[296] George Smith, Assyrian Discoveries, pp. 146, 308, 429. This lintel has been fixed over the south doorway into the Kouyundjik Gallery of the British Museum. When examined in place, the running ornament in the hollow of the cornice will be easily recognized—in spite of the mutilation of its upper edge—as made up of a modified form of the palmette motive, which had its origin in the fan-shaped head of the date palm. The eight plumes of which the ornament consists are each formed of three large leaves or loops and two small pendant ones, the latter affording a means of connecting each plume with those next to it.—Ed.
[297] Place, Ninive, vol. i. pp. 295-302.
[298] Place, Ninive, vol. i. pp. 302, 303.
[299] Two much better examples of this same work may be seen in the Assyrian basement-room of the British Museum.—Ed.
[300] Place, Ninive, vol. i. p. 314.
[301] We here quote the opinion of Mr. Ready, the well-known director of the museum workshops. In April, 1882, he had examined this curious monument, which is now placed in the public galleries close to the Balawat gates.
[302] Herodotus, ii. 179: Πυλαι δε ενεστασι περιξ του τειχεος ἑκατον, χαλκεαι πασα και σταθμοι τε και ὑπερθυμα ὡσαυτως.
[303] An account of the discovery and a short description of the remains, will be found in an article by Mr. Theo. G. Pinches, published in the Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archæology, and entitled: The Bronze Gates discovered by Mr. Rassam at Balawat (vol. vii. part i. pp. 83-118). The sculptured bronze from these gates is not all, however, in the British Museum. Mr. Rassam's workmen succeeded in appropriating a certain number in the course of the excavations, and thus M. Gustave Schlumberger has become possessed of a few pieces, while others of much greater importance have come into the hands of M. de Clercq. M. F. Lenormant has published in the Gazette Archéologique (1878) a description of the pieces belonging to M. Schlumberger, with two plates in heliogravure. We have already referred to the great work which is now in course of publication by the Society of Biblical Archæology; it will put an exact reproduction of this interesting monument in the hands of Assyriologists and those interested in the history of art. We shall return to these gates when we come to treat of sculpture.
[304] A number of sockets found by M. de Sarzec in the ruins of Tello are now deposited in the Louvre. M. Place found some at Khorsabad (Ninive, vol. i. p. 314), and Sir Henry Layard on the sites of the towns in Upper Mesopotamia (Discoveries, p. 242). The British Museum has a considerable number found in various places.
[305] In the same case as the Balawat gates there is a brick, which has obviously been used for this purpose.