[406] Among these we may mention the Philips cylinder, from which, in
speaking of the great works carried out by Nebuchadnezzar, LENORMANT gives
long extracts in his _Manuel d'Histoire ancienne_, vol. ii. pp. 233 and
235.

[407] LAYARD, _Nineveh_, vol. i. p. 115, and vol. ii. p. 91.

[408] OPPERT, _Expedition en Mesopotamie_, vol. ii. pp. 343-351.

[409] PLACE, _Ninive_, vol. i. p. 188.

[410] OPPERT, _Expedition scientifique_, vol. i. pp. 354 _et seq._

Sec. 9.--_Mechanical Resources._

The Chaldaeans and Assyrians were never called upon to transport such
enormous masses as some of the Egyptian monoliths, such as the obelisks and
the two great colossi at Thebes. But the stone bulls that decorated the
palaces of Nineveh were no light weight, and it was not without difficulty
that the modern explorers succeeded in conveying them to the borders of the
Tigris and loading them on the rafts upon which they began their long
journeys to Paris and London. In moving such objects from place to place
the Assyrians, like the Egyptians, had no secret beyond that of patience,
and the unflinching use of human arms and shoulders in unstinted
number.[411] We know this from monuments in which the details of the
operation are figured even more clearly and with more pictorial power than
in the bas-relief at El-Bercheh, which has served to make us acquainted
with the methods employed in taking an Egyptian colossus from the quarry to
its site.

In Mesopotamia, as in Egypt, there were waterways that could be used at any
season for the transport of heavy masses. Quarries were made as near the
banks of the Euphrates and Tigris as possible, and when a stone monster had
to be carried to a town situated at some distance from both those rivers
the canals by which the country was intersected in every direction supplied
their place. Going down stream, and especially in flood time, no means of
propulsion were required; the course of the boats or rafts was directed by
means of heavy oars like those still used by the boatmen who navigate the
Tigris in _keleks_, or rafts, supported on inflated hides; in ascending the
streams towing was called into play, as we know from one of the Kouyundjik
bas-reliefs.[412] In this the stone in course of transport is oblong in
shape and is placed upon a wide flat boat, beyond which it extends both at
the stern and the bows. It is securely fastened with pieces of wood held
together by strong pins. There are th