Page:A History of Art in Chaldæa & Assyria Vol 1.djvu/305

 DECORATION. 283 on its towers and their curtain-walls every sort of animal might be seen imitated according to all the rules of art, both as to their form and colour. The whole represented the chase of various animals, the latter being more than four cubits (high) in the middle Semiramis on horseback letting fly an arrow against a panther and, on one side, her husband Ninus at close quarters with a lion, which he strikes with his lance." 1 Diodorus attributes all these buildings to his fabulous Semiramis. He was mistaken. It was the palace built by Nebuchadnezzar that he had before him ; his eyes rested upon the works of those sovereigns of the second Chaldee empire who presided at a real art renaissance at the re-awakening of a civilization that was never more brilliant than in the years immediately preceding its fall. The historian's mistake is of little importance here. We are mainly interested in the fact that he actually saw the walls of which he speaks and saw them covered with pictures, the material for which was furnished by enamelled brick. These bricks must have been manufactured in no small quantity to permit of decorations in which there were figures nearly six feet high. 2 We may form some idea of this frieze of animals from one in the palace of Sargon at the foot of the wall on each side of the harem doorway (plate xv.). 3 As for the hunting incidents, we may imagine what they were like from the Assyrian sculptures (Fig. 5). At Babylon as at Nineveh the palette of the enameller was very restricted. Figures were as a rule yellow and white relieved against a blue ground. Touches of black were used to give accent to certain details, such as the hair and beard, or to define a contour. The surface of the brick was not always left smooth ; in some cases it shows hollow lines in which certain colours were placed when required to mark distinctive or complementary features. As a rule motives were modelled in relief upon the ground, so that they were distinguished by a gentle salience as well as by colour, L 'Eivrjcrav $(. (.v rots Trupyois /cat Tfiytxri a>a TravroSaTra e^tXore'^J'ws rots re x Kal TOIS rwv TVTTWV U7rcya/mcn KO.ra.<TKf.va.(T^i'a.. (DlODORUS ii. 8, 6.) 2 TLavroiwv 6f)pi<t)V . . . . wv ?]crav ra {jLtycOrj TrXtlov r) TTT^COV Tf.rra.pwv. Four cubits was equal to about five feet eight inches. At Khorsabad the tallest of the genii on the coloured tiles at the door are only 32 inches high ; others are not more than two feet. 3 PLACE, Ninire, vol. iii. plates 24 and 31.