Wood was the essential part of the structure of the chariots, the wheels of which have spokes turned in the lathe, and the body of which is of woven wicker-work, while the pole, describing a graceful curve, ends in an elegant horse’s head or in the head of a deer, a bull, a lion or a swan. The very weapons, lances, daggers and bows have shafts, hilts, and handles carved into figures of animals, crouching, sleeping, springing or folded in two, similar to the figures drawn and carved by the mediæval decorators. [Illustration: Fig. 110.--Assyrian chariot (from a bas-relief).] These objects, however, are not always of wood; oftenest, perhaps, they are of bone or ivory, as it is proved by the ivory tablets and the toilette articles, such as combs and pins, which the excavations have brought to light.[48] [Illustration: Fig. 111.--Ivory plaque (British Museum).] But side by side with these knick-knacks in the Ninevite style, there are others which, though found in Mesopotamia, seem to be of foreign origin. Witness to this is borne by an ivory plaque found at Nimroud, which was certainly part of the incrustation of a piece of furniture (fig. 111). The relief is clear, the work highly finished; the figure, which holds in its hand a large lotus-stalk, has woolly hair like an Ethiopian, and bears the Egyptian Uræus on its brow. Another tablet from Nimroud represents the head of a woman, whose hair is arranged in Egyptian fashion. She is enclosed in a frame which resembles a window with a balustrade, the capitals of which, original in style, seem to have been coloured. An ivory statuette of the goddess Istar, found at Nimroud, has the same heavy coiffure in successive rolls, and resting upon the shoulders; here we have again the Egyptian style with an exaggerated naturalism proper only to the Phœnicians. We may conclude that these ivories were fashioned, like the bronze dishes, in the workshops of Phœnicia. Thence caravans transported all these small objects as far as Nineveh; we know that the merchants of Tyre and Sidon had numerous stores in the very heart of Mesopotamia. Phœnician commerce was the great vehicle by which Egyptian and Assyrian art was carried abroad. § IV. LEATHER AND STUFFS. The art of embroidery and tapestry, which we have seen so highly developed in primitive Chaldæa, and a most remarkable example of which was furnished us in the costume of Marduk-nadin-akhi, did not cease to flourish during the whole existence of the Ninevite empire, and was more prosperous than ever at Babylon in the time of Nebuchadnezzar. Can robes of greater richness be imagined than these worn by Assur-nasir-pal, Sargon, Sennacherib, or Assurbanipal? Are there, even at the present day, any embroideries or tapestries of more wonderful delicacy or in more exquisite taste? Assyrian stuffs are celebrated throughout the ancient [Illustration: Fig. 112.--Assur-nasir-pal[49] offering a libation (Bas-relief in the British Museum).]