he gods, and
the transmission to posterity of his own image and the memory of his reign.
To these ends the architect called in the sculptor, under whose hands the
rudely dressed slabs took the historic forms with which we are familiar.

Of all parts of the palace the doorways were most exposed to injury from
the shocks of traffic, and we find their more solid plinths surmounted by
higher and thicker slabs than are to be found elsewhere. These slabs are
carved with the images of protecting divinities. Huge winged and man-headed
bulls (Plate X)[333] or lions (Fig. 114), the speaking symbols of force and
thought, met the approaching visitor. Sometimes a lion, reproducing with
singular energy the features of the real beast, was substituted for the
human-headed variety (Plate VIII).[334]

These guardians of the gate always had the front part of their bodies
salient in some degree from the general line of the wall. The head and
breast, at least, were outside the arch. Right and left of the passage
were very thick slabs, also carved into the form of winged bulls in
profile, and accompanied by protecting genii. These latter divinities are
sometimes grave and noble in mien, obviously benevolent (Figs. 8 and 29),
sometimes hideous in face, and violent in gesture. In the latter case they
are meant to frighten the profane or the hostile away from the dwelling
they guard (Figs. 6 and 7). All these figures are in much higher relief
than the sculptures in the inner chambers.

[Illustration: FIG. 114.--Human-headed lion. Nimroud; from Layard.]

All this shows that the sculptor thoroughly understood how to make the best
of his opportunities when he was once called in to ornament those massive
door-frames and slabs which at first were no more than additional supports
for the building to which they were applied. He varied the shapes of these
blocks according to their destined sites, and increased their size so as
to give gigantic proportions to his man-headed bulls and lions. Some of the
winged bulls are from sixteen to seventeen feet high.[335] In spite of the
labour expended upon the carving and putting in place of these huge
figures, they are extremely numerous, hardly less so, indeed, than the
Osiride piers of Egypt.[336] In the palace of Sargon at Khorsabad,
twenty-six pairs have been counted; in that of Sennacherib at Kouyundjik,
there were ten upon a single facade.[337]

In those passages, halls, and courtyards, whose destinatio