Representations of foreigners in their strange attire have a long tradition in the Ancient Near East. While the Assyrian Empire was expanding during the early first millennium BC, the Assyrian kings ‒ with the help of skilled and even inspired craftsmen – attached a growing importance to the differentiation of their near neighbours and people further away. The palace reliefs of Assurnaṣirpal were of excellent craftsmanship, the garments, the hair-styles, the beards and the surrounding landscape were carefully rendered, quite often in every minute detail. Through these details the meaning of the ‘images’ became fully understandable to the well informed Assyrian viewer. Foreign people were not merely enemies, they were people in their own right.