Sennacherib's Palace at Nineveh: The Drawings of H. A. Churchill and the Discoveries of H. J. Ross

Sennacherib's Palace at Nineveh: The Drawings of H. A. Churchill and the Discoveries of H. J.RossAuthor(s): Geoffrey TurnerSource: Iraq, Vol. 63 (2001), pp. 107-138Published by: British Institute for the Study of IraqStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4200504 .

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107

SENNACHERIB'S PALACE AT NINEVEH: THE DRAWINGS OF H. A. CHURCHILL AND THE DISCOVERIES OF H. J. ROSS

By GEOFFREY TURNER

Inspired and also shamed by John Russell's discovery of the fair copy of Layard's excavation notes for Sennacherib's palace at Nineveh (Russell, 1995), I have recently gone through the extensive Layard Papers in the British Library in the hope of further interesting finds.' From his first excavations at Nimrud and Nineveh, November 1845-June 1847, there is very little, only some notes and sketch plans of Nimrud;2 but these would have been only a fraction of the records Layarded oall riginothers, such as field notes, journals and diaries, sketches and site plans, after completing Nineveh and its Remains (1849).3 Of the excavations on Sennacherib's palace at Kuyunjik, in May and June 1847, there is only Layards later fair copy of his field notes LN 1 (Russell, 1995, pp. 72-7 and SWPS, pp. 10-12). By comparison, for his second campaign, October 1849-April 1851, there is a wealth of material, both for Nimrud and especially for Kuyunjik, and although much of this does not necessarily add greatly to our knowledge of Layard's discoveries, his notebooks and diaries certainly do contain new and interesting details. These documentary sources will be used in a separate article, charting the course of Layard's excavation of Sennacherib's palace.

As is so often the case, one of the last groups of documents I came across in the Layard Papers does contain new information and on an unexpected subject. These are letters to Layard from Col. W. F. Williams of the Turco-Persian Boundary Commission, written at Kuyunjik in the spring of 1849 when Williams was en route to Baghdad and thence to Mandali on the disputed border. At this time Toma Shishman, Layard's foreman, was still working on the site of Sennacherib's palace, and Williams had a junior member of his staff, H. A. Churchill, make drawings of a number of the reliefs exposed. These he sent together with details of the present state of excavations to Layard, who was then at Constantinople and would himself be back at Nineveh in six months. Williams' letters, ad an important sketch plan included in one of them, throw new light not only on the discoveries in Sennacherib's palace between Layard's two expeditions, first under the supervision of his friend H. J. Ross and then of the vice-consul Christian Rassam, but more importantly on Churchill's drawings. Although we still know little of Churchill the person, at least now we do know when and why he made these drawings at Kuyunjik.

PART 1. The drawings of H. A. Churchill W. F. Williams at Kuyunjik, March-April 1849

Col. William Fenwick Williams4 was the British commissioner appointed to work with Russian, Persian and Turkish delegates in determining the Turco-Persian boundary, following a recent fracas between those two countries. Layard had also been assigned to this commission in 1848, but only as private secretary to Williams, a post he soon resigned, considering it inferior to his abilities, recent experience and accomplishments. Little seems to be known of Churchill, and of his official function on the commission. In his letters Williams stresses Churchill's youth and calls him "my Protege", but says nothing of his background or station in life. He praises his artistic skills, which may not have been of professional quality (SWPS, p. 16), but were of an adequate

' For a brief account of the Layard Papers see SWPS, expeditions to Nimrud and Nineveh, 1847-8, Layard did pp. 8-9. Copies of my notes and references to the relevant not have a real base or home in England. His mother in documents on Nimrud and Nineveh will be deposited with Cheltenham, his aunt and uncle (the Austens) in London, the Department of the Ancient Near East, British Museum. and his cousin Lady Charlotte Guest at Dowlais and

2Add.MS. 39.090, especially B. Canford, were all people with whom he could have left his 3 Layard's publishers, John Murray of Albemarle Street, papers, but nothing appears to have survived from these

London WI, kindly showed both R. D. Barnett and later houses. myself their Layard archives, but these did not include any 4 1800-83. Later General, "the Hero of Kars" 1855, Bart. manuscripts or original plans and drawings. It must also 1856, G.C.B. 1871. be borne in mind that in the interval between his two

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amateur standard in view of the working conditions in ill-lit tunnels, for much of the time with torrential rain above, and within a limited time. Another member of the Boundary Commission, A. G. Glascott (SWPS, pp. 17 and 19 n. 12), made a trigonometrical survey of Kuyunjik, the original of which is in the British Museum (Fig. 1) (SWPS, p. 17 Plan II (a) and PI. 2). An adapted version of this was later used by Layard, who himself did not make a contour survey of Kuyunjik, as an inset to his plan of Sennacherib's palace in Nineveh and Babylon (Fig. 2). Layard only records that Williams "had visited Mosul on his way to Baghdad, and had kindly permitted Lieutenant Glascott, R.N., the engineer of the commission, to make a careful survey of Kouyunjik" (Layard, 1853, p. 76), without mentioning Williams' reports to him nor Churchill's drawings, which Williams had posted to him in Constantinople, together with Glascott's survey, the squeeze of an inscription and two relief fragments.

Two other members of the Boundary Commission, Loftus and Dodson, joined Williams at Mosul on 5 April 1849; but Williams does not record that either helped at Kuyunjik, and Loftus states only that he now visited the four sites of Kuyunjik, Khorsabad, Karamlis and Nimrud.5 Later in the course of their duties on the commission, Churchill accompanied Loftus to Warka and Susa where he made more drawings, helped Loftus in the survey of Warka, and himself did that of Susa.6

On his way out to Baghdad and the Persian border, Williams stayed at the Embassy in Constantinople with Sir Stratford Canning, and was still there when Layard arrived just before Christmas 1848. Williams left shortly afterwards on Christmas Day, but the two, who had been in correspondence since 1845, would have had time to discuss both Williams' mission and forthcoming journey and also Layard's discoveries of 1845-7 at Nimrud and Nineveh. Williams and his party reached Mosul on 23 March 1849, staying there with the British vice-consul Christian Rassam,7 and two days later Rassam took them over to Kuyunjik to show them "your grand galleries". When Layard had left Mosul at the end of his first expedition, in June 1847, the British Museum asked his friend Henry Ross to keep an eye on Kuyunjik, where Layard's foreman Toma Shishman continued the excavations, principally to retain the Museum's claim to the site. When Ross left Mosul in July 1848, Rassam was asked to supervise the work, and Williams reported to Layard that the vice-consul would cross the Tigris about once a week to check on "Mr. Moonface, your Arab".

Williams and his staff remained at Mosul till mid-April, for part of the time encamped at Kuyunjik, and also away on trips to other sites in the neighbourhood. Williams sent Layard three letters addressed from Coiinjick, describing Toma Shishman's investigations of Sennacherib's palace and Churchill's drawings of the sculptures, written with the precision and detail one would expect of a senior officer.8 Although neither in "copper-plate" script nor as neatly written as those

5 In his letter, Add.MS. 38.978, f. 306r, Williams notes that Loftus was a welcome addition, but not so Dodson. Also W. K. Loftus, Travels and Researches in Chaldaea and Susiana, London 1857, p. 4.

6Loftus, op.cit., pp. 73, 93, 125, 134-5, 287, 343, 368-9 and 415, and plans facing pp. 160 and 340.

7Williams' letter to Layard, Mosul, 25 March 1859- Add.MS. 38.978, ff. 288-9. In this letter he describes Rassam as "the best nigger I ever saw", a compliment he presumably did not repeat in the same words to Rassam's British wife, Matilda Badger (see below p. 128). Rassam's youngest brother, Hormuzd, wrote that almost all English travellers stayed with the vice-consul, as there were no hotels or lodging houses in any large town in Mesopotamia (H. Rassam, Asshur and the Land of Nimrod, New York 1897, p. 4). I do not know if it was the same building, but in 1860 John Ussher also stayed with the Rassams and writes, "It was one of the largest houses in Mosul, and certainly the handsomest. Built some years before the promulgation of the Tanzimat, which may be almost called the Magna Charta of the Turkish empire, by the then Aga of the Janizaries, the Pasha of Mosul, envious of his wealth, contrived on some pretext to have him seized and decapit- ated, appropriating to himself at the same time all his moveable property. The family of the unfortunate Aga,

thus reduced to comparative indigence, were forced to sell the remainder of their possessions, and thus a house which had cost some £6000 was sold to Mr. Rassam for £300.

The walls of the spacious court were of alabaster found in abundance near Mosul, of which material the slabs and statues discovered in the ruins of Nineveh and Nimrud also consist. Low arches round the court gave light and air to the serdaubs, or half-underground cellars, in which, as well as at Bagdad, the inhabitants remain during the great heat of the day in summer. These cellars are, in fact, subterranean rooms, handsomely furnished, and differing in no respect from the other apartments, save that they are a little darker and much cooler. The court was paved with large flags, many of which had been brought from the ruins of Nineveh, and in the centre was a small plot of ground filled with orange and lemon trees" (A Journey from London to Persepolis, London 1865, pp. 392-3).

8Add.MS. 38.978, ff. 300r-301v, 29 March 1849; ff. 304r-305v, 5 April 1849; and ff. 306r-308v, a "running" letter dated between 6 and 15 April 1849. For other correspondence of Williams to Layard, 1845-78, see British Library Add.MS. Index vol. 19 B. Also of some archaeolo- gical interest is Williams' letter of 1 February 1851 from Susa, which also contains rough sketches - Add.MS. 38.980, ff. 13-15.

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SENNACHERIB'S PALACE AT NINEVEH

of Rassam's British wife, and in parts with the ink badly smudged by heavy rain, these letters are still relatively easy to decipher, especially when compared to parts of Layard's field notes, LN 2. Williams' third letter includes a rough sketch plan of those parts of Sennacherib's palace now exposed and also of the slabs drawn by Churchill (Fig. 3). The main area of these excavations is also drawn on Glascott's Plan of the subterraneous excavation now in progress, on the left side of the manuscript of his survey of Kuyunjik (Fig. 1). This appended plan is a detailed enlargement of the area marked on his survey of the mound, with the walls drawn and the slabs delineated. The distorted alignment of the walls reflect the difficulty of accurately planning excavations made underground in tunnels and not in open trenches. Layard did not include this appended plan when he added Glascott's survey on to his own plan of Sennacherib's palace (Fig. 2).

Williams' sketch plan shows the excavations on an almost straight east-west line, drawn down the length of the page. At the lower end, the small cross-hatched area A is side-entrance c from Forecourt H into Throneroom I, which Layard had unearthed in the early summer of 1847 and which was still open to view, "the deep excavation in which you found the Colossal winged quadruped & the fragment of his keeper". Above this, at an unspecified distance to the west, is the excavation now in progress. This starts at point B, a shaft or pit in the south-east9 corner of Court VI, close to where Layard had ceased excavating in June 1847. Excavation was by tunnels or "Subterranean galleries" (marked X), with shaft holes (cross-hatched double circles) for both light and air. Trenches were impracticable and dangerous, the palace being as much as 30 feet (approx. 9 m) below "the level of the present green fields" (also Layard, 1853, p. 69). Walls lined with sculptured slabs are shown along the south side of Court VI, starting at the south-east corner, Williams' 1st Series; at entrance k into Room XIII, ZZ - Bulls; along the north wall of Room XII, 2nd Series; on the doorway between Rooms XIII and XIV, Portal guarded by winged griffins - feet only remaining; with two relief fragments on the adjacent short end wall of Room XIII, P.P; and the north and part of the west wall of Room XIV, 3rd Series. Again at an unspecified distance to the west, Williams re-excavated D.D. galleries fallen in but reopened by me to draw the 4th Series, also described Q western & detached galleries, that is the area of Layard's Rooms LI-LIII.

On Glascott's plan of the excavation now in progress the location of Williams' shaft or pit B is marked Entrance. This does not indicate a doorway of the palace but a ramp leading down from the surface of the tell to the excavated tunnels, as noted by Williams, "... at the shaft entrance of which you have the first slab of the series on your left hand". On his return to Nineveh in autumn 1849, Layard described Toma Shishman's excavated tunnels, "I descended into the vaulted passages by an inclined way, through which the workmen issued from beneath to throw away the rubbish dug out from the ruins. At the bottom I found myself before a wall forming the southern side of the great Hall [Court VI]" (Layard, 1853, p. 69). Glascott marks another such Entrance to the east of entrance k, along the line of the north wall of Room XIII.

Drawings of Henry A. Churchill There are thirty-one drawings by Churchill in the Original Drawings (abbreviated Or. Dr.

followed by the number of the volume in which they are bound and the number of the drawing) in the British Museum (Department of the Ancient Near East). Of these thirty are listed in R. D. Barnett, E. Bleibtreu and G. Turner, Sculptures from the Southwest Palace of Sennacherib at Nineveh, p. 16 et passim, with twenty-two reproduced, whilst for the other eight there are illustra- tions of duplicate drawings of the same slabs, made following Layard's return to Kuyunjik in the autumn of 1849. Churchill's drawing or sketch of entrance k from Court VI into Room XIII is published here on Fig. 4. All but one of Churchill's drawings, No. 241 c, are signed. Williams wrote to Layard, "I shall number every slab on their paper [drawing], and again on the plans of the excavations". Thus on all but Nos. 86 and 132 there is an annotation corresponding to references in Williams' letters and/or to his sketch plan. This identifies the actual slab drawn, which in turn can be matched with Layard's numbering of the slabs. Of Churchill's drawings

9 For simplicity I follow Layard, and also Williams et al., north-west, south-east. Layard observed, "I assume the and refer to the orientation of the walls of Sennacherib's building to be due north and south, although it is not so. palace as by the cardinal points of the compass, viz. north, It faces nearly north-east and south-west" (Layard, 1853, south, etc., rather than by the more strictly correct p. 103 n.).

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listed in SWPS, twenty-one have been correctly attributed; and it is now possible to identify another seven with certainty, and the possible/probable provenance of the two unannotated drawings, Nos. 86 and 132.

The drawings of the 1st Series are each annotated "No. 1", etc., but those of the 2nd-4th Series are marked more precisely "No. 1 Second Series", etc. The 1st Series were posted to Layard on 31 March, together with the sketch of entrance k and the drawings of slabs A and B from the western & detached galleries, and the unannotated fragments, Nos. 86 and 132. The other eighteen drawings were all sent on 14 April or thereabouts. The numbering on the second batch of drawings is by Williams, but on the 1st Series and on the drawings of slabs A and B it is in a different hand, probably Churchill's, as indicated by the similarity of the "A" in his signature and of that marked on No. 553b, the drawing of slab A.

Williams also wrote of the drawings, "all of which are measured and marked" and "one thing you may be sure of- accuracy in measurements". Again with the exception of the two unannotated drawings, Nos. 86 and 132, and of that of entrance k, Williams marked all Churchill's drawings with the height and width of each slab, except No. 229b, which only has the height and not the width. Several drawings also have other notes by Williams, as listed in SWPS, three of which are signed with his initials, Nos. lOlb and 108b and that of entrance k.

The following table lists Churchill's drawings, with the position of each slab or its attribution, and the references in SWPS. This is followed by an analysis of Williams' letters and his sketch plan, especially with reference to the earlier discoveries of H. J. Ross and the later excavations of Layard.

Williams/Churchill

1st Series No. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

2nd Series No. 1 2 3 4 5

Location

Court VI slab 9

1 1

entr. l

Room XII slab

6

W Room XLVIII s

Portal - griffins P fragment

P. fragment

3rd Series No. 1 2 3 4 5

(Williams' sketch plan 6- 6 7

0

2 3 4 5 6 k

SWPS

lOOb p. 62 lOlb p. 62 102b p. 62 103b p. 62 104b p. 62 121b p. 64 attributed to slab 30 122b p. 64 attributed to slab 31 108b pp. 62-3, P1. 87 114 p. 63

16 229c p. 76, P1. 155 attributed to slab 15 right 15 229b p. 76, PI. 155 attributed to slab 15 left 14 228b pp. 75-6, PI. 153 13 227b p.75, PI. 151 12 225a-226a p. 75, PI. 150 attributed to slab 1 1?

and 12 11 85 pp. 59-60, PI. 72 attributed to Room V

slab (?) slab 7 520b p. 118, PI. 409

Rooms XIII entr. a 231a? p. 76, Pl. 157 west wall 205a p. 73, PI. 141 attributed to Room IX

slab (?) west wall 206a p. 73, PI. 141 ditto

Room XIV slab 17 16 15 14 13

7) 12 11 10

247 p. 78, not drawn 246b p. 78, P1. 181 245c p. 78, PI. 180 244c p. 78, PI. 176 243c p. 78, PI. 176 242 p. 77, not drawn 241c p. 77, PI. 172 240c p. 77

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4th Series No. 1-2 r e not drawn 3 south-west edge 84 p. 59, PI. 71 attributed to Room V slab (?)

4-5 of Kuyunjik 83 p. 59, PI. 70 ditto

slab A Room LI slab (?) 553b pp. 122-3, PI. 430 B (?) 554b p. 123, P1. 430 S probably 86 p. 60, PI. 73 attributed to Court VI slab (?)

possibly or Court VI 132 p. 64, PI. 95 attributed to Court VI

1st Series - Court VI slabs 9-16. There are eight drawings by Churchill of the reliefs of the 1st Series, Nos. 1-7 and 9, all of which were again drawn on Layard's return to Kuyunjik later in 1849, probably by the artist F. C. Cooper.10 Churchill's Nos. 1-5 and 9 have been correctly identified as slabs 9-13 and 16 of Court VI, but Nos. 6-7 have been attributed to slabs 30-31, based on Layard's numbering of the later drawing, whereas in fact they are most probably of slabs 14-15, as will be seen below, p. 112.

In his letter of 29 March, which was sent by the same post as the drawings, Williams writes, "the shaft [B on his sketch plan] hit this gallery at first slab of the series - The King comes out of a Fortress in his chariot accompanied by his Troops, horse & foot and prepared for battle ... The Battle goes on to its close without any flaw except the second last slab, which is missing, but the last represents the Commander leaning forward on his horse & an archer alongside of him [slab 16] ... procession of Captives horses and cattle, and amongst the prisoners is evidently a Princess and her son, for instead of the usual fearful way of securing their prisoners, this female is mounted on a mule & has her son seated behind her [slab 13]". On Churchill's drawing No. 2 [slab 10] Williams added, "The indistinctness of the lower figures of this plate and of those of almost all the others, will shew the extent of the injury done by time to this series of diminutive sculptures -".

The eight drawings of the 1st Series are numberend-7 and 9, and on No. 9, the fragmentary slab 16, Williams noted "N.B. One missing.", signed with hi s initials. This corresponds to "the second last slab, which is missing" of his letter, as quoted above. On Williams' sketch plan eight slabs are delineated, but only seven are numbered, 1-6 and 8, with the wall drawn as uninterrupted, and the gap between nos. 6 and 8 simply marked with a short stroke. Williams did not make his sketch plan until after the drawings of the 1st Series had been sent off to Layard on 31 March, with the first mention of it in his letter of 6 April, and this hiatus of a few days may account for the confusion both of the numbering and of the number of the slabs. However on Glascott's plan there are also only seven slabs on this wall: a line of six slabs, followed by a broken gap, and then a seventh slab, the intervening gap in fact representing side-entrance / into Room XIII, which Williams had not recognized as a doorway, his "missing" slab.1 Layard planned the south wall of Court VI with slabs 8-15 starting at the south-east corner, side-entrance 1, the short slab 16, and then the east buttress of entrance k faced with slabs 18 20 (Fig. 6).

It is unlikely to be but chance and coincidence that the plans of both Williams and Glascott have only seven and not eight slabs for the 1st Series. A possible but undocumented explanation is that the first slab, the 1st Series No. 1 or Layard's slab 9, had in this interval of a few days become covered by rubble and other debris, which collapsed on to it as a result of the torrential rain. In his letter of 29 March Williams says that the shaft marked B on his sketch plan was immediately above this slab, and also that some of the galleries or trenches had already been brought down by the rain, and that there was every sign of the rest collapsing. On 5 April, when he next wrote, the mound was awash, and this heavy rain continued till at least 7 April. Shaft B was in fact a ramp and the principal means of access to and from the tunnelled excavations, and it is well possible that the heavy rain combined with the continuous use of this inclined passage had eroded the section, and the falling rubble had covered up this slab. Williams noted its dimensions on Churchill's drawing as 3ft. 6in. high and 5ft. 7in. wide (approx. 106 x 170 cm), which is by no means inconsiderable; but

'°Although on the whole not very detailed, Layard's This will be covered in greater detail in my article on diary entries do note when he made drawings, copied Layard's second campaign at Kuyunjik. inscriptions or took measurements, etc.; and from these it " As also in Layard's field notes, LN 2C, "east ent[ran]ce can be presumed that the later drawings of the lst-4th quite destroyed" (S WPS, p. 17, where Layard's poor writing series, etc., were made by F. C. Cooper and not Layard. of east was misread as west, but queried as such).

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Churchill's drawing (Fig. 5) omits several features on the relief which are shown on Cooper's later drawing (SWPS, PI. 81), namely only one and not two vines and no trees in the hilly landscape. Churchill also has the slab badly cracked or broken, with fallen stones and other rubble along the lower edge, including a large lump to the right. This debris continues on to his drawing of 1 st Series No. 2, slab 10. The lower half of 1st Series/slab 9 was thus only partly exposed when drawn by Churchill, and it may well have become almost totally covered in the following few days, before Williams and later Glascott made their plans. The adjacent slab 8 to the east was not excavated at this time,12 but Layard would have had the wall completely cleared on his return to Kuyunjik, although he records almost nothing of it in his field notes, LN 2C (S WPS, p. 13).

Court VI- slabs 14-15 or 30-31. Cooper's later drawing of the two slabs 1st Series Nos. 6-7 is on one sheet of paper with the annotation Chamber I [VI] Nos. 30.31 (SWPS, Nos. 121a-122a -

p. 63 and Pls. 92-3), that is on the west side of Court VI, between entrances h and i. On his plan Williams only sketched the outlines of the galleries excavated, but from Glascott's plan it is clear that in April 1849 the tunnelled excavations did not branch off along the west side of the courtyard, even for a short distance; and the annotations on drawings Nos. 6 and 7 show that they are certainly from the 1st Series, following Nos. 1-5. When recording the discoveries of his second campaign at Kuyunjik, Layard did not yet number the individual slabs of the various rooms and courtyards; but introduced his system of notation only after his return to England, probably at the same time as he compiled the fair copy of his field notes (Russell, 1995) and completed the MS Plan of the palace (SWPS, Pls. 6-7), also now adding the annotations with chamber and slab number to the drawings.13 For the smaller rooms and those of which only a few drawings had been made, this would have been relatively straight forward, as presumably the drawings of each chamber or court were kept together, probably in separate tin cylinders; and Layard would have referred to his field notes and diary, and also would have had recourse to his memory. In the case of Court VI, however, this would not have been so simple. Some fifteen sheets of drawings were made, illustrating thirty or so slabs and fragments (SWPS, pp. 62-70), executed not only at different times during the campaign, from early October 1849 until the middle of the same month of the following year, but also drawn by both Cooper and Layard.

In view of the numbering of Churchill's drawings 1st Series Nos. 6-7, the later version by Cooper of the same slabs was most probably mislabelled by Layard as slabs 30 and 31, and these are in fact slabs 14 and 15. The outline of slab 13, with a diagonal curve on the right side sloping down to the band of hilly landscape with a row of diminutive captives (SWPS, P1. 85), corresponds closely to the left side of No. 121a (SWPS, P1. 92). The fact that the circular fortified camp partly shown on slab 13 is not continued on No. 121a would be due to the damaged state of the latter. Layard's field notes, LN 2C, which were written at Kuyunjik at the time of the excavation, also corroborate this (SWPS, pp. 12-13 - Chamber I): of slabs 23-5 "all gone except bottom part evidently forming part of scenes continuing to east of Bulls [entrance k] all of which have been drawn [my italics]", that is slabs 9-16 and 19-20 had been drawn. And of the western wall, "fragments of slabs continuation of subj[ec]t on Southern representing battle scene in mountainous country with vineyards, cattle, prisoners &c [my italics] - some fragments drawn", these fragments being slabs 38 and 39 which illustrate this scene (SWPS, No. 129a - p. 64 and Pls. 94-5).

Court VI - slabs 17-21 and entrance k. Following his description of the reliefs of the 1 st Series and Churchill's artistic skills, Williams continues his letter of 29 March 1849, "after the last slab of the battle, one slab advanced at right angles to this exposed side of a grand Chamber (as I take it to be) and then two slabs of large figures lead you to a gate turning to the left, this gate is guarded by two Colossal Bulls the sketch of which accompanies the other drawings, and between the hind & fore

12 For Court VI slab 8 see Russell, 1998, p. 239 and Pis. same landscape as on slabs 9-16. Slab 8 was not drawn. 197 and 199. Russell's photograph taken in 1990 shows the '3This and references in the following paragraph will be left side of slab 8, of which the lower part was preserved, covered in greater detail in my article on Layard's second with trees in a hilly landscape. This scene continued from campaign at Kuyunjik. slab 7 in the doorway into Room XVIII, and shows the

112




legs exist very perfect inscriptions which Mr. Moonface, your Arab, has taken in papier mache, but it will not be dry enough to come this post".

On Williams' sketch plan there is only a short dotted line between the last slab of the 1st Series (numbered 8) and the two bulls Z Z of central entrance k into Room XIII, showing the line of the excavated tunnel. On Churchill's drawing of slab 16 a part of the adjacent slab 17 can be seen, "advanced at right angles to this exposed side" (SWPS, P1. 87), as also marked on Glascott's plan. On the east buttress of entrance k Glascott delineates two wide slabs, Layard's 19 and 20, which Cooper drew together with the short and damaged slab 16 on the same sheet of paper (SWPS, Nos. 108a and 1 lOa-1 Ila - pp. 62-3 and Pls. 77 and 87-914); and although of the same series, the scene of slab 16 does not continue directly onto the slab drawn adjacent to it, and was shown as such. At the very end of his letter of 29 March Williams adds, "N.B. Slabs No. 5 & 6 show that the Battle took place on both sides of the river", again evidently confusing the numbering of the drawings of the 1st Series. Nos. 5 and 6 have been identified as slabs 13-14 (SWPS, Pls. 85 and 92), but of the latter the upper part, which would have included the river, was damaged and it was no longer visible. On the very top of slabs 12-13, 1st Series Nos. 4-5, there is a river with a battle scene above (SWPS, Pls. 84-5), but Williams was more probably referring to slabs 19-20 (SWPS, Pls. 88-9), which show a battle in full action on both sides of a river running mid-way across the surviving parts of the two slabs. For some reason, possibly lack of time, Churchill was not instructed to draw slabs 19-20.

Williams' "two slabs of large figures" would be the prophylactic guardian figures lining the recess to the eas o the first bull colossus of entrance k, slab 21 and its partner which Layard did not number.15

Churchill's sketch of entrance k, reproduced on Fig. 4, looks across the entrance at an angle from the right, with a tunnel between the bulls into Room XIII and, to the left, the gallery excavated along the south facade of Court VI, with the ramp shaft B at the end. Except for the bulls, no other sculptures are drawn. This may not be such an accomplished composition as the watercolours made by S. C. Malan the following year (SWPS, Pls. 25, 361 and 449), but it does give a good impression of the entrance and bull colossi, and especially of Toma Shishman's "subterranean galleries", which were apparently holding up well in a relatively stable condition. On the lower right side Williams noted in pencil, "N.B. Inscriptions attached to the bull complete - the other side (or hidden inscription [)] much injured ", signed with his initials. In the upper right corner there is another annotation, (c), but in a different hand and obviously added in the belief that the drawing was of side-entrance c from Forecourt H into Throneroom I.16 Towards the end of his letter of 29 March Williams added, "P.S. Churchill's drawing of the legs of the Colossal Bull (six each, on the exterior sides)", or in fact five in total, confirming Russell's suggestion that the inscription on the bulls show that these were five-legged colossi, whereas the others from Sennacherib's palace may have all been four-legged (Russell, 1999, pp. 278-9). The papier-mache squeeze which Williams had Toma Shishman make of the bull inscription is unfortunately no longer in the British Museum, but Russell has identified a copy of the text by Layard in the British Museum archives.'7 Layard returned to Mosul on 29 September 1849, and rode over to Kuyunjik the following morning to inspect the discoveries made there during his absence. On 2 October, only his third day back, he

14Layard first marked this drawing "00", on the left side on the opposite side of Court VI (Russell, 1995, p. 78 in below slab 16, then crossed out each letter, annotating it Comment of Chamber I dis misprinted b). In the autumn correctly on the lower right side, "Kouyunjik Chamber I of 1850 Layard had several slabs removed from the north [VI] Nos. 16.19.20". For other mistakes in the numbering side of Court VI for shipment to London, most of which of the drawings of Chamber 00 or XXXVI, the Lachish he drew himself, but not all, e.g. slab 59/60 (SWPS, p. 66 Room , see SWPS, p. 102 Nos. 428a-429a and 430a-431a, No. 147a), probably on account of his feverish health and and p. 105 n. 1. pressure of time. LN 2C suggests that on entrance k these

15 In SWPS, p. 63, the "half-size" lahmu figure, No. I 13a guardian figures were fragmentary (SWPS, p. 13 end of (PI. 90) which Layard sent to London in 1850 but did not entry for Chamber I), but on entrance d in better condition have drawn, is attributed to slab 21. Although Williams (SWPS, p. 12). writes of "two slabs of large figures", Churchill also did not 16 As shown on another drawing, probably by Cooper draw No. I113a, and on Glascott's plan the corresponding (Russell, 1998, PI. 16=SWPS, p. 49 No. 8c). slabs on the west buttress of entrance k are delineated, but 17 Russell, 1999, pp. 276-80. 1 am most grateful to Russell not so on this part of the east buttress, which is drawn as for pointing this out to me. The squeeze of the inscription damaged or unexcavated with no slabs shown. Russell has was "deacquisitioned", or more accurately, thrown away proposed that No. 113a is in fact slab 48 from entrance d on the instructions of Sidney Smith.

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wrote in his diary, "Most part of the day at the mound copying inscription on Bull" (Add.MS. 39.096, f. 18v), and again on 12 October, "At Tell during the day, copied inscription on a pair of Bulls - employed pulley to raise te the earth from the trenches" (Add.MS. 39.096, f. 24v). Both entries obviously refer to the bulls of entrance k and presumably to his transcription of the text, identified by Russell. On this is the note, "copied from paper impression sent by Col. Williams" (Russell, 1999, p. 276), but the wording of Layard's diary indicates that he copied the actual inscription, although he may well have used the squeeze as a guide or "crib". Churchill's sketch and the notes in Williams' letter thus confirm both of Russell's suggestions, first on the number of legs of the guardian animals, and secondly on the identification of the unpublished copy of the inscription.

2nd Series - Room XII slabs 11-16 and Roomi XLVIII slab 7. On Williams' sketch plan, the 2nd and 3rd Series are drawn out of alignment, with both, but especially the 2nd Series, set too close to entrance k, and with the 2nd Series to the east of and not parallel to the 3rd Series. On Glascott's and Layard's plans they are plotted correctly.

Churchill's 2nd Series Nos. 1 4 were later redrawn, probably by Cooper, as a continuous frieze on one sheet of paper and subsequently numbered by Layard slabs 13-15 (SWPS, Nos. 227a-229a - p. 75 and PI. 144). The first two, slabs 13 and 14, join perfectly, but not so 14 and 15. On slab 14 the three rows of figures on the right side are at a smaller scale than those on slab 15, and thus the corresponding registers are on different levels. On Churchill's drawings Williams noted the height of each slab, with Nos. 3 and 4 both at 6ft. 8in. (approx. 203 cm) and No. 2 just one inch or approximately 2.5 cm lower; whereas on Cooper's composite drawing, slab 15 is considerably higher than slabs 13-14, a difference which can be calculated at some 11 or 12 cm. By making the appropriate adjustments, the three adjoining registers on slabs 14 and 15 of Cooper's drawing would match.

Cooper drew Churchill's 2nd Series Nos. 1 and 2 as broken, but with an almost perfect join (SWPS, PI. 154); and later Layard numbered them as one slab, 15. However from Churchill's drawings it is to be seen that the two did not fit, and are in fact to be identified as two adjacent slabs with damaged edges, 15 and the fragmentary 16 (SWPS, P1. 155). It is not easy to compare the accuracy of the draughtsmanship of Churchill and Cooper. This is best exemplified by slabs 10-11 and 13-15 of Room XIV, which were not only drawn by both men, but the original reliefs or parts thereof are now in the British Museum (SWPS, Pls. 168-80). It will be seen that both Churchill and Cooper omit not only details but also complete features, and draw details out of line; and although Cooper may have been a professional and produced more artistic compositions, he was not necessarily the more accurate. Williams wrote of Churchill, "over whom I have stood, and who has carefully avoided any exaggeration, or more properly speaking - approach to grecian art - the great mistake, indeed deception of the French artists in Egypt's Temples". It would have been better if Layard had spared some time to stand over Cooper and monitor his work. Cooper also "finished up" some of the drawings he had made on Kuyunjik when back in Mosul"8 and in doing so he may have sacrificed accuracy of detail for artistic effect. In the case of Cooper's composite drawing of Room XII slabs 13-16, he probably mistakenly and over-ambitiously tried to include a complex and intricate frieze of three slabs and part of a fourth on a single sheet of paper. He had only recently arrived at Kuyunjik and, although a trained artist, had as yet little experience of the task in hand.

Churchill's 2nd Series Nos. 5 and 6, Room XII slabs 12 and 11, were not later redrawn, as was recorded in Layard's field notes, "slabs on North side drawn - except last & corner adjoining which merely represents slingers & archers in a row in a wooded mountainous country" (SWPS, p. 13 - Chamber L19). Slab 12, Churchill's No. 5, was both wide, 7ft. 5in. (approx. 226cm), as drawn on Glascott's plan, and very fragmentary. An alternative drawing or sketch shows part of the right side and its overlap on slab 13, with the two rivers or streams drawn as not confluent and

"8As in his diary, e.g. 18 February 1850, Department of '9The reference [16+corner. 230] should be [10-12, the Ancient Near East, British Museum (SWPS, p. 19 n. 10). 224-226].

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part of a ramp to the left. This is unsigned and has not been attributed (SWPS, No. 226b - p. 75 and PI. 150). Churchill's No. 6, slab 11,20 follows closely Layard's description in LN 2C.

The numbering of the slabs on the north wall of Room XII and the attribution of the drawings of Churchill and Cooper are to be adjusted as on the table on pp. 110-11. To avoid ambiguity, the "corner' slabs 9 and 10 are assumed to have lined the two short end walls, to either side of entrance b into Room XLVIII.

Williams writes of the 2nd Series in his letter of 5 April 1849. Kuyunjik was hit by torrential rain which continued for at least another two days, reminiscent of a storm in June 1850 which Layard recorded in his diary (Add.MS. 39.089 A, ff. 4r and v). This resulted in the ink of Williams' letter becoming badly smudged, but he managed to save Churchill's drawings from the rain by covering them with the bed curtain in his tent. Of the reliefs he notes, "the procession of captives of the Fortress; they are very jewish in physiognomy ... the attack of the Citadel by escalade [sic - the siege was by ramps, not ladders]". The slabs were in comparison smaller than thaose of the 1 st Series, "have never been moved", and were "crumbling to pieces".

In his next letter, in the section dated 9 April, Williams wrote, "I also send you the last fragment - march by a lake the pioneers cutting down the trees before the Troops Castle in lake". The position of this relief is marked W on his sketch plan, just to the west of the 2nd Series, with the note "Fragment representing a Castle in a lake, and the march of Troops through a ford - the felling of Trees & lengths Pioneers &c", that is slab 7 in the doorway between Rooms XII and XLVIII. On Churchill's drawing Williams has also noted, "Fragment at the end of No 2 gallery or series", and Layard in LN 2C, "Warriors walking thro' water only very indistinct" (SnWPS, p. 13 Chamber L, final line).

Room XIII. Williams' sketch plan confirms the identification of Churchill's drawing of the two sides of a doorway, each carved with apotropaic figures, as that between Rooms XIII and XIV (also Russell, AJA 104 (2000) p. 612). Both the plan and drawing are marked :+: ; the plan with the note "Portal guarded by winged griffins feet only remaining", and in the section of his third letter dated 9 April, "the portals of the room containing the third series being guarded by the remnants of the Monster (winged, half man half lion) - young Churchill to draw". In LN 2C Layard gives a similar description (S WPS, p. 13 Chamber J).

Williams' sketch plan also establishes the position in Room XIII of two damaged slabs drawn by Churchill, on the end short wall to the right of the doorway into Room XIV. These are marked by the letters P.P and with the note "Two fine fragments accompanying this sketch", the drawings annotated "P fragment" and "P. fragment". On Glascott's plan two slabs are delineated on this wall. On his sketch plan Williams marked the letters P P first on the west jamb of side-entrance j from Court VI into Room XIII, but then corrected it, crossing these out. There is no reference in his letters to the two slabs.

These "Two fine fragments" were sent to Constantinople, together with Williams' third and final letter from Kuyunjik and Churchill's drawings of the 2nd-4th Series. There they were presented to Antonio Lopez de Cordoba, the Spanish minister plenipotentiary to the Sublime Porte, who on his return to Madrid in 1851 donated them to the Real Academia de la Historia, which they still grace.21 Although Lopez de Cordoba had met both Layard and Botta, being much interested in their Assyrian discoveries, it was most probably Sir Stratford Canning, the British ambassador, who actually gave him these two fragments, as there is no letter of thanks from the Spaniard in the Layard Papers. Layard had probably asked Williams to select and send him suitable relief fragments, either for the British Museum or for giving away in this manner, as he had similarly written to his friend H. J. Ross the previous year (see p. 124 below). Thus on 7 April Williams reported, "the small horses Nos 1 & 2 of the third series could be removed, whereas none of the No 4 Series could be even taken out of their exact position without separating into minute pieces", and on Churchill's drawing of 1st Series No. 2 he added the note, "The only slab, which would bear removal". Doubtless due to the poor condition of the two slabs P.P, Williams only sent a small

20AsalsoidentifiedbyRussell,AJA 104 (2000), p.612. 21J. M. Peniuela, Sefarad 26 (1966), pp.247-52. Also J. E. Reade, Iraq 34 (1972), p. 1 10.

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fragment of each to Constantinople, as is to be seen by comparing the photographs of the remaining pieces now in Madrid with Churchill's drawings (SWPS, Pl. 141 ).

3rd Series - Room XIV slabs 10-16. Churchill made six drawings of the 3rd Series, No. 2-7, all of which were later redrawn by Cooper. Five of the actual slabs or parts thereof were removed from Kuyunjik in 1850 by Layard and are now in the British Museum. There is no drawing of 3rd Series No. 1, the damaged slab 17.

On his sketch plan Williams numbered the slabs as 1-9, with 1-5 the same as drawings Nos. 1-5 and 8-9 as drawings Nos. 6-7, but numbers 6-7 on the sketch plan are the damaged corner slabs, Layard's slab 12, which were not drawn. On 9 April Williams wrote that the 1st, 6th and 7th slabs were broken, and on Churchill's drawing No. 5 he noted, "N.B. No. 6 of this series, a ruin ".

Of this important series of reliefs, recording the siege and capitulation of the city of Alammu, Williams writes little more than "No 3 series better work", and that two of the slabs were the only ones at Kuyunjik with "marks of fire, quite black". On his sketch plan he notes that the southern side of Room XIV was as yet unexcavated, but Glascott's plan shows that at least by 27 April the outline of all four walls had been revealed, as later described by Layard (Layard, 1853, p. 72).

Western & detached galleries, 4th Series, etc. Room LI, etc. On Williams' sketch plan, above and so to the west of the 1 st-3rd Series, are the "western & detached galleries" or "galleries fallen in but reopened by me to draw the 4th Series". On the the back of his plan Williams added, "Note The detached gallery in which the fourth series was redug by me is close to the western or Moussul edge of the mound, and in a direct line with your colossal winged figure and the intermediate excavation containing the first, second & third series". These galleries, unfortunately, are not included on Glascott's more detailed Plan of the subterraneous excavation in progress, with only the outlines of the excavated area marked on his general survey of Kuyunjik (Fig. 1). To co-ordinate Williams' sketch plan, Glascott's survey and Layard's ground-plan is not a simple task.

On the lower or east edge of the western & detached galleries are two slabs A and B, "ox & camel fragments", and a third slab S adjacent to the 4th Series, "fragment of horse & man". Williams also notes on his sketch plan that these drawings had already been sent to Layard on 31 March, by the same post as the 1st Series. In his letter of 29 March he first gives a full account of the 1st Series and of entrance k, and in a later part, "Some other fragments of horses, camels & oxen of the old Indian breed (humped) I also send you", but without any mention of where these fragments had been found. Two of Churchill's drawings are annotated A and B, identifying them as these slabs, one with captives, an ox-cart and camels, and the second with Assyrian soldiers and the royal chariot. When Layard returned to Kuyunjik six months later and reopened these excavations for a second time, as well as Williams' A and B, he found another five slabs from the same series, Room LI, and all seven were drawn (Layard, 1853, pp. 67-9, and SWPS, pp. 122-3 and Pls. 424-9). Although Layard writes of "carts drawn by oxen" (Layard, 1853, p. 68), the new drawing of slab A shows the head of the draught animal closer to that of a horse than an ox (SWPS, Pls. 428 and 430). The slabs of Room LI were badly damaged and on Layard's plan not numbered; and on Churchill's

drawing A the broken bricks and rubble below the slab may indicate that when found it was no

longer upright but had to be propped up to be drawn. There are two drawings by Churchill of relief fragments, rather than of fragmentary slabs, No. 86

(SWPS, p. 60 and PI. 73) and No. 132 (SWPS, p. 64 and P1. 95), either or both of which could be

fragment 5, discovered between A and B and the 4th Series. Neither drawing is marked with a find

spot, showing that they were probaby sent to Layard on 31 March together with the drawings of the 1st Series and slabs A and B, and not on 14 April with the second batch of drawings. By then Williams had made his sketch plan showing the positions of the various slabs. Drawing No. 86 has an Assyrian soldier leading his horse, a second soldier and the fore-legs of his horse behind; and No. 132 has a battle scene with a mounted Assyrian archer and foot soldiers, a fallen adversary below and a vine and river above. No. 86 is thus closer to the description of fragment S, "horse &

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man", and although the scene on No. 132 is certainly not discounted, it could as well be a fragment from the 1st Series, which had been found lying loose along the south wall of Court VI.

The 4th Series lay a short distance to the west of fragment S, on an east-west alignment. Williams refers to this series on 6, 7 and 9 April in his third "running" letter, and Churchill drew three slabs, Nos. 3-5, with Nos. 4 and 5 on the same sheet of paper. On drawing No. 3 Williams noted, "N.B.:

& 2 of this seris series are in ruins "and in his and in his letter, "the first & second slabs containing the Fortress, obliterated, 3, 4 & 5 therefore displaying the assault and attendant captivity". Churchill's drawings show that slab No. 3 was complete in its length, No. 4 damaged on the right side but most probably adjacent to No. 3, and that No. 5 was complete but relatively narrow. Williams does not mention slab 6 marked on his sketch plan. As with the 2nd and 3rd Series, the 4th Series is numbered from right to left, whereas the 1st Series is left to right. Williams remarked that Layard would probably like the 4th Series, as it showed the Assyrians "in their true character - evil devils", with a vivid description of the treatment meted out to their captives. As he had re-opened these tunnels, the reliefs were again covered up after Churchill had drawn them. In his third letter Williams makes no mention of slabs A and B or fragment S, which he had disinterred only a week earlier. Similarly when writing of his own later investigations in this area, Layard only describes Williams' slabs A and B and the five new reliefs he now found in Room LI, but does not mention the 4th Series. These will be discussed in further detail in connection with the discoveries of H. J. Ross.

On 29 March Williams wrote of Churchill's drawings, "these are the originals & no copies are kept, they are yours & I have infinite pleasure in sending them for the inspection of Sir Stratford"; and ten days later noted on his sketch plan, "every thing hitherto excavated is now in your possession. The work has gone on without interruption & in spite of storms from day light till darkness then the 'finishing up' till midnight". From a remark elsewhere in his letter, "finishing up" apparently referred to a tumblerful or two of brandy, necessitated by the terrible weather. This torrential rain seriously hampered Glascott's surveying of Kuyunjik, "the weather has put a stop to Glascott's work during four days" - 6 April; and "Glascott will not have the plan ready" 15 April. Williams and the other members of the commission then left for Hatra, with Glascott remaining at Kuyunjik to finish off his survey, which he finally dated "April 27th. 1849" and sent to Layard two weeks after Williams' departure. The post from Mosul to Constantinople evidently left once per week, each Monday.

PART II: The discoveries of H. J. Ross H. J. Ross at Kuyunjik, June 1847-July 1848

Williams believed that the Ist-3rd Series of reliefs in Court VI and Rooms XII-XIV had been excavated by Toma Shishman after Layard's departure from Mosul in June 1847, but that the western & detached galleries with the 4th Series and slabs A, B and S had been first excavated by Layard himself. In fact all had been excavated after Layard left Kuyunjik at the end of his first campaign, with the area on the south-western edge of the mound investigated by his friend H. J. Ross. Williams wrote to Layard, "on general points of course you have heard from the Consul, but I nevertheless think Sir Stratford Canning and yourself will be glad to have all the information and as much detail", being unaware of Ross' involvement. When Layard left Mosul on 24 June 1847, the Trustees of the British Museum asked Ross to continue the excavations on Kuyunjik on a modest scale and reduced budget, principally to maintain their presence and claim to the mound. This work was carried out by Layard's foreman, Toma Shishman, and when Ross himself left Mosul a year later, the British Museum transferred the supervision to the vice-consul Christian Rassam. As has been seen, Toma Shishman was still excavating to the south of Court VI when Williams reached Kuyunjik in late March 1849, and although he does not mention it, Williams may well have contributed to the cost of the work, in the hope of new and exciting discoveries. When Layard returned to Kuyunjik five months later at the end of September 1849, these "subterranean galleries" were still open, but from Layard's accounts, both in Nineveh and Babylon and in his diary and notebooks, it does not appear that much, if any further work had been done since Williams had left in mid-April.

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Henry James Ross22 was born of British parents in Malta in 1820, and partly educated in England. He subsequently followed in his father's footsteps and became a merchant or businessman in the Near East, in effect a Levantine trader. In 1843 he met the Chaldaean entrepreneur Christian Rassam, who was the British vice-consul in his native Mosul, and shortly afterwards they went into partnership and Ross moved to Mosul. In July 1848 Ross transferred his business activities to Samsun on the Black Sea, and then in 1852 to Alexandria, where in the 1860 as director of the Ottoman Bank, of which Layard had been one of the founders. In 1860 he married Janet, daughter of Sir Alexander and Lady Duff Gordon, the authoress of the well-known Letters from Egypt and also a friend of Layard. In 1869 the Rosses retired to a villa near Florence, where Ross spent the last thirty or so years of his life and where his widow still lived in the earlier part of the twentieth century (Ross, pp. 323-32, and Waterfield, p. I et passim). After his death Janet Ross published a collection of her husband's letters written between 1837 and 1857, mostly to his sister Mary, Letters from the East (Ross). These vivid descriptions of his travels, adventures and hunting exploits and a miniature of him aged 2923 reveal an interesting and colourful character.

When Layard arrived at Mosul in the autumn of 1845, he and Ross soon became friends. They were of almost the same age and both enjoyed the excitements of travel, coursing for hare and gazelle, and when the infrequent opportunity arose, delighting i the company of young women. On 8 November 1845 Ross accompanied Layard when he travelled down the Tigris by raft to open the excavations at Nimrud, and was a frequent visitor there and later at Kuyunjik. When Layar nd returned to England in late June 1847, the British Museum asked Ross to keep an eye on Kuyunjik, so as to maintain and retain their claim to the mound (Layard, 1849, II, pp. 137 ff., and SWPS, p. 4). A year later, in July 1848, Ross left for Samsun and Christian Rassam was engaged to take over from his English ex-partner on Kuyunjik. Rassam's youngest brother, Hormuzd, who had worked as Layard's assistant and general factotum during his first campaign of 1845-47, was at this time in England, where Layard had taken him to improve his education.

In the period of just over twelve months between Layard's departure from Mosul in late June 1847 and his own in mid-July 1848, Ross sent Layard several reports on Kuyunjik. Layard refers to these letters in Nineveh and its Remains ins II, pp. 137-40, and most, but evidently not all, are included in Ross' Letters from the East. Strangely there are no letters from Ross in the Layard Papers in the British Library, which do contain an extensive collection of correspondence sent to Layard throughout his life; but this archive does include those written by Layard to Ross.24 In the preface to her husband's letters, Janet Ross thanks Lady Layard for permission to include those to Layard (Ross, pp. v-vi), and it is clear that in fact the two widows exchanged their deceased husbands' correspondence at this time.

In Letters from the East nine of Ross' letters to Layard include a reference to or description of the work at Kuyunjik, in some very brief and only in three more detailed. As is shown by the letters to his sister Mary, Ross was travelling a great deal and would have gone over to Kuyunjik only when his business activities and other distractions allowed, and when Toma Shishman was making interesting discoveries. Since Letters from the East is not easily obtainable, the relevant passages are here reproduced, referred to as Letters Nos. 1-9.

Letter No. 1, 7 August 1847 (Ross, pp. 53-6) I believe I told you that Behman smashed your horseman into fragments, the slab that came out

afterwards I have had saved, but it went into four pieces. For a long time after the slab I noted to you, nothing turned up but blocks of black stone; now two slabs flat on the ground have appeared, but seem to have nothing on them. I have another of those Greek-looking busts in terra-cotta, about half the size of the one you had; this one has the breasts very prominent, and round one of them is twined a most diminutive deformity of an arm and hand. No Greek would have made such things, they must be Assyrian; besides, how could they be at such a depth if not genuine? I intend letting the straight line

22"Not to be confused with Dr John Ross, a physician shows a far more sedate and mature man - Ross, attached to the British Residency in Baghdad in the late frontispiece. 1830s and the 1840s, but no relation. For Dr Ross' letters 24Add.MS. 38.941 -typescript copies, and Add.MS. to Layard, 1843-7, see Add.MS. 38.975, f. 156, and 38.977, 38.977-9 - manuscript originals, together with the original fI. 81, 88 and 177. envelopes. Also Add.MS. 39.077, f. 108 - Ross' accounts

23 Ross, facing p. 156, and Waterfield, facing p. 150. A of 1848 for the Kuyunjik excavations. Layard and Ross drawing of Ross made only eleven years later, in 1860. continued their correspondence certainly until 1889.

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run on for two or three days. Then I shall go over, and unless there is some promise, shall turn off from the angle of the east slabs, and endeavour to discover the other side of the room. (Ross, p. 56)

Letter No. 2, 21 August 1847 (Ross pp. 56-8) a/ In my last I also gave you what merchants would call a "proforma" plan of the Kouyunjik diggings.

What was my anger and annoyance when, after the post, I went out to judge in what direction the excavation had best be carried on, to find that pig-headed beast Toma had been experimenting on his own wise suggestion, and, in spite of my positive orders to dig straight into the Tell, immediately I turned my back had broken the ground at right angles and lost a lot of time in making a useless trench. Then finding nothing, had begun another parallel one at the point where I told you I had some idea of trying to catch the other side of the room; and all this time he had asked me day after day whether he was to go on straight and my answer was, "Yes, go on straight until I come."

I have gone forward with the old trench right into the Tell, and broken fragments of marble are coming out, one of which has inscriptions. By continuing the trenches the other sides of the room might be found, but I doubt whether they would be well preserved; by going deeper into the Tell I have a faint hope of perhaps running across another portion of the palace which may, or may not, have suffered like the rest. (Ross, p. 57)

b/ I just hear that at the Tell in the straight trench is a black pavement, and under it charcoal and great quantities of broken marble; after the post I shall go over and see. (Ross, p. 58)

Letter No. 3, 16 October 1847 (Ross, pp. 59-61) At the Tell indications always continue, but with the exception of a slab about six feet high and three

wide, nothing has turned up. This slab has been broken off at the top, so that the inscription is only the fag end; it has also been either cut in two or else fitted to another, as, although the edge is cut smooth, in some of the lines the ends of letters spring from it, and so I am afraid this large slab of inscription is of little use. It has not been touched by fire, though a little corroded, but as the characters are of a very large size and deeply cut, every stroke is perfect, not a line has been obliterated; the only thing which puzzled me was which way the triangles pointed. Bad as my copy is, for I am ashamed of it, it took me a long time to do, and I found it more difficult than I had supposed. I have kept in a straight line till now, but to-day have commenced at right angles and shall dig for fourteen days a cross trench. If nothing turns up I shall open fresh ground altogether. As well as I can make out the whole Tell has been covered with marble buildings, but many appear to have been broken up purposely, even where fire has not been present. This is the only way I can account for portions of sound slabs being isolated as they are. (Ross, pp. 59-60)

Letter No. 4, 9 December 1847 (Ross, pp. 129-36) Kouyunjik is doing nothing, and the funds are nearly exhausted. (Ross, p. 132)

Letter No. 5, 10 January 1848 (Ross, pp. 143-4) In the corner of Kouyunjik nearest Mosul, where I am now digging, plenty of sculptured figures are

coming out which may perhaps lead to something, but I must soon stop for the funds are coming to an end. (Ross, p. 144)

Letter No. 6, 24 January 1848 (Ross, pp. 144-6) A long letter I wrote you on my return from Asheetha has been lost by the robbery of the post near

Osmanjik. The excavations are much more promising than they have been for a long time past. I am digging in the S.W. corner, and half tablets of chariots and horsemen are coming out in regular series, and apparently leading to something good. But the depth of the trench is tremendous, and with the few men I have the work proceeds slowly. Pieces of very fine inscription come out but not a single one perfect as yet. In the enclosure under Kouyunjik to the north, a man while ploughing struck a stone; he came to me and I had it dug out. It is about three feet in height, shaped like a tombstone; at the top is a figure with all kinds of emblems over his head, amongst them the guardian angel, and inscriptions run right over the whole, but unhappily the right corner has been defaced by the action of rain. Be-hanged if I do not think it is an Assyrian tombstone, because the figures and emblems are so like those of Bavian; besides the shape and size, and the fact that a large portion of a thick clay sarcophagus came out alongside of it. It was erect when found with a good deal of brick work on the sides to support it. Above where I am digging at the Tell, over the Assyrian ruins, are strong remains of building in stone and lime, and just under them in the earth, a Sassanian coin of mixed metal came out - apparently bronze and iron. It is clear there have been several palaces on Kouyunjik; the one I am now at is quite distinct from yours; and on the east side of the Tell in the gully facing the mills, Toma showed me fragments of yellow bulls. Now the people of the country say they have always known the greater portion of the relics that have been found since they were children to have come out on the north side of the Tell, and particularly betwixt that side and the ruined village near the centre, and also in the flat

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enclosure on the north, below the Tell, where the present stone (the tombstone) has been found. So I am persuaded that all four sides have been built on. I am at the last gasp for funds; however I shall not stop with such good indications before me. If I did Guillois would certainly carry my unfinished trench on, and if it did lead to anything it would be vexatious. Therefore I shall if necessary advance 500 piastres upon the chance of its being allowed.25 (Ross, pp. 144-5)

Letter No. 7, 20 March 1848 (Ross, pp. 146-8) Your instructions about excavations came very apropos, for as I wrote to you I had knocked off work

altogether. Now I have recommenced with Fat Toma and six men. (Ross, p. 146)

Letter No. 8, 17 April 1848 (Ross, pp. 148-50) At Kouyunjik we have got into two sides and a portion of what has been a magnificent hall, but,

unfortunately, dreadfully destroyed as usual. The slabs consist of a double series of tablets, representing the return of a triumphant army, principally chariots and led horses moving along the bank of a river, with palm trees in fruit in great abundance. The river is full of fish, tortoises and crabs. This all leads to a castle, also on the river's bank, out of which are proceeding men and women on foot, in ox-carts, on camels and mules, bearing presents to the conquerors. Near the castle is a field of millet in full bearing, and across the tablets are the remains of inscriptions; in the army two of the circular models of towns are carried - also broken. In fact, of the whole there are only two pieces which can possibly be moved, and these are doubtful; a woman and a child on a mule, and the castle. The ground is so deep that we are digging in tunnels, breaking a hole here and there to give light; the roof is six or seven feet thick. (Ross, p. 149)

Letter No. 9, 15 May 1848 (Ross, pp. 150-2) a/ The excavations go on as usual, chambers that have been magnificent, but are destroyed. My Assyrian tombstone I am keeping here on the chance of your coming to Mosul this summer.

(Ross, pp. 150-1)

b/ I have just come from Kouyunjik, where the excavations are regular catacombs, and in spite of the perforated skylights, I had to examine some of the slabs by candle light. All is very much destroyed; it is a great pity, for otherwise they would have been a very fine suite of rooms. The only things that I may succeed in saving are- the woman on a mule, the castle and millet field, two separate led horses, with the accompanying soldier to each, and a pair of beautiful horses' heads belonging to a chariot, a little procession of figures, a woman, two prisoners manacled and a soldier driving them with his uplifted sword. There are chariots and palm trees by dozens, one or two castles assaulted by the king in the act of drawing his bow, scaling ladders, men and headless corpses falling to the ground. In fact, just like the Nimrood ones, but completely charred. They might be drawn, but not removed. I think I shall begin in a new place altogether, on the chance of getting something better preserved.

29th. I have been to Nimrood, and pointed out to Behnan the pieces he is to move. The slabs you buried and which have begun to reappear, I directed to be well covered over. Some of those which you left exposed have been wantonly injured the two priestesses on each side of a sacred tree have had the eyes and noses defaced, and the same has been done to a priest on the other side, which was one of the best that remained. I did not like to take upon myself to have the whole covered up as the expense would be considerable. If you wish it done write to Rassam, as I shall have left Mosul before this will reach you. (Ross, pp. 151-2)

Finally Ross wrote to Layard from Malta on 13 August 1848, a month after leaving Mosul, telling him that the "tombstone" had been shipped to the British Museum, and that on his last day at Kuyunjik they had found fragments of a barrel-shaped cylinder. He had instructed Toma Shishman to look for the rest of the inscription (Ross, pp. 155-6).

Ross almost certainly made no plan of the excavations carried out under his supervision, but fortunately Glascott's survey of Kuyunjik does show the positions of various trenches and tunnelled excavations in addition to those described by Williams, and these were probably the work of Ross (Fig. 1). With the exception of side-entrance c from Forecourt H into Throneroom I, Williams' "Colossal remains of a winged Bull discovered by Layard", Glascott did not include Layard's other main excavations of May and June 1847; and those made subsequently by Ross were doubtless pointed out to him by Toma Shishman and Rassam. On his sketch plan Williams noted, "N.B. Your new wishes regarding the bearings of the different places included in old Nineveh, will prevent the map [Glascott's] being sent till next post", which suggests that Layard had written

25 Approximately £5 in 1848.

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asking that Glascott be instructed to include the sites of Ross' investigations. This was possibly in Layard's letter of 20 March 1849, which Williams mentioned that he had just received on 9 April.

Within the confines of Sennacherib's palace, Glascott marks excavated areas in: i) Forecourt H, with trenches branching off to the north of Layard's entrance c; ii) the tunnels on the south side of Court VI as described by Williams and as also drawn on Glascott's Plan of subterraneous excavation now in progress, together with an irregular L-shaped area to the south; iii) a complex of trenches and/or tunnels on the western edge of the mound, which included Williams' western & detached galleries; and iv) two trenches to the west of the gully south of Layard's Room II, possibly also in the palace surrounds is a right-angled trench to the north of those in Forecourt H; and to the north-west but almost certainly beyond Sennacherib's palace, Glascott marks a group of trenches by the west corner of the mound.26 Glascott's plan also has soundings on other parts of Kuyunjik, with trenches in gullies to the east, overlooking the Khosr, and two on the opposite, north-west side.

The excavations described in Ross' letters fall into three groups, with gaps of almost three months between each:- a) Letters Nos. 1-3 - August and October 1847 - Forecourt H. b) 5-6 and the missing letter mentioned in No. 6 - January 1848 - south-west

edge of mound. c) 8-9 - April and May 1848 - although more detailed, Ross does not indicate in

either letter the area investigated, but it was most probably also the south-west edge of the tell, as in Letters Nos. 5-6 and as assumed by Layard.

a) Letters Nos. 1-3 Forecourt H. The trenches described by Ross correspond closely to those marked on Glascott's survey (see enlarged plan Fig. 7). Entrance c into Throneroom I is the irregular area off which branches Layard's trench along the west wall of Forecourt H, coloured in a lighter tone than the other excavated areas and with broken lines, with Ross's extension continuing to the north. This is interrupted by a short east-west cross trench, off which leads the second parallel north-south trench, broken by two gaps at its southern end. At the northern end of this, Ross' final trench branches off to the east, on an east-west alignment.

The slab carved with a horseman, which Ross reported in Letter No. I as smashed to pieces, was probably one of slabs 4-7 of Forecourt H (Layard, 1849, II, p. 137). Of two of these slabs plaster casts had been made (SWPS, p. 49 and Pls. 26 and 28, Nos. 13a and 15a; and Russell, 1991, p. 295 n. 31). The basalt paving slabs in Letters Nos. 1 and 2b were probably those of Ashurbanipal, as also excavated by Madhloom some 120 years later (Sumer 24 (1968), p. 50 and SWPS, p. 24). The inscription of Letter No. 3 is a duplicate of Ashurnasirpal II's Standard Inscription, and although Ross did not indicate where on Kuyunjik it had been found, this was probably also in Forecourt H. It may have either been reused in Sennacherib's palace, or found its way there after the fall of Nineveh. Ross also did not say whether it was the same inscribed slab as in Letter No. 2a. Above Ross' transcription of the text, which is in the Department of the Ancient Near East in the British Museum, is the note, "Copied & sent by Mr. Ross, from Kouyunjik", which has been crossed through, with "On a fragment from Koujunjik" being added below.27

In Nineveh and its Remains II, pp. 137-8, Layard first describes his own excavations in Forecourt H, entrance c into Throneroom I and slabs 4-7 on the west wall, and then gives an account of Ross' investigations:

After my departure from Mosul, Mr. Ross continued the excavations along this wall for a short time, and discovered several other slabs and the openings into three new chambers, one entrance having, it appears, been formed by four lion sphinxes, fragments of which were found amongst the rubbish. The subjects of the bas-reliefs appear to have been nearly the same as those preceeding them. Mr. Ross could trace chariots, horsemen, archers, and warriors in mail. The country, in which the events recorded took place, was indicated by a river and palm trees. On one slab were the remains of two lions. This wall

26Boutcher's 1855 plan of Kuyunjik marks two shafts fly-leaf M S B. Folio 30. Published in Layard, Inscriptions here Barnett, 1976, Text-Plate 9. in the Cuneiform Character from Assyrian Monuments, 27 Bound in a volume with the spine entitled Copies of 1851, p. 81:A. Cuneijorm Inscriptions. A. H. Layard., and in pencil on the

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having ceased altogether, he first opened a trench in the same direction, but without coming upon other remains of building. Resuming the excavations at right angles to the end of the wall, he discovered, about eighteen feet from it, an immense square slab, which he conjectures to be a dais or altar, resembling that found in the great hall of the principal edifice at Nimroud. The wall was continued beyond it. The lower part of a few slabs still remained, and it was evident that they had been sculptured: but this part of the building had been so completely destroyed by fire, that Mr. Ross soon renounced any further attempt to examine it.

This description includes the basic details of Ross' Letters Nos. 1-3, with the various trenches he opened in Forecourt H and of the little that he found there; but theare also several additional items, principally entrances into three new chambers, one with fragmentary lion sphinxes, and a large stone dais or podium. These missing features were presumably in a letter or letters, which either Janet Ross did not consider of sufficient general interest to include in Letters from the East, or which had been lost or thrown away before she and Lady Layard exchanged their late husbands' correspondence. The lion sphinxes and the stone dais will be discussed below; and whilst Layard's description of the subjects on Ross' slabs in Forecourt H is not in Letters Nos. 1-3, it does in

part recall Letter No. 8 in which Ross wrote of his discoveries on the south-west edge of Kuyunjik. On d Layard's earlier plan of Sennacherib's palace (SWPS P, 1849, II, facing p. 124), the west wall of Forecout H continues to the north, with the addition of slabs 8-14, at which

point it meets the north wall of the courtyard, shown as a broken facade, presumably representing the openings into the three new rooms. Ross did not mention that he found any trace of such a north wall. Ross' dais or altar is possibly shown on this plan by the corner of a cross-hatched feature on the edge of the excavated area, to the east of the south buttress of entrance c.

On his return to Kuyunjik in autumn 1849, Layard continued his excavations in Forecourt H, but probably only on the Grand Entrance into Throneroom I, to the south of entrance c (Layard, 1853, pp. 135-8). This had not been touched by Ross. However Layard also describes the reliefs along the west wall of the courtyard, towards the north-west corner: "They had represented the conquest of a district, probably part of Babylonia, watered by a broad river and wooded with palms, spearmen on foot in combat with Assyrian horsemen, castles besieged, long lines of prisoners, and beasts of burden carrying away the spoil. Amongst various animals brought as tribute to the conquerors, could be distinguished a lion led by a chain" (Layard , 1853, p. 138). This appears to be taken in part from Layard's earlier account, as above on p. 121 (Layard, 1849, II, pp. 137-8), and possibly also from Ross' Letter No. 8, which in fact described the south-west edge of the mound. Layard nowhere records that he investigated Ross' trenches in Forecourt H, probably judging it not worth the trouble in view of Ross' reports of the little he had found there and of what was still visible in the open excavations. Layard's reference to a relief showing a captive leading a lion recalls a remark, "On one slab were the remains of two lions", which he made in his earlier account as Ross finding in Forecourt H (Layard, 1849, II, p. 138, and p. 121 above), but which is not included in Ross' published letters. As yet this subject of a tributary with a lion is not known from the Late Assyrian period, but it is found some 200 years later at Persepolis, where Susians are shown both leading a lioness and carrying her cubs (E. F. Schmidt, Persepolis I (OIP LXVIII) 1953, P1. 28 B). Layard may also have had in mind a relief he had excavated in the North-west Palace at Nimrud carved with western tributaries and monkeys, and also two scenes on the Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III.28 Of Forecourt H Layard's final plan shows the Grand Entrance into Throneroom I and only slabs 4-7 on the west wall. Slabs 7-14 are not numbered, and the north wall is drawn in outline as restored, without any openings, and the dais or altar is not marked. On the MS Plan only the Grand Entrance is drawn, but as a detached unit and not in its true position (SWPS, pp. 18 and 24). In Layard's field notes LN 2C, Forecourt H and the Grand Entrance are not included, but there are three brief references to the Grand Entrance in his diary (Add.MS. 39.096, f. 27v - 14 November 1849; f. 36v 12 January 1850; and f. 50v 11 March 1850).

28 Layard, 1849, 1, p. 385 - D slab 7, and Russell, 1999, has musicians with a tame lion - Barnett, 1976, p. 39 and Fig. 9; and Layard, The Monuments of Nineveh 1, 1849, Pis. PI. XIV. 55-6. In the North Palace on Kuyunjik, Room E slab 5

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b) Letters Nos. 5-6 - western & detached galleries. In Letters Nos. 5-6 of January 1848, Ross reported that he had now started work on a new site, as he had already remarked was his intention in Letter No. 3, on the south-west edge of Kuyunjik. This he mistook to be another palace, not that of Sennacherib. His "half tablets of chariots and horsemen" in Letter No. 6 recall the reliefs of Room LI, later re-excavated by Layard and drawn by Cooper (SWPS, Pls. 425-9).

In Letter No. 6 Ross also described other finds made on Kuyunjik and at Nineveh. The most notable was a "tombstone" or stele of Sennacherib, which was turned up by a plough in the lower town, to the north of and below Kuyunjik, and which later in the year Ross had shipped to the British Museum (Fig. 8).29 The fragments of yellow bulls, in the gully on the eastern edge of the mound, were possibly the entrance figures of the bit nakkapti or Eastern Building of Sennacherib.30 This structure was probably part of Sennacherib's final extension to his palace, at the extreme eastern edge of the palace complex. On Glascott's survey plan, two trenches or cuttings are marked above the gully overlooking the river Khosr.

c) Letters Nos. 8-9- western & detached galleries. In Letters Nos. 5-6 Ross wrote little of the actual discoveries on the south-west edge of the mound, only that there were numerous fragments of sculptured slabs, with good prospects of more to come, and that they were buried at a great depth. Letters Nos. 8-9 contain more detailed descriptions of the reliefs and of the tunnels in which Ross was now forced to work. Although he did not specify the site where he was digging, there can be little or no doubt that it was still on the south-west edge of Kuyunjik. In Nineveh and its Remains, II, pp. 139-40, Layard follows Ross's Letter No. 8, reproducing an abridged abstract of the main section.3' Ross noted, "across the tablets [slabs] are the remains of inscriptions", which Layard misinterpreted, assuming that the two registers of reliefs were separated by a central inscribed band, as at Khorsabad and Nimrud. In Letter No. 6 Ross also wrote, "Pieces of very fine inscription but not a single one perfect yet"; but on neither Churchill's drawings of the 4th Series and slabs A and B, nor on Cooper's of Room LI, is there any trace of an inscription, and certainly not between the two registers of those slabs on which there are remains of an upper scene.

Ross left Kuyunjik in July 1848, and the following spring Williams re-excavated some, but probably not all, of his tunnels to the south-west, the western & detached galleries, as summarized above. Part was again re-excavated by Layard on his return in early autumn 1849, and seven slabs from Room LI were drawn, these includin g Williams' slabs A and B (Layard, 1853, pp. 67-8 and SWPS, p. 122 and Pls. 424-9). These were drawn on two sheets of paper (SWPS, P1. 424). On one are two sets of two adjacent slabs, all with the ground-line of a narrow strip of river containing a single row of fish (Nos. 548-549 and 550-551); and nd on the second sheet are three slabs, with no direct joins but all with the same ground-line of a river with two rows of fish (Nos. 552-554). Two slabs on the second sheet are slabs A and B, bthe he 4th Series and fragment(s) S were not redrawn. The seven reliefs of Room LI show the Assyrians receiving the submission of defeated inhabitants filing out of their city, which stands on a river bank, surrounded by cane-brakes and palms. This corresponds closely to the description in Ross' Letter No. 8.

In Letter No. 8 Ross describes the river on the slabs he now excavated as full of fish, tortoises and crabs. In Sennacherib's palace, rivers and marshes are most frequently stocked solely with fish, but crab and tortoises are also found. Throneroom I and Court XIX have fish, crab and tortoise (SWPS, Pls. 38 and 212), whilst in Room V there are fish and tortoise, but no crab (SWPS, P1. 55).32 On Cooper's drawings of Room LI, the river ground-line has only fish, but on Churchill's slab A there is a tortoise in the right corner, and on slab B a crab towards the centre, supporting Ross' description. Ross also writes, "in the army two of the circular models of towns are carried", but these are not on the drawings of either Churchill or Cooper. Town models do appear on

29 ANE 124800 (1851-9-2, 9). Layard, 1849, II, p. 140, and 31 The section of Ross' Letter No. 8 reproduced by Layard Gadd, pp. 45 and 170, 44 with other references. does not correspond word for word with that in Letters

30Thompson and Hutchinson, pp. 64-6 and Plan 7 (the Jrom the East. It is more than probable that both Layard original is in the Department of the Ancient Near East in and Janet Ross edited Ross' original. the British Museum, Miscellaneous Maps 111, 25); Iraq 1 320On a recently identified crustacean shown on (1934), p. 97, Fig. 1; Russell, 1991, pp. 85-6; and Russell, Khorsabad relief see C. Michel and B. Lion, Akkadica 118 1995b, pp. 299-301. (2000), pp. 1 3.

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processional scenes at Khorsabad,33 which had been excavated by Botta a few years earlier and which Ross may well have seen when he visited Botta there (Ross, p. 23, 20 October 1844). As a result, Ross may have identified as such the circular object or plate carried by one of the leading captives on Cooper's drawing No. 550a (SWPS, PI. 426); but this has no resemblance to the Khorsabad town models, which are rectangular. Alternatively, as proposed by Russell, Ross may have believed that the frequently represented circular fortified camps were such town models (Russell, 1991, p. 72).

In Letter No. 9 Ross described Sennacherib "in the act of drawing his bow", but the king is not depicted in this manner elsewhere in the palace (Russell, 1991, p. 72). Ross possibly misidentified an ordinary Assyrian bowman as Sennacherib, but this would seem improbable, as Letters Nos. 8-9 appear to be accurate in their descriptions. Alternatively Sennacherib may have been standing in his chariot with his bow in his left hand, as frequently represented when reviewing his troops following the assault of a city (e.g. SWPS, PI. 48). In this letter Ross also wrote of towns taken by escalade and "headless corpses falling to the ground", probably Churchill's 4th Series No. 3 (SWPS, PI. 71).

Sculptures sent by Ross to England When Layard received Ross' Letter No. 6 (24 January 1848) describing the "tombstone", he

wrote back on 27 March with instructions to send it to London, and in the same letter gave details of four slabs from Nimrud to be shipped to his cousin Lady Charlotte Guest at Canford Manor,34 together with "a specimen or two from Kouyounjik with horses, chariots or anything in that line" (Add.MS. 38.941, f. 27), a request repeated two months later (Add.MS. 38.941, f. 30). In August of the previous year Layard had already asked Ross to send sculptured fragments, or specimens, to Count Perponcher, the Prussian Charge d'affaires at Constantinople and to his friend Alison, the Oriental Secretary at the British Embassy (Add.MS. 38.941, f. 11). Ross obviously reacted promptly, as in October 1847 Layard wrote back that Perponcher and Alison were most grateful for their fragments (Add.MS. 38.941, f. 19).35 In Letter No. 8 (17 April 1848) Ross replied to Layard's of 27 March, that due to the bad condition of the slabs, there were only two pieces at this time that could possibly be moved, "a woman and a child on a mule, and the castle"; but a month later, in Letter No. 9 (15 May 1848), he added three other fragments that might also be sent, "two separate led horses, with the accompanying soldier to each, and a pair of beautiful horses' heads belonging to a chariot, a little procession of figures, a woman, two prisoners manacled and a soldier driving them with his uplifted sword". Further in this letter he wrote that he had already given instructions for the Nimrud slabs to be extracted.

33P. Albenda, The Palace of Sargon, King of Assvyriu, 1986, PIs. 24, et passim.

34Charlotte Guest, 1814-95, nee Bertie, daughter of Layard's aunt, Charlotte Layard and her first husband the Earl of Lindsey, hence the courtesy title. After the death of Lindsey, Lady Charlotte's mother married secondly the Rev. P. W. Pegus, but due to his drunkenness, the family became ostracized by polite society. To improve her lot, Lady Charlotte in 1835 when 21 married Sir John Guest, a widower of 49 but a highly successful and wealthy iron- master, of Dowlais near Cardiff. To soften the taint of new money, in 1846 the Guests, but in effect Lady Charlotte, bought Canford Manor, near Wimborne in Dorset, some- what more genteel than Wales and relatively close to the Queen's holiday home, Osborne House on the Isle of Wight. Canford had been built 20 years earlier for Lord de Mauley, but was now greatly enlarged and remodelled by the prominent architect, Sir Charles Barry, who added the Nineveh Porch decorated with reliefs sent by Layard from the North- west Palace at Nimrud and that of Sennacherib at Kuyunjik, together with plaster casts of reliefs from the North Palace at Kuyunjik in the British Museum (Russell, 1997). In 1869 Layard married one of the Guests' younger children, Enid,

then only 25: and Lady Charlotte married secondly her son's tutor, Charles Schreiber, 14 years her junior. ( Waterfield, pp. 182-5, et passim: Earl of Bessborough (ed.), Lady Charlotte Guest: Extracts from her journal, 1833-52, 1950).

35 The pieces sent to Perponcher probably included SWPS, Nos. 14c and 15b from Forecourt H (SWPS, p. 49 and Pls. 27-8). These, together with a third fragment. were found in 1947 in an abandoned country house near Swidnica, set in a wall of the entrance hall, and were then removed to the Muzeum Narodowe in Warsaw (I. Belke, Bulletin du Musee National de Varsovie 8/3 (1967), pp. 57-63 and 10/1 (1969), pp. 4-6; 1 am most grateful to Dr. Antoni Mierzejewski for this reference). Ross was excavating along the west wall of Forecourt H in August 1847 (Letters Nos. 1 2) when Layard wrote asking him to send Graf Perponcher-Sedlnitzky a specimen or two, noting that Perponcher preferred small to large pieces, and suggested a small horse's head and a warrior's head from Kuyunjik. The expenses of the pieces for Alison (Layard proposed some heads from Nimrud) were to Layard's account, but Ross was to charge the Prussian for his fragments (Add.MS. 38.941. f. I11, 11 August 1847).

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At about this time Layard wrote of Kuyunjik, "Hitherto Mr. Ross has been unable to move any entire bas-reliefs, although there are fragmnents which, it is hoped, will be secured, and added to the collection of Assyrian antiquities to be brought to this country" (Layard, 1849, II, p. 139). In fact Ross shipped five slabs from Nimrud together with the five Kuyunjik fragments described in Letters No. 8-9; and these arrived at Canford in October of the following year, as recorded by Lady Charlotte Guest in her diary and later reported in almost identical articles in the Literary Gazette and the Poole Herald hof 24 January 1850. These documents have been traced by Russell (Russell, 1995b, pp. 296-9, and Russell, 1997, pp. 53-5 and 60-3), who has kindly provided me with copies of the two newspaper cuttings. In these the reliefs are described in detail, Nos. 1-5 the Nimrud slabs and Nos. 6-10 the Kuyunjik fragments, which in turn can be matched with Ross' descriptions, and four of which can be identified with fragments formerly at Canford. Russell has also unearthed a concise inventory of the Assyrian reliefs and casts of reliefs which originally decorated the Nineveh Porch at Canford, made by L. W. King of the British Museum (Russell, 1997, pp. 206-10), and he has identified the Kuyunjik fragments in this with those of Ross and the two newspaper articles. These correspond with the SiWPS catalogue as follows:

SWPS Ross Literary Gazette King

No. 555 = castle = No. 9 = 6 653 = woman & child = 6 =21 703 = 2 led horses 7 = 5 753 = captives = 8 = 17

For the other eight Kuyunjik fragments in King's inventory, SWPS, No. 196b corresponds to King 7; 196c to King 23; 286b to King 22; 292b to King 8; 365c to King 11; 450b to King 15; 456b to King 12; and 675 to King 18.

In Ross' Letter No. 8, SWPS, No. 555 is termed "the castle" and described more fully, "Near the castle is a field of millet in full bearing", and in Letter No. 9 "the castle and millet field". Ross is here describing the complete scene and not specifically fragment No. 555, which has no millet or reed beds,36 but these are on No. 552a, which was later re-excavated by Layard and drawn by Cooper (SWPS, p. 122 and PI. 428). Ross probably did not remove the the latter because of its size, being not a fragment or "specimen" as such, but constituted a "slab",37 and Layard had asked only for a "specimen" or two from Kuyunjik, if practicable.

The fifth fragment sent by Ross, "a pair of beautiful horses' heads belonging to a chariot", is not in King's inventory and there is no corresponding piece from Canford listed in SWPS. Lady Charlotte Guest recorded in her diary for 19 October 1849 that this was the only Kuyunjik fragment to arrive intact as such and not broken into smaller pieces (Russell, 1997, p. 62); and in the Literary Gazette/Poole Herald No. 10 is, "Two horses' heads, similar to those in Remains of Nineveh, (II.353), except that in the Canford Marbles the horses are without the plume and tassel. A fragment. Dimensions, 8'in. by 7'in." The only fragment in SWPS which fits this description is No. 710 (SWPS, p. 139 and PI. 510). This was presented to the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, in 1920 by Sir Herbert Thompson, who had inherited it from his father Sir Henry, 1st Bart., eminent surgeon and advocate of cremation (Waterfield, pp. 481-3), who in turn had been given it by Layard in 1890. The two horses' heads may have been too small to be incorporated in the Nineveh Porch at Canford, and at some date were possibly returned to Layard by his cousin, Lady Charlotte. The Literary Gazette/Poole Herald give the dimensions of No. 10 as

36 By "millet" (Latin milium, cereal with minute seeds) Canford the sizes are: No. 555 - 69 x 76.2 cm, No. 653 - Ross is evidently referring to cane-brakes, Layard's "reeds" 60 x 83 cm, No. 703 - 70 x 76.2 cm, and No. 753 - or "canes". Layard appears to have used the term "millet" 44.5 x 40.6 cm. Also to be compared are the two fragments only once, in his diary for 1 January 1850 (Add.MS. 39.096, from Room XIII sent by Williams to Constantinople and f. 35r), where he describes the fragmentary relief SWPS, now in Madrid - 65 x 38 cm and 64 x 40 cm. Slab No. 552a No. 184 (p. 70 and P1. 127) found on the pavement of may also have been in an unstable condition as Layard did Court VI near slab 64, "a field of millet in ear". not ship it to London either, but he did consider it of

37 The dimensions of No. 552a are not marked on sufficient interest to illustrate in Nineveh and Babylon, p. 68. Cooper's drawing; but by comparison with Churchill's In Nineveh and its Remains II, p. 140, Layard omitted Ross' drawings of slabs A and B, they can be estimated at approx. sentence in Letter No. 8 that only two fragments could be 95 x 140 cm. For the fragments which Ross did send to moved, the woman and child and the castle.

125



GEOFFREY TURNER

approx. 21.6 x 19 cm, and the Fitzwilliam's No. 710 are 23.2 x 17.2 cm, which are not incompatible. Another Kuyunjik fragment recently rediscovered at Canford, No. 378 (SWPS, p. 94 and P1. 284), is even smaller, 16.5 x 12.7 cm, and also not in King's inventory. This was in a wood frame, and thus had probably never been set in a wall, as might also have been the case of No. 710. Alternatively, Ross' "beautiful horses' heads" may simply have been lost, "disappeared", or are possibly still at Canford and remain yet to be located.

The plan of the western & detached galleries For the plan of the western & detached galleries, and indeed of the whole of that part of

Sennacherib's palace opening off the south-west terrace platform, our information is very meagre, conflicting and inconclusive. The primary sources are the letters of Ross and Williams, a few notes by Layard and his more lengthy published accounts and proposed restorations, the drawings of Churchill and Cooper, the sketch plan of Williams, Glascott's survey, and Layard's MS and final plans.

In Letter No. 8 Ross reported that he was now working in "two sides and a portion of what had been a magnificent hall",38 and in Letter No. 9 "a very fine suite of rooms", showing that in the intervening month the investigations had probably extended from the first impressive reception hall to a group of rooms. On Williams' sketch plan the western & detached galleries roughly follows three sides of a rectangle, with slabs A and B to the east and the 4th Series at right angles along the north side, the two connected by a stepped trench or tunnel, with fragment S close to the first slab of the 4th Series. On Glascott's survey plan (Figs. 1 and 7), three areas of excavation are marked on the south-west edge of Kuyunjik. That to the east, the most extensive, is evidently made up of a series of trenches and/or tunnels; and although it is difficult to discern any close relationship or correspondence in outline, Williams' galleries were probably part of this complex. To the west on Glascott's survey, there is an irregular L-shaped plot, and to the north a long straight sounding. By comparing the enlargement of Glascott's survey with Layard's plan, Figs. 2 and 7, it is seen that the first and largest excavated area most probably included Rooms LI-LIII, with the L-shaped plot corresponding to the southern part of Room L, and the long straight trench to Sloping Passage LI.

On Layard's return to Kuyunjik in autumn 1849, some of Ross' "trenches" on the south-west edge of the mound were still open, with "a few remains of reliefs in the corner opposite Mosul" (diary for 30 September - Add.MS. 39.096, f. 18v). In Nineveh and Babylon, pp. 67-9, he wrote that two rooms had been traced, and seven reliefs from Room LI were now drawn, two of which were Williams' A and B (SWPS, p. 122 and Pis. 424-9). In the second Room, LIII, the orthostats were not carved, but were of a close-grained magnesian limestone (Russell, 1991, pp. 99-100), as also were those lining the doorway between Rooms LI and LIII. In the fair copy of his field notes, Layard records that the adjacent Rooms LV and LVI to the south-east were lined with plain "low slabs of very fine white limestone" (Russell, 1995, p. 82). In the wide opening between Rooms LI and LIII there were two small crouching lions of alabaster, one of which Layard notes in his diary, 22 October 1849, "crouching lion with the remains of an inscription in entrance to a chamber on the W. side of the mound" (Add.MS. 39.096, f. 25r), but he does not refer elsewhere to the inscription. These lion figures recall Layard's earlier report in Nineveh and its Remains, II, p. 137, that Ross had found, "the openings into three new chambers, one entrance having, it appears, been formed by four lion sphinxes, fragments of which were found amongst the rubbish", but Layard believed that these discoveries were in Forecourt H (above pp. 121-22). Ross' letter containing this information is unfortunately not published in Lettersfrom the East, and thus it is not sure whether he was working in Forecourt H or on the south-west edge of Kuyunjik.

There is no other reference in Layard's diary to the south-west area of the palace, and it is not included in his field notes, LN 2. For Chamber ZZ/Room LI, the fair copy of the notebooks has only, "Siege of castle, warriors etc." (Russell, 1995, p. 83), and Layard's description of this room in Nineveh and Babylon, pp. 67-8, is based on Cooper's drawings of the seven reliefs found there. On Layard's MS Plan only the north wall of Room LI is drawn (SWPS, Pls. 6-7), yet his final

3 This sentence of Ross' letter is omitted by Layard, 1849, II, p. 137.

126




plan (Fig. 2) shows all three rooms, LI-LIII, as actually excavated, with the two lion figures in the doorway between LI and LIII, but in no room are the slabs numbered. When excavating the long gallery, Room XLIX, Layard had a tunnel dug at its western end through into Room LI, opposite the doorway into the Sloping Passage LI, thus linking Ross' discoveries to his own excavations (Layard, 1853, p. 103). In a footnote he here refers to Room LII, but this is the only instance that this chamber is mentioned and without a single detail.

The two sets of reliefs from the western & detached galleries, those of Room LI, which include slabs A and B, and the 4th Series, each illustrate the siege and capitulation of an enemy city, the first in the south, on a river bank amid palm-trees and marsh reeds, Ross' millet, and the 4th Series in a hilly or mountainous landscape, thickly studded with trees. Of the slabs from Room LI, four have a ground-line of a river with a single row of fish, but the other three have two rows of fish, and thus these slabs were originally on different walls, but possibly in the same room. Similar ground-lines of a river with both one and two rows of fish are found in Rooms III (SWPS, Pls. 48-9) and XLV (SWPS, Pls. 378-86). On Churchill's drawing of slab A, but not on that by Cooper, the left side has a plain, uncarved border (SWPS, Pls. 430 and 428), suggesting that it was a corner slab. In this case those slabs with a ground-line of two rows of fish would have extended across at least two walls of the room.39 Williams termed slabs A and B "fragments", not "slabs", nor did he describe them as parts of a "series". This probably indicates that they were found out of position, as possibly also shown by the loose rubble in Churchill's drawing below slab A, and reflecting Ross' words, "All is very much destroyed" is very much destroyed" in Letter No. 9. On Williams' sketch plan, slabs A and B are relatively close to the 4th Series, as if on adjacent walls of the same room, but this was only a rough plan, with little regard to scale. In the main section, the distances between entrance k (ZZ) and the 1st Series on the east and the 2nd and 3rd Series on the west side are likewise not to scale; whereas the length of 160 ft (approx. 50m) which he marked as the distance from shaft B to the west wall of Room XIV (3rd Series) is accurate.

On Layard's final plan, the north wall of Room LI is as on his MS Plan, but his evidence and/or reasons for the outlines of the rest of this group of rooms are unknown. There is only the reference in his diary to a crouching lion in an entrance, and the drawings of the seven slabs annotated as from Room LI. It is of course possible that Layard did excavate more extensively in this area, and that any notes or site plans have subsequently been discarded or lost. His plan of Rooms LI-LIIIl could reflect the reference to Ross' unpublished letter, "the openings into three new chambers, one entrance ... four lion sphinxes". Layard may also have made use of Williams' sketch plan or, less probably, of Glascott's survey. If that of Williams, then the 4th Series would be on the north wall of Room LI and slabs A and B in Room LII. On Layard's final plan, Room LI has doorways in the south and east walls, retaining the "jog" on the north wall as on the MS Plan. In fact it would be more logical to restore this as an entrance leading to the west,40 as for instance is probably also to be restored at the north end of Room LXIII, where there is a similar "jog" on the MS Plan. On the west wall of Room L, which is shown as restored, there is also an awkward "jog", close to the north-west corner.

The Grand Entrance to Room LIV Only a stone's throw from Rooms LI-LIII, Layard's final plan has a Grand Entrance opening

off the south-west terrace and giving into the reception hall LIV. The two flanking buttresses on the outer faqade are drawn as "actually excavated" and the rest as restored, but no part of this facade is on the MS Plan. Neither have I traced any reference to it in Layard's notebooks or diaries, nor in the letters written to him after his departure from Kuyunjik in late April 1851, first by Matilda Rassam and then by her young brother-in-law Hormuzd, on his return to Mosul in October 1852. If there had been reports of such discoveries, these could yet have been included in Nineveh and Babylon (Layard, 1853, p. 589).41 There is no mention of this fa9ade in Layard's

39For a restoration of this series of reliefs see Russell, 4' Add.MS. 38.980, ff. 74-5, 169-70 and 236-8, and 1995b, pp. 298-9 and Fig. 2. Add.MS. 38.981, ff. 64-5, 80-2, 133-4, 141-2 and 187-9.

40 In SWPS, p. 34 and Fig. 7 I have proposed the alternative restoration of a recessed niche in the north wall of Room LI.

127



GEOFFREY TURNER

account of his excavations, only in the final chapter, in the section Palace of Kouyunjik Restored. "To the west, therefore, it immediately overlooked the Tigris; and on that side was one of its principal facades ... The western terrace, like the eastern [from Forecourt H into Throneroom I], was formed by five pairs of human-headed bulls, and numerous colossal figures, forming three distinct gateways .... Only a part of the palace has been hitherto excavated, and we are not in possession of a perfect ground-plan of it" (Layard, 1853, p. 645).

In 1903 L. W. King of the British Museum made further investigations in this area of the palace, primarily in the search for tablets from Ashurbanipal's Library, digging in Rooms LI, LIII and LIV, and at the west end of the long gallery XLIX. On the western edge of the mound he also found the remains of an important entrance, with two bull colossi and a flanking "Gilgamesh" figure.42 Although the exact position of this doorway is uncertain, it corresponds closely to Layard's Grand Entrance into Room LIV, and raises the question of whether this was only an inspired restoration by Layard, or whether he did in fact discover part of this facade. Close to one of his new bull colossi, King also found fragments of a "red and white marble throne",43 recalling "an immense square slab, which he [Ross] conjectures to be a dais or altar", as Layard reported Ross to have discovered in Forecourt H (Layard, 1848, II, p. 138, and above p. 122). Unfortunately the original of this letter was not included in Ross' Letters from the East, and thus we cannot check the circumstances of his discovery, whether he was digging in Forecourt H, or was now working on the south-west edge of the mound. If the latter, then Ross' slab was possibly one and the same as King's throne.44

Glascott's survey plan and two letters of Matilda Rassam Glascott's survey marks four main areas of excavation within the confines of Sennacherib's

palace (Fig. 7 and above pp. 120-21). Two of these, in Forecourt H and on the south-west edge of the mound, were the work of Ross, and that to the south of Court VI the work of Toma Shishman under the "supervision" of Christian Rassam, as described by Williams and drawn by Churchill. To the south of the last is an irregular L-shaped area, which probably included part of Room XLIII and its facade onto Court XIX. There is no mention of this in Williams' letters, nor of the two cuttings further to the south, projecting westwards from the gully on the south-east edge of the mound, to the mound, to the south of the Throneroom Suite, Rooms I-V. By matching the enlargement of Glascott's survey with Layard's plan, Figs. 2 and 7, the first of these two trenches, that projecting more to the west, is in the vicinity of Room XXII on the east side of Court XIX. In his diary for 26 Januay 1850 Layard wrote, "In a new Karkhaneh near an old trench [my italics] on the S. of recent excavations several remains of bas-reliefs discovered, one with horses crossing in a boat" (Add.MS. 39.096, f. 37v), recording his discovery of Chamber XX/Room XXII (Layard, 1853, pp. 230-3, and SWPS, Pis. 224-5). There is no indication whether these excavations marked by Glascott were made by Ross or by Toma Shishman after Ross had left Mosul, or even by the Frenchman Guillois, whom Ross suspected would start digging at the first opportunity (Letter No. 6).

When Ross left Mosul on 17 July 1848, the British Museum appointed his erstwhile partner, the vice-consul Christian Rassam, to supervise Toma Shishman's work on Kuyunjik. The main account of these later investigations is that of Williams, but there are also brief reports in two letters to Layard from Rassam's British wife, Matilda.45 In the first, of 21 August 1848, she wrote, "The excavations are going on as usual, the trench Mr. Ross opened some time before leaving

42SWPS, pp. 34-5; Thompson and Hutchinson, p. 61; fit into its true place, and that any such problems and and King's reports and letters in the Department of the doubts will evaporate. Ancient Near East, British Museum. 45 Sister of the Rev. G. P. Badger, a high-church Anglican

43 SWPS, pp. 34-5; and a letter to Budge, 1 June 1903, who went to Mosul to direct the local Christians towards in the Department of the Ancient Near East, British the authority of Canterbury and away from that of Rome, Museum. to which they were more inclined (Waterfield, p. 115). Their

44 When writing SWPS, pp. 23-4 I already doubted father was a sergeant, based in Malta. Ross commented of whether Ross' dais had in fact been excavated in Forecourt Matilda Rassam that she "knew nothing of England" (Ross, H and was not the same as that found by King; but I was p. 48 n.). In Baghdad there was also a Society for the too hesitant to commit this to print. However as an Conversion of the Jews, which in 1860 had two missionaries, optimistic fatalist, I live in the hope that eventually all will Messrs Bruhl and Hepstein (Ussher, op. cit., pp. 441-2).

128




Moossul they continued working at it for a long time without finding anything but sun dried bricks & jars containing ashes of the dead. I told Toma to open another trench in which he has found two large objects in the shape of Globes cut flat at the top apparently pedestals to some pillars they are made of lime stone & stand on two square stones of the same material, the globes are about eight feet in diameter". Rassam went over to Kuyunjik to inspect these "globes", and thought that the pillars might also be found. "Near these two strange things a large marble slab has partly come out in good preservation it seems to have fallen down." Mrs. Rassam continued that she would have this slab raised when the workmen had finished cleaning it, but wrote no further of it (Add.MS. 38.978, f. 158r).

In this letter Mrs. Rassam reports that Toma Shishman first continued working in a trench opened by Ross, but does not specify where on Kuyunjik this was. It may have been on the south- west edge of the mound, but in his Letter No. 9 of 15 May 1848 Ross gives the impression that he has finished his investigations in this area, the remains of the palace being much destroyed and the working conditions in tunnels difficult. "I think I shall begin in a new place altogether, on the chance of getting something better preserved." Thus it is possible that Ross had started a new trench or trenches, there still being two months before he left Mosul for Samsun. The "Globes" or column bases which Toma Shishman found in his new excavations were presumably the same as Layard later excavated in the wide opening between Rooms XLVIII and XLIX. In his field notes Layard mentions these but without details (SWPS, p. 13 Chamber M), in Nineveh and Babylon, p. 103 he gives their height as about 3 ft (approx. 90 cm), and on his MS and final plans they are drawn as of approximately that diameter. There is no reference to them in Layard's diary. Matilda Rassam's diameter of 8 ft (approx. 240 cm) is excessive, and obviously measures the distance between the two bases. Since Williams does not mention them, they had presumably been covered up after excavation in August 1848. On his sketch plan Williams does mark two double circles, KK, at an unspecified distance between Room XIV (3rd Series) and the western & detached galleries, but beside them he has noted "Shafts now sinking", and on the right side of the sketch "air-holes in double lines".

In another letter to Layard, 14 October 1848, Matilda Rassam wrote, "they have lately opened a new trench & the sculptures found in it are really beautiful quite of a new description all small & each slab seems to contain three rows of figures one over the other, in many of the slabs you find the vine & several trees that I do not know, women leading & carrying children goats, sheep, mules, horses, cows, calves & in fact [or part ?] many new things which was never found at Nimrood" (Add.MS. 38.978, f. 188 r and v). From Mrs. Rassam's description of the reliefs, this new trench, or rather tunnel, was that along the south side of Court VI, in which Williams' 1st Series were now being excavated.

In the following five months before Williams' arrival at Mosul on 23 March 1849, Toma Shishman continued the tunnelled excavation along the south fasade of Court VI and in Rooms XII-XIV. He probably worked with a small gang of some six men, as in Ross' Letter No. 7, that is, pickman, hoeman and basket boys. These excavations were still continuing in April 1849, as on his sketch plan (completed 14 April) Williams notes to the left of the 3rd Series "unexcavated side of chamber"; but on Glascott's Plan of the subterraneous excavation in progress (completed 27 April), Room XIV is shown as totally exposed. However in the last five months, between Glascott finally managing to finish his survey and Layard's return at the end of September 1849, little or nothing appears to have been done. Presumably Christian Rassam had Toma Shishman still maintain a presence on Kuyunjik; but he probably no longer had him continue the excavations, expecting Layard's imminent arrival from Constantinople and almost certainly having little or nothing left of the funds allotted by the British Museum.

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GEOFFREY TURNER

References Add.MS.: British Library, London, Department of Manuscripts, Additional Manuscripts. Barnett: R. D. Barnett, Sculptures from the North Palace of Ashurhanipal at Nineveh (668-627 B.C.), 1976. Gadd: C. J. Gadd, The Stones of Assyria, 1936. Layard, 1849: A. H. Layard, Nineveh and its Remains. 1849. Layard, 1853: A. H. Layard, Discoveries in the Ruins of Nineveh and Babylon, 1853. LN: Layard's Notebooks, or more correctly field notes; see SWPS, pp. 10-15. Ross: H. J. Ross, Letters from the East, 1837-1857, 1902. Russell, 1991: J. M. Russell, Sennacherib's Palace Without Rival at Nineveh, 1991. Russell, 1995: J. M. Russell, Layard's description of rooms in the Southwest palace at Nineveh, Iraq 57

(1995), pp. 71-85. Russell, 1995b: J. M. Russell, Sennacherib's Palace Without Rival Revisited: Excavations at Nineveh and in

the British Museum Archives. In S. Parpola and R. M. Whiting (eds.), Assyria 1995, Helsinki 1997, pp. 295-306.

Russell, 1997: J. M. Russell, From Nineveh to New York, 1997. Russell, 1998: J. M. Russell, The Final Sack of Nineveh, 1998. Russell, 1999: J. M. Russell, The Writing on the Wall, 1999. SWPS: R. D. Barnett, E. Bleibtreu and G. Turner, Sculptures from the Southwest Palace of Sennacherib at

Nineveh, 1998. Thompson and Hutchinson: R. Campbell Thompson and R. W. Hutchinson, A Century of Exploration at

Nineveh, 1929. Waterfield: G. Waterfield, Layard of Nineveh, 1963.

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Documents

Sennacherib's Palace at Nineveh: The Drawings of H. A. Churchill and the Discoveries of H. J. Ross