CHAPTER XIX - Assyrians.—Babylon

Summary

The name of the Assyrians, who formed one wing of this early system of intercourse and commerce, rests chiefly upon the great cities of Nineveh and Babylon. To the Assyrians of Nineveh (as has been already mentioned) is ascribed in early times a very extensive empire, covering much of Upper Asia, as well as Mesopotamia or the country between the Euphrates and the Tigris. Respecting this empire —its commencement, its extent, or even the mode in which it was put down—nothing certain can be affirmed; but it seems unquestionable that many great and flourishing cities—and a population inferior in enterprise, but not in industry, to the Phenicians—were to be found on the Euphrates and Tigris, in times anterior to the first Olympiad. Of these cities, Nineveh on the Tigris and Babylon on the Euphrates were the chief; the latter being in some sort of dependence, probably, on the sovereigns of Nineveh, yet governed by kings or chiefs of its own, and comprehending an hereditary order of priests named Chaldeeans, masters of all the science and literature as well as of the religious ceremonies current among the people, and devoted from very early times to that habit of astronomical observation which their brilliant sky so much favoured.