The romance of excavation

by David Masters

The removal of the sculptures from the ruins and their safe transport to England, was not the least of the many problems that Layard had to solve. The river Tigris was the only highway to the sea, and as it was too shallow to allow steamers to steam up to Mosul, it was necessary to build rafts to float the sculptures down to Basra, where they could be transhipped to the vessels that were to take them to England. It needed a deal of persuasion to induce a native to build a raft big enough to support the weighty lion and the bull. The raft was eventually constructed and supported by six hundred sheep and goat skins, every one of which had to be blown up by the mouth of the raftsman and tied securely. It was a task which must have severely tested the lungs and temper of the blower.

Layard made his plans carefully. As no timber was available, a man was sent high up the river to cut down mulberry trees to make a rude cart for transporting the bull and lion to the river edge. The trees were floated down the Tigris, and four solid wooden wheels a foot thick were cut out of the trunks and bound with iron. Big beams formed the body of the cart, and when it was ready half the population of Mosul crowded to see the buffaloes drag it over the bridge of boats spanning the river.

The bull was buried 20 feet deep in the earth. Layard had no tackle for lifting a weight of fifty tons, so his diggers cut a sloping road from the statue to the edge of the mound, paving it with planks of wood. The bull, which stood upright, was to be lowered on its side to a frame of strong planks. The ropes were placed round the bull, and over a mighty rock some distance away. Scores of men slowly paid out the ropes, while the bull canted over on its side. The statue was about 5 feet from the ground, when all the ropes broke, the men fell backwards in a heap, and the bull descended with a crash.

Layard rushed down from his post expecting to find it shattered, but it proved to be quite uninjured by its fall. Then the men began to haul the bull over rollers to the edge of the mound. The noise made by the onlookers was deafening. They danced and shouted and behaved like mad people. Gradually the bull was pulled up the incline until it stood just above the cart, which had been placed in an excavation to bring it on a level with the end of the road. The earth was dug away from under the bull, and it slowly settled in the cart.

That was the beginning of a few strenuous days full of troubles. The buffaloes, upon being harnessed up, refused to pull. Cracking whips and the shouts of Arabs alike failed to have any effect, so at last they were taken out, and three hundred natives caught hold of the ropes and began to drag the cart to the river. The road had been carefully surveyed to make sure that there were no secret holes in which the villagers were wont to store their corn, but unluckily one was overlooked. A perverse fate directed the cart straight to it, and before any one realized what was happening a wheel suddenly sank into the covered hole, nearly capsizing the rough cart.

Spades and timbers were brought to the spot, and the natives dug and hauled with all their might, but it was night before the cart was extricated. The next day saw the long lines of Arabs straining at the cart once more, and this time progress was stopped by a bed of soft sand in which the wheels sank. Not until the third day was the great bull brought down to the water’s edge.

Here it remained until the melting snows on the Kurdish mountains made the river rise, and when there was a sufficient depth of water to float the bull down to Basra, the final task was undertaken. A slipway of poplar beams was first of all built from the bull to the top of the raft. This was thoroughly greased, just as the slipways are greased when a battleship is launched, and down this slipway Layard began to lower the bull. For a moment he thought all his carefully laid plans were to end in disaster. The natives hung on to the ropes in their attempt to check the descent of the bull. It was too much for them. Getting out of hand, the bull dropped with a thud on to the raft. The raft gave a terrific lurch, but luckily it withstood the impact, and all was well.

Before the bull was embarked, Layard was faced with the prospect of being defeated by the marauding Arabs. He ordered all the felts and ropes and other materials to be brought down to Nimroud on a raft, but the raft, owing to its late start from Mosul, was unable to reach the mound before dark, so the Arabs in charge tied up to the bank to pass the night. In the middle of the night a raiding party swarmed down on them and stripped the raft of everything.

Layard was quickly stirred to action. Directly he discovered who the culprits were he galloped off to their camp, and in the very face of the hostile tribe seized the sheik and carried him off. Under the lash of Layard’s tongue that worthy soon repented, and ordered all the missing articles to be returned.

On another occasion a sudden flood swept away many Arabs, and sent one of his rafts of sculptures swirling through a break in the bank into the swamps, from which they were rescued with the utmost difficulty. Even in those days lightning strikes were not unknown, for Layard contended with one on the part of his Arabs. His sculptures were all waiting to be placed aboard the raft, when the Arabs, who knew he dare not miss the spring floods, told him they were moving camp, thinking to induce him to give them more money for the work. Layard bade them good-bye, and galloped off into the desert to get helpers from another tribe. When the strikers came back, finding their bluff of no avail, they were already superseded.