The range of these changes in detail on both sides of the Taurus is another indication of close bonds between the various branches of the Hittite peoples. In the architecture of these times there appears a new and striking motive, equally wide in its distribution, in the lion corner-stone.[956] The lion itself we have seen to have been early introduced into Hittite symbolism, but the earliest examples in the round seem to be the product of this age. The carvings of Sakje-Geuzi, which show the Hittite style just tinged with Assyrian or Aramaic (Semitic) influence, can be assigned with some certainty to the period 900-850 B.C. At Sinjerli the great lions seem to be of earlier date,[957] but in any case there is a remarkable coherence in design and method of employment between all the recorded specimens; as well as a correspondence in treatment of detail with the lions which decorate the chief gateway and the tank at Boghaz-Keui.[958] One of the lions of Marash is covered with an inscription, the nature of which seems to conform entirely with the dominant theocratic ideals of the age.[959] The monuments and ruins of this place are in themselves evidence of a city of remarkable strength and of conspicuous importance in the Hittite world,[960] of which it was one of the last surviving members. Unhappily for history we must still wait here as elsewhere for the evidences which the excavator’s spade alone can satisfactorily bring to light. The bare references in the Assyrian annals to the capture of this or that city, or to the various desperate coalitions of the Hittite states against the power that threatened their independence, if not their existence, tell us little but the date and manner of their downfall. If one could but penetrate the gloom that enshrouds the story of the Hittites in these stirring times, how many Iliads could be written to delight their readers! We pass then to the last phase, which covers the period 850-700 B.C., during which the Hittite states were one by one submerged by the various powers that encircled them, and finally the Cimmerians blotted out from Asia Minor the memory of the past. The story is soon told; for we have only the record of the Assyrian[961] and Vannic[962] inscriptions to help in filling the outline of the Hittite story of these last centuries which was sketched in an earlier chapter. These records also are usually either brief and formal, or expressed in terms obviously exaggerated and partial; and the operations of which they tell were for the most part confined to the eastern Hittite states. Such as they are, however, they are welcome.