The Record Chambers of Nineveh, recently discovered, have supplied documents, now being published, which confirm the biblical annals.

The vast mounds which were supposed to mark the sites of Nineveh, Babylon, Erech, Calneh, and other great cities were long known to oriental travellers; but it was not till the year 1842 that the work of excavation was begun. Then M. Botta, French consul at Mosul, commenced to excavate the mound of Kouyunjik, on the left bank of the Tigris. His discoveries were so remarkable that they immediately attracted the attention of Europe. In the mound of Khorsabad, ten miles farther north, he found the remains of the palace of Sargon, who ruled Assyria from B.C. 722 to B.C. 705, and who was the cotemporary of Hezekiah, King of Judah. The interior walls of the palace were covered with sculptures representing battles, sieges, chariots, hunting scenes, festive entertainments, huge winged bulls, figures of priests, kings, and gods-almost all of which had upon or around them long cuneiform inscriptions. Such of the sculptures and inscribed slabs as could be removed were conveyed to Paris, and now form a valuable part of the magnificent collection of antiquities in the Louvre. A splendid work was published, at the expense of the French Government, containing engravings of those monuments, and of others which were too much injured to admit of their being removed.

Botta was followed by Layard, who inaugurated his great work in 1845, under the patronage and at the expense of the English ambassador at Constantinople, Sir Stratford Canning, now Lord Stratford de Redcliffe. His success was complete. He speedily laid bare the palaces of Sardanapalus, Esarhaddon, and other Assyrians monarchs, in the mound of Nimrod, the site of the ancient Calah (Gen. 10:12); and the palace of Sennacherib at Kouyunjik, the ancient Nineveh-all of them containing remarkable sculptures and historical documents of inestimable value. In the palace of Sennacherib, Layard found a

"doorway, guarded by fish-gods (similar to the Philistine Dagon), which led into two small chambers opening into each other, and once panelled with bass-reliefs. On a few fragments, still standing against the walls, could be traced a city on the shores of a sea whose waters were covered with galleys. I shall call these chambers 'the chambers of records,' for, like the house of the

rolls,' or records, which Darius ordered to be searched for the decree of Cyrus, concerning the building of the temple of Jerusalem,' they appear to have contained the decrees of the Assyrian kings as well as the archives of the empire. . . The historical records and public documents of the Assyrians were kept on tablets and cylinders of baked clay. On a large hexagonal cylinder, presented by me to the British Museum, are the chronicles of Esarhaddon; on a similar cylinder, discovered in the mound of Neby Yunus, are eight years of the annals of Sennacherib, and on a barrel-shaped cylinder in the British Museum, and known as Bellino's, we have part of the records of the same king. The importance of such relics will be readily understood. They present, in a small compass, an abridgment or recapitulation of the inscriptions on the great monuments and palace walls, giving in a chronological series the events of each monarch's reign.

"The chambers I am describing appear to have been a depository in the palace of Nineveh for such documents. To the height of a foot or more from the floor they were entirely filled with them; some entire, but the greater part broken into many fragments. They were of different sizes; the largest tablets were flat, and measured about 9 inches by 6; the smaller were slightly convex, and some were not more than an inch long, with but one or two lines of writing. The cuneiform characters on most of them were singularly sharp and well defined, but so minute in some instances as to be almost illegible without a magnifying-glass. These documents appear to be of various kinds. Many are historical records of wars and distant expeditions undertaken by the Assyrians; some seem to be royal decrees, and are stamped with the name of a king; others, again, contain lists of the gods."

"Sir Henry Rawlinson, who made the preliminary examination of Mr. Layard's treasures, and who was the first to recognize their value, estimated the number of these fragments at over twenty thousand." These precious tablets are now in the British Museum, accessible to all oriental scholars. The key to the cuneiform writing, with which they are covered, was discovered by Grotefend, but Sir Henry Rawlinson was the first to use it with success in deciphering inscriptions. The difficult and laborious task has since been prosecuted with great zeal by Hincks, Oppert, Norris, Fox Talbot, Lenormant, Sayce, Smith, and others; and we are now only just beginning to realize the vast importance of those primeval records in a biblical and archæological point of view. Fortunately, too, they are being brought within the reach of the general public, for some of the more important tablets themselves have been published

1 Ezra 6: I.

3 Smith,

2 Layard, "Nineveh and Babylon," p. 344 et seq.

"Chaldean Account of Genesis," p. 2.

by the authorities of the British Museum, and translations of them are appearing in volumes entitled "Records of the Past," issued under the sanction of the Society of Biblical Archæology, by the Messrs. Bagster, of London.

CHALDEAN ACCOUNT OF THE CREATION.

Amongst the most intensely interesting of the inscriptions are those which contain the Genesis legends. Notices of the creation were first observed by Smith on tablets in the British Museum when preparing one of the volumes of his cuneiform texts. Curiosity was at once awakened, and his search was diligently prosecuted in the Museum. Subsequently he went to Nineveh, and re-examined with new and special care the ancient Record Chambers The success which rewarded his praiseworthy toil far surpassed expectations. He brought to light records which appear to have been copied by Assyrian scribes from Akkadian tablets, originally written several centuries before the time of Abraham. Each distinct subject was treated of in a series of tablets, and had a special title composed, as in the case of the Hebrew books of the Old Testament, of the first few words of the story. The number of each tablet in the series was written upon it; and it had besides a "catch-phrase" at the end, consisting of the first line of the following tablet. This arrangement greatly facilitates classification, and enables the scholar in some cases to identify even a small fragment. The existing documents, having been found in the ruined palaces of the Assyrian monarchs, cannot be later than B.C. 625, when Nineveh was destroyed; and they were copied from Akkadian documents of a far older date. Mr. Smith's words are worthy

"The Izdubar legends, containing the story of the flood, and what I believe to be the history of Nimrod, were probably written in the south of the country, and at least as early as B.C. 2000. These legends were, however, traditions before they were committed to writing, and were common in some form to all the country. The story of the creation and fall belongs to the upper or Akkad division of the country, and may not have been committed to writing so early as the Izdubar

1

legends; but even this is of great antiquity. Thus the Assyrian tablets in their original form are at least two centuries older than Abraham, and six centuries older than Moses; while the remarkable traditions they contain are more ancient still.

It is unfortunate that nearly all the tablets hitherto discovered are mere fragments. Some of them have been, after great labor, put together; pieces of others have been exhumed from the mound of Kouyunjik; and a careful examination of what remain has shown that the Record Chamber originally contained detailed legends of the creation, the fall, the deluge, the Tower of Babel, the confusion of tongues, and the dispersion of mankind, resembling in many particulars the Mosaic narrative.'

"The first series," says Smith, "which I may call the story of 'The Creation and Fall,' when complete must have consisted of nine or ten tablets at least, and the history upon it is much longer and fuller, than the corresponding account in the book of Genesis. . . . The narrative commences with a description of the period before the world was created, when there existed a chaos, or confusion. The desolate and empty state of the universe and the generation by chaos of monsters are vividly given. The chaos is presided over by a female power named Tisalat and Tiamat, corresponding to the Thalatth of Berosus; but, as it proceeds, the Assyrian account agrees rather with the Bible than with the short account from Berosus. We are told, in the inscriptions, of the fall of the celestial being who appears to correspond to Satan. In his ambition, he raises his hand against the sanctuary of the God of heaven; and the description of him is really magnificent. . . The rebellion leads to a war in heaven and the conquest of the powers of evil, the gods in due course creating the universe in stages, as in the Mosaic narrative, surveying each step of the work and pronouncing it good, the divine work culminating in the creation of man, who is made upright and free from evil, and endowed by the gods with the noble faculty of speech. The deity then delivers a long address to the newly-created being, instructing him in all his duties and privileges, and pointing out the glory of his state. But this condition of blessing does not last long before man, yielding to temptation, falls; and the deity then pronounces upon him a terrible curse, invoking on his head all the evils which have since afflicted humanity."

"3

Such is a summary of the Assyrian legend. A few extracts from the tablets themselves will show more clearly in what points they accord with the biblical narrative. It is unfortunate

1 "Chaldean Account of Genesis," p. 27.

'See, generally, Smith, “Assyrian Discoveries,” p. 166 et seq.; Chaldean Account of the Creation," p. 3 et seq.; Records of the Past," vols. i., iii., vii.,

and ix.

Smith, "Chaldean Account of the Creation," pp. 13-15.

that so comparatively small a portion of the original documents has been saved from the ruins, and that even those which do remain are so fragmentary, and in some places so obscure, that the exact sense can scarcely be absolutely fixed; yet there is no doubt about their general tenor. The writing upon each tablet is on one column, extending over both the front and back, and contained about one hundred lines. Portions of the first and fifth tablets only of the series have been found and deciphered with any fair degree of certainty. We give extracts from the translation made by Mr. Fox Talbot :

First Tablet.

"When the upper region was not yet called heaven,

And the lower region was not yet called earth,

And the abyss of Hades had not yet opened its arms,

Then the chaos of waters gave birth to all of them,

And the waters were gathered into one place.

No men yet dwelt together; no animals yet wandered about." The rest of the tablet refers to the gods, and is mutilated. The above extract corresponds in outline very remarkably with Genesis II and 2: "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form and empty, and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God hovered over the face of the waters.'

The fifth tablet is of very great importance. We give the following extract from the first part of it, which alone remains perfect :

"He constructed dwellings for the great gods,

He fixed up constellations, whose figures were like animals,

He made the year. Into four quarters he divided it.

Twelve months he established, with their constellations, three by three,

And for the days of the year he appointed festivals.

In the centre he placed luminaries.

The moon he appointed to rule the night

And to wander through the night, until the dawn of day.
Every month without fail he made holy assembly days.
In the beginning of the month, at the rising of the night,

It shot forth its horns to illuminate the heavens.

On the seventh day he appointed a holy day,
And to cease from all work he commanded.
Then arose the sun in the horizon of heaven." 1

1 "Records of the Past," ix., 117.