Page:A History of Art in Chaldæa & Assyria Vol 2.djvu/51

Other Palaces of Mesopotamia. 33 Calah and Nineveh began to raise their sumptuous houses. The sites of the ancient cities of Lower Chaldaea inclose buildings that seem to date from a very remote epoch, buildings in which we may recognize the first sketch, as it were, for the magnificent dwellings of Sargon and Sennacherib. The most important of these buildings, and the most interesting, is the ruin at Warka, which Loftus calls Wuszvas (Fig. 172, Vol. I., letter B on the plan). 1 Unfortunately his explorations were very partial and his description is very summary, while his plan of the ruin only gives a small part of it (Fig. 9). There is, how- ever, enough to show the general character of the structure. The latter stood upon a rectangular mound about 660 feet long and 500 wide. In spite of the enormous accumulation of rubbish, Loftus succeeded in making out an open door in the outer wall, and several chambers of different sizes com- municating with a large court. There was the same thickness of wall and the same absence of symmetry as at Khorsabad ; the openings were not in the middle of the rooms. In the long wall, decorated with panels and grooves, which still stands among the ruins to a height of about twenty-four feet and a length of about K Ml r 'II LLZKr. J • 172 feet, the posterior facade, through which Fig. 9.— Plan of a palace , • r . 1 at Warka ; from Loftus. there was no means of ingress and egress, may be recognized. We have already copied Loftus's repro- duction of this façade for the sake of its decoration (Fig. 100, Vol. I.). The building at Sirtella (Tello) in which M. de Sarzec dis- covered such curious statues, was less extensive ; it was only about 175 feet long by 102 wide. The faces of the parallelo- gram were slightly convex, giving to the building something of the generaljbrm of a terra-cotta tub (Fig. 150, Vol I.). Here the excavations were pushed far enough to give us a better idea of the general arrangement than w r e can get at Warka. A great central court, about which numerous square and oblong apart- ments are arranged, has been cleared ; there is a separate quarter, which may be the harem ; at one angle of the court the massive stages of a zigguratt may be recognized. The walls are entirely of burnt brick. They are decorated only on the principal 1 Loftus, Travels and Researches, chapter xvi. and especially page 179. VOL. II. F