In the same way, when he wishes, for instance, to show us what passes within the enclosure of a fortress (see fig. 57), he is reduced to display it on the ground with the bastions and battlements in profile around it, turned outward like the points of a coronet; at the same time he arranges all his scenes within this enclosure in divisions one above the other, without regard for the laws of proportion, and without even taking the trouble to contain himself, as he has done with regard to the enclosure, within the spaces marked out by radii starting from the centre. By a further neglect of perspective, in the representation of an ox or other horned animal, he places the horn in profile projecting forwards from the head. Besides the bas-reliefs which were displayed upon the walls of the palace-chambers, there were secondary pieces of sculpture in which the originality of the Assyrian genius comes to light. A notable example is found in the decoration of the thresholds of the palaces, which were carved in such a way that they looked like rich carpets. One of the most remarkable of these is a large slab of gypsum found at Kouyunjik, (fig. 84), in which the lotus or tulip-flower is combined with rosettes, open daisies and geometrical designs most harmonious in effect; nothing more elegant in decorative sculpture has ever been conceived. To sum up, Assyrian sculpture triumphs in the bas-relief, and in the patient and minute labour of ornamental design. If the work of the Ninevite chisel is compared to that of the Greeks in the archaic period, down to the appearance of the Æginetan school, a surprising affinity will be observed between them. The stela of Aristion, that primitive Athenian bas-relief, known under the incorrect name of the _Warrior of Marathon_, looks, at first sight, as if it had been taken from the walls of Sargon’s or Sennacherib’s palace. At Khorsabad a cippus, acquired by Victor Place, is adorned with parallel flutings terminating in a hemisphere of elegant palmettes; it presents the appearance of a Greek stela.[39] [Illustration: Fig. 84.--Fragment of threshold, Kouyunjik (British Museum).] If we compare the sculpture of Kouyunjik, Nimroud, Khorsabad and Kalah Shergat with one another, we observe, beneath the general uniformity that we have indicated, differences important enough to enable us to characterise the progress of art during the three centuries before the fall of Nineveh, and not simply [Illustration: Fig. 85.--Slaves dragging a winged bull. Bas-relief from Kouyunjik (British Museum).]