s together we find that enough is left to give
the taste and invention of the Assyrian ornamentist a very high place in
our respect. That artist was richly endowed with the power of inventing
happy combinations of lines, and of varying his motives without losing
sight for an instant of his original theme.

We may show this very clearly by a more careful study of two motives
already encountered, the rosette, and the running ornament which is known
in its countless modifications as the "knop and flower pattern." These two
motives are united in those great thresholds which have been found now and
then in such marvellous preservation. They also occur in certain
bas-reliefs representing architectural decorations, so that we are in
possession of all the documents required for the formation of a true idea
of their varied beauties. In the Assyrian Basement Room of the British
Museum there is a fine slab of gypsum of which we reproduce one corner in
our Fig. 131.[392] Besides the daisy shaped rosette which is so
conspicuous, there is one of more elaborate design which we reproduce on a
larger scale and from another example in our Fig. 132. It is inclosed in a
square frame adorned with chevrons. This frame with the rosette it incloses
may be taken as giving some idea of the ceiling panels or coffers.

[Illustration: FIG. 131.--Threshold from Kouyundjik. From Layard.]

In this rosette it should be noticed that beyond the double festoon about
the central star appears the same alternation of bud and flower as in the
straight border. That flower has been recognized as the Egyptian lotus, but
Layard believes its type to have been furnished, perhaps, by a scarlet
tulip which is very common towards the beginning of spring in
Mesopotamia.[393] We ourselves believe rather in the imitation of a motive
from the stuffs, the jewels, the furniture, and the pottery that
Mesopotamia drew from Egypt at a very early date through the intermediary
of the Phoenicians. The Phoenicians themselves appropriated the same motive
and introduced it with their own manufactures not only into Mesopotamia but
into every country washed by the Mediterranean. Our conjecture is to some
extent confirmed by an observation of Sir H. Layard's. This lotus flower is
only to be found, he says, in the most recent of Assyrian monuments, in
those, namely, that date from the eighth and seventh centuries B.C.,
centuries during which the Assyrian kings more than once invaded Pho