[54] Its employment with the determinative nâru, "river" or "canal," does not prove that it was at this time a canal in the strict sense. According to the explanation offered in the text, it would have been a section of the river, including an open basin and probably a canal. In earlier periods it may have been simply a canal, which led off from the river at this point.
[55] See above, p. 28.
[56] See above, p. 30, Fig. 6, N.
[57] On a foundation-cylinder from Sippar in the British Museum (No. 91114; A. H. 82—7—14, 1042) Nebuchadnezzar writes: "For the protection of E-sagila and Babylon, that sandbanks (pu-ri-im) should not form in the bed of the Euphrates, I caused a great fortification to be made in the river, of bitumen and burnt-brick. Its foundation I laid in the abyss, and its head I raised mountain-high"; cf. Ball, "Troc. Soc. Bibl. Arch.", X., May 1888, Pl. IV., Col. ii., ll. 19-24, and Langdon, "Neubabylonischen Königsinschriften," p. 106 f.
[58] See p. 30, Fig. 6, T, and p. 32, Fig. 7, N.
[59] Fig. 6, P, R. It re-entered the river close under the citadel-wall, for its outlet has been found in the later river-wall of Nabonidus. It was perhaps the canal called in the inscriptions Libil-khegalla, "May it bring abundance." It will be seen from the plan that the remains of the canal to the south-east show a narrow channel (P), less than three metres in breadth, but widening westward of the Sacred Road (G) into a broad basin (R). This represents a reconstruction, probably of the time of Neriglissar, who built a bridge for the road across the canal. Formerly the road crossed the canal by a dam with walled embankments, of which traces have been found below the canal-walls. Beneath the embankment the water probably flowed through grated sluices like these spanning Nebuchadnezzar's narrow channel between his river-fortification and the citadel.
[60] See above, p. 30, and cf. Fig. 6, V.
[61] I., 181.
[62] If we except the foundations of the Ishtar Gate, this door is the only structure recovered on the site of Babylon which gives us an idea of what a building looked like above ground-level. Elsewhere the ground-plan is our only guide.
[63] See p. 30, Fig. 6, D.