[385] Herodotus, i. 98.
[386] See above, p. 202.
[387] Layard, Nineveh, vol. ii. p. 264, note 1. Frequent allusions to this use of metal are to be found in the wedges. In M. Lenormant's translation of the London inscription (Histoire ancienne, vol. ii. p. 233, 3rd edition) in which Nebuchadnezzar enumerates the great works he had done at Borsippa, I find the following words: "I have covered the roof of Nebo's place of repose with gold. The beams of the door before the oracles have been overlaid with silver ... the pivot of the door into the woman's chamber I have covered with silver."
[388] Among the fragments of tiles brought from Nimroud by Mr. George Smith, and now in the British Museum, there are two like those reproduced above, to which bosses or knobs of the same material—glazed earthenware—are attached. The necks of these bosses are pierced with holes apparently to receive the chain of a hanging lamp, and are surrounded at their base with inscriptions of Assurnazirpal stating that they formed part of the decoration of a temple at Calah.—Ed.
[389] The size of our engraving is slightly above that of the object itself.
[390] 1 Kings vi. 15; vii. 3.
[391] Zephaniah ii. 14.
[392] The design consists entirely in the symmetrical repetition of the details here given. [In this engraving the actual design of the pavement has been somewhat simplified. Between the knop and flower that forms the outer border and the rosettes there is a band of ornament consisting of the symmetrical repetition of the palmette motive with rudimentary volutes, much as it occurs round the outside of the tree of life figured on page 213. In another detail our cut differs slightly from the original. In the latter there is no corner piece; the border runs entirely across the end, and the side borders are stopped against it.—Ed.]
[393] Layard, Discoveries, p. 184, note.
[394] Layard, Nineveh. vol. ii. p. 212, note.