§ II Metals
The art of working in metals, which was already so highly developed among the primitive Chaldæans, reached its apogee under the Sargonids. We find statuettes, bas-reliefs in repoussé, vases and utensils of every sort, weapons and ornaments, so that there is no use of the precious metals, or of iron and bronze, to which they were not put by the industry of Ninevite craftsmen. Among the ruins of Sargon’s palace, objects of iron and bronze, such as hooks, rings, chains, pickaxes, hammers, plough-shares, weapons, fragments of chariots, and tools of all sorts, were picked up. From the strictly artistic point of view, we have already described the wooden pillars plated with overlapping scales of bronze, so as to imitate the bark of the palm tree.
The most important of the Assyrian monuments in bronze hitherto discovered is the famous decoration of the gates of the palace of Shalmaneser III. (857-822), at Balawat. It consists of metal bands, 9 in. broad, decorated in repoussé with reliefs representing the campaigns of Shalmaneser. They were fixed horizontally, at intervals, on wooden gates, which may have been quite 7 or 8 yards high; the scenes are reproduced upon them with the same ease and the same details as on the limestone slabs: battles, landscapes, trees, rivers and mountains are to be seen; the figures, however, are treated more roughly, and the muscles are marked with less precision and delicacy. Each band (fig. 96) is divided into two compartments by a row of rosettes, imitating the heads of nails. “Taking them all in all,” says M. Perrot, “these bronze reliefs are among the works which do most honour to Assyrian art.”46
The perfection of the work in certain Assyrian bronze vessels makes these monuments real masterpieces. Pateræ found at Nineveh, sometimes incrusted with gold and silver, present on their inner surface, in an exquisite style, concentric zones of rosettes and symmetrical festoons of figures engraved in outline or standing out in relief (fig. 97). Symbols are encountered which have evidently been borrowed from Egypt, such as the winged scarabæus and the figures of Hathor and Bes. Similar in form, in the metal of which they are composed, in the gold and silver incrustations, and even in the choice of subjects, to the Phœnician vessels from Cyprus (figs. 233 and 234), the pateræ of Nineveh are not, for the most part, of Assyrian manufacture; they were brought thither by Phœnician commerce, and were probably fashioned in the workshops of Tyre or Sidon, where the artistic traditions of Egypt and Assyria were united. The glass found among the Assyrian ruins was also probably of Phœnician manufacture, as it will be seen in the chapter on Phœnician art. Much more exclusively Assyrian are the bronze seals which the bas-reliefs show us in the hands of priests or genii. We find among them lions’ heads, flowers and elegant rosettes on the bottom, on the border, or at the point at which the handles are attached.
The equipment of an Assyrian soldier consists of a bow and arrows, a lance or javelin, a club, a sword, a dagger, a helmet, a coat of mail, and a buckler; the battering-rams which sap the walls had a metal carapace and head. Might it not be imagined that these Assyrian soldiers, wearing the conical helmet, and entirely covered, with the exception of their arms, nose and eyes, with a long coat of iron mail, were mediæval knights? The shape of the Assyrian helmet varies according to the time, and perhaps also according to military rank. There is the helmet formed of a conical basin, without ornament, the helmet provided with cheek-pieces, as among the Greeks, the helmet decorated with an elegant crest bearing an aigrette of feathers or of horsehair. But the essential form is always that of a hemispherical basin, covering the head, but leaving the face bare. A votive shield, preserved at the British Museum, has, like those represented in the bas-reliefs, the form of a large round disk, convex in its central part; this metal disk, 34 in. in diameter, is decorated like the pateræ with a central rosette and several concentric zones containing lions and bulls in relief.
The preceding examples prove the existence of a manufacture of metals which had reached a high degree of perfection, and was in possession of all the technical methods. Accordingly, we believe that the scanty number of statues or statuettes in bronze of human beings or of Assyrian deities must be attributed to an unfortunate chance. They must have been produced in large numbers, as in ancient Chaldæa, and a good proof of this is the large cow’s head disinterred near Bagdad and preserved at the British Museum47; another example is the statuette of a lion found at Khorsabad (fig. 100); this has, doubtless, serious defects, such as a singular disproportion between the head and the body, between the fore legs and the hind legs; but what truth of expression in the muzzle with its gaping mouth, and in those powerful claws!
A statuette in M. de Vogüé’s collection, found at Van, represents a sort of siren which seems to have acted as an ornament attached to a vessel or a piece of furniture (figs. 101 and 102). The oriental appearance of the head, the hair in ringlets, the large eyes, the bracelets upon the outstretched arms behind the wings, and the artistically marked feathers, make of this little monument one of the most precious relics of the art of working in bronze among the Assyrians. A similar figure is preserved in the British Museum, and in this instance the loose ring by which the vessel was held is still in place.
The Louvre possesses the figure of a monster with four wings which represents the demon of the south-west wind, as the cuneiform inscription upon it teaches us (fig. 103). Nothing can be imagined more hideous and more expressive than the head with its glaring eyes, roaring throat, horned brows, crooked fingers and fleshless body with lion’s claws. It leads us naturally to cite a bronze plaque from the collection of M. de Clercq, in which M. Clermont-Ganneau has recognised a representation of the Assyrian hell. One side (fig. 104) is occupied by a monster with four wings and eagle’s claws, looking over the top of the plaque; on the other side (fig. 105) the monster’s head is seen, and under it scenes arranged in four rows: first the symbolical figures of the stars, then a procession of seven creatures dressed in long robes and having the heads of various animals: these are the heavenly genii called Igigis. Below this we witness a funeral scene: two creatures with human bodies combined with the head and body of a fish, like the god Oannes, stand by a bed on which a corpse is laid out, swathed in its mummy-clothes; near them stand two monsters like the demons which appear in a battle scene belonging to the campaigns of Assur-nasir-pal, and, of larger size, on the walls of Assurbanipal’s palace; they face one another in the same attitude here as there, and seem to be disputing or quarrelling. The lowest row shows a stream of water in which are fish. In a boat is a kneeling horse; on his back is a monster holding serpents in his hands; lion-cubs are springing forwards towards him; another monster stands on the brink of the water; in the background are trees and fragments of different kinds, looking like the remains of a banquet. There is some artistic merit in several portions of this curious scene. The monster on the other side is boldly designed, and his form is vigorous and supple.
In the chiselling of a royal standard (fig. 106), the artist really attained to the highest technical skill: the bulls’ heads and the lions’ heads arranged along the pole are masterpieces of taste, and might be proposed as models at the present day. In the palaces fragments of thrones have been found formed of bronze plating. One of the most remarkable pieces, found at Van, belongs to M. de Vogüé (fig. 107); the deep sculpture in the claws of the crouching lion reminds the spectator of a bronze statuette from Tello (fig. 26).