ASSYRIAN MONUMENTS. 151 



up the evil-eye horns, seen by them so often, into 

 decorative motives, altering their form, but keeping the 

 elements almost intact. The upper part of a ' fleur- 

 de-lys ' at the foot of the conventional sacred fir tree 

 of fig. 25, and that used on the summit of the stem 

 of another conventional pomegranate tree, shown in 

 fig. 24, can be no other than modified forms of the 

 same horns used on the conventional date tree of fig, 16. 



It is, therefore, much more probable that the Crusaders, 

 having come into contact in Syria with this luck-emblem, 

 brought it back to Europe, where it then became a 

 prevalent heraldic emblem. 



Before that time, modifications of the trefoil may have 

 possibly been mistaken by archaeologists for the ' fleur- 

 de-lys.' Anyhow, neither the lily nor the iris have any 

 need of a ligature, made of from one to three turns 

 of a string, to keep their petals together; but horns 

 on a post or on a tree certainly would require some 

 sort of ligature to keep them there. Undoubtedly the 

 ornaments on the stem of the sacred date tree (fig. \6) 

 cannot be mistaken for anything else but the horns 

 of an ibex or a ram, especially when we compare 

 them with those of figs. 18 and 19. 



Eventually I think that in Assyria itself these luck- 

 liorns became modified into emblems, not only of 

 royalty, but also of some divinity, and may have 

 got mixed up with spiritual, religious, and super- 



