Syria - Mesopotamia :|: Document

Army crossing un river in coracles

ref. : en.711.2013 |

5 April 2013 | by Francis Leveque
sculpture | Second quarter of IXe century BC
Nimrud (Kalhu), Mésopotamie ( Irak )

Gypsum wall panel relief (Panel 10) excavated from North West Palace, Room B Nimrud (Kalhu), Irak. Excavated by Sir Austen Henry Layard, shipped to England in H.M.S. ’Jumna’ after an adventurous earlier voyage in 1848 (cf. ’Athenaeum’ 1848, p.1152 f., no.14).

The panel shows the crossing of a river of Ashurnasirpal II’s army. Horses swim, led by grooms, while a chariot, bed and jar are carried on coracles (transport baskets). Figures are shown complete and not half submerged which is typical of Assyrian art. There is an inscription written in cuneiform script.

Width: 213.36 centimetres
Height: 91.44 centimetres

Date
865BC-860BC

Bibliography :

E.A.W. Budge, Assyrian Sculptures in the British Museum, Reign of Ashur-nasir-pal, 885-890 B.C, British Museum Press, London , 1914, pl. XXI.2

C.J. Gadd, The Stones of Assyria: the surviving remains of Assyrian sculpture, their recovery, and their original positions, Chatto and Windus, London , 1936, p.134

A.K. Grayson, Assyrian Rulers of the Early First Millennium BC, I (1114-859 BC) (RIMA), University of Toronto Press, Toronto , 1991, n° 101.23.33