sounds which may be assigned to the
ideograms, grammatical tablets, and dictionaries--Their contracts, and
their numerous copies of them: the finger-nail mark, the seal._

_The constitution of the family: the position held by the
wife--Marriage, the contract, the religious ceremonies--Divorce:
the rights of wealthy women; woman and marriage among the lower
classes--Adopted children, their position in the family; ordinary
motives for adoption--Slaves, their condition, their enfranchisement._

_The Chaldaean towns: the aspect and distribution of the houses, domestic
life--The family patrimony: division of the inheritance--Lending
on usury, the rate of interest, commercial intercourse by land and
sea--Trade corporations: brick-making, industrial implements in stone
and metal, goldsmiths, engravers of cylinders, weavers; the state of the
working classes._

_Farming and cultivation of the ground: landmarks, slaves,
and agricultural labourers--Scenes of pastoral life: fishing,
hunting--Archaic literature; positive sciences: arithmetic and geometry,
astronomy and astrology, the science of foretelling the future--The
physician; magic and its influence on neighbouring countries._

[Illustration: 239.jpg CHAPTER III.]

Drawn by Boudier, from the sketch by Loftus. The initial
vignette, which is by Faucher-Gudin, represents a royal
figure kneeling and holding a large nail in both hands. The
nail serves to keep the figure fixed firmly in the earth. It
is a reproduction of the bronze figurine in the Louvre,
already published by Heuzey-Sakzeo, _Decouvertes en
Chaldee_, pl. 28, No. 4.

CHAPTER III--CHALDAEAN CIVILIZATION

_Royalty--The constitution of the family and its property--Chaldaean
commerce and industry_.

The Chaldaean kings, unlike their contemporaries the Pharaohs, rarely
put forward any pretensions to divinity. They contented themselves with
occupying an intermediate position between their subjects and the gods,
and for the purpose of mediation they believed themselves to be endowed
with powers not possessed by ordinary mortals. They sometimes designated
themselves the sons of Ea, or of Ninsun, or some other deity, but
this involved no belief in a divine parentage, and was merely pious
hyperbole: they entertained no illusions with regard to any descent from
a god or even from one of his doubles, but they desired to be recognized
as his vicegerents here below, as his pr