Literature and science, 536. Epistolary literature, 539. Art, 543. Assyrian art, 552. Assyrian sculpture and the evolution of art, 558. A classical estimate of Chaldean philosophy and astrology, 563. The Babylonian year, 565. The Babylonian day and its division into hours, 566. Assyrian science, 567. APPENDIX A CLASSICAL TRADITIONS 571 The Creation and the Flood, described by Polyhistor, 573. Other classical fragments: of the Chaldean kings, 575. Of the Chaldean kings and the deluge, 576. Of the tower of Babel, 577. Of Abraham, 577. Of Nabonassar, 577. Of the destruction of the Jewish Temple, 577. Of Nebuchadrezzar, 577. Of the Chaldean kings after Nebuchadrezzar, 578. Of the feast of Sacea, 579. A fragment of Megasthenes concerning Nebuchadrezzar, 579. Ninus and Semiramis, 580. Semiramis builds a great city, 584. Semiramis begins a career of conquest, 588. Semiramis invades India, 589. Another view of Semiramis, 593. Reign of Ninyas to Sardanapalus, 594. The destruction of Nineveh, 598. APPENDIX B EXCAVATIONS IN MESOPOTAMIA AND THEIR RESULTS 600 The ruins of Nineveh and M. Botta’s first discovery, 600. Layard’s discoveries at Nineveh, 604. Later discoveries in Babylonia and Assyria, 610. The results of the excavations, 612. Treasures from Nineveh, 613. The library of a king of Nineveh, 618. How the Assyrian books were read, 623. BRIEF REFERENCE-LIST OF AUTHORITIES BY CHAPTERS 627 A GENERAL BIBLIOGRAPHY OF MESOPOTAMIAN HISTORY 629 PART I. PROLEGOMENA BOOK I. HISTORY, HISTORIANS, AND THE WRITING OF HISTORIES CHAPTER I SOME GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS Broadly speaking, the historians of all recorded ages seem to have had the same general aims. They appear always to seek either to glorify something or somebody, or to entertain and instruct their readers. The observed variety in historical compositions arises not from difference in general motive, but from varying interpretations of the relative status of these objects, and from differing judgments as to the manner of thing likely to produce these ends, combined, of course, with varying skill in literary composition, and varying degrees of freedom of action. As to freedom of selective judgment, the earliest historians whose records are known to us exercised practically none at all. Their task was to glorify the particular monarch who commanded them to write. The records of a Ramses, a Sennacherib, or a Darius tell only of the successful campaigns, in which the opponent is so much as mentioned only in contrast with the prowess of the victor.