an inch, and are either circular, or barrel-shaped, or slightly curved inwards. They are usually of lapis-lazuli, rock-crystal, cornelian, amethyst, chalcedony, agate, onyx, jasper, quartz, serpentine, sienite, oriental alabaster, green felspar, and hæmatite. The workmanship varies in different specimens, that of some being of considerable sharpness and delicacy, and that of others so coarse as scarcely to enable us to recognise the objects engraved upon them. The subjects are generally either religious or historical, usually the former, and on many are short inscriptions in the cuneiform character. These cylinders belong to several distinct periods. The most ancient with which I am acquainted are those of the time of the kings who built the oldest edifices hitherto discovered at Nineveh. The subjects are usually the king in his chariot discharging his arrows against a lion or wild bull, warriors in battle, the monarch or priests in adoration before the emblem of the deity, the eagle-headed god, winged bulls[Pg 488] and lions, and other mythic animals, accompanied by the common Assyrian symbols, the sun, the moon, the seven stars, the winged globe, the sacred tree, and the wedge or cuneatic element.

The next in order of date are those of the time of Sargon and his successors. To this period belong the cylinder with the fish-god, and that which I believe to be the signet of Sennacherib himself, described in a previous part of this work.[245] A very fine specimen, cut in agate, represents an Assyrian goddess, perhaps Astarte, or the Moon, surrounded by ten stars, with a dog seated before her. In front of her is the moon’s crescent, and a priest in an attitude of adoration. A tree and a rampant goat, both common Assyrian symbols, complete the group. On others of the same age we find the gods represented under various forms, the king and priests worshipping before them, altars and various signs peculiar to the period, and the usual mythic emblems.

The pure Babylonian cylinders are more commonly found in European collections than the Assyrian. They are usually engraved with sacred figures, accompanied by a short inscription in the Babylonian cuneiform character, containing the names of the owner of the seal and of the divinity, under whose particular protection he had probably placed himself. They are usually cut in a red iron ore or hæmatite, which appears to have been a favorite material for such objects. Many specimens, however, are in agate, jasper, and other hard substances.

A class of cylinders of very rude workmanship, and usually in hæmatite, are probably of the latest Babylonian period. Upon them are usually found the figures of various deities, and especially of Venus, sometimes represented with the waters of life flowing from her breasts.

[Pg 489]A few cylinders and gems, Assyrian in character, are inscribed with Semetic letters, resembling the Phœnician and cursive Babylonian. They are rare, and have chiefly been found, I believe, in ruins on the banks of the Euphrates to the north of Babylon, near Hit and Ana. I would attribute them, therefore, to the Semetic population which inhabited the districts on the eastern borders of the Syrian desert. They appear to belong to various periods, from the time of the lower Assyrian dynasty (of which three fine specimens are in possession of Captain Jones of Baghdad) to that of the Persian occupation of Babylonia.

Persian cylinders frequently bear an inscription in the cuneiform character peculiar to the monuments of the Achæmenian dynasty. The most interesting specimen of this class is the well-known gem of green chalcedony in the British Museum, on which is engraved king Darius in his chariot, with his name and that of his father. This was probably a royal signet. Another, in the same collection, bears the name of one Arsaces, who appears to have been a chamberlain, or to have held some other office in the Persian court. A very fine cylinder in rock crystal, brought by me to this country, and now also in the British Museum, has the god Ormuzd represented as at Persepolis, raised by two winged bulls with human heads, above an oval, containing the image of a king. The engraving on this gem is remarkable for its delicacy and minuteness.

Persian cylinders are recognised at once by the draperies of the figures, gathered up into folds, as in the sculptures of the Achæmenian dynasty, a peculiarity never found on pure Assyrian or Babylonian monuments; by the crown of the king; by the form of the supreme deity,[Pg 490] or Ormuzd and by the monstrous animals, resembling the sculptures on the walls of Persepolis.

It has been conjectured that these cylinders were amulets engraved with a kind of horoscope of the owner, or with the figures of the deities who were supposed to preside over his nativity and fortunes. But it is evident from the specimens above described, that they were seals or signets to be impressed on clay and other materials on which public and private documents were written. Herodotus states that the Babylonians were accustomed to have their signets constantly with them, as a modern Eastern always carries his seal.[246]

The seal was evidently rolled on the moist clay, at the same time as the letters were impressed.[247] The tablet was then placed in the furnace and baked. All these cylinders have been pierced, and one specimen, found by my workmen in a mound in the desert near the Sinjar, still retained its copper setting. They revolved upon a metal axis, like a garden rolling-stone.

Such then were the objects of sculpture and the smaller relics found at Nimroud and Kouyunjik. I will now endeavour to convey to the reader, in conclusion, a general idea of the results of the excavations, as far as they may tend to increase our acquaintance with the history of Assyria, and to illustrate the religion, the arts, and the manners of her inhabitants.
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