Part 22 (1/2)
With the exception of a few rudely engraved gems and enamelled bricks, this was the only relic I obtained from the Mujelibe
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 lass
The last ruin I exareat extent, so village of that name, and sometimes, as stated by Rich, Amran ben Ali, from a Koubbe, or small domed tomb, of a Mohammedan saint on its summit No masonry is here seen as in the Mujelibe All re, are deeply buried beneath the loose nitrous earth It is traversed by innuular 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 hly 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 Soures, la out of it, are evidently of the time of the Seleucidae 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 Museust the antiquities recently purchased by the Trustees frohdad, where they are sometimes offered for sale by the Arabs; but it is not known froht The characters upon them are in form not unlike the Hebrew, and on some they resembled the Sabaean 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 entleenuity as a Hebrew scholar Mr E has succeeded, afterthe 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 Jeere 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, Benja the cities of the captivity to seek the re the Persian do 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 have been a turbulent race, rebelling against their rulers and waging civil war ast themselves They had celebrated schools in many cities of assyria and Chaldaea
As early as the third century Hebrew travellers visited Babylon, and some of them have left records of the state of their country 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 fahth and ninth centuries we have further mention of these colonies
In the twelfth century, Benja within twenty ue, 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 worshi+p, in every town he visited, keeping during his journey an exact daily itinerary, which includes nearly all the stations on the eration 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 soer at Hillah, and in Baghdad the principal native trade and money transactions are carried on by Jeho 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 frorees, and traced their lineage to the princes and prophets of Judah Their chief resided at Baghdad, and his title was ”Lord Prince of the Captivity” He was lineally descended, according to his people, froed 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 eold[208]
We ed to Jews of Babylonia and Chaldaea Similar relics have been found as I have stated in many ruins near Babylon I discovered an entire bowl, as well asout of a hdad and Hillah, but they were unfortunately dispersed or destroyed before I could obtain possession of the 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 ritten We must endeavour to form some opinion upon such internal evidence as they may afford Mr Ellis re 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 Chaldaean, and appear to have been invented for the purpose of writing the cuneiform character in a more cursive and expeditious uage of the assyrian inscriptions as closely rese that on the bowls The relics, however, are evidently of different dates The ht be referred to the second or third century before Christ, but may be of a later period
Others are undoubtedly of a ht even have been written as late as the fifth century of our era The Syriac characters on the latter bowl appear to have in, and on a bowl from Mr Stewart's collection there is an inscription, unfortunately aler decipherable, in that peculiar character still used by the Sabaeans of Susiana
In the forels, 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 alsoof 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 i was to be dissolved in water, to be drank as a cure against disease, or a precaution against the arts of witchcraft and ic Similar remedies are still resorted to in the East in cases of obstinate illness, and there are Mullahs who make the preparation of such charenerally consist of sentences frons 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 cererave
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 REshi+D--THE GEBEL SHAMMAR--THE MOUNDS OF EL HYMER--OF ANANA
Such then were the discoveries ast 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 ht--giving no clue whatever to the original fored If the tradition be true that Xerxes, to punish the Babylonians and humiliate their priests, ordered thereat public edifices, and that Alexander the Great employed 10,000 men in vain to clear away the rubbish fro that with a sress should have been s
No sculptures or inscribed slabs, the panelling of the walls of palaces, have been discovered ast 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 iround”[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 re purposes could only be obtained frost the Babylonians for carving detached figures, and for architectural ornast the ruins, came from the Kurdish mountains, or from the north of Mesopotaris on rafts from those districts The assyrian alabaster could have been brought from Nineveh, and the water coreat 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 the materials which they found on the spot With the tenacious mud of their alluvial plains, mixed with chopped straw, they made bricks, whilst bituhborhood furnished thee of the art ofcolors, enabled the them equally ornamental for the exterior and interior of their edifices The walls of their palaces and tees in the Bible, withfroers of the man's hand wrote the words of condemnation of the Babylonian e's palace”[213] Upon those walls were painted historical and religious subjects, and various orna to Diodorus Siculus, the bricks were enaes of stone were no doubt introduced into the buildings We learn froures 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
On one of the ht to this country we have sohly curious notices of the architecture of the Babylonians
They are contained in tablets inscribed upon a black stone, and divided into ten colu to Dr Hincks, with the naan, it may be inferred from Ptole of Babylon, son of Nabubaluchun, king of Babylon”
Wefrom 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 co of many doubtful words accurately ascertained,to Babylonian architecture The walls were built of burned bricks and bituypsum and other materials Some seem to have been wainscotted
Over these walls ork, 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] Soilt, other parts silvered: and a large portion of it was brought from Lebanon