When we learn that this testimony takes us back to a date older than the pyramids and to the earlier Egyptian dynasties, we may well exclaim at the astonishing facts archæology is presenting.
Until recently there were no evidences of a civilization in Babylonia which approached the antiquity of Egyptian monuments.
In 1883, Dr. Taylor placed the earliest dates from the cuneiform at between 2700 and 3000, B. C. Recent discoveries, however, refer back to a period, according to Prof. Hilfrecht, at least three milleniums earlier, and point to a civilization distinct and original with the Turanian races of Asia preceding that of other races and people in these regions.
Mesopotamia, “The land between the rivers,” is a tract of country extending about seven hundred miles from its northernmost boundaries, near the mountains of Armenia, to the southernmost limit, the Persian Gulf. A range of hills crosses this region near the center, running east and west, from the Euphrates to the Tigris. North of these hills the country is the ancient Assyria, with its capital, Nineveh, situated on the Tigris. South of these hills to the Persian Gulf, is the ancient Babylonia, or Chaldea, where, on the Euphrates, its later capital, Babylon, was situated.
In the more ancient records Assyria appears as “Accad,” or “Agade;” the southern portion, or Babylonia, as “Sumir,” or the land of “Shinar,” and later as Chaldea.
For the greater portion, this region is a dead level, its monotony unbroken but for the rich verdure of the lands bordering upon these great rivers, and the long lines of slightly elevated embankments marking the course of ancient, or more recent canals, and the solitary mounds rising here and there from the plain.
These are the sites of ancient temples and cities and are sometimes very extensive. The mounds of Warka, the ancient Erech, are nearly six miles in circumference and in some places rise to the height of one hundred feet.
The great mound of Koyunjik covers an area of over one hundred acres in extent, and is ninety-five feet high at its most elevated point. That of Nippur, with the ruins of the great temple of Bel, rose over one hundred feet above the plain. Others are smaller, and sometimes were intended to support but one palace or temple.
These mounds are artificial, their foundations consisting of earth mixed with burned bricks in alternate layers, the whole encased by a wall of bricks cemented with bitumen, or as in Assyria, where stone could be obtained, by a facing of stone masonry.
Upon these artificial hills or mounds, the inhabitants of Mesopotamia, from the most remote to later times, built their cities, their palaces, their temples and other important structures.