ASSYRIAN MONUMENTS. 165 



I think there is more than one way of interpreting 

 these figures ; but let us first clear a little misconcep- 

 tion. The animal to which Count d'Alviella refers ^ is 

 not a * daim ' — a deer — but a bull. Its tail and its horns, 

 I think, make this plain. Without reference to their 

 mythological origin, let us examine two ways of inter- 

 preting these compositions. 



(a) A human figure — a god — holding a bident, trident, 

 or quadrident, from which issues a /cas/i leading to the 

 mouth of an animal. 



(l^) The same figure holding the same symbols, 

 from which issues a stream of water, running to the 

 mouth of the animal. If a leash, it may mean the 

 subjection of these animals, by the all-powerful horns. 

 But you might say, in the case of the bull, why does 

 the string go to the mouth, and not to a collar ? 

 Possibly because, in those days, as now, they pierced 

 the nose of their cattle, to put in a string ; and the 

 nose and mouth in such a small figure would be one. 

 This would, perhaps, mean the taming of the wild 

 bull. 



Let us, however, discard, in toio, the idea of its 

 having been intended for a leash, emblematical of the 

 subjection of these animals, and consider it a stream 

 of ivater. 



Water issuing from the hand of a god, holding a 

 ' 'Migration of Symbols,' fig. 38, p. 124. 



