170 THEOPHILUS G. PINCHES, LL.D., M.R.A.S., ON 
which he laid out, wherein were all herbs and fruit-trees, trees 
produced on the mountains and in the land of Chaldea (a plain 
low-lying and flat), and trees bearing wool. This, as my former 
colleague of the British Museum points out, must be a reference 
to the growing of cotton, as is shown by the statement, that it 
was used for the fabricating of clothing. 
At this point he quits the references to his palaces, and speaks 
of his work on the city of Nineveh. From former days, he says, 
the area of its circuit had been 9,500 cubits, and the princes 
going before him had not built an inner and an outer wall. 
Here we have two rather surprising statements, for this estimate 
of its area is too small to accord with what we have learned from 
ancient writers, and the absence of defensive walls is not what 
we should have expected from the Assyrians. If true, however, 
it would show how remarkably confident they were that the city 
would not be taken by an enemy—it must have been indeed the 
city of a nation which trusted in its own power. 
This state of things, however, he immediately proceeded to 
rectify, for he states that he increased the size of the city by 
12,515 cubits, and from this portion of the record we gather that 
the suk/um and the dmmat or cubit were the same. The great 
wall, of which he records the laying of the foundation, he called 
“The Wall whose glory overthroweth the enemy.” He made 
its brickwork 40 (? cubits) thick, which would probably not 
greatly exceed the estimate of the late George Smith, who 
reckoned it at about 50 feet, but added that excavation would 
probably decide that point—and we may add, that it would also, 
perhaps, decide the measure of the swklum or dmmat. The 
height of the walls he raised to 180 ¢ipki, which, according to 
Diodorus, should amount to about 100 feet. These were pierced 
by fifteen gates :— 
“To the four winds fifteen city-gates, 
before and behind, on both sides, 
for entering and going forth, 
I caused to be opened in it.” 
Then follow their names, with which, though they are suffi- 
ciently interesting, I will not tire you. As specimens of their 
nature, however, it may be mentioned that the gate of the god 
Assur of the city of ASSur was called “ May Assur’s viceroy be 
strong” ; whilst “The Overwhelmer of the whole of the enemy,” 
was the name of the gate of Sennacherib of the land of 
Halzi—an indication, perhaps, of Sennacherib’s birthplace. 
The gate of the Mesopotamian city of Halah was called “ The 
