Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-2plfb Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T04:20:26.286Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

MORE THOUGHTS ON THE BALAWAT GATES OF SHALMANESER III: THE ARRANGEMENT OF THE BANDS*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 January 2016

John Curtis  and
Nigel Tallis
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article seeks to demonstrate that the correct arrangement of the bronze bands on the Shalmaneser III gates from Balawat can be established by comparing the position of the nail holes on the ends of the bands with those on the edging strips that were fixed to the edges of the doors and partly overlap the ends of the bands. This new approach confirms the order previously proposed by Curtis and Tallis for the bands on the left-hand gate, but a new arrangement is suggested for the four lower bands on the right-hand gate.

Type
Research Article
Information
IRAQ , Volume 77 , December 2015 , pp. 59 - 74
Copyright
© The British Institute for the Study of Iraq 2015 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

**

JEC wishes to record his deep gratitude to Dominique for the constant help and support that she gave him from 1989 when he was appointed Keeper of the Department of Western Asiatic Antiquities in the British Museum until her retirement in 2005. During this time, apart from joining the British Museum excavations in the Eski Mosul Dam Salvage Project in 1983 (Curtis and Collon 1989) and participating in the British Museum mission to Iraq in 2003, she wrote on request a British Museum handbook on Ancient Near Eastern art (Collon 1995) and selflessly edited a major catalogue of the sculptures of Sennacherib (Barnett et al. 1998).

*

This study is dedicated to Dominique Collon who is well known as the doyenne of Mesopotamian seal studies, in which field she has published widely and made contributions of unparalleled significance. Less well known, perhaps, are her interests in Mesopotamian art history and her forays into archaeology. Amongst the latter, in 1989 she was Deputy Director of a British Museum expedition that excavated at Nimrud and Balawat (Curtis et al. 1993), so it is hoped that this short article on Balawat will be of interest to her.

References

Barnett, R.D., Bleibtreu, E., and Turner, G. 1998. Sculptures from the Southwest Palace of Sennacherib at Nineveh, British Museum Press.Google Scholar
Billerbeck, A., and Delitzsch, F. 1908. Die Palasttore Salmanassars II von Balawat: Erklärung ihrer Bilde und Inschriften, Beiträge zur Assyriologie VI/I, Leipzig.Google Scholar
Birch, W. de G., and Pinches, T.G. 1902. The Bronze Ornaments of the Palace Gates of Balawat (Shalmaneser II B.C. 859–825), London.Google Scholar
Collon, D. 1995. Ancient Near Eastern Art, British Museum Press.Google Scholar
Curtis, J.E. 2002. Reflections on Balawat. In Werr, L. al-Gailani, Curtis, J., Martin, H., McMahon, A., Oates, J., & Reade, J. (eds), Of Pots and Plans: Papers on the Archaeology and History of Mesopotamia and Syria presented to David Oates in Honour of his 75th Birthday, London: 54–66.Google Scholar
Curtis, J.K., and Collon, D. 1989. Excavations at Qasrij Cliff and Khirbet Qasrij, British Museum Publications.Google Scholar
Curtis, J.E., Collon, D., Green, A. R., and Searight, A. 1993. British Museum excavations at Nimrud and Balawat in 1989. Iraq 55: 1–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Curtis, J.E., and Tallis, N. (eds.) 2008. The Balawat Gates of Ashurnasirpal II, British Museum Press (with Barnett, R.D., Davies, L.G. , Howard, M.M., and Walker, C.B.F.).Google Scholar
Grayson, A.K. 1996. Assyrian Rulers of the First Millennium BC, II (858–745 BC), The Royal Inscriptions of Mesopotamia, Assyrian Periods vol. 3, Toronto.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Güterbock, H.G. 1957. Narration in Anatolian, Syrian and Assyrian art. American Journal of Archaeology 61: 62–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Harmanşah, O. 2013. Review of Curtis and Tallis 2008. Ancient East and West 12: 362–66.Google Scholar
Hertel, T. 2004. The Balawat Gate narratives of Shalmaneser III. In Dercksen, J.G. (ed.), Assyria and Beyond: Studies presented to Morgens Trolle Larsen, Leiden: 299–315.Google Scholar
Hertel, T. 2012. Review of Curtis and Tallis 2008. Journal of Near Eastern Studies 71/1: 118–20.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
King, L.W. 1915. Bronze Reliefs from the Gates of Shalmaneser, King of Assyria B.C. 860–825, London.Google Scholar
MacGinnis, J. 2009. Review of Curtis and Tallis 2008. Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 3 rd series 19: 392–93.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marcus, M.I. 1987. Geography as an organizing principle in the imperial art of Shalmaneser III. Iraq 49: 77–90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Melville, S.C. 2009. Review of Curtis and Tallis 2008. Journal of the American Oriental Society 129: 552–54.Google Scholar
Parpola, S. and Porter, M. 2001. The Helsinki Atlas of the Near East in the Neo-Assyrian Period. Helsinki. Google Scholar
Rassam, H. 1881. Recent Assyrian and Babylonian research. Journal of the Transactions of the Victoria Institute 14: 182–225.Google Scholar
Rassam, H. 1882. Excavations and discoveries in Assyria. Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archaeology 7: 37–58.Google Scholar
Rassam, H. 1897. Asshur and the Land of Nimrod, New York.Google Scholar
Reade, J.E. 1979. Narrative composition in Assyrian sculpture. Baghdader Mitteilungen 10: 52–110.Google Scholar
Reynolds, F. 2009. Review of Curtis and Tallis 2008. Antiquity 83: 1198–99.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schachner, A. 2007. Bilder eines Weltreichs: Kunst- and kulturgeschichtliche Untersuchungen zu den Verzierungen eines Tores aus Balawat (Imgur-Enlil) aus der Zeit von Salmanassar III, König von Assyrien, Subartu XX, Turnhout.Google Scholar
Unger, E. 1913. Zum Bronzetor von Balawat: Beiträge zur Erklärung und Deutung des assyrischen Inschriften und Reliefs Salmanassars III, Leipzig.Google Scholar
Unger, E. 1920. Die Wiederherstellung des Bronzetores von Balawat. Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts: Athenische Abteilung XLV: 1–105.Google Scholar
Wicke, D. 2012. Review of Curtis and Tallis 2008. Zeitschrift für Assyriologie und vorderasiatische Archäologie 102: 155–64.Google Scholar
Yamada, S. 2000. The Construction of the Assyrian Empire. A Historical Study of the Inscriptions of Shalmaneser III (859–824 BC) relating to his Campaigns to the West, Leiden.Google Scholar