The Neo-Babylonian Empire (625-538 B.C.) inherited the stereotyped traditions of the long period of Kassite
Fig. 71. supremacy, and though there was a certain reaction in favour of the pictorial as against the literary element in the later cylinder-seals, the style of art remained more or less unchanged, if not unchangeable. A good example of a Neo-Babylonian seal-impression is that found on a tablet dated in the 26th year of Nebuchadnezzar (cf. Fig. [72]).[136] The worshipper stands before a rectangular box which looks like an altar, but which, according to Ward, is the seat of the gods. It supports two emblems, one a dog and the other a thunderbolt of the storm-god Adad. The posture, attitude and general appearance of the worshipper exactly correspond to those found on the Kassite cylinders of Kurigalzu (cf. Fig. [70]), and are a good illustration of the conventionalism to which later Mesopotamian art became so hopelessly enslaved.
The cylinder-seal was employed in Assyria from the earliest periods of her history,
Fig. 72. and continued to be used right down to the time of the Persians, who in turn adopted the same kind of seal. A cylinder-seal belonging to the early Assyrian period, i.e. about 2000 B.C., is shown in Fig. [73]. The workmanship is crude, but in the scene itself we see in embryo the military exploits of the late Assyrian bas-reliefs. A warrior, mounted in his two-wheeled war-chariot, is in the act of dispatching an arrow from his drawn bow; his rival, on foot, is doing exactly the same, and it appears to be a question as to which of the two combatants will get his arrow in first. The chariot is drawn by a bull, an indication that the horse was not as yet used for war purposes, while the four-spoked wheels
Fig. 73. are a further archaic touch—the chariot-wheels of the later Assyrians having eight, twelve, or sometimes sixteen spokes. The bull, in his mad career, is trampling over a prostrate foe, a scene which is frequently represented on the bas-reliefs; it is however interesting to see the symbolical star and crescent of the old Babylonians reproduced on this early Assyrian seal.
We have already seen the winged-dragon on an archaic Babylonian seal (cf. Fig. [59]), but it was apparently not till the Assyrian era that the conflict between “Bel and the dragon” was represented in Mesopotamian art.[137]
