Explorations in Bible lands during the 19th century - H. V. Hilprecht

76 EXPLORATIONS IN BIBLE LANDS
The village of Khorsabad, situated about five hours to
the northeast of Mosul, on the left bank of the same little
river Khosar which flows through Nineveh, is built on the
more elevated eastern part of a long-stretched mound. The
gradually descending western half of the same tell ends in
two ridges which are both unoccupied.
It was in the northern
ridge of the latter section that Botta's workmen began
to cut their trenches. They came almost immediately upon
two parallel walls covered with the mutilated remains of
large bas-reliefs and cuneiform inscriptions. A messenger
was despatched to Mosul in order to inform their master
of the great discovery. But well acquainted with the rich
phantasy and flowery speech of the Arab race, Botta seriously
doubted the truth of the extraordinary news so quickly
received, and at first ordered a servant to the scene of excavations
with instructions to
inspect the work and bring him
The required
a more intelligent account of the actual finds.
evidence was soon in Botta's possession. There could be
no longer any doubt that this time the Arabs had spoken
the full truth, and that most remarkable antiquities of a
He
genuine Assyrian character had been brought to light.
now hastened at once to Khorsabad himself. His consular
duties allowed him to remain only one day. But the few
hours which he could spend in the trenches were well employed.
Though the first sight of these strange sculptures
and witnesses of a long-forgotten past which, out of the
depth of a buried civilization, suddenlv rose like the fata
morgana before his astonished eyes, must have filled
his soul
with great excitement and rare delight, yet he could calm
himself sufficiently to sit down among his Arab workmen,
and sketch the most important reliefs and inscriptions for
his friend in Paris.
On April 5, 1843, Botta wrote the first of a series of
letters to Mohl, 1 in which he briefly described what he had
1
Published in Journal Asiatique, series iv., vol. ii., pp. 61-72 (dated