(After Déc. en Chald., pl. 23.)
The symbolism of these and similar monsters may well have been suggested by the grinding of the heavy doors in their stone sockets and the shrieking of thair bolts.[23] The noises suggested the cries of animals, which, in accordance with the tenets of primitive animism, were thought to inhabit the doors and gateways and to guard them. We may probably trace to this ancestry the colossal lions and winged bulls which flanked the doorways of Assyrian and Persian palaces, and, like the enamelled monsters of Babylon and Persepolis, continued to be reproduced as divine guardians of a building after their primitive associations had been forgotten or modified.[24]
FIG. 71.
THE GUARDIAN LIONS OF THE EASTERN GATE OF HEAVEN.
(After Heuzey.)
Archæological evidence thus supports the view, already deduced from historical considerations, that astrology did not dominate the religious activities of Babylon. And an examination of the literature points to the same conclusion. Magic and divination bulk largely in the texts recovered, and in their case there is nothing to suggest an underlying astrological element.[25] We are the less inclined, therefore, to accept the axiom that an astral conception of the universe permeated and coloured Babylonian thought to such an extent, that not only myths and legends, but even historical events, were recorded in terms which reflect the movements of the sun, moon and planets and the other phenomena of the heavens. If we once grant this assumption, it might perhaps have followed, as the astral mythologists claim, that the beliefs of the Babylonian star-worshippers became the prevailing doctrine of the ancient East and left their traces broadcast upon the records of antiquity. But the original assumption appears to be unsound, and the theory can only find support by treating late evidence as applicable to all stages of Babylonian history.
