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 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 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 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.
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 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 hyaena
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, 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 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
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 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 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 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.
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
Chaldaean: 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 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
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.
[Illustration: 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, 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]
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, 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 Seleucidae 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 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 Achaemenian
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.
[Illustration: 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 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 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
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 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 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 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 Phoenician, 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
haematite. 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 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 haematite, 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 haematite,
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.
A few cylinders and gems, Assyrian in character, are inscribed with
Semetic letters, resembling the Phoenician 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 Achaemenian 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 Achaemenian dynasty, a
peculiarity never found on pure Assyrian or Babylonian monuments; by the
crown of the king; by the form of the supreme deity, 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.