The Mystery of the Hanging Garden of Babylon: An Elusive World Wonder Traced

by Stephanie Dalley

  27. Layard, Nineveh and Babylon (1853), 590–5, and note there.

  28. Rassam, Asshur and the Land of Nimrod (1897), 35.

  29. Rassam, Asshur and the Land of Nimrod (1897), 223. See also S. Simpson, ‘Christians at Nineveh in late antiquity’, Iraq 67 (2005), 285 with references.

  30. T. Madhloum, ‘Nineveh: the 1967–1968 campaign’, Sumer 24 (1968), English section, 50.

  31. Discrepancy and contradictory indications between text and archaeology are well discussed by A. Frendo, Pre-exilic Israel, the Hebrew Bible, and Archaeology (2011), e.g. 30–1.

  32. BM 124773.

  33. Reade, Assyrian Sculpture (1983), 40–1, plate 58 with caption, ‘about 630–620 BC’, to fit them in before the fall of Nineveh, which is of course quite likely.

  34. Campbell Thompson and Hutchinson, ‘The excavations on the temple of Nabu’, Archaeologia 79 (1929), 107–8.

  35. Campbell Thompson and Hutchinson, ‘The site of the palace of Ashurnasirpal at Nineveh’, Liverpool Annals of Archaeology and Anthropology 18 (1931), 90–2.

  36. See J. Reade, Reallexikon der Assyriologie, vol. 9 (1998–2001), s.v. ‘Ninive’, 428b for references.

  37. J. Reade, ‘The Ishtar temple at Nineveh’, Iraq 67 (2005), 385–6.

  38. S. James, ‘Evidence from Dura Europus for the origin of late Roman helmets’, Syria 63 (1986), 117–19.

  39. Glassner, Mesopotamian Chronicles (2004), 223.

  40. Schaudig, Die Inschriften Nabonids (2001), Babylon Stela col. ii. 32‘–41’.

  41. Modern Sheh Hamad.

  42. H. Kühne, ‘Thoughts about Assyria after 612 BC’, ed. L. Al-Gailani et al., Of Pots and Plans (2002), 171–5. Subsequent field-work around other towns has found other examples, and a few more examples have now been recognized from the palace of Nebuchadnezzar in Babylon, found nearly a century ago. See O. Pedersén, ‘Neo-Assyrian texts from Nebuchadnezzar’s Babylon: a preliminary report’, eds. M. Luukko et al., Of God(s), Trees, Kings and Scholars (2009), 193–9.

  43. P. de Miroschedji, ‘Glyptique de la find’Élam’, Revue d’Assyriologie 76 (1982), 51–63.

  44. See Reade, Reallexikon der Assyriologie, vol. 9 (1998–2001), s.v. ‘Ninive’, 425b, and Potts, The Archaeology of Elam (1999), 301.

  45. J. Alvarez-Mon, The Arjan Tomb, Acta Iranica 49 (2010), 166–7 and 177 n. 17.

  46. R. Rollinger, ‘Der Stammbaum des achaimenidischen Königshauses’, Archaeologische Mitteilungen aus Iran 30 (1998), 155–209; M. Waters, ‘Cyrus and the Achaemenids’, Iran 42 (2004), 155–209; D. T. Potts, ‘Cyrus the Great and the kingdom of Anshan’, eds. V. Curtis and S. Stewart, Birth of the Persian Empire: The Idea of Iran (2005), 1–22.

  47. J. Reade, ‘Restructuring the Assyrian sculptures’, ed. R. Dittmann et al., Variatio delectat: Gedenkschrift für Peter Calmeyer (2000), 613.

  48. A definite overlap between Media and Elam around 600 BC is pointed out by Potts, Archaeology of Elam (1999), 306. Lindsay Allen has suggested that ‘Medes’ changed its meaning to something like ‘barbarian horsemen’ in Greek sources (forthcoming).

  49. Mallowan, Nimrud and its Remains, vol. 1 (1966), 286 ‘derelict city’; 299–300; vol. 2, 602.

  50. Mallowan, Nimrud and its Remains, 1, 298.

  51. Mallowan, Nimrud and its Remains, 1, 287 and 310.

  52. See Canali di Rossi, Iscrizioni dello estremo oriente greco: un repertorio (2004), 45, no. 72 with a photograph of the amphora stamp. The volume gives information with photographs for all the Greek inscriptions mentioned in this chapter.

  53. D. Barag, Catalogue of Western Asiatic Glass in the British Museum, vol. 1 (1985), no. 107.

  54. D. Oates, Studies in the History of Northern Iraq (1968), 58.

  55. P. Fiorina, ‘Italian excavations at Nimrud-Kalhu: chronological and stratigraphical problems’, eds. J. Curtis et al., New Light on Nimrud (2008), 53–6; P. Fiorina, ‘Nimrud–Fort Shalmaneser: entrepôts et ateliers de la zone SW’, eds. S. M. Cecchini, S. Mazzoni and E. Scigliuzzo, Syrian and Phoenician Ivories (2009), 37.

  56. W. Vogelsang, The Rise and Organisation of the Achaemenid Empire (1992), 309–10.

  57. D. Stronach, ‘Anshan and Parsa: early Achaemenid history, art and architecture on the Iranian plateau’, ed. J. Curtis, Mesopotamia and Iran in the Persian Period (1997), 35–53.

  58. T. Kawami, ‘A possible source for the sculptures of the audience hall, Pasargadae’, Iran 10 (1972), 146–8; M. Roaf, Reallexikon der Assyriologie, vol. 10 (2004), s.v. ‘Persepolis’; see also Layard, Nineveh and its Remains, vol. 2 (1850), 288–91.

  59. G. Cawkwell, Xenophon: The Persian Expedition (1972), introduction.

  60. See V. Azoulay, ‘Exchange as entrapment: mercenary Xenophon?’, ed. R. Lane Fox, The Great March (2004), 289–304.

  61. Lane Fox, The Great March (2004), introduction, 44–5.

  62. H. Gasche, ‘Habl aṣ-Ṣahr, nouvelles fouilles: l’ouvrage défensif de Nabuchodonosor au nord de Sippar’, Northern Akkad Project Reports 2 (1989), 23–70.

  63. The Akkadian noun mušpalu ‘depression, lowland’ has been suggested as the early form of the name Mosul on the other side of the Tigris, opposite Nineveh (Meissner and Lehmann, followed by Reade), but the word is nowhere else attested as a place-name.

  64. Strabo, Geography, XI. 14.

  65. Tacitus, Annals, XII. 12.

  66. Ammianus Marcellinus, History, XVIII. 7.1.

  67. Strabo XVI. 1.1.

  68. e.g. Arba’il as Erbil, Kar-Mullissi as Keremleis, Shusharra as Shemshara, Balad as Balaṭa, Melid as Malatya, Harran as Harran, Isana as Isān köy, Nampigu as Membidj, Naṣibina as Nisibin, Raṣappa as Reṣep, Sarugu as Saruj.

  69. B. Porten and A. Yardeni, Textbook of Aramaic Documents from Ancient Egypt, 1: Letters (1986), 114, but reading as Halahhu, a district NE of Nineveh, rather than Halṣu—the third consonant is damaged—Halzi has the correct sibilant. Cf. Oates, Studies in the History of Northern Iraq (1968), 59–60; B. Porten, Archives from Elephantine (1968), 54 and 71; P. Briant, Histoire de l’empire Perse (1996), 377. See Dalley, forthcoming, eds. J. Ma and C. Tuplin.

  70. S. A. Stephens and J. J. Winkler, Ancient Greek Novels: The Fragments (1995), 23.

  71. J. R. Morgan, ‘Fiction and history: historiography and the novel’, ed. J. Marincola, A Companion to Greek and Roman Historiography, vol. 2 (2007), 554.

  72. See D. Feeney, Caesar’s Calendar (2007), 102.

  73. Porten and Yardeni, Textbook of Aramaic Documents, 1: Letters (1986), A6.9, and see Kuhrt, ‘The Assyrian heartland in the Achaemenid period’, ed. P. Briant, Dans les pas des deux-mille, Pallas 43 (1995), 345.

  74. See Boiy, Late Achaemenid and Hellenistic Babylon (2004), 288.

  75. Layard, Nineveh and Babylon (1853), 594–5. See J. Malek, Topographical Bibliography, vol. 7, s.v. ‘Nineveh’, a fragmentary stone vase of Kha‘ip, second prophet of Amun.

  76. ‘… about four feet above the floor of the central court.’ See now Canali di Rossi, Iscrizioni, 40, no. 64, using Reade, ‘Greco-Parthian Nineveh’, Iraq 60 (1998), 69. The titles stratēgos ‘general’ and epistatēs ‘governor’ were also used at Babylon and Dura Europus. See L. Capdetrey, Le Pouvoir séleucide: territoire, administration, finances d’un royaume hellénistique (2007), 288–9.

  77. The Greek name may have been adopted by a non-Greek, as happened in Babylonia. See e.g. Boiy, Late Achaemenid and Hellenistic Babylon (2004), 289.

  78. Grayson, Assyrian Rulers of the Early First Millennium BC II (858–745 BC) (1996), 153–4, gives an edition of the cuneiform. Possibly the Greek inscription added to the altar, and the text on the stone column, refer to the same man Apollonios as is named on the column. For the Greek inscription see Canali di Rossi, Iscrizioni (2004), 41, no. 65.

  79. F. Safar, ‘The temple of Sibitti at Khorsabad’, Sumer 13 (1957), 219–21.

  80. Reade, ‘Greco-Parthian Nineveh’, Iraq 60 (1998), 68.

  81. Capdetrey, Le Pouvoir séleucide (2007), 288–9.

 
82. For the debate over the veracity of such claims, see R. Thomas, Herodotus in Context: Ethnography, Science and the Art of Persuasion (2000), 200 with n. 73.

  83. R. Syme, ‘Galatia and Pamphylia under Augustus: the governorships of Piso, Quirinus and Silvanus’, Klio 27 (1934), 127–31. See also S. Dalley, ‘Sennacherib and Tarsus’, Anatolian Studies 49 (1999), 73–80, for evidence that Assyrians were still remembered in Tarsus in the Roman period.

  84. I owe this observation to Joyce Reynolds, who kindly checked the panel with an expert eye.

  85. Canali di Rossi, Iscrizioni (2004), 43, no. 67. J. Reade, ‘More about Adiabene’, Iraq 63 (2001), 191–2, assumes a literate Greek drain digger whose cutting in fact missed the panel by several feet.

  86. M. Scott and J. McGinnis, ‘Notes on Nineveh’, Iraq 52 (1990), 69.

  87. M. Colledge, ‘Sculptors’ stone-carving techniques’, East and West 29 (1979), 232.

  88. BM 115642. See Reade, ‘Greco-Parthian Nineveh’, Iraq 60 (1998), 71 and fig. 5. Its provenance as Nineveh has no further detail. The name might be a calque on Assyrian šēdu damqu, ‘favourable protecting deity’; but cf. Canali di Rossi, Iscrizioni (2004), no. 69, for the other interpretation.

  89. J. Curtis, ‘Parthian gold from Nineveh’, The Classical Tradition, British Museum Yearbook I (1976), 47–66.

  90. Corpus Inscriptionum Graecorum 4672. For the discovery see Campbell Thompson and Hutchinson, ‘The excavations on the temple of Nabu at Nineveh’, Archaeologia 79 (1929), 142; Reade, Reallexikon (1998–2001), s.v. ‘Nineveh’, writes ‘perhaps anachronistically’ without explanation; Canali di Rossi, Iscrizioni (2004), 44 questions the find-spot without justification.

  91. See J. A. Brinkman, Prelude to Empire (1984), 54 n. 254.

  92. Curtis, ‘The Assyrian heartland’, eds. G. Lanfranchi, M. Roaf and R. Rollinger, Continuity of Empire? (2003), 157–67.

  93. R. Da Riva, The Neo-Babylonian Royal Inscriptions: An Introduction (2008), 22, Eurmeiminanki cylinder ii.10’.

  94. Whether Dur-šarrukki in late Babylonian texts may be identified with Khorsabad is currently disputed.

  95. Fiorina, ‘Nimrud–Fort Shalmaneser’, ed. S. M. Cecchini et al., Syrian and Phoenician Ivories (2009), 45–6.

  96. See Boiy, Late Achaemenid and Hellenistic Babylon (2004), 290.

  97. Ishtar of Nineveh was already referred to as Bel in the late Assyrian period. See Livingstone, Court Poetry (1989), no. 39, line 21.

  98. See G. Herrmann, The Iranian Revival (1977), 17.

  99. See L. Vanden Berghe, Reliefs rupestres de l’Iran Ancien (1984), cat. no. 94 with plate 38; and cat. no. 68 with plate 29; also S. Matheson, Persia: An Archaeological Guide (1976), 256.

  100. M. Liverani, ‘The fall of the Assyrian empire: ancient and modern interpretations’, eds. S. Alcock et al., Empires (2001), 374–91.

  101. N. Yoffee, ‘The collapse of ancient Mesopotamian states and civilization’, eds. N. Yoffee and G. Cowgill, The Collapse of Ancient States and Civilizations (1988), 57; N. Yoffee, ‘Notes on regeneration’, eds. G. Schwartz and J. L. Nichols, After Collapse: The Regeneration of Complex Societies (2006), 222–7.

  102. See Giovino, The Assyrian Sacred Tree (2007), Chapter 9.

  103. A. Livingstone, ‘Remembrance at Assur: the case of dated Aramaic memorials’, eds. M. Luukko et al., Of God(s), Trees, Kings and Scholars (2009), 151–6.

  CONCLUSION

  1. Rassam, Asshur and the Land of Nimrod (1897), 33.

  2. Rassam, Asshur and the Land of Nimrod (1897), 355.

  3. Layard, Nineveh and Babylon (1853), 232, also reproduced in Barnett et al., The Sculptures of Sennacherib (1998), plates 223–5.

  4. R. M. Czichon, Reallexikon der Assyriologie, vol. 9 (1998–2001), 202, s.v. ‘Nebukadnezar’; in The Garden Book (Phaidon 2000) s.v. ‘Sennacherib’; Boiy, Late Achaemenid and Hellenistic Babylon (2004), 64; mentioned as perhaps correct on the British Museum website as updated in 2007; Van der Spek, ‘Berossus as a Babylonian chronicler and Greek historian’, ed. Van der Spek, Studies in Ancient Near Eastern World View and Society (2008), 302–4.

  5. L. Morgan, Ancient Society (1877); see K. Greene, ed. Oleson, Oxford Handbook of Engineering (2008), 62–3.

  APPENDIX

  1. See also the reasons inferred for choosing the word kirimāhu for the palace garden, Ch. 4.

  2. In a similar passage in the Bellino cylinder the erosion of royal tombs by the uncontrolled river water is mentioned, which indicates that there were extended versions of parts of this inscription.

  3. Patron god of craftsmen, especially stone-cutters and sculptors.

  4. These are to be seen on the sculpture panel of Ashurbanipal from the North Palace, see Reade, Assyrian Sculpture (1983), 40 fig. 56 with caption.

  5. The word used is ambassu. The name shows that there was a hunting park outside the city, distinct from the kirimāhu.

  6. handuri may mean a projecting spur of a wall.

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