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Hamath and Nimrud

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 August 2014

R. D. Barnett
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Extract

It must be very unusual in the history of archaeology for a site to have a history of excavation in two stages, separated by over a century. Ur, Babylon and Susa were touched, it is true, by early workers in the Mesopotamian field; but their work there had little to compare with that of our generations. Yet the brilliantly successful excavations of Professor Mallowan and his staff of the British School of Archaeology in Iraq have repeatedly carried us back to the first beginnings of Assyriology, in particular by their great finds of ivories to that second day of Layard's excavations, the 9th of November, 1845, when Layard's men sank their spades into the soil of the North-West Palace and brought out the first of the ‘Nimrud Ivories’. These finds of ivories by Layard have now all been published in full and discussed at length, and in the publication I put forward the view that the work of decorating with them perhaps furniture or rooms was originally carried out by Phoenician and Hamathite craftsmen for the ruler of Hamath, Iau-bi’di, and that it was Sargon who carried off the ivories to Nimrud when he destroyed Hamath and swept away its wealth as booty in 719 B.C.

Type
Research Article
Information
IRAQ , Volume 25 , Issue 1 , Spring 1963 , pp. 81 - 85
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute for the Study of Iraq 1963

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References

1 Barnett, R. D., A Catalogue of the Nimrud Ivories in the British Museum (1957)Google Scholar.

2 ibid., pp. 133, 135.

3 On this variation of the name see A. Malamat, ‘Aspects of the Foreign Policies of David and Solomon’; (B) Israel and Hamath, J.N.E.S., XXII, 1963, esp. p. 7, n. 26.

4 Millard, A. R., ‘Alphabetic inscriptions on ivories from Nimrud”, Iraq XXIV, 1962, Pt. 1, Pl. XXIIIGoogle Scholar.

5 Professor D. J. Wiseman kindly informs me that in the present season, April 1963, still more pieces have been found.

6 For this identification, I am deeply grateful to Rev. H. E. J. Biggs.

7 On B.M. Nos. 133011, 133014, 133015, 133018, 133021, 133023 (= Plate XV, d, i,f, c, h, l).

8 L. Messerschmidt, Corpus Inscriptionum Hettiti-carum, M.V.A.G. 1900, IIIB, IVA, B, V, VI; Hrozný, B., Les Inscriptions hittites hiéroglyphiques II, pp. 297–312Google Scholar.

9 A New Decipherment of the Hittite Hieroglyphics. (Oxford, 1913; Society of Antiquaries.)Google Scholar

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11 cf. L. W. King, Babylonian Boundary Stones … the British Museum, Nos. 90829, 90835.

12 L. Messerschmidt, loc. cit. pl. XXXIX.

13 R. C. Thompson & M. E. L. Mallowan, “The British Museum Excavations at Nineveh’, A.A.A., XX, pl. CV.

14 B. Hrozný, op. cit. II, pp. 124–149.

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16 R. D. Barnett, op. cit. fig. 89 (S.408).

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21 I.L.N., 08 16th, 1952, p. 526, fig. 28Google Scholar.

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23 Ingholt, H., Sept Campagnes de Fouilles à Hama en Syrie, 1932–1938, pl. XXIV, Copenhagen 1940Google Scholar; Riis, P. J., Hama, , Fouilles et Recherches 1931–1938, II, 3, fig. 230Google Scholar

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25 R. Hinks, Catalogue of Greek & Roman Mosaics & Paintings, fig. 100.