volume 2 - Robert Bedrosian's Armenian History Workshop

258 The Turkish Authorities Exploit Dir.
exception of many thousands of broken pots, nothing
had been found. There were no Mushm graves on or
near the mounds, and no mosque, and as no one hved
there, no objection could possibly be raised by anyone
if the British were permitted to make excavations in
them. The Wall stated that the excavations carried
out by him had been very expensive, for Der was a
long way from Baghdad, and food for the men had to
be sent there, and water had to be carried there from
a considerable distance. But the Wall's report did
not state the true facts of the case. The men he sent
to dig through the mounds at Der found a great many
things in them, Babylonian cylinder seals, several small
hoards of coins in pots, and three chambers containing
many thousands of Babylonian " case-tablets." The
diggers and their overseers decided not to report their
"find" to the Wall, but to keep the matter a secret
among themselves, and to sell what they had found to
the dealers in Baghdad. They then came to an arrangement
with the dealers, who little by little had all the
Babylonian tablets and other antiquities carried into
Baghdad. This work occupied some months, and when
everything had been safely deposited in BaghdM, the
overseers reported to the Wali that they had dug through
the mounds, and that there was nothing in them but
broken pots. The Wali transmitted their report to
Stambul, and in due course the Porte informed the
British Ambassador that the permit would be granted.
The recital of the above facts gave Hasan much
pleasure, and he laughed again and again as he gave
me details of the trickery which his acquaintances had
practised on the Wali. For myself, I was filled with
disappointment and disgust, for it seemed as if, though
through no fault of my own, my mission had failed in
its chief object. Hasan must have divined my thsughts,
for he at once began to point out to me the good side of
the situation as it concerned myself, and said, " Be not
sad of heart, for such a thing has never happened to any
seeker for ' antikat ' before. We have all the tablets
in Baghdad, we are all your friends, and we have kept