Page:Discovery and Decipherment of the Trilingual Cuneiform Inscriptions.djvu/85

 however, he enumerates six distinct buildings, which appear to be formed by the ruins of the Great Hall of the Hundred Columns and those of the Central Edifice united. Although the description of the arrangement of these buildings is hopelessly confused, we obtain for the first time an adequate account of the remarkable bas-reliefs found among them. He describes the personage seated upon a chair of state, a staff or sceptre in his hand, while beneath him are three rows of figures, one over the other, with uplifted arms, supporting those above. The winged figure is, he says, an idol seated upon an arc, with the body passed through a ring. He found another similar piece of sculpture with three rows of figures among these ruins, and he also mentions the great bas-relief in the north door of the Hall, where the seated personage is elevated above five rows of figures, but he failed to notice that these were guards. He divides the edifices on the platform into three rows of buildings one behind the other from west to east, the first two 'rows' containing, he says, each four buildings and the third of which the third is the largest, and we thus arrive at the thirteen buildings in all. His description of the Tombs is more intelligible. They resemble, he says, the façade of a temple cut into the rock. Below are four columns with capitals representing the head and throat of an ox. In the centre is the entrance to the tombs. They support an architrave approaching to Doric in style, and ornamented by lions. Above are two rows of arcades composed of human figures about two feet in height. Over them, in the centre, is an idol, resembling a winged man. On the right is a person praying, and to the left a pedestal surmounted by a globe. At either end is a portion of a round column with the head of a bull, and below, on