M. Ménant believes himself able to determine where most if not all the cylinders of the early monarchy were produced. He talks of the schools of Ur, of Erech, of Arade, and in many cases the signs on which he relies appear to have a serious value. But we shall not attempt even to give a _résumé_ of the arguments he uses to justify the classification he was the first to sketch out; we could not do so without multiplying our illustrations and extending our letterpress to an extravagant degree. Judging from the examples quoted by M. Ménant himself in support of his own theory, the workshops of different towns in the course of a single period were distinguished rather by their predilection for particular themes than by anything peculiar in their styles of execution; the same processes and the same way of looking at living forms may be recognised in all. We may, then, treat all these early works of the Chaldæan gem-engravers as the productions of a single school; and in this history we only propose to note and discuss the general direction of the great art currents. We cannot follow all the arms and side streams into which the main river is subdivided. [Illustration: FIG. 143.--Chaldæan cylinder. Green serpentine. Louvre. Drawn by Wallet.] [Illustration: FIG. 144.--Chaldæan cylinder. Basalt. Louvre. Drawn by Wallet.] [Illustration: FIG. 145.--Chaldæan cylinder. Basalt. Louvre.] One of the favourite subjects at this time was the scene of worship we have already encountered on the Sippara tablet (Vol. I., Fig. 71.); in the cylinders as well as on the larger tablet the worshipper is led by a priest into the presence of an enthroned divinity. The temple, indicated in the tablet, is suppressed in the seals, where the space is so much less, but otherwise the composition is the same. It would be difficult to imagine anything better fitted for objects of a talismanic character, which were also to be used for the special purpose of these cylinders. Whenever the Chaldæan put his seal upon clay he renewed the act of prayer and faith which the engraver had figured upon it; he took all men to witness his faith in the protection of Anou, of Samas, or of some other god. We need therefore feel no surprise at encountering this subject upon the cylinders of Ourkam, (Vol. I., Fig. 3), and his son Dungi,[310] princes in whom the oldest Chaldæan royalty was embodied. Both of these seals seem to have been engraved in Ur, the home of that dynasty. We have given several other variants of the same theme (Vol. I., Figs. 17–20, and above, Figs. 40 and 124);[311] here are two more found by M. de Sarzec at Tello (Figs. 143, 144). In the first of these two streams seem to flow from the shoulders of the seated deity; they may have some connection with that worship of the two great rivers whose traces appear elsewhere.[312] In the second example, which is not a little rough and summary in its execution, the