The four doors of Esagila are mentioned by Neriglissar in his cylinder inscription (_K.B._ iii. 2, p. 73): “Esagila and Ezida I beautified. The temples I placed in order, noble worship (?) I adhered to (?) perpetually. The bronze serpents ... (?) on the face of the walls (i-na ki-si-i) of the doorways of Esagila which ... are placed standing at the ‘door of the Rising Sun,’ at the ‘door of the Setting Sun,’ at the ‘door of Abundance,’ at the ‘door of ...’ (which) no earlier king had erected, I the humble, the submissive, who am learned in the worship of the gods, have erected. Eight serpents standing upright (sirruš) ... (?) which hiss deadly poison against the nefarious and the foe, I have clothed with a covering of shining silver; and at the door of the Rising Sun, at the door of the Setting Sun, at the door of Abundance, and at the door of ... on the walls of these self-same doors according to ancient custom ... silver ... in accordance with its exalted destiny, set up in ...” (trans. by Bezold). The eight sirrush were undoubtedly on the balustrades of the entrance ramps, two at each gate. Herodotus calls the temple the κατω νηος, in which, according to him, there was a great seated statue of Zeus, that like the throne, the footstool, and table was formed of gold of the weight of 800 talents. Small objects found on the pavement show that this must have remained open as late as the Seleucid period. Thus the building existed long unroofed, and crumbled into an accumulation of rubbish amounting to 4 or 5 metres high. Then the mud walls fell down flat, and in this position we found them (Fig. 129), and over them rubbish of all sorts was accumulated for a long period, which, during our excavations, appeared in most unpleasant guise as a horrible, black, powdery mass. At a height of 14 metres above zero mud-brick houses begin once more, which become poorer in the higher parts of the midden, until at last they almost entirely disappear. The upper layer certainly contains traces of habitation, and among them many Arabic glazed sherds, but scarcely walls, and the Babylon of that period, whose inhabited area was confined to this mound, must have presented a somewhat miserable aspect. As Hilleh was founded in the eleventh century A.D., we may assume that Babylon ceased to be inhabited at that time. The sacred tomb of Amran Ibn Ali (Fig. 130), somewhat to the south of the temple, consists of two cupolas inside the walls of a court, against which various halls and secondary buildings are placed. It is the latest building on the town site of Babylon, for the Euphrates flowed previously where the village of Kweiresh now lies. [Illustration: FIG. 129.—The excavation of Esagila. ] [Illustration: FIG. 130.—Tomb of Amran Ibn Ali. ] XXXVI THE EASTERN ANNEX (B) OF ESAGILA