ASSYRIAN CYLINDERS: BEL AND THE DRAGON. 209 
ona palm. We may safely assume that it is the same scene that is depicted in other 
cases, as in fig. 623, where the god is identified solely by his characteristic scimitar. 
Another example appears in fig. 625, where we have the winged disk, the crescent, 
the star, and a low plant or sacred tree. It is the same god who in fig. 624 attacks 
a bull, while a scorpion-man stands behind the god. Equally in fig. 626 we see the 
god attacking a bull, while we have a sitting monkey, a sacred tree under the winged 
emblem of Ashur, a crescent, and the Egyptian crux ansata. Quite curious, and 
showing decided foreign influence, is fig. 627, in which the rudely drawn winged 
god seizes two ibexes. Equally foreign seems fig. 628, in which the god is on horse- 
back and shoots with his bow, after the Parthian fashion, a winged monster, perhaps 
a horse, which pursues him, while under his own horse is a headless man, and a 
bird follows, perhaps to feed on the carcass. It is by no means clear in this case 
that we have a variant of the story of Bel and the dragon; it may be the rendition 
of quite another tale current among the wilder hunters of the countries to the north 
or east. Indeed in all these more naturalistic scenes we appear to feel the influence 



TamR 629 
of the early Babylonian art with the contests with wild beasts of Gilgamesh and 
Fabani, quite as much as that of Marduk and Tiamat. 
In this connection we may properly consider those cases in which the wild 
imagination of the artist is directed towards the god as well as his antagonist. We 
have already seen in fig. 576 the god replaced by a scorpion-man. Other variations 
occur. Another such case we see in fig. 630, where a scorpion-man shoots at a lion. 
In fig. 629 a bull is pursued by a sort of archer-centaur, but with the hind legs of 
an eagle. Other accessories in this very rude example are a star, a crescent, a 
thomb, a fish, and a simple plant or tree. Quite similar is fig. 631. Here a centaur- 
archer attacks the fleeing dragon. In the field are a star, a crescent, and a fish. 
In neither of the last two cases can one suppose a purely Assyrian design; and the 
guilloche border here indicates as much. Yet this is not in the style of the Syro- 
Hittite cylinders which we shall consider later. Fig. 21 shows us a centaur of the 
Kassite period. Very probably we have here a hunter god, a sort of Esau, of one 
of the neighboring regions whose mythology and whose art can not yet, with our 
imperfect materials, be separated from those of Assyria which affected them so 
much. A similar centaur is shown in fig. 632, in which the archer-centaur shoots 
14 
