797 



BABYLON. 



BABYLON. 



798 



opened by Dr. Layard in various parts of the mound, but no trace of 

 buildings was found. Some specimens of glass, several terra-cotta 

 figures, lamps, and jars were dug out, which are evidently of the time 

 of the Seleucidae, or of the Greek occupation of Babylonia. With 

 these were found five earthenware bowls which had inscriptions on 

 their inner surface in Chaldee and Hebrew, written with ink in very 

 ancient characters. The inscriptions have been deciphered and trans- 

 lated by Mr. Thomas Ellis of the British Museum. They were charms 

 for the exorcism of evil spirits and for the cure of diseases ; and there 

 is no doubt that they were written by Jews of the captivity probably 

 within a few centuries before or after Christ. Mr. Ellis thinks that 

 the writing was intended to be dissolved in water, which was to be 

 drunk as a cure against disease, or as a safeguard against witchcraft 

 and magic. " As they were found at a considerable depth beneath 

 the surface in mounds which had undoubtedly been used as places of 

 sepulture," Dr. Layard is " rather inclined to believe that they were 

 charms buried with the dead, or employed for some purpose at 

 funeral ceremonies, and afterwards placed in the grave." Fac-similes 

 of the writing on the five bowls, and translations, are given in Dr. 

 Layard 'a work. 



"A mile to the north of the kasr or palace (says Mr. Rich), 5 miles 

 from HilLah, and 950 yards from the river bank, is a ruin called the 

 Mujelibe", meaning the 'overturned' [this it must be remembered is 

 the Babel of Dr. Layard] ; its shape is oblong, and its height, as well as 

 the measurements of its sides, irregular. The sides face the cardinal 

 points ; the northern is 200, the southern 219, the eastern 182, and the 

 western 186 yards in length ; and the elevation of the south-east, or 

 highest angle, is 141 feet The western face, which is the least ele- 

 vated, is the most interesting on account of the appearance of building 

 it presents. Near the summit of it appears a low wall with interrup- 

 tions, built of unburnt bricks mixed up with chopped straw or reeds, 

 and cemented with clay-mortar of great thickness, having between 

 every layer a layer of reeds ; and on the north side are also some 

 vestiges of a similar construction. The south-west angle is crowned by 

 something like a turret or lantern : the other angles are in a less perfect 

 state, but may originally have been ornamented in a similar manner. 

 The western face is lowest and easiest of ascent ; the northern the 

 most difficult. All are worn into furrows by the weather ; and in 

 some places, where several streams of rain-water have united together, 

 these furrows are of great depth and penetrate a considerable way 

 into the mound. The summit is covered with heaps of rubbish, in 

 digging into some of which layers of broken burnt brick cemented 

 with mortar were discovered, and whole bricks with inscriptions are 

 sometimes found. The whole is covered with innumerable fragments 

 of pottery, brick, bitumen, pebbles, vitrified brick or scoria, and even 

 shells, bits of glass, and mother-of-pearl. In the northern face of the 

 Mujelibe' near the summit is a niche or recess, high enough for a man 

 to stand upright in, at the back of which is a low aperture leading to 

 a small cavity, whence a passage branches off to the right, sloping 

 upwards in a westerly direction till it loses itself in the rubbish." 

 Mr. Rich made excavations here, and after digging into a shaft or 

 hollow pier, 60 feet square, lined with fine brick laid in bitumen and 

 filled up with earth, a brass spike, some earthen vessels, and a beam 

 of date-tree wood were found. After carrying on the excavations 

 some way further they discovered a narrow passage, nearly 10 feet 

 high, flat on the top, exhibiting both burnt and unburnt bricks, the 

 former with inscriptions on them, and the latter laid with a layer of 

 reeds between every row, except in one or two courses near the 

 bottom, where they are cemented with bitumen. The hollow pier 

 just alluded to corresponds exactly to Strabo's description (p. 738) 

 of the hollow brick piers which supported the hanging-garden ; in the 

 hollow thus filled with earth the largest trees grew. 



It appears that the walls were lined with a fine burnt brick to con- 

 ceal the unburnt bricks, of which the body of the building was princi- 

 pally composed ; there is a continuation of this passage to the eastward, 

 choked up with earth. Here Mr. Rich discovered a wooden coffin 

 containing a skeleton in high preservation. Under the head of the 

 coffin was a round pebble ; attached to the coffin, on the outside, was 

 a brass bird, and inside an ornament of the same material, which had 

 apparently been suspended to some part of the skeleton. A little 

 farther the skeleton of a child was found ; and Mr. Rich was of 

 opinion that the whole passage was occupied in a similar manner. 

 It may therefore be conjectured that the Mujelib<5 was a great brick 

 pyramid for the dead. It may perhaps also have been used for an 

 observatory. 



Dr. Layard pushed his excavations on the track of Mr. Rich in this 

 great mound of Babel as he calls the Mujelibe'. Beyond the under- 

 ground chamber in which Mr. Rich found the coffin " the entrance 

 to other galleries which had not been explored was reached ; they 

 were still closed by large burnt bricks, amongst which were a few 

 square stones inscribed on one edge with two lines of cuneiform cha- 

 racters containing the name and titles of Nebuchadnezzar. It was 

 evident that they had originally belonged to an edifice erected by that 

 monarch and had been taken from its ruins to form the covering to 

 the vaults and tombs. 



" Beneath this masonry were found several coffins precisely similar 

 to that discovered by Mr. Rich. They still held skeletons more or 

 low entire, which fell to pieces as soon as exposed to the air. No 



relic or ornament had been buried with the bodies. The wood of the 

 coffins was in the last stage of decay, and could only be taken out 

 piecemeal. A foul and unbearable stench issued from these loathsome 

 remains and from the passages which had become the dens of wild 

 beasts who had worked their way into them from above." The 

 coffins Dr. Layard pronounces to be of later date than even the time 

 of the Seleucidie. " It is evident," he says, " that they were buried 

 after the destruction of the edifice covered by the mound. Upon 

 that great heap over the fallen palace or temple was probably raised 

 one of those citadels which formed the defences of a city built long 

 after the destruction of the Babylonian empire and its magnificent 

 capital, and which resisted the arms of Demetrius Poliorcetes (Diod. 

 Sicul. xix. 100). Of that stronghold the thick wall of sun-dried 

 brick on the northern side is probably the remains." 



After opening numerous deep trenches on the mound and carrying 

 several tunnels into its sides Dr. Layard discovered only relics of a 

 doubtful period, such as are found after heavy rains among all 

 Babylonian ruins. The most interesting were bronze and iron arrow- 

 heads, small glass bottles (some coloured, others ribbed or otherwise 

 ornamented), and earthenware vases of various forms and colours, and 

 a rudely-carved jug of soapstone similar to one in Mr. Rich's collection 

 in the British Museum. 



At last by carrying tunnels into the mound on the eastern side 

 nearly on a level with the plain " the workmen reached solid piers 

 and walls of brick masonry buried under an enormous mass of loose 

 bricks, earth, and rubbish." Eight or ten piers were uncovered and 

 walls branching off in several directions, but no sculptures or wall- 

 paintings were discovered, nor could a plan be traced. The excava- 

 tions in this part were discontinued in consequence of the danger to 

 the workmen from the falling in of the rubbish above them. On the 

 western and southern sides of the mound remains of solid masonry 

 were also discovered at the very base. The bricks used in the structure 

 are also stamped with the name of Nebuchadnezzar and are firmly 

 united with fine white mortar. " It is thus evident," adds Dr. 

 Layard, "that a vast edifice once stood either on the level of the 

 plain or raised upon enormous piers and buttresses of brickwork, and 

 that the tombs and any traces of building that may exist on or near 

 the present surface of the mound are of a more recent period." Dr. 

 Layard does not undertake to decide whether Babel be the remains 

 of Nebuchadnezzar's palace, of the hanging gardens, or of a temple. 

 According to Jewish tradition in the time of Benjamin of Tudela it 

 was the ruins of the palace, and near it was pointed out the site of 

 the furnace into which the three Hebrew children were thrown. 



The ruin called El-Hymer, to the north-east of the site of Babylon, 

 is of pyramidal form, but in Dr. Layard's opinion " it is evidently the 

 remains of a solid square structure, consisting like the Birs Nimroud 

 of a series of terraces or platforms. It may be conjectured therefore 

 that it was a sacred edifice, built upon the same general plan as all 

 the temples of Babylonia and Assyria." The structure was erected 

 partly with sun-dried and partly with burnt bricks, cemented with 

 mud. Many of the kiln-burnt bricks are marked with the name of 

 Nebuchadnezzar. Like the Birs Nimroud this ruin has square holes 

 to admit air. 



It may be as well perhaps to mention here the result of Dr. Layard's 

 examination of the great mounds of NifFer. They are situated about 

 60 miles to the south-east of Hillah, on the edge of a vast marsh that 

 covers a large part of South Mesopotamia, There are four distinct 

 groups of mounds, each separated from the others by deep ravines 

 which have the appearance of streets. A high cone at the north-east 

 corner of the whole mass is called Bint-el-Ameer (' Daughter of the 

 Prince ' /, and is probably the remains of a square tower built of large 

 sun-dried bricks. The bricks differ somewhat in shape from those of 

 Babylon ; but many of them are stamped with Babylonian characters 

 expressing the name of a king and of the city. Colonel Rawlinson 

 reads the name of the city ' Tel Anu,' and seems to think it the same 

 as ' Telaney which Stephen of Byzantium says was the native place of 

 the Assyrian kings before the building of Nineveh. The mounds were 

 found by Dr. Layard to rest upon massive foundations of Babylonian 

 brickwork. The excavations brought to light a great number of glazed 

 earthenware coffins similar to those brought by Mr. Loftus from 

 Warka and now placed in the British Museum. Earthenware vases, 

 jugs, cups, and pieces of bowls covered with ancient Hebrew charac- 

 ters, similar to those discovered at Babylon, and fragments of glass 

 bottles were also found. It is Dr. Layard's opinion that these mounds 

 are the ruins of a Babylonian city, and that they were used as the 

 necropolis of a later city which occupied part of the site during the 

 early centuries of the Christian era. 



Of the history of Babylon this part of the ENGLISH CYCLOPAEDIA 

 must not treat at length. We give some of ite principal epochs and 

 events. There seems good reason to suppose that the city originated in 

 Babel, which is mentioned (Gen. x. and xi.) as the beginning of Nim- 

 rod's kingdom, and as the scene of the confusion of tongues. The 

 word Babel means ' confusion,' or according to another interpretation 

 the ' gate or court of Bel,' the Babylonian Jupiter. In the Bible the 

 city is not subsequently noticed till the people of Samaria were carried 

 away captive about B.C. 730 (2 Kings, xvii.) ; but evidence of its exist- 

 ence in the 15th century B.C. has been found on Egyptian monuments 

 of the time of Thothmes III. During the long interval between these 



