In Pl. XXIII, B we have another statue of Gudea, this time seated. The chief peculiarity about this and its companion statue, both of which are in the Louvre, lies in the flat tablet which each of them carries on their knees. On one of these tablets a regular plan of Gudea’s buildings has been engraved, showing various doors, crenelated towers, and so forth, together with the carpenter’s rule and stylus, which are similarly engraved on the knee-tablet of the statue reproduced here. The most striking feature in the sculpture itself is the boldness with which the nude limbs are carved, and the nervous vitality with which they abound. This is especially noticeable in the treatment of the right arm and shoulder, which the arrangement of the mantle leaves exposed. The cartouche on the shoulder contains the name and titles of Gudea. The lengthy inscription below records that this statue has been dedicated to the goddess Gatumdug, who is styled “the mother of Shirpurla” (= Lagash), it then treats of the various rites and ceremonies with which the building of the temple of this goddess was accompanied. This statue, like the standing one in Pl. XXIII A, is made of diorite. Several of the heads belonging to these statues have been brought to light, one of which is seen in Pl. XXIII, C. The head which is decked with a variegated turban is again remarkable for its strength and the boldness with which it is executed; the eyes are large and wide open, a noticeable characteristic in all Mesopotamian art, whether early or late; the eyebrows are heavy, and the chin firm, while the jaws are thick-set and make the general contour of the face square. The absence of due proportion in all these early Babylonian sculptures is at once manifest: they one and all have a more or less squat appearance, the breadth being always too great proportionally for the height, while the head is too large for the body and the latter is too thin from back to front. But when all the failings incidental to the products of an inexperienced art are duly taken into consideration, there is a certain fidelity to nature, and consequently a degree of life observable in the crudest of these early Babylonian sculptures which at once raises them to a higher level than the Assyrian statues to which they unconsciously gave birth. The accentuation of the strong lines and curves of the earlier sculptures in the later products of Assyrian times, has merely led to exaggeration, and the effect is inevitably stereotyped and unnatural. _PLATE XXIII_ [Illustration: _Musée du Louvre_ A, B. DIORITE STATUES OF GUDEA, PATESI OF LAGASH C. DIORITE HEAD OF GUDEA D. UPPER PART OF A DIORITE STATUETTE OF A WOMAN (GUDEA PERIOD)]