Page:A History of Art in Chaldæa & Assyria Vol 2.djvu/410

 37? A History of Art in Ciiald.ea and Assyria. have clothed them in a robe of brilliant green, studded with the pure white of the marguerite, the gold of the ranunculus, and the rich satin of the purple tulip. Fig. 259. — Detail of embroidery ; from Layard. §. 8. Commerce. The industry whose products we have been describing presupposed an active and widely extended commerce. It made use of many things that were not to be found within its own country, and it produced so much that it could not fail to seek for profitable exchanges. " Thou [Nineveh] hast multiplied thy merchants above the stars of heaven, " 1 says the prophet Nahum ; and Ezekiel calls Chaldaea " a land of traffic " and Babylon " a city of merchants." 2 Like Egypt, neither Chaldaea nor Assyria understood the use 01 money, but its absence did not affect their trade. Whether their system was one of barter, or whether they employed the precious metals in rough ingots or rings of a certain weight, weighing them in the balance for each transaction, we cannot say, but we know that the great cities of Mesopotamia had intimate business relations with the surrounding countries for many centuries, and that their merchants had ingenious methods of mobilizing their 1 Nahum iii. 16. 2 Ezekiel xvii. 4. 15)- Isaiah also alludes to the commerce of Babylon (xlvii.