The arts and civilisation of Nineveh represent those of Babylon also. Babylon, though it was long of attaining to the political greatness of her rival, was evidently an older city. It can hardly be doubted that it arose from the first gathering of mankind upon the plains of Shinar. From notices of it on Egyptian monuments of the time of Thothmes III., it is evident that it was a place of considerable note at least in the fifteenth century before Christ. Although for long politically overshadowed by her neighbour Nineveh, Babylon at an early period became famous for the extent and importance of her commerce. No position could then have been more favourable than hers for carrying on a trade with all the regions of the known world. She stood upon a navigable stream that brought to her quays the produce of the temperate highlands of Armenia—running westward in one part of its course to within a hundred miles of the Mediterranean, and emptying its waters into a gulf of the Indian Ocean. Parallel to this great river, and scarcely inferior to it in size, was the Tigris, flowing through the fertile plains of Assyria, and carrying their produce to the Babylonian cities. The inhabitants turned these natural advantages to the best account; and their industry and enterprise, cooperating with that of civilised people in the adjoining countries, greatly increased the means of locomotion. Highroads and causeways across the Desert connected Babylonia with Syria and Palestine. Fortified stations protected the merchant from the wandering tribes of Arabia,—walled cities served as resting-places and storehouses,—and wells at regular intervals gave an abundant supply of water during the hottest season of the year. One of those highways was carried through the centre of Mesopotamia, and, crossing the Euphrates near the town of Anthemusia, led into Central Asia;—a second appears to have left Babylon by the western quarter of the city, and entered Idumea, after passing through the country of the Nabathæans;—while others branched off to Tadmor, and to other cities built in the Desert almost solely for purposes of trade. To the east of Babylon was the celebrated military and commercial road described by Herodotus, leading from Sardis to Susa in ninety days’ journey, and furnished at intervals of about fifteen miles with stations and public hostelries, probably resembling the modern caravanserais of Persia. A very considerable trade was likewise carried on with India, through Media, Hyrcania, and the centre of Asia,—by which route it was, probably, that the greater part of the precious stones and gold were supplied to Babylon. A coasting trade existed along the shores of the Persian Gulf eastwards. The prophet Isaiah alludes to the ships of the Chaldeans; and we learn from the Kouyunjik inscriptions that the inhabitants of the country at the mouth of the Euphrates possessed vessels in which, when defeated by the Assyrians, they took refuge on the sea.