Before we pass to the temple of Esagila, which was so closely connected with Etemenanki (p. [204]), we will inspect the walls that lie to the west of the enclosure, and the Euphrates bridge.
XXXI
THE EUPHRATES BRIDGE
The Procession Street which, with its strongly-asphalted brick pavement, runs close to the southern side of the peribolos, ended in the west at the land pier of a bridge of burnt brick and asphalt. Seven river piers have been excavated. The western one differs somewhat in plan, and may have been the end pier on the bank at that side (Fig. 122), but this is not yet certain. The complete length of this bridge, as far as we have made it out, amounted to 123 metres, and the pier lengths of 21 metres may have exceeded the breadth of the roadway very considerably. The piers are 9 metres wide and are placed 9 metres apart. They are built with a very marked batter. Their bricks are of the small size 31 × 31 centimetres and are unstamped, from which we may conclude that the building dates from Nebuchadnezzar’s first period or from Nabopolassar. There are rectangular cavities in the piers in which, as far as we can judge, strengthening baulks of wood once lay 50 centimetres apart. Above this, at a distance of 2 metres, there was a second similar course of wood. The sides of the piers are convex and meet in a point in front facing the current on the north. The back is also slightly curved. Thus the ground-plan of the pier follows the water-line of a ship.
Herodotus (i. 186), Diodorus (ii. 8, after Ctesias), and others speak of this bridge. They report that stone blocks were used for it, and it is very probable that the brick piers were roofed over with stone, on which the rafters for the roadway were laid. We have seen in the north wall of the Kasr that Nebuchadnezzar bound his blocks together with dove-tail clamps, and this is also reported of the bridge. Diodorus calls special attention to the peculiar shape of the piers, which is specially adapted to the requirements of the current. The measurements here also do not agree on all points. The length is given as 5 stadia, the breadth 30 feet, and the distance between the piers 12 feet. But it appears to me rash to argue from this lack of agreement the existence of a second stone bridge. This is the most ancient stone bridge of which we have any record, and its well-deserved fame is evident from the fact that it was the only one remarked on in the scanty reports of the ancient historians.
Fig. 122.—The western pier of the bridge over the Euphrates.
The ancient bed of the river is clearly marked just in the vicinity where a long depression between the mounds of ruins extends to the village of Kweiresh. In the south-west, close to the bridge head, one of these mounds of ruins rises to a considerable height. Its western side is worn away by the modern Euphrates into a vertical steep declivity, and the mud walls of the houses that stand out between the usual rubbish in the mound are here laid bare and clearly visible. They extend down below the usual level of the water.
Among the Babylonian texts that refer to the bridge, it is described by Nebuchadnezzar as the work of Nabopolassar in the E-ulla cylinder (M’Gee, B. ii. col. 1, 8): “The embankment wall of Arachtu ... from the Ishtar Gate to the Urash Gate, my father, my begetter, had built with asphalt and brick, had erected piers of burnt brick for the crossing over of the Euphrates” (see K.B. iii. 2, p. 21, l. 7, and p. 41, l. 38). The meaning of the words ma-ka-at a-bar-ti Purâti as “bridge over the Euphrates” was kindly given me as early as the year 1904 by Lehmann-Haupt.
XXXII
THE BRIDGE GATEWAY
Between the land pier of the bridge, and the first river pier, a gateway was inserted that lay in the line of a long fortification wall that stretches to the north with stamped bricks in it of Nabonidus. As usual with city gateways, it had an inner court and two massive fronting towers. The bricks, so far as we can see, have Nebuchadnezzar’s stamp, and, like the wall itself, are laid in asphalt. In the entrance lies a brick pavement of many courses, and also the great southern door socket of the west door. In the middle of the east doorway there is a brick set upright, which projects slightly above the pavement and served as a stop for the leaves of the door. The pavement is 3.10 metres above zero, rather higher than that of the Procession Street, and above it 12 metres of the rubbish of the Amran hill is still piled. The gateway was inserted partly in the land and partly in the river pier, and both are cut away to some extent to accommodate the later building.