276 SEAL CYLINDERS OF WESTERN ASIA. 
mostly lost by fracture, appears to have contained Hittite sphinxes. In the upper 
register an uncertain figure, perhaps a deity, stands each side of a Babylonian 
caduceus, with its central vase between the two serpents. Iwo figures follow, one 
with a branch over his shoulder. ‘There are two other figures facing each other, 
who may represent the principal Hittite deity as seen in Chapter XLVII. 
In fig. 823 we have seen Gilgamesh lifting a lion over his head. Gilgamesh 
is frequent in the Syro-Hittite art, and it is not strange that he was transferred from 
the Ionian coasts into the Greek mythology as Hercules. In fig. 831 Gilgamesh 
stands with one foot on the neck of a reversed bull, while under them is the Hittite 
guilloche and behind him is a lion over a long-haired, nude worshiper. On one 
side of a strict sacred tree surmounted by a winged disk is a god much in the attitude 
of the Babylonian Ramman, but holding a curved weapon in his right hand, while 
on the other side is the goddess Aa-Shala. It will be seen that the disk takes the 
form of a rosette, which suggests that the rosette when seen alone represents the sun. 

A very beautiful cylinder seen in fig. 832 is large and shows Assyrian as well 
as Babylonian influence. Gilgamesh is duplicated symmetrically, standing on 
each side of a column, made of small circles, on which rests the symbol of the sun 
drawn with circles in place of the four alternating streams. Evidently the meaning 
of the streams had been lost in the transfer to the north and west. But the figure of 
Gilgamesh is finely drawn. ‘That the sun on the column takes the place of the sacred 
tree appears from the following figure, which is bird-headed and winged, and carries 
a pail in one hand and a branch in the other. Behind him is the owner in the attitude 
of worship, and last in the procession, as frequently, is the goddess Aa-Shala. Under 
these three figures is an elaborate guilloche. 
In fig. 833 Gilgamesh stands nude between two figures of Aa-Shala, while 
between them, duplicated, is the “libra”’ under a vase; the remaining space is filled 
by two rabbits, over a guilloche, over three marching figures. 
A most delicately engraved cylinder is seen in 834. Gilgamesh kneels and holds 
down two bulls by the head, their bodies reversed. Under him is a griffin whose 
front leg reaches toward a figure which suggests Eabani, who holds an ibex with one 
hand. Within an angular guilloche two sphinxes face each other, and, below, two 
lions face each other with a human head between them (omitted in the drawing). A 
god, much like Ramman-Martu but holding a crook instead of a scepter, occupies 
