The culture of Assyria, and still more of Babylonia, was essentially literary; we miss in it the artistic spirit of Egypt or Greece. Relief from Assyrian capital of Dur Sharrukin, showing transport of Lebanese cedar (8th c. ... , Babylon is the Greek variant of Akkadian Babilu (bāb-ilû, meaning Gateway of ...

In Babylonia the abundance of clay and lack of stone led to the use of brick; Babylonian temples are massive but shapeless structures of crude brick, supported by buttresses, the rain being carried off by drains, one of which at Ur was of lead. The use of brick led to the early development of the pilaster and column, and of frescoes and enamelled tiles. The walls were brilliantly coloured, and sometimes plated with bronze or gold, as well as with tiles. Painted terra-cotta cones were also embedded in the plaster. , For other uses, see UR. Ur seen across the Royal tombs, with the Great Ziggurat in the background, January 17, 2004 Ur was an ancient city in southern Mesopotamia, located near the original mouth of the Euphrates and Tigris rivers on the Persian Gulf and close to Eridu. ...

Assyria, copying Babylonian architecture, also built its palaces and temples of brick, even when stone was the natural building material of the country, and faithfully preserving the brick platform, necessary in the marshy soil of Babylonia, but little needed in the north.

An Assyrian winged bull, Bas-relief c. 713–716 BC.

As time went on, however, later Assyrian architects began to shake themselves free of Babylonian influences, and to use stone as well as brick. The walls of the Assyrian palace were lined with sculptured and coloured slabs of stone, instead of being painted as in Chaldea. We can trace three periods in the art of these bas-reliefs: it is vigorous but simple under Ashurnasirpal II, careful and realistic under Sargon II, and refined but wanting in boldness under Ashurbanipal. ImageMetadata File history File links Download high resolution version (1400x1394, 258 KB) Description: Human-headed winged bull facing. ... ImageMetadata File history File links Download high resolution version (1400x1394, 258 KB) Description: Human-headed winged bull facing. ... Bas relief is a method of sculpting which entails carving or etching away the surface of a flat piece of stone or metal. ... Chaldea, the Chaldees of the KJV Old Testament, was a Hellenistic designation for a part of Babylonia. ... Ashurnasirpal II, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, California Ashurnasirpal II was king of Assyria from 884 BC-859 BC. Ashurnasirpal succeeded his father, Tukulti-Ninurta II, in 884 BC. He conquered Mesopotamia and the territory of what is now the Lebanon, adding them to the growing Assyrian empire. ... Sargon II, captor of Samaria, with a dignitary Sargon II (r. ... Ashurbanipal, Assurbanipal or Sardanapal, (reigned 669 - 627 BCE), the son of Esarhaddon and Naqia-Zakutu, was the last great king of ancient Assyria. ...

In Babylonia, in place of the bas relief, we have the figure in the round, the earliest examples being the statues from Telloh that are realistic but somewhat clumsy. The lack of stone in Babylonia made every pebble precious, and led to a high perfection in the art of gem-cutting.

Nothing can be better than two seal-cylinders that have come down to us from the age of Sargon of Akkad. No remarkable specimens of metallurgy of an early period have been found, apart perhaps from the silver vase of Entemena; but at a later epoch, great excellence was attained in the manufacture of such jewellery as ear-rings and bracelets of gold. Copper, too, was worked with skill; indeed, it is possible that Babylonia was the original home of copper-working. Sargon of Akkad, or Sargon the Great (Akkadian Sharru-kin ܫܪܘܟܢ, the true king, reigned 2334 BC - 2279 BC, short chronology), founder of the Dynasty of Akkad. ... Metallurgy is a domain of materials science and of materials engineering that studies the physical and chemical behavior of metallic elements, their intermetallic compounds, and their mixtures, which are called alloys. ...

At any rate, the people were famous at an early date for their embroideries and rugs. The ceramic history of Babylonia and Assyria has unfortunately not yet (as of 1911) been traced. We do not even know the date of the spirited terracotta reliefs discovered by Loftus and Rawlinson. See Henry Rawlinson, 1st Baron Rawlinson for the British World War I general (the son of Henry Creswicke Rawlinson). ...

The forms of Assyrian pottery are graceful; the porcelain, like the glass discovered in the palaces of Nineveh, was derived from Egyptian originals. Transparent glass seems to have been first introduced in the reign of Sargon. Stone, clay and glass were used to make vases, and vases of hard stone have been dug up at Telloh similar to those of the early dynastic period of Egypt. , For other uses, see Nineveh (disambiguation). ...

See also

• Babylonia and Assyria
• Sumerian architecture

This article was originally based on content from the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica. Update as needed. See also Category:Babylonia and Category:Assyria. ... The Sumerians generally built structures using mud brick. ... 1911 (MCMXI) was a common year starting on Sunday (click on link for calendar). ... 1913 advertisement for the 11th edition, with the slogan When in doubt — look it up in the Encyclopædia Britannica The Encyclopædia Britannica (properly spelled with æ, the ae-ligature) was first published in 1768–1771 as The Britannica was an important early English-language general encyclopedia and is still...