volume 2 - Robert Bedrosian's Armenian History Workshop

204 Shaddddtyah and 'Ardhdn.
thicket." Layard camped here in 1850.^ Soon after
we started in the morning it began to rain, and later
in the day the rain was driven in our faces by a strong
wind, and our progress was slow. We pressed onwards
and arrived at Shaddadi, or Shaddadiyah, at 3.15, where
there is a ford over the Khabur. The people received
us very kindly, and as Muhammad and our two soldiers
had friends among them we were well treated. The
Ka'im Makam and the quarantine officer gave us no
trouble. The ruins near the modern town were not
very interesting, and curiously enough most of the
stones which formed the old fortress had disappeared.
As in Tayard's time fragments of bricks and pottery
strewed the ground.
As we had been obliged to follow the Kh§.bur instead
of crossing the desert direct to Mosul, I determined to
take the opportunity of visiting the ruins of 'Araban,
where Layard carried on excavations in 1850. When I
made enquiries with this object in view I found that I
could not carry out my intention unless I made a journey
there specially from Shaddadiyah, and it would delay me
a whole day. But I felt that I might never be in that
region again and I therefore set about hiring camels
for the journey. The Ka'im Makam gave me every
assistance, and lent me a couple of soldiers, and we set
out in heavy rain at 6 a.m., November 17th. Our
camels were good and strong, and we reached 'Araban,
or Tall 'Ajabah, as the natives call it, in about four
hours and a half. I found the places where Layard had
dug, and also one of the two winged man-headed bulls
which the Arabs had told him about, and which he
uncovered completely. It seemed to me to be a prototype
of the bulls of Khorsabad and Kuyunjik, but the
details of the sculpture were quite different, and it was
much smaller, being only about 5 feet long and nearly
4 feet high. The bulls of Sargon II at Khorsabad are
much larger and are majestic and imposing figures, but
they lack the characteristic decoration of the bull of
' Op. cit., p. 298.