volume 2 - Robert Bedrosian's Armenian History Workshop

96 Stratford Canning and NimrM.
from Malta the report on Nimrud of which he printed
a copy in his " Nestorians and their Rituals " (vol. i.
p. 87 ff) . This report was the clearest and fullest account
of Nimrud possible at that time, and there can be little
doubt that it induced Stratford Canning to start the
excavations at Nimrud.
When Layard was in Constantinople in 1845, Stratford
Canning proposed to him that he should excavate
Nimrud, and offered to defray most of the expenses of
the undertaking. Layard accepted his offer with alacrity
and set out for Nimrud in October. In a few months he
cleared out the four great buildings on the platform at
Nimrud, and obtained a briUiant success. When the
extent of the excavations increased the Trustees of the
British Museum took over the work and carried it to a
triumphant conclusion. But had it not been for the
liberality and public spirit of Stratford Canning in the
first instance it is probable, as Layard suggests, that
the " treasures of Nimroud would have been reserved
for the enterprise of those who have appreciated the
value and importance of the discoveries at Khorsabad."^
In 1854 H. Rassam reopened the excavations at Nimrud
and discovered the ruins of the temple of Adar, among
which were six statues of the god Nebo.* These were
made by Bel-tarsi-iluma, the Governor of Kalkhu
(Nimrud), and dedicated by him to the god so that he
might grant a long life to Rammannirari III (812-783 B.C.),
and to the Queen Sa-am-mu-ra-mat,* and to himself.
In April, 1873, George Smith made excavations at
Nimrud with the object of finding the foundationcylinders
which both he and Rassam expected to discover
^ Nineveh and its Remains, p. ii. This work contains a full description
of Layard's excavations at Nimrud from 1845 to 1847 ; the
account of his labours there in 1849-51 will be found in his Nineveh
and Babylon, London, 1853.
^ Two of these are in the British Museum (Nimrud, Central Saloon,
Nos. 69 and 70). See Trans. Soc. Bihl. Arch-, vol. viii, p. 365.
' In cuneiform -jj^ ^ ^:^ »^ ^jf V- The first sign -^
means " woman." See Rawlinson, Cun. Inscr., vol. i, pi. 35, No. 2,
1. 9. This name may be the original of the Greek " Semiramis."