Fig. 147.—Ruins of Epatutila.
After the time of Nabopolassar the floor was three times raised with Nebuchadnezzar’s bricks to a height of 4.2 metres above zero. At 6 metres above zero the wall ruins end. Here in the rubbish of the ruins lie the trough sarcophagi of the Seleucid period.
The exterior (Fig. [147]), as well as the court, is enriched with plain towers, while the gateway towers are grooved. At the northern door, through which the processions passed out, the projection of the towers is less than in the other two. At the south-east corner, where two gateways adjoin each other, an additional grooved tower is introduced. A large vertical gutter, built of 31 × 31 centimetre bricks, in the east front carried off the rain-water from the roof.
Fig. 148.—Terra-cotta apes, male and female.
Among the terra-cottas found here during the excavations, the most frequent types are: (1) a bearded figure holding a vase in both hands (see Fig. [212]) and wearing a long frilled garment on the cylindrical lower part of the body; (2) a nude female figure with arms hanging down (see Fig. [211]); (3) an ape. If the two first represent Ninib and his consort Gula, the third cella is left for the ape. What part was played by these creatures in Babylon I will not attempt to discover. It must have been an important one, for the figures of these squatting apes are found not only here, but over the whole area in great numbers (Fig. [148]). The workmanship varies; some are modelled in the finest and most realistic manner, others are treated more or less as idols, and many are practically mere crude upright lumps of clay, in which the figure of an ape would be unrecognisable were it not possible to compare them with innumerable examples of somewhat better workmanship.
Beside these types we found a number of small figures of horsemen. The oldest of these, which date back to the time before Nabopolassar, and of which several have been found in the temple, are some of them glazed (Fig. 149); the details are always roughly modelled by hand, and the rider sits like a lump of clay on the neck of a barely recognisable horse. Later on these riders were more carefully worked, the horse’s head was slightly modelled, while the legs remain shapeless stumps, the rider becomes a long strip sitting across the animal, and only the bearded head of the rider is produced from a fairly good mould (Fig. [150]). He wears a hood, which in one type has the point erect, while in another it falls on one side, as in the figure of Darius in the mosaic of Pompeii.
Fig. 149.—Early horseman, glazed.
