A great number of vase fragments made of marble, porphyry, granite, alabaster and onyx, together with innumerable objects made of ivory, mother of pearl, metal and stone were found round about the temple tower. In regard to the temple itself, an entrance was discovered on the south-east side, the principal remaining features of which were the marble gate-socket supported on two slabs of pink marble. At the south corner, an oval-shaped room was brought to light, which was once covered with a dome-shaped roof. But the base of the temple tower had depths even below the stratum containing the small plano-convex bricks, which yet remained to be fathomed. Some sixteen or seventeen feet below the surface a large metal spike (cf. Fig. 40) terminating in a lion’s head was recovered, while much lower still, about thirty-nine to forty feet below the level of the mound a number of fragments of wheel-made black pottery were revealed. The date of this wheel-made pottery is of course unknown, but judging from the depth at which it was found, Dr. Banks, the Field-director of the expedition, suggests a date of 10,000 B.C. In the same year (1903) in which these successful excavations were being carried on at Bismâya, Nineveh, the ruined mounds of which once-famous city had already yielded such a rich harvest to the great pioneers in the field of Mesopotamian exploration, received further attention at the hands of the Trustees of the British Museum, who sent out an expedition under Messrs. L. W. King and R. C. Thompson, with a view to the further excavation of the Kouyunjik mound. The principal result of the excavations carried on there between the years 1903 and 1905 was the discovery of the site of Nabû’s temple, which had however been so ruthlessly destroyed—presumably by the Elamites—that no complete plan of the temple could be made. Meanwhile the excavations at Tellô (Lagash) which had been brought suddenly to an end by the death of the brilliant French excavator (M. de Sarzec) in May, 1901, were resumed in January, 1903, under the directorship of Captain Gaston Cros. The principal fresh discovery made was a massive fortification wall built by Gudea (_circ._ 2450 B.C.). It is about thirty-two and a half feet thick, and in places is still in position to the height of twenty-six feet. Captain Cros also excavated a large rectangular building, and brought to light various objects of interest, including implements of flint and copper, together with a brick-stamp of Narâm-Sin, which latter may be regarded as evidence that building operations were carried on in Lagash by a Semitic king of Agade during the period of Semitic supremacy. CHAPTER III—DECIPHERMENT OF THE CUNEIFORM INSCRIPTIONS