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

128 EXPLORATIONS IN BIBLE LANDS
sympathy and loyalty which once, when an unknown adventurer,
he himself had experienced there at the hand of
his predecessor and patron.
During the two years which Rawlinson spent in
England
(1850-51) for the restoration of his health and to superintend
the publication of his famous second memoir " On
the Babylonian Translation of the Great Persian Inscription
at Behistun," through which he announced to the world that
the deciphering of the Babylono-Assyrian cuneiform writing
was an accomplished fact, he entered into closer relations
with the British Museum. The trustees of this large storehouse
of ancient
art-treasures were anxious to resume their
researches in the ruins on the banks of the Tigris and the
Euphrates, which hitherto had been conducted with such
marvellous success bv Layard. Who was better qualified
to carry out their plans and to take charge of the proposed
excavations than Rawlinson, with his unique knowledge
of the cuneiform languages, his rare experience as a soldier
and traveller, and his remarkable influence in the East as
the political representative of a great nation at Baghdad !
And he was at once ready to add the labors of an explorer
and excavator to those of a diplomat and decipherer. Before
he departed from England, he was entrusted with the
supervision of all the excavations which might be carried
on by the British
Museum in Assyria, Babylonia, and Susiana,
and was authorized to employ such agents as he
thought fit in excavating and transporting the best-preserved
antiquities to the national collections in London. 1
Well provided with the necessary funds furnished by the
government and private individuals, he entered upon his
second official residence in Baghdad in the fall of 1851.
But intelligent men who could be relied upon, and at the
same time were able to manage the work properly in the
1
Comp. George Rawlinson, " A Memoir of Major-General Sir Henry
Creswicke Rawlinson," London, 1898, pp. 172, seqq.