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Excavations at Nimrud, 1949–1953 Seals and Seal Impressions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 August 2014

Barbara Parker
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This article is concerned with the seals and seal impressions on clay labels and business documents discovered at Nimrud during the five seasons of excavations conducted by the British School of Archaeology in Iraq, from 1949-1953. The seals, and particularly the impressions of seals on dated tablets, and a few bullae provide a valuable addition to our knowledge of the development of Assyrian seal engraving. One of the aims of this study is, of course, to obtain as close a dating as possible for the different types. For this we have previously been dependent on the few seals in public and private collections, dated by inscription; on the seals and impressions from the excavations at Assur, dating mostly to the thirteenth century B.C., and to the ninth-eighth centuries B.C.; on the few seals found at Khorsabad, presumably not later than the reign of Sargon; and on the impressions upon clay sealings found by Layard in Sennacherib's palace at Quyunjik, (a few of these Layard illustrated and others he described).

The new material leaves inevitably a number of gaps and problems; one of the principal gaps seems to be the lack of evidence for seals made at the time of Tiglath-pileser III; for example, we do not know whether the delicate engraving of seals such as ND.305 (Pl. XI, 1) was practised in his reign. The stone reliefs from Nimrud of Tiglath-pileser III are evidence of a distinctive development in design, and a comparable development in the art of seal engraving might be expected.

Type
Research Article
Information
IRAQ , Volume 17 , Issue 2 , Autumn 1955 , pp. 93 - 125
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute for the Study of Iraq 1955

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References

page 93 note 1 In studying the Nuzu seal impressions Miss Porada suspected that seals were not infrequently handed down from father to son A.A.S.O.R. XXIV, 11, note 1Google Scholar. The handing down of dynastic seals is rather a different matter, cf. Smith, Sidney, A.J. XIX (1959), 40 f.Google Scholar Many examples of the use of a dynastic seal were discovered at Ugarit where the inscribed tablets had frequently been sealed with a cylinder of Yaqarum which had been made in the Isin-Larsa period probably 19th-18th century B.C. and was still used four centuries later on documents of Niqmadu III in the 14th century. At this later period replicas were manufactured in addition to the original seal. See Nougayrol, J., Le Palais Royal d'Ugarit III, p. XL f. and XLIII, footnote (1)Google Scholar, for other examples of dynastic seals from Boghaz-koi, and Tarsus.

page 95 note 1 This must be so in the case of ND. 3226 (Pl. XIII, 1) a typically ninth-eighth century seal, found in the late seventh century level in T.W.53.

page 97 note 1 Standard inscription, line 15.

page 97 note 2 An interpretation suggested many years ago by Smith, Sidney, in Early History of Assyria, f 331Google Scholar. See also ND. 2151, p. 100.

page 98 note 1 Of the “Skuehorn” variety, a domesticated breed.

page 99 note 1 Cylinder B, col. V, lines 50–55 and 73, L.A.R. II, para. 861. Also Rassam Cylinder, col. IX, 79 “Ištar of Arbela who is clothed in fire” L.A.R. II, para. 829.

page 99 note 2 Professor F. E. Zeuner tells me this would be the “wild” bezoar variety, from Iran. The difference between the horns of this animal and the ibex is not usually distinguishable on seals.

page 105 note 1 cf. Thureau Dangin, Tablettes d'Uruk, no. 12, where the illustration of the ear of corn held by the goddess Šala (Virgo) looks very much like the plant shown on this seal.

page 106 note 1 e.g. Woolley, Carchemish II, pl. 26, b 4. and Tufnell, Lachish II, The Fosse Temple, pl. XXXII, B, no. 18.

page 106 note 2 Pottier, , Catalogue des Antiquités Assyrienne du Musée du Louvre, 1917, 117, pl. 26Google Scholar.

page 108 note 1 On NIN.ḪUR.SAG symbolised as a cow, cf. Gadd in Hall and Woolley, , Ur Excavations I, Al-Ubaid, 143 ff.Google Scholar and her relation to the milking scene on the limestone freize.

page 108 note 2 cf. Labat, , Le Caractère religieux de la royaute Assyro-habylonienne, 67 f.Google Scholar

page 109 note 1 The difference being that one is used for sealing documents and the other is not. Both have amuletic value.

page 112 note 1 Hinke, , A New Boundary Stone of Nebucbadressor I, B.E. Series D, vol. IV, p. 95Google Scholar.

page 112 note 2 There are at least three alternative symbols by owhich the goddesses may be represented if this theory is accepted; a flattened band curling at the ends which Mrs. Van Buren regards as the same as the Omega shaped symbol (cf. D.P.M. VII, pl. XVII, Hinke, op cit. fig. 30); a very strange curling object (King, Babylonian Boundary Stones, plates I and LXXVI), the former example is reminiscent of the double spiral, the latter example, not, but suggests some part of the intestines. There is yet another object, perhaps also intestinal (D.P.M. VII, fig. 453 and Hinke, op. cit. fig. 2). Sometimes the Omega shaped symbol may itself be shown upside down (D.P.M. I, 172, pl. XVIGoogle Scholar and Hinke, op. cit. fig. 11).

page 113 note 1 From the number of clay figures of the nude goddess discovered in the Temple of NIN.MAḪ at Babylon, Koldewey concluded that they might represent this goddess (Koldewey, , Excavations at Babylon (English Edition) 65 and 277, fig. 202)Google Scholar.

page 113 note 2 If Layard is correct in drawing an arrow in the hands of the preceding statue, then it might be Ninurta himself, with the weapon which names his constellation, the arrow šliltaḫu (Sirius).

page 115 note 1 M. Delaporte describes the tree thus: “Trois vasques disposées en pyramide et dans chacune desquelles sont deux lignes ovales dont la convexité est vers le haut; la ligne supérieure est surmontée de rayons.”

page 116 note 1 An antler found at Nimrud in houses behind the citadel wall (A. 51) was that of the red deer. I am again indebted to Prof. F. E. Zeuner for this information.

page 116 note 2 Mallowan, , Iraq IX, Pl. VII, 6 and XI, pts. 1 and 2, pp. 97, 103Google Scholar.

page 116 note 3 Woolley, , Ur Excavations II (The Royal Cemetery), pl. 165Google Scholar.

page 116 note 4 Frankfort, , OJ.P., 17, fig. 61Google Scholar.

page 116 note 5 Frankfort, Cylinder Seals, pl. XIII h.

page 116 note 6 Woolley, , A.J. III, 332 (U. 216)Google Scholar.

page 117 note 1 Gadd, , The Assyrian Sculptures, British Museum, 1934, pl. XIII and p. 50Google Scholar.

page 117 note 2 Delaporte, Catalogue des Cylindres Orientaux de la Bibliothèque Nationale, pl. XXV, no. 383.

page 117 note 3 Koldewey, , Excavations at Babylon (English edition), 234 f.Google Scholar

page 117 note 4 From the illustrations it is probably the Rhesus monkey. I am indebted to Professor F. E. Zeuner for this information about the monkeys.

page 117 note 5 A text published by Thompson, R. Campbell, J.R.A.S. 1924, 153Google Scholar, reads “The Imḫur-ašra plant like the brilliance of Ištar.” Campbell Thompson says that the daisy-like Ištar emblem may well be the chrysanthemum segetum.

page 119 note 1 It may be that there was another copy of the tablet bearing the seal impression of the second seller.

page 120 note 1 In the same way as Kurdish embroidered caps still use designs found on T. Halaf prehistoric pottery.

page 123 note 1 Probably the star of Ištar; her emblem as shown on the boundary stones is very similar. The emblem of Šamaš also has eight points, but four of these are wavy lines.