EXHIBIT OF BIBLICAL ANTIQUITIES. 1007 



tioued in Genesis was conceived on the same plan. The Temple of 

 Borsippa was reconstructed with great splendor by Nebuchadnezzar 

 (G04-5G1 B. C), but he made no changes in the general character and 

 plan. According to the description of Herodotus/ who mistakes it for 

 the Temple of Bel, and the report of Sir Henry Rawlinson, who care- 

 fully examined the mound of Birs-Nimrud, tlie Tower of Borsippa 

 appears to have been constructed on the plan of a step-shaped or ter- 

 raced pyramid. Such stepped j)yramids have not only survived in 

 Egypt, in the Great Pyramid of Sakkarah, but are also found in Mexico 

 (at Cholula, City of Mexico, etc.), where they are called TeocalUs — i. e., 

 "houses of god" — consisting of terraced structures, live to seven stories 

 high, and surmounted by a chamber or cell, which is the temple itself. 

 It is assumed that these temple towers were the prototype of the later 

 Egyptian pyramids, the stories disappearing in the latter by tilling- up 

 the platforms of the difterent stages, which produced an uninterrupted 

 slope on all sides. The Temple Tower of iSTebo, at Borsippa, was built 

 in seven stages, whence it is sometimes called in the inscriptions 

 "Temple of the seven spheres of heaven and earth." Upon an artifi- 

 cial terrace of burnt bricks rose the first stage, 272 feet square; on 

 this the second, 230 feet square; then the third, 188 feet square, each 

 of these three lower stages being 20 feet high. The height of each of 

 the four upper stories was 15 feet, while their width was 140, 101, 02, 

 and 20 feet, respectively, so that the whole edifice, not including the 

 artificial terrace, had a height of about 140 feet. The several stages 

 were faced with enameled bricks in the colors attributed to the differ- 

 ent planets, the first story, representing Saturn, in black; then, in 

 order, Jupiter, orange; Mars, red; the Sun, thought to have been 

 originally plated with gold; Venus, white; Mercury, blue, and the 

 seventh, dedicated to the Moon, the head of the Babylonian pantheon, 

 was plated with silver. The floors of the platforms were probably 

 inlaid with mosaics. The whole structure terminated in a chapel placed 

 on the central axis of the tower and surmounted by a cupola. Accord- 

 ing to Herodotus there stood in the spacious sanctuary on the top of 

 the tower a couch of unusual size, richly adorned, with a golden table 

 by its side. But no statue of any kind vzas set up in the chamber, nor 

 was it occupied at night by anyone but a native woman. The top 

 stage was also used as an observatory. Double converging stairs or 

 gently ascending ramps led up to the several platforms. 



The Chaldean Deluge Tablet. — Containing the cuneiform text 

 of the Babylonian account of the Deluge as restored by Prof. Paul 

 Haupt. Engraved in clay under the direction of Professor Haupt, by 

 Dr. R. Zehnpfund, of Eosslau, Germany. Measurement, 8| by 6| inches. 

 The Babylonian story of the Deluge is contained in the eleventh tablet 

 of the so-called Izdubar or Gilgamesh^ legends, commonl}^ known 

 under the name of the Babylonian Mmrod Epic. The Babylonian 



' Book i, 181-183. * This name is also read by some Gizdubar and Gibel-gamesh. 



