Part 28 (1/2)

In the custom, frequently alluded to in the inscriptions, of removing the inhabitants of conquered cities and districts to distant parts of the empire, and of replacing them by colonists from Nineveh or from other subdued countries, we have another interesting ill.u.s.tration of Scripture history. It has generally been inferred that there was but one carrying away, or at the most two, of the people of Samaria, although three, at least, appear to be distinctly alluded to in the Bible; the first, by Pul;[268] the second, by Tiglath-Pileser[269]; the third, by Shalmaneser.[270] It was not until the time of the last king that Samaria was destroyed as an independent kingdom. On former occasions only the inhabitants of the surrounding towns and villages seem to have been taken as captives. Such we find to have been the case with many other nations who were subdued or punished for rebellion by the a.s.syrians. The conquerors, too, as we also learn from the inscriptions, established the wors.h.i.+p of their own G.o.ds in the conquered cities, raising altars and temples, and appointing priests for their service. So after the fall of Samaria, the strangers who were placed in its cities, ”made G.o.ds of their own and put them in the houses of the high places which the Samaritans had made.”[271]

The vast number of families thus sent to dwell in distant countries, must have wrought great changes in the physical condition, language, and religion of the people with which they were intermixed. When the a.s.syrian records are with more certainty interpreted, we may, perhaps, be able to explain many of the anomalies of ancient Eastern philology and comparative geography.

We further gather from the records of the campaigns of the a.s.syrian kings, that the country, both in Mesopotamia and to the west of the Euphrates, now included in the general term of ”the Desert,” was at that remote period, teeming with a dense population both sedentary and nomade; that cities, towns, and villages arose on all sides; and that, consequently, the soil brought forth produce for the support of this great congregation of human beings. All those settlements depended almost exclusively upon artificial irrigation. Hence the dry beds of enormous ca.n.a.ls and countless watercourses, which are spread like a network over the face of the country. Even the traveller, accustomed to the triumphs of modern science and civilization, gazes with wonder and awe upon these gigantic works, and reflects with admiration upon the industry, the skill, and the power of those who made them. And may not the waters be again turned into the empty channels, and may not life be again spread over those parched and arid wastes? Upon them no other curse has alighted than that of a false religion and a listless race.

Of the information as to the religious system of the a.s.syrians which may be derived from the inscriptions, I am still unwilling to treat in the present state of our knowledge of their contents. A far more intimate acquaintance with the character than we yet possess is required before the translation of such doc.u.ments can be fully relied on. All we can now venture to infer is, that the a.s.syrians wors.h.i.+pped one supreme G.o.d, as the great national deity under whose immediate and special protection they lived, and their empire existed. The name of this G.o.d appears to have been a.s.shur, as nearly as can be determined, at present, from the inscriptions.

It was identified with that of the empire itself, always called ”the country of a.s.shur;” it entered into those of both kings and private persons, and was also applied to particular cities. With a.s.shur, but apparently far inferior to him in the celestial hierarchy, although called the great G.o.ds, were a.s.sociated twelve other deities, whose names I have given in table No. 3. Some of them may possibly be identified with the divinities of the Greek Pantheon, although it is scarcely wise to hazard conjectures which must ere long be again abandoned. These twelve G.o.ds may also have presided over the twelve months of the year, and the vast number of still inferior G.o.ds, in one inscription, I believe, stated to be no less than 4000, over the days of the year, various phenomena and productions of nature, and the celestial bodies. It is difficult to understand such a system of polytheism, unless we suppose that whilst there was but one supreme G.o.d, represented sometimes under a triune form, all the so-called inferior G.o.ds were originally mere names for events and outward things, or symbols and myths. Although at one time generally accepted as such even by the common people, their true meaning was only known in a corrupted age to the priests, by whom they were turned into a mystery and a trade. It may, indeed, be inferred from many pa.s.sages in the Scriptures, that a system of theology not far differing from the a.s.syrian prevailed at times amongst the Jews themselves. a.s.shur is generally, if not always, typified by the winged figure in the circle.[272]

The question as to the s.p.a.ce occupied by the city of Nineveh at the time of its greatest prosperity is still far from being set at rest. Col.

Rawlinson, founding his opinion upon the names on bricks from the several sites, believes the inclosures of Nimroud, Kouyunjik, and Khorsabad, and the small mounds of Shereef-Khan, scarcely three miles from Kouyunjik, as well as others in the immediate neighbourhood, to be the remains of distinct cities. He would even separate the mound of Nebbi Yunus from Kouyunjik, identifying the former with Nineveh, and making the latter a mere suburb. A glance at the plan of the ruins will show this conjecture to be quite untenable. Discoveries in both mounds prove that they belong to nearly the same period, and that Nebbi Yunus is the more recent of the two. The supposition that any of these groups of mounds represent alone the city of Nineveh can in no way be reconciled with the accounts in Scripture and in the Greek authors, which so remarkably coincide as to its extent; a difficulty which leads Col. Rawlinson to say, that all these ruins ”formed one of that group of cities which, in the time of the prophet Jonah, were known by the common name of Nineveh.” It is indeed true, that, on bricks from different mounds, distinct names appear to be given to each locality, and that those from Kouyunjik are inscribed with the name of Nineveh, whilst those from Nimroud and Khorsabad bear others which have not yet been satisfactorily deciphered. These names are preceded by a determinative monogram a.s.sumed to signify a city, but which undoubtedly also applies to a fort or fortified palace. Nahum describes Nineveh as a city of many strongholds and gates,[273] and such I believe it to have been, each fort or stronghold having a different name. The most important, as it was the best defended, may at one time have been the palace at Kouyunjik, which being especially called Nineveh, gave its name to the whole city. By no other supposition can we reconcile the united testimony of ancient writers as to the great size of Nineveh with the present remains.

It is very doubtful whether these fortified inclosures contained many buildings beside the royal palaces, and such temples and public edifices as were attached to them. At Nimroud, excavations were made in various parts of the inclosed s.p.a.ce, and it was carefully examined with a view to ascertain whether any foundations or remains of houses still existed. None were discovered except at the south-eastern corner, where the height of the earth above the usual level at once showed the existence of ruins. In most parts of the inclosure, the natural soil seems never to have been disturbed, and in some places the conglomerate rock is almost denuded of earth.

Such is also the case opposite Mosul. The remains of one or two buildings appear to exist within the inclosure; but in the greater part there are no indications whatever of ancient edifices, and the conglomerate rock is, as at Nimroud, on a level with the surrounding soil.

At Khorsabad, the greater part of the inclosed s.p.a.ce is so much _below_ the surrounding country, that it is covered with a marsh formed by the small river Khauser, which flows near the ruins. Within the walls, which are scarcely more than a mile square, can only be traced the remains of one or two buildings, and of a propylaeum, standing below the platform, and above two hundred yards from the ascent to the palace[274], but they are at once perceived by well-defined inequalities in the soil.

If the walls forming the inclosures of Khorsabad and other a.s.syrian ruins were the outer defences of a city, abruptly facing the open country, it is difficult to account for the fact of the palace having been built in the same line, and actually forming part of them. All access to it must have been strongly fortified, and even the view over the surrounding country, the chief object of such a position, must have been shut out.

After several careful excavations of the ruins and of the s.p.a.ces inclosed by the ramparts of earth, I am still inclined to the opinion that they were royal dwellings with their dependent buildings, and parks or paradises, fortified like the palace-temples of Egypt, capable of standing a prolonged siege, and a place of refuge for the inhabitants in case of invasion. They may have been called by different names, but they were all included within the area of that great city known to the Jews and to the Greeks as Nineveh. I will not pretend to say that the whole of this vast s.p.a.ce was thickly inhabited or built upon. As I have elsewhere observed, we must not judge of Eastern cities by those of Europe.[275] In Asia, gardens and orchards, containing suburbs and even distinct villages, collected round a walled city are all included by the natives under one general name. Such is the case with Isfahan and Damascus, and such I believe it to have been with ancient Nineveh.

A few remarks are necessary on the additional information afforded by recent discoveries as to the architecture and architectural decorations, external and internal, of the a.s.syrian palaces. The inscriptions on their walls, especially on those of Kouyunjik and Khorsabad, appear to contain important and even minute details, not only as to their general plan and mode of construction, but even as to the materials employed for their different parts, and for the objects of sculpture and ornaments placed in them. This fact furnishes another remarkable a.n.a.logy between the records of the Jewish and the a.s.syrian kings. To the history of their monarchs and of their nation, the Hebrew chroniclers have added a full account of the building and adornments of the temple and palaces of Solomon. In both cases, from the use of technical words, we can scarcely hope to understand, with any degree of certainty, all the details. It is impossible to comprehend, by the help of the descriptions alone, the plan or appearance of the temple of Solomon. This arises not only from our being unacquainted with the exact meaning of various Hebrew architectural terms, but also from the difficulty experienced even in ordinary cases, of restoring from mere description an edifice of any kind. In the a.s.syrian inscriptions we labor, of course, under still greater disadvantages. The language in which they are written is as yet but very imperfectly known, and although we may be able to explain with some confidence the general meaning of the historical paragraphs, yet when we come to technical words relating to architecture, even with a very intimate acquaintance with the a.s.syrian tongue, we could scarcely hope to ascertain their precise signification. On the other hand, the materials, and the general plan of the a.s.syrian palaces are still preserved, whilst of the great edifices of the Jews, not a fragment of masonry, nor the smallest remains are left to guide us. The architecture of the one people, however, may be ill.u.s.trated by that of the other. With the help of the sacred books, and of the ruins of the palaces of Nineveh, together with that of cotemporary and later remains, as well as from customs still existing in the East, we may, to a certain extent, restore the princ.i.p.al buildings of both nations.

Before suggesting a general restoration of the royal edifices of Nineveh, I shall endeavor to point out the a.n.a.logies which appear to exist between their actual remains and what is recorded of the temple and palaces of Solomon. In the first place, as Sennacherib in his inscriptions declares himself to have done, the Jewish king sent the bearers of burdens and the hewers into the mountains to bring great stones, costly stones, and hewed stones[276], to lay the foundations, which were probably artificial platforms, resembling the a.s.syrian mounds, though constructed of more solid materials. We have the remains of such a terrace or stage of stone masonry, perhaps built by king Solomon himself, at Baalbec. The enormous size of some of the hewn stones existing in that structure, and of those still seen in the quarries, some being more than sixty feet long, has excited the wonder of modern travellers. The dimensions of the temple of Jerusalem, threescore cubits long[277], twenty broad, and thirty high, were much smaller than those of the great edifices explored in a.s.syria.

Solomon's own palace, however, appears to have been considerably larger, and to have more nearly approached in its proportions those of the kings of Nineveh, for it was one hundred cubits long, fifty broad, and thirty high. ”The porch before the temple,” twenty cubits by ten,[278] may have been a propylaeum, such as was discovered at Khorsabad in front of the palace. The chambers, with the exception of the oracle, were exceedingly small, the largest being only seven cubits broad, ”for without, _in the wall_ of the house, he made numerous rests round about, that _the beams_ should not be fastened in the walls of the house.” The words in italics are inserted in our version to make good the sense, and may consequently not convey the exact meaning, which may be, that these chambers were thus narrow that the beams might be supported without the use of pillars, a reason already suggested for the narrowness of the greater number of chambers in the a.s.syrian palaces. These smaller rooms appear to have been built round a large central chamber, called the oracle, the whole arrangement thus corresponding with the halls and surrounding rooms at Nimroud, Khorsabad, and Kouyunjik. The oracle itself was twenty cubits square, smaller far in dimensions than the Nineveh halls; but it was twenty cubits _high_--an important fact, ill.u.s.trative of a.s.syrian architecture, for as the building was thirty cubits in height, the oracle must not only have been much loftier than the adjoining chambers, but must have had an upper structure of ten cubits.[279] Within it were the two cherubim of olive wood ten cubits high, with wings each five cubits long, ”and he carved all the house around with carved figures of cherubim and palm trees, and open flowers, within and without.” The cherubim have been described by Biblical commentators as mythic figures, uniting the human head with the body of a lion, or an ox, and the wings of an eagle.[280]

If for the palm trees we subst.i.tute the sacred tree of the Nineveh sculptures, and for the open flowers the a.s.syrian tulip-shaped ornament--objects most probably very nearly resembling each other--we find that the oracle of the temple was almost identical, in general form and in its ornaments, with some of the chambers of Nimroud and Khorsabad. In the a.s.syrian halls, too, the winged human-headed bulls were on the side of the wall, and their wings, like those of the cherubim, ”touched one another in the midst of the house.”[281] The dimensions of these figures were in some cases nearly the same, namely, fifteen feet square. The doors were also carved with cherubim and palm trees, and open flowers, and thus, with the other parts of the building, corresponded with those of the a.s.syrian palaces. On the walls at Nineveh the only addition appears to have been the introduction of the human form and the image of the king, which were an abomination to the Jews. The pomegranates and lilies of Solomon's temple must have been nearly identical with the usual a.s.syrian ornament, in which, and particularly at Khorsabad, the pomegranate frequently takes the place of the tulip and the cone.

But the description given by Josephus of the interior of one of Solomon's houses, already quoted by Mr. Fergusson in support of his ingenious arguments, even more completely corresponds with, and ill.u.s.trates the chambers in the palaces of Nineveh. ”Solomon built some of these (houses) with stones of ten cubits, and _wainscoted the walls with other stones that were sawed_, and were of great value, such as were dug out of the bowels of the earth, for ornaments of temples, &c. The arrangement of the curious workmans.h.i.+p of these stones was in three rows; but the fourth was pre-eminent for the beauty of its sculpture, for on it were represented trees, and all sorts of plants, with the shadows caused by their branches and the leaves that hung down from them. These trees and plants covered the stone that was beneath them, and their leaves were wrought so wonderfully thin and subtile, that they appeared almost in motion; but the rest of the wall, up to the roof, was plastered over, and, as it were, wrought over with various colors and pictures.”[282]

To complete the a.n.a.logy between the two edifices, it would appear that Solomon was seven years building the temple, and Sennacherib about the same time building his great palace at Kouyunjik.[283]

The ceiling, roof, and beams of the temple were of cedar wood. The discoveries in the ruins at Nimroud show that the same precious wood was used in the a.s.syrian edifices; and the king of Nineveh, as we learn from the inscriptions, employed men, precisely as Solomon had done, to cut it in Mount Lebanon. Fir was also employed in the Jewish buildings, and probably in those of a.s.syria.[284]

In the proposed restoration of the palace at Kouyunjik from the existing remains, the building does not face the cardinal points of the compa.s.s. I will, however, a.s.sume, for convenience sake, that it stands due north and south. To the west, therefore, it immediately overlooked the Tigris; and on that side was one of its princ.i.p.al facades. The edifice must have risen on the very edge of the platform, the foot of which was at that time washed by the river. If, therefore, there were any access to the palace on the river front, it must necessarily have been by a flight of steps, or an inclined way leading down to the water's edge, and there might have been great stairs parallel to the bas.e.m.e.nt wall as at Persepolis. Although from the fact of there having been a grand entrance to the palace on this side, it is highly probable that some such approach once existed, no remains whatever of it have been discovered. The western facade, like the eastern, was formed by five pairs of human-headed bulls, and numerous colossal figures[285], forming three distinct gateways.

The princ.i.p.al approach to the palace appears, however, to have been on the eastern side, where the great bulls bearing the annals of Sennacherib still stand. In the frontispiece I have been able, by the a.s.sistance of Mr. Fergusson, to give a restoration of this magnificent facade and entrance. Inclined ways, or broad flights of steps, appear to have led up to it from the foot of the platform, and the remains of them, consisting of huge squared stones, are still seen in the ravines, which are but the ancient ascents, deepened by the winter rains of centuries. From this grand entrance direct access could be had to all the princ.i.p.al halls and chambers in the palace; that on the western face, as appears from the ruins, only opened into a set of eight rooms.

The chambers. .h.i.therto explored appear to have been grouped round three great halls. It must be borne in mind, however, that the palace extended considerably to the north-east of the grand entrance, and that there may have been another hall, and similar dependent chambers in that part of the edifice. Only a part of the palace has been hitherto excavated, and we are not in possession of a perfect ground-plan of it.

The general arrangement of the chambers at Kouyunjik is similar to that of Khorsabad, though the extent of the building is very much greater. It is also to be remarked that the Khorsabad mound falls gradually to the level of the plain, apparently showing the remains of a succession of broad terraces, and that parts of the palace, such as the propylaea, were actually beneath the platform, and removed some distance from it in the midst of the walled inclosure. At Kouyunjik, however, the whole of the royal edifice, with its dependent buildings, appears to have stood on the summit of the artificial bas.e.m.e.nt[286], whose lofty perpendicular sides could only have been accessible by steps, or inclined ways. No propylaea, or other edifices connected with the palace, have as yet been discovered below the platform.

The inscriptions appear to refer to four distinct parts of the palace, three of which, inhabited by the women, seem subsequently to have been reduced to one. It is not clear whether they were all on the ground-floor, or whether they formed different stories. Mr. Fergusson, in his ingenious work on the restoration of the palaces of Nineveh, in which he has, with great learning and research, fully examined the subject of the architecture of the a.s.syrians and ancient Persians, availing himself of the facts then furnished by the discoveries, endeavors to divide the Khorsabad palace, after the manner of modern Mussulman houses, into the Salamlik or apartments of the men, and the Harem or those of the women.

The division he suggests, must, of course, depend upon conjecture; but it may, I think, be considered as highly probable, until fuller and more accurate translations of the inscriptions than can yet be made may furnish us with some positive data on the subject. In the ruins of Kouyunjik there is nothing, as far as I am aware, to mark the distinction between the male and female apartments. Of a temple no remains have as yet been found at Kouyunjik, nor is there any high conical mound as at Nimroud and Khorsabad.

In all the a.s.syrian edifices. .h.i.therto explored, we have the same general interior plan. On the four sides of the great halls are two or three narrow parallel chambers opening one into the other. Most of them have doorways at each and leading into smaller rooms, which have no other outlet. It seems highly probable that this uniform plan was adopted with reference to the peculiar architectural arrangements required by the building, and I agree with Mr. Fergusson in attributing it to the mode resorted to for lighting the apartments.

In my former work I expressed a belief that the chambers received light through an opening in the roof. Although this may have been the case in some instances, yet recent discoveries now prove that the a.s.syrian palaces had more than one story. Such being the fact, it is evident that other means must have been adopted to admit daylight to the inner rooms on the ground-floor. Mr. Fergusson's suggestion, that the upper part of the halls and princ.i.p.al chambers was formed by a row of pillars supporting the ceiling and admitting a free circulation of light and air, appears to me to meet, to a certain extent, the difficulty. It has, moreover, been borne out by subsequent discoveries, and by the representation of a large building, apparently a palace, on one of the bas-reliefs discovered at Kouyunjik. In the restoration of the exterior of the Kouyunjik palace forming the frontispiece to this volume, a somewhat similar capital has been adopted in preference to that taken by Mr. Fergusson from Persepolis, which, although undoubtedly like the other architectural details of those celebrated ruins, a.s.syrian in character, are not authorised by any known a.s.syrian remains.

A row of pillars, or of alternate pillars and masonry, would answer the purpose intended, if they opened into a well-lighted hall. Yet inner chambers, such as are found in the ruins of Kouyunjik, must have remained in almost entire darkness. And it is not improbable that such was the case, to judge from modern Eastern houses, in which the absence of light is considered essential to secure a cool temperature. The sculptures and decorations in them could then only be seen by torchlight. The great halls were probably in some cases entirely open to the air, like the court-yards of the modern houses of Mosul, whose walls are still adorned with sculptured alabaster. When they were covered in the roof was borne by enormous pillars of wood or brickwork, and rose so far above the surrounding part of the building, that light was admitted by columns and b.u.t.tresses immediately beneath the ceiling. It is most probable that there were two or three stories of chambers opening into them, either by columns or by windows. Such appears to have been the case in Solomon's temple; for Josephus tells us that the great inner sanctuary was surrounded by small rooms, ”over these rooms were other rooms, and others above them, equal both in their measure and numbers, and that these reached to a height equal to the _lower part_ of the house, for the upper had no buildings about it.” We have also an ill.u.s.tration of this arrangement of chambers in the modern houses of some parts of Persia, in which a great central hall, called an Iwan, rises to the top of the building, and has small rooms in two or three separate stories, opening by windows into it, whilst the inner chambers, having no windows at all, have no more light than that which reaches them through the door. Sometimes these side chambers open into a centre court, as I have suggested may have been the case in the Nineveh palaces, then a projecting roof of woodwork protects the carved and painted walls from injury by the weather. Curtains and awnings were also suspended above the windows and entrances, to ward off the rays of the sun.

Although no remains or even traces of pillars have hitherto been discovered in the a.s.syrian ruins, I now think it highly probable, as suggested by Mr. Fergusson, that they were used to support the roof. It is curious, however, that no stone pedestals, upon which wooden columns may have rested, have been found in the ruins, nor are there marks of them on the pavement. I can scarcely account for the entire absence of all such traces. However, unless some support of this kind were resorted to, it is impossible that even the large chambers at Kouyunjik, without including the central halls, could have been covered in. The great hall, or house as it is rendered in the Bible,[287] of the forest of Lebanon was thirty cubits high, upon four rows of cedar pillars with cedar beams upon the pillars. The a.s.syrian kings, we have seen, cut wood in the same forests as King Solomon; and probably used it for the same purposes, namely, for pillars, beams, and ceilings. The dimensions of this hall, 100 cubits (about 150 feet) by 50 cubits (75 feet), very much resemble those of the centre halls of the palaces of Nineveh. ”The porch of pillars” was fifty cubits in length; equal, therefore, to the breadth of the hall, of which I presume it to have been an inclosed s.p.a.ce at the upper end, whilst ”the porch for the throne where he might judge, even the porch of judgment ...