60 



THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



Underwood & Underwood 



THE WAEES OF NINEVEH : MESOPOTAMIA, TURKEY IN ASIA 



Out of the past of this land, now ruled by the Turk, speaks a glory of military power, 

 material wealth, literature and art, philosophy and religion. Centuries before the Christian 

 era, a regularly appointed librarian had charge of the library of Nineveh's King Ashurbanipal. 

 That institution was open to the public, for Ashurbanipal himself recorded : "I wrote upon the 

 tablets; I placed them in my palace for the instruction of my people/' 



waste, the desert sands have encroached 

 upon the fertile fields, while the clogged 

 canals have turned other portions into 

 swamps and marshes. 



What population there is — -not more 

 than one million — is of Arab origin and 

 the Arabic language is spoken through- 

 out. There is, in fact, a very distinct 

 dividing line between the Arabic and the 



Turkish-speaking portions of the Otto- 

 man Empire. This boundary corre- 

 sponds with the line of the Bagdad Rail- 

 way from the Mediterranean to the Per- 

 sian Gulf. It is for the exploitation of 

 this rich land of Mesopotamia that the 

 famous Bagdad line was built. 



Syria, the region extending from the 

 Taurus Mountains to Egypt and from the 



