n
bas-reliefs; crowded and noisy bazaars, where each trade is located in
its special lanes and blind alleys; silent and desolate spaces occupied
by palaces and gardens, in which the private life of the wealthy
was concealed from public gaze; and looking down upon this medley of
individual dwellings, the palaces and temples with their ziggurats
crowned with gilded and painted sanctuaries. In the ruins of Uru,
Eridu, and Uruk, the remains of houses belonging doubtless to well-to-do
families have been brought to light. They are built of fine bricks,
whose courses are cemented together with a thin layer of bitumen, but
they they are only lighted internally by small appertures pierced at
irregular distances in the upper part of the walls: the low arched
doorway, closed by a heavy two-leaved door, leads into a blind passage,
which opens as a rule on the courtyard in the centre of the building.

[Illustration: 208a.jpg Chaldean houses at Uru.]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the sketch by Taylor.

[Illustration: 208b plans of houses excavated at Eridu and Ubu.]

These plans were drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from sketches by
Taylor. The houses reproduced to the left of the plan were
those uncovered in the ruins of Uru; those on the right
belong to the ruins of Eridu. On the latter, the niches
mentioned in the text will be found indicated.

In the interior may still be distinguished the small oblong rooms,
sometimes vaulted, sometimes roofed with a flat, ceiling supported by
trunks of palm trees;* the walls are often of a considerable thickness,
in which are found narrow niches here and there. The majority of the
rooms were merely store-chambers, and contained the family provisions
and treasures; others served as living-rooms, and were provided with
furniture. The latter, in the houses of the richer citizens no less
than in those of the people, was of a very simple kind, and was mostly
composed of chairs and stools, similar to those in the royal palaces;
the bedrooms contained the linen chests and the beds with their thin
mattresses, coverings, and cushions, and perhaps wooden head-rests,
resembling those found in Africa,** but the Chaldaeans slept mostly on
mats spread on the ground.

* Taylor, _Notes on the Ruins of Mugeyer_, in the _Journ. of
the Royal As. Soc_, vol. xv. p. 266, found the remains of
the palm-tree beams which formed the terrace still existing.
He thinks (_Not