Assyria contains many large cities, the most renowned and the strongest of which, where the seat of government was established after the destruction of Nineveh, was Babylon, which is of the following description. The city stands in a spacious plain, and is quadrangular, and shows a front on every side of one hundred and twenty stades [15 miles]; these stades make up the sum of four hundred and eighty in the whole circumference. It was adorned in a manner surpassing any city we are acquainted with. In the first place, a moat deep, wide, and full of water, runs entirely round it; next, there is a wall fifty royal cubits in breadth [about 84 feet], and in height two hundred [270 feet], but the royal cubit is larger than the common one by three fingers' breadth. And here I think I ought to explain how the earth, taken out of the moat, was consumed, and in what manner the wall was built. As they dug the moat they made bricks of the earth that was taken out; and when they had moulded a sufficient number they baked them in kilns. Then making use of hot asphalt for cement, and laying wattled reeds between the thirty bottom courses of bricks, they first built up the sides of the moat, and afterward the wall itself in the same manner; and on the top of the wall, at the edges, they built dwellings of one story, fronting each other, having spaces between these dwellings wide enough to turn a chariot with four horses. In the circumference of the wall there were a hundred gates, all of bronze, as also were the posts and lintels. Eight days' journey from Babylon [200 miles] stands another city, called Is, on a small river of the same name, which discharges its stream into the Euphrates; this river brings down with its water many lumps of bitumen, from which the bitumen used in the wall of Babylon was taken. The city consists of two divisions, for the Euphrates, separates it in the middle: this river, which is broad, deep, and rapid, flows from Armenia, and falls into the Red Sea. The wall on either bank has an elbow carried down to the river; and thence along the curvatures of each bank runs a wall of baked bricks. The city itself, which is full of houses three and four stories high, is cut up into straight streets running at right angles to each other. At the end of each street a little gate is formed in the wall along the river side, in number equal to the streets; and they are all made of bronze, and lead down to the edge of the river. This outer wall is the chief defence, but another wall runs round within, not much inferior to the other in strength, though narrower. In the middle of each division of the city fortified buildings were erected; in one, the royal palace, with a spacious and strong enclosure, bronze-gated; and in the other, the precinct of Jupiter Belus, which in my time was still in existence, a square building of two stades [¼ of a mile] on every side. In the midst of this precinct is built a solid tower of one stade both in length and breadth, and on this tower rose another, and another upon that, to the number of eight. And there is an ascent to these outside, running spirally round all the towers. About the middle of the ascent there is a landing-place and seats on which those who go up may rest themselves; and in the uppermost tower stands a spacious temple, handsomely furnished, and in it a large couch, with a table of gold by its side. No statue has been erected within it, but as the Chaldæans, who are priests of this deity, assert, though I cannot credit what they say, the god himself comes to the temple and reclines on the bed, in the same manner as the Egyptians say happens at Thebes in Egypt.
There is also another temple below, within the precinct at Babylon; in it is a large golden statue of Jupiter seated, and near it a great table of gold; the throne also and the step are of gold, which together weigh eight hundred talents [twenty-two tons], as the Chaldæans affirm. Outside the temple is a golden altar; and another large altar, where full-grown sheep are sacrificed; for on the golden altar only sucklings may be offered. On the great altar the Chaldæans consume yearly a thousand talents [twenty-seven tons] of frankincense when they celebrate the festival of this god. There was also at that time within the precincts of this temple a statue of solid gold, twelve cubits high [eighteen feet]; I, indeed, did not see it, but only relate what is said by the Chaldæans. Darius, son of Hystaspes, formed a design to take away this statue, but dared not do so; but Xerxes, son of Darius, took it, and killed the priest who forbade him to remove it.
There were many others who reigned over Babylon, whom I shall mention in my Assyrian history, who beautified the walls and temples, and amongst them were two women. The first of these, named Semiramis, lived five generations before the other; she raised mounds along the plain, which are worthy of admiration; for before, the river used to overflow the whole plain like a sea. But the other, who was queen next after her, and whose name was Nitocris, (and she was much more sagacious than the other queen,) in the first place left monuments of herself, which I shall presently describe; and in the next place, when she saw the power of the Medes growing formidable and restless, and that, among other cities, Nineveh was captured by them, she took every possible precaution for her own defence. First of all, the River Euphrates, which before ran in a straight line, and which flows through the middle of the city, by having channels dug above, she made so winding, that in its course it touched three times at one and the same village in Assyria, called Arderica: and to this day, those who go from our sea to Babylon, if they travel by the Euphrates, come three times to this village on three successive days. She also raised on either bank of the river a mound, astonishing for its magnitude and height. At a considerable distance above Babylon, she had a reservoir for a lake dug, carrying it out some distance from the river, and in the depth digging down to water, and in width making its circumference of four hundred and twenty stades [about fifty-two and a half miles]: she consumed the soil from this excavation by heaping it up on the banks of the river, and when it was completely dug, she had stones brought and built a casing to it all round. She had both these works done, the river made winding, and the whole excavation a lake, in order that the current, being broken by frequent turnings, might be more slow, and the navigation to Babylon tedious, and that after the voyage, a long march round the lake might follow. All this was done in that part of the country where the approach to Babylon is nearest, and where is the shortest way for the Medes; in order that the Medes might not, by holding intercourse with her people, become acquainted with her affairs. She enclosed herself, therefore, with these defences by digging, and immediately afterwards made the following addition. As the city consisted of two divisions, which were separated by the river, during the reign of former kings, when any one had occasion to cross from one division to the other, he was obliged to cross in a boat: and this, in my opinion, was very troublesome: she therefore provided for this, for after she had dug the reservoir for the lake, she left this other monument built by similar toil. She had large blocks of stone cut, and when they were ready and the place was completely dug out, she turned the whole stream of the river into the place she had dug: while this was filling, and the ancient channel had become dry, in the first place, she lined with burnt bricks the banks of the river throughout the city, and the descents that lead from the gates to the river, in the same manner as the walls. In the next place, about the middle of the city, she built a bridge with the stones she had prepared, and bound them together with plates of lead and iron. Upon these stones she laid, during the day, square planks of timber, on which the Babylonians might pass over; but at night these planks were removed, to prevent people from crossing by night and robbing one another. When the hollow that was dug had become a lake filled by the river, and the bridge was finished, she brought back the river to its ancient channel from the lake.
WINGED HUMAN-HEADED LION.
The same queen also contrived the following deception. Over the most frequented gate of the city she prepared a sepulchre for herself, high up above the gate itself; and on the sepulchre she had engraved, Should any one of my successors, kings of Babylon, find himself in want of money, let him open this sepulchre, and take as much as he chooses; but if he be not in want, let him not open it; for that were not well. This monument remained undisturbed, until the kingdom fell to Darius; but it seemed hard to Darius that this gate should be of no use, and that when money was lying there, and this money inviting him to take it, he should not do so; but no use was made of this gate for this reason, that a dead body was over the head of any one who passed through it. He therefore opened the sepulchre, and instead of money, found only the body, and these words written: Hadst thou not been insatiably covetous, and greedy of the most sordid gain, thou wouldest not have opened the chambers of the dead.
Cyrus made war against the son of this queen, who bore the name of his father Labynetus, and had the empire of Assyria. Now when the great king leads his army in person, he carries with him from home well prepared provisions and cattle; and he takes with him water from the river Choaspes, which flows past Susa, of which alone, the king drinks. A great number of four-wheeled carriages drawn by mules carry the water of this river, after it has been boiled in silver vessels, and follow him from place to place wherever he marches. Cyrus, in his march against Babylon, arrived at the river Gyndes, whose fountains are in the Matianian mountains, and which flows through the land of the Dardanians, and falls into another river, the Tigris; the latter, flowing by the city of Opis, discharges itself into the Red Sea. When Cyrus was endeavoring to cross this river Gyndes, which can be passed only in boats, one of the sacred white horses through wantonness plunged into the stream, and attempted to swim over, but the stream having carried him away and drowned him, Cyrus was much enraged with the river for this affront, and threatened to make his stream so weak, that henceforth women should easily cross it without wetting their knees. After this menace, deferring his expedition against Babylon, he divided his army into two parts; and marked out by lines one hundred and eighty channels, on each side of the river, diverging every way; then having distributed his army, he commanded them to dig. His design was indeed executed by the great numbers he employed; but they spent the whole summer in the work. When Cyrus had avenged himself on the river Gyndes, by distributing it into three hundred and sixty channels, and the second spring began to shine, he then advanced against Babylon. But the Babylonians, having taken the field, awaited his coming; and when he had advanced near the city, the Babylonians gave battle, and, being defeated, were shut up in the city. But as they had been long aware of the restless spirit of Cyrus, and saw that he attacked all nations alike, they had laid up provisions for many years; and therefore were under no apprehensions about a siege. On the other hand, Cyrus found himself in difficulty, since much time had elapsed, and his affairs were not at all advanced. Whether therefore some one else made the suggestion to him in his perplexity, or whether he himself devised the plan, he had recourse to the following stratagem. Having stationed the bulk of his army near the passage of the river where it enters Babylon, and again having stationed another division beyond the city, where the river makes its exit, he gave orders to his forces to enter the city as soon as they should see the stream fordable. Having thus stationed his forces, and given these directions, he himself marched away with the ineffective part of his army; and coming to the lake, Cyrus did the same with respect to the river and the lake as the queen of the Babylonians had done. For having diverted the river, by means of a canal, into the lake, which was before a swamp, he made the ancient channel fordable by the sinking of the river. When this took place, the Persians who were appointed to that purpose close to the stream of the river, which had now subsided to about the middle of a man's thigh, entered Babylon by this passage. If, however, the Babylonians had been aware of it beforehand, or had known what Cyrus was about, they would not have suffered the Persians to enter the city, but would have utterly destroyed them; for having shut all the little gates that lead down to the river, and mounting the walls that extend along the banks of the river, they would have caught them as in a net; whereas the Persians came upon them by surprise. It is related by the people who inhabited this city, that on account of its great extent, when they who were at the extremities were taken, those of the Babylonians who inhabited the centre knew nothing of the capture (for it happened to be a festival) but they were dancing at the time, and enjoying themselves, till they received certain information of the truth. Thus was Babylon taken for the first time.[9]
How great was the power of the Babylonians, I can prove by many other circumstances, and especially by the following. The whole territory over which the great king reigns, is divided into districts for the purpose of furnishing subsistence for him and his army, in addition to the usual tribute; of the twelve months in the year, the Babylonian territory provides him with subsistence for four, and all the rest of Asia for the remaining eight; so that the territory of Assyria amounts to a third part of the power of all Asia, and the government of this region, which the Persians call a satrapy, is remunerative; since it yielded a full artabe of silver every day to Tritæchmes son of Artabazus, who held this district from the king: the artabe is a Persian measure, containing three Attic chœnices more than the Attic medimnus [or about twelve and a half gallons]. And he had a private stud of horses, in addition to those used in war, of eight hundred stallions, and sixteen thousand mares. He kept, too, such a number of Indian dogs, that four considerable towns in the plain were exempted from all other taxes and appointed to find food for the dogs. Such were the advantages accruing to the governor of Babylon. The land of Assyria is but little watered by rain, only enough in fact to nourish the root of the corn; the stalk grows up, and the grain comes to maturity only by being irrigated from the river, not, as in Egypt, by the river overflowing the fields, but by the hand and by engines. The Babylonian territory, like Egypt, is intersected by canals; and the largest of these is navigable, stretching in the direction of the winter sunrise[10]; and it extends from the Euphrates to another river, the Tigris, on which the city of Nineveh stood. This is, of all lands with which we are acquainted, by far the best for the growth of corn: but it does not carry produce trees of any kind, either the fig, or the vine, or the olive; yet it is so fruitful in the produce of corn, that it yields continually two hundred-fold, and when it produces its best, it yields even three hundred-fold. The blades of wheat and barley grow there to fully four fingers (three inches) in breadth; and though I well know to what a height millet and sesama grow, I shall not mention it; for I am well assured, that to those who have never been in the Babylonian country, what has been said concerning its productions will appear to many incredible. They use no other oil than such as is drawn from sesama. They have palm-trees growing all over the plain; most of these bear fruit from which they make bread, wine, and honey. They also tie the fruit of that which the Greeks call the male palm, about those trees that bear dates, in order that the fly entering the date may ripen it, lest otherwise the fruit may fall before maturity; for the male palms have flies in the fruit, just like wild fig-trees.
The most wonderful thing of all, next to the city itself, is what I am now going to describe: their vessels that sail down the river to Babylon are circular, and made of leather. For when they have cut the ribs out of willows that grow in Armenia above Babylon, they cover them with hides extended on the outside, by way of a bottom; not making any distinction in the stern, nor contracting the prow, but making them circular like a buckler; then having lined this vessel throughout with reeds, they suffer it to be carried down by the river freighted with merchandise, chiefly casks of palm-wine. The vessel is steered by two spars, held by two men standing upright, one of whom draws his spar in and the other thrusts his out. Some of these vessels are made very large, and others of a smaller size; but the largest of them carry a cargo of five thousand talents [about one hundred and thirty-five tons]. Every vessel has a live ass on board, and the larger ones more. For after they arrive at Babylon, and have disposed of their freight, they sell the ribs of the boat and all the reeds by public auction; then having piled the skins on the asses, they return by land to Armenia, for it is not possible by any means to sail up the river because of the rapidity of the current: and for this reason they make their vessels of skins and not of wood, and upon their return to Armenia with their asses, they construct other vessels in the same manner. For their dress, they wear a linen tunic that reaches down to the feet; over this they put another garment of wool, and over all a short white cloak; they have sandals peculiar to the country, very much like the Bœotian clogs. They wear long hair, binding their heads with turbans, and anoint the whole body with perfumes. Every man has a seal, and a staff curiously wrought; and on every staff is carved either an apple, a rose, a lily, an eagle, or something of the kind; for it is not allowable to wear a stick without a device.
Many curious customs prevail amongst them. This, in my opinion, is the wisest, which I hear the Venetians, of Illyria, also practise. Once a year, in every village, whatever maidens are of a marriageable age, they collect together and bring in a body to one place; around them gathers a crowd of men. Then a crier having made them stand up one by one, offers them for sale, beginning with the most beautiful; and when she has been sold for a large sum, he puts up another who is next in beauty. They are sold on condition that they shall be married. Such men among the Babylonians as are rich and desirous of marrying, bid against one another, and purchase the handsomest. But such of the lower classes as are desirous of marrying, do not require a beautiful form, but are willing to take the plainer damsels with a sum of money. So when the crier has finished selling the handsomest of the maidens, he makes the ugliest stand up, or one that is a cripple, and puts her up to auction, for the person who will marry her with the smallest sum, until she is knocked down to the man who offers to take the least. This money is that obtained from the sale of the handsome maidens; so that the beautiful ones portion out the ugly and the crippled. A father is not allowed to give his daughter in marriage to whom he pleases, nor can a purchaser carry off a maiden without security; but he is first obliged to give security that he will certainly marry her, and then he may take her away. If they do not agree, a law has been enacted that the money shall be repaid. It is also lawful for any one who pleases to come from another village and purchase. They have also this other custom, second only to the former in wisdom. They bring their sick to the market-place, for they have no physicians; then those who pass by the sick person confer with him about the disease, to discover whether they have themselves been afflicted with the same disease, or have seen others so afflicted. They then advise him to have recourse to the same treatment as that by which they escaped a similar disease, or have known to cure others. And no one passes by a sick person in silence, without inquiring into the nature of his distemper. They embalm their dead in honey, and their funeral lamentations are like those of the Egyptians.