Castings in a low relief formed the ornamentation of thrones [PLATE LXXIV., Figs. 2, 3], stools, and sometimes probably of chariots. They consisted of animal and human figures, winged deities, griffins, and the like. The castings were chiefly in open-work, and were attached to the furniture which they ornamented by means of small nails. They have no peculiar merit, being merely repetitions of the forms with which we are familiar from their occurrence on embroidered dresses and on the cylinders.
The embossed work of the Assyrians is the most curious and the most artistic portion of their metallurgy. Sometimes it consisted of mere heads and feet of animals, hammered into shape upon a model composed of clay mixed with bitumen. [PLATE LXXV., Figs. 1, 2.] Sometimes it extended to entire figures, as (probably) in the case of the lions clasping each other, so common at the ends of sword-sheaths (see [PLATE LXXV., Fig. 3]), the human figures which ornament the sides of chairs or stools, and the like. [PLATE. LXXV., Fig. 3.] Occasionally it was of a less solid but at the same time of a more elaborate character. In a palace inhabited by Sargon at Nimrud, and in close juxtaposition with a monument certainly of his time, were discovered by Mr. Layard a number of dishes, plates, and bowls, embossed with great taste and skill, which are among the most elegant specimens of Assyrian art discovered during the recent researches. Upon these were represented sometimes hunting scenes, sometimes combats between griffins and lions, or between men and lions, sometimes landscapes with trees and figures of animals, sometimes mere rows of animals following one another. One or two representations from these bowls have been already given. They usually contain a star or scarab in the centre, beyond which is a series of bands or borders, patterned most commonly with figures. [PLATE LXXVI., Fig 1.] It is impossible to give an adequate idea of the delicacy and spirit of the drawings, or of the variety and elegance of the other patterns, in a work of moderate dimensions like the present. Mr. Layard, in his Second Series of “Monuments,” has done justice to the subject by pictorial representation, while in his “Nineveh and Babylon” he has described the more important of the vessels separately. The curious student will do well to consult these two works, after which he may examine with advantage the originals in the British Museum.
One of the most remarkable features observable in this whole series of monuments, is its semi-Egyptian character. The occurrence of the scarab has been just noticed. It appears on the bowls frequently, as do sphinxes of an Egyptian type; while sometimes heads and head-dresses purely Egyptian are found, as in [PLATE LXXVI., Fig. 2], which are well-known forms, and have nothing Assyrian about them and in one or two instances we meet with hieroglyphics, the onk
(or symbol of life), the ibis, etc. These facts may seem at first sight to raise a great question namely, whether, afterall, the art of the Assyrians was really of home growth, or was not rather imported from the Egyptians, either directly or by way of Phoenicia. Such a view has been sometimes taken; but the most cursory study of the Assyrian remains in chronological order, is sufficient to disprove the theory, since it will at once show that the earliest specimens of Assyrian art are the most un-Egyptian in character. No doubt there are certain analogies even here, as the preference for the profile, the stiffness and formality, the ignorance or disregard of perspective, and the like; but the analogies are exactly such as would be tolerably sure to occur in the early efforts of any two races not very dissimilar to one another, while the little resemblances which alone prove connection, are entirely wanting. These do not appear until we come to monuments which belong to the time of Sargon, when direct connection between Egypt and Assyria seems to have begun, and Egyptian captives are known to have been transported into Mesopotamia in large numbers. It has been suggested that the entire series of Nimrud vessels is Phoenician, and that they were either carried off as spoil from Tyre and other Phoenician towns, or else were the workmanship of Phoenician captives removed into Assyria from their own country. The Sidonians and their kindred were, it is remarked, the most renowned workers in metal of the ancient world, and their intermediate position between Egypt and Assyria may, it is suggested, have been the cause of the existence among them of a mixed art, half Assyrian, half Egyptian. The theory is plausible; but upon the whole it seems mere consonant with all the facts to regard the series in question as in reality Assyrian, modified from the ordinary style by an influence derived from Egypt. Either Egyptian artificers—captives probably—may have wrought the bowls after Assyrian models, and have accidentally varied the common forms, more or less, in the direction which was natural to them from old habits; or Assyrian artificers, acquainted with the art of Egypt, and anxious to improve their own from it, may have consciously adopted certain details from the rival country. The workmanship, subjects, and mode of treatment, are all, it is granted, “more Assyrian than Egyptian,” the Assyrian character being decidedly more marked than in the case of the ivories which will be presently considered; yet even in that case the legitimate conclusions seems to be that the specimens are to be regarded as native Assyrian, but as produced abnormally, under a strong foreign influence.
The usual material of the Assyrian ornamental metallurgy is bronze, composed of one part of tin to ten of copper which are exactly the proportions considered to be best by the Greeks and Romans, and still in ordinary use at the present day. In some instances, where more than common strength was required, as in the legs of tripods and tables, the bronze was ingeniously cast over an inner structure of iron. This practice was unknown to modern metallurgists until the discovery of the Assyrian specimens, from which it has been successfully imitated.