The principal rock-tablet at Bavian contains four figures, sculptured in relief upon the smoothed face of a limestone cliff, rising perpendicularly from the bed of the torrent. They are inclosed by a kind of frame 28 feet high by 30 feet wide, and are protected by an overhanging cornice from the water which trickles down the face of the precipice. Two deities, facing each other, are represented, as they frequently are on monuments and relics of the same period, standing on mythic animals resembling dogs. They wear the high square head-dress, with horns uniting in front, peculiar to the human-headed bulls of the later Assyrian palaces. One holds in the left hand a kind of staff surmounted by the sacred tree. To the centre of this staff is attached a ring encircling a figure, probably that of the king. The other hand is stretched forth towards the opposite god, who carries a similar staff, and grasps in the right hand an object which is too much injured to be accurately described. These two figures may represent but one and the same great tutelary deity of the Assyrians, as the two kings who stand in act of adoration before them are undoubtedly but one and the same king. The monarch, thus doubly portrayed, is behind the god. He raises one hand, and holds in the other the sacred mace, ending in a ball. His dress resembles that of the builder of the Kouyunjik palace, Sennacherib, with whom the inscriptions I shall presently describe, identify him. This bas-relief has suffered greatly from the effects of the atmosphere, and in many parts the details can no longer be distinguished. But they have been still more injured by those who occupied the country after the fall of the Assyrian empire. Strangers, having no reverence for the records or sacred monuments of those who went before them, excavated in the ready-scarped rocks the sepulchral chambers of their dead.[93] In this great tablet there are four such tombs. I entered them by means of a rope lowered from above by a party of Kurds. They were empty, their contents having, of course, been long before carried away, or destroyed. To the left of this great bas-relief, and nearer the mouth of the ravine, is a second tablet containing a horseman at full speed, and the remains of other figures. Both horse and rider are of colossal proportions, and remarkable for the spirit of the outline. The warrior wears the Assyrian pointed helmet, and couches a long ponderous spear, as in the act of charging the enemy. Before him is a colossal figure of the king, and behind him a deity with a horned cap; above his head a row of smaller figures of gods standing on animals of various forms, as in the rock-sculptures of Malthaiyah. This fine bas-relief has, unfortunately, suffered even more than the other monuments from the effects of the atmosphere, and would easily escape notice without an acquaintance with its position.