Most of the vases from Bismâya are circular in shape, though examples of oval, oblong, square, and shell-shaped vases were also found. The stone most commonly used was marble, due no doubt to its comparative softness and adaptability to the chisel. The curvature and general symmetry of these vases is so perfect that, according to Banks, a lathe or something answering the same purpose as a lathe, must have been used. The softer stones at this period were doubtless worked with flint instruments, as in the case of the earliest cylinder-seals. The purposes which these vases served must have been as diversified as the vases themselves. Some appear to have been lamps, others drinking-cups; some were probably used as water, wine, or oil jars, while others may have been used as wash-basins; some were used for articles of toilet, and in one vessel traces of _henna_[148] were still visible in one compartment and traces of _kohl_ in the other. [Illustration: FIG. 90, _a_.] [Illustration: FIG. 89.] [Illustration: FIG. 90, _b_.] Of the stone-ware of the early period of Semitic supremacy in the Euphrates valley, a gracefully curved vase of white marble belonging to Urumush[149] king of Kish, which was discovered at Nippur during the course of the excavations carried on by the University of Pennsylvania, and is now preserved in the Pennsylvania Museum, affords us a good example; while of the stone-ware of the somewhat later period of Shar-Gâni-sharri and Narâm-Sin, the Semitic kings of Agade, a white alabaster “phial” (cf. Fig. 89) discovered at Tellô and bearing the name of Narâm-Sin is an excellent specimen. It consists in a well-rounded flask or phial seven and a half inches high, and is inscribed with the words “Narâm-Sin, King of the four regions.” Another small stone vase of this king made of marble was acquired by Oppert during the ill-fated expedition of 1855, the inscription upon which gave the additional information that the stone from which the vase was made came from Magan, but this valuable relic shared the fate of the other monuments and tablets recovered by Fresnel and Oppert, and went down in the Tigris on May 23rd, 1855.[150]