We have thus represented, with remarkable fidelity and spirit[41], the several processes employed to place these colossi where they still stand, from the transport down the river of the rough block to the final removal of the sculptured figure to the palace. From these bas-reliefs we find that the Assyrians were well acquainted with the lever and the roller, and that they ingeniously made use of the former by carrying with them wedges, of different dimensions, and probably of wood, to vary the height of the fulcrum. When moving the winged bulls and lions now in the British Museum from the ruins to the banks of the Tigris, I used almost the same means. The Assyrians, like the Egyptians, had made considerable progress in rope twisting, an art now only known in its rudest state in the same part of the East. The cables appear to be of great length and thickness, and ropes of various dimensions are represented in the sculptures.
On comparing representations of similar works among the Egyptians, it will be found that they succeeded in removing masses of stone far exceeding in weight any sculpture which has yet been discovered in Assyria. Yet it is a singular fact, that whilst the quarries of Egypt bear witness of themselves to the stupendous nature of the works of the ancient inhabitants of the country, and still show on their sides engraved records of those who made them, no traces whatever, notwithstanding the most careful research, have yet been found to indicate from whence the builders of the Assyrian palaces obtained their large slabs of alabaster. That they were in the immediate neighbourhood of Nineveh there is scarcely any reason to doubt, as strata of this material, easily accessible, abound, not only in the hills but in the plains. This very abundance may have rendered any particular quarry unnecessary, and blocks were probably taken as required from convenient spots, which have since been covered by the soil.
There can be no doubt, as will hereafter be shown, that the king represented as superintending the building of the mounds and the placing of the colossal bulls is Sennacherib himself, and that the sculptures celebrate the building at Nineveh of the great palace and its adjacent temples described in the inscriptions as the work of this monarch. Unfortunately only fragments of the epigraphs have been preserved. From them it would appear that the transport of more than one object was represented on the walls. Besides bulls and sphynxes in stone are mentioned figures in some kind of wood, perhaps of olive, like “the two cherubims of olive tree, each ten cubits high,” in the temple of Solomon.[42] Over the king superintending the removal of one of these colossi is the following short inscription thus translated by Dr. Hincks:—
“Sennacherib, king of Assyria, the great figures of bulls, which in the land of Belad, were made for his royal palace at Nineveh, he transported thither.” (?)
The land of Belad, mentioned in these inscriptions, appears to have been a district in the immediate vicinity of Nineveh, and probably on the Tigris, as these great masses of stone would have been quarried near the river for the greater convenience of moving them to the palace. The district of Belad may indeed have been that in which the city itself stood.
Over the representation of the building of the mound there were two epigraphs, both precisely similar, but both unfortunately much mutilated. As far as they can be restored, they have thus been interpreted by Dr. Hincks:—
“Sennacherib, king of Assyria. Hewn stones, which, as the gods[43] willed, were found in the land of Belad, for the walls (?) (or foundations, the word reads ‘shibri’) of my palace, I caused the inhabitants of foreign countries (?) and the people of the forests (Kershani), the great bulls for the gates of my palace to drag (?) (or bring).”
If this inscription be rightly rendered, we have direct evidence that captives from foreign countries were employed in the great public works undertaken by the Assyrian kings, as we were led to infer, from the variety of costume represented in the bas-reliefs, and from the fetters on the legs of some of the workmen. The Jews themselves, after their captivity, may have been thus condemned to labor, as their forefathers had been in Egypt, in erecting the monuments of their conquerors; and we may, perhaps, recognise them amongst the builders portrayed in the sculptures.
From the long gallery, we have unfortunately only three fragments of inscriptions without the sculptured representations of the events recorded. The most perfect is interesting on more than one account. According to Dr. Hincks it is to be translated:—
“Sennacherib, king of Assyria ... (some object, the nature not ascertained) of wood, which from the Tigris I caused to be brought up (through ?) the Kharri, or Khasri, on sledges (or boats), I caused to be carried (or to mount).”