It is now just on forty years since Professor Garstang made his first excavations in the mounds of Sakce Gözü (then known as Sak je Geuzi) accompanied by Mr. (now Canon) Phythian Adams and Mr. Hamilton Beattie. The first indication of the site had been the discovery of sculptured Hittite blocks on the surface in 1907. The excavations were conducted in the autumn of 1908 and 1911, and the weather was hot and sultry. To avoid malaria, the excavators had to pitch their tents high on the slopes of the Kurt Daǧ, and ride several miles each day to the scene of the work. The site, however, amply repaid excavation, for in two seasons a periphery wall was discovered enclosing to the north-east the portico of a palace ornamented with a fine series of late Hittite sculptures. As well, several trenches were excavated outside the wall. These revealed a series of painted pottery levels, and at bed-rock a black incised and burnished ware. The importance of this discovery and the early period represented, were at once recognised by Professor Garstang, although at this point no comparable matetiaJ was available. For although Tall Halaf had been discovered by Baron von Oppenheim in 1899, he was not able to excavate there until 1911, and the prehistoric kilns of Carchemish were not discovered by Woolley until two years later, in 1913. Years afterwards in 1936 when much work had been done on the prehistoric cultures of the Near East, Professor Garstang decided to republish the early wares from this site, making use of the comparative material then available. He was not, however, satisfied that all that could be known about Sakce Gözü had been discovered, and had long planned a furthet season in the field.

During his excavations of the successive cities of Troy, Schliemann uncovered a few clay pots adorned in relief with a crudely moulded human face, presumably female, which might have been thought to be in the tradition of the vase decorated in relief and painting with a female face from Hassuna and the pots with moulded faces from Kish. Professor Frankfort, however, in his most interesting article Ishtar in Troy, proposes quite a different derivation for these pots, termed by him “face-urns”, which implies that they were used for funerary purposes, although they did not contain human remains and were not found in graves, but in dwellings, which suggests that they may have been domestic utensils. A piece bearing rudimentary indications of a human face was also discovered and, although not found in the same level as the pots, has been thought to be the cover which fitted over the mouth and neck of one of the vessels. From this fact Frankfort concludes that the derivation of this type of pot can be traced back to certain objects of stone and clay which consist of a bell-shaped base surmounted by double volutes with perforated centres which were not uncommon at various sites in strata of the Protoliterate d (= Uruk III, Jamdat Naṣr) period.

It was on the 18th March, 1949, that we set to work on the mound of Nimrud, high up on its western flanks. Our party was composed of twenty-two skilled men from Qala'at Sharqat, who later on were joined by one hundred and twenty labourers from the neighbourhood. For many days and nights it had rained heavily, and between us and the river Tigris, a mile to the west, there lay a great sheet of water through which the men had waded from the village of Nimrud, where the shaikh had given them lodging for the night. From where we were working we had a clear view of the green plains of Assyria stretching northwards towards Nineveh and southwards towards Assur: to the east, over more undulating ground, we could see the mountains of Kurdistan and of Persia.

A hundred years had passed since Austen Henry Layard had laboured on this spot: our men were well aware of the prizes he had found and of how much more might still await discovery; for to the trained eye it was clear that, in spite of the vast amount of soil which had been removed from the Assyrian Palaces in the preceding century and subsequently thrown back into them, an immense amount of uncharted ground still awaited exploration. And it was not only the prospect of finding hidden treasure that attracted us. On every aspect of Assyrian life questions had been raised to which Nimrud might supply an answer. The pickmen themselves had about them an air of excitement and expectancy and, as the third generation of trained workers in the field, a sense of their historic mission.

The circumstances in which inscribed tablets were found during the first season's work at Nimrud (Kalḫu) in 1949 have already been described by the Director of the Expedition, Professor M. E. L. Mallowan. While excavating Rooms K and M of a large building located to the north of the “S.E. Palace” on the east side of the tall, seventy-six tablets were found scattered over or between the main floor level (III) formed by re-using the inscribed bricks of Shalmaneser III. Initially called “A palace of Shalmaneser III(?)”, this building is now, on the basis of the epigraphic evidence, referred to as “Governor's Palace”. Although considerable trouble was taken, the manner in which the unbaked tablets had been apparently thrown down, the damp nature of the ground in this area and the effect of exposure to adverse weather conditions in antiquity has resulted in most of the tablets being recovered in a poor condition, only ten of them being complete.

Where possible, each item in the catalogue is arranged as follows: (i) Excavation number of tablet, (ii) Size in cm. (iii) Condition of tablet, (iv) Number of lines, (v) Locus. Usually the Room number is given in brackets, (vi) Description: type of tablet, outline of contents, date.

ND 201. 9·2 × 8·4 × 4·3 (thick) cm. Fragment from the centre left edge of a large, slightly plano-convex, limestone tablet. Parts of 4 + 5 ll. Found in ash rubbish outside S. external wall of bathroom and c. 2 m. above floor level.

Fragment from a Standard Nimrud Wall Inscription of Assur-naṣir-pal II. Duplicate of B.M. 90868, obv. ll. 31–35, rev. ll. 14–18 (published by L. W. King A.K.A., pp. 177–188).