ni] 



AND HISTORIC TIMES 



197 



back (Fig. 64) of the horse, which is only adorned with a cloth 

 even when led behind the chariot of the king. Layard^ thought 

 that " the horses of the Assyrian bas-reliefs were evidently 

 drawn from the finest models, and the Assyrian sculptor has 

 not altogether been unsuccessful in their delineation. The 

 head is small and well shaped, the nostrils large and high, 

 the neck arched, the body long, and the legs slender and 

 sinewy." The prophet Habakkuk- characterises the horses 

 of the Chaldees as " swifter than the leopards and more fierce 

 than evening wolves." 



Fig. 64. Assyrian Lion-hunt. 



As the connection of Assyria with Armenia was very close, 

 it is probable that the horses which the Assyrians rode and 

 drove, and the possession of which was a chief factor in the 

 story of Assyrian conquest, were largely supplied by Armenia, 

 which was sending horses as far as Tyre in the seventh century 

 B.C., and which supplied the Persian monarchs, and later still 

 the Parthian kings, with vast numbers of excellent horses. 

 But as we shall see j)resently, it is more than probable that 

 the best horses of Assyria had in their veins some of the blood 

 from which both the Arabian horse and our thoroughbreds are 



1 Nineveh and its Remains (ed. 1867), pp. 234-5. 



"- i. 8. 



