The Dallas daily herald. [volume] (Dallas, Tex.) 1873-1887, 1882-02-11
LANDS NEAR BAGDAp.
Ten Thousand Tablets In an Enormous
Bsilding--Po Possibly Antsdilsvian Records.

Ten Thousand Tablets In an Enormous
Possibly nssdiisvian Records.
On Monday evening, during discussion
which took place on paper read at the
Victoria Institute, Mr.. Rassam, the we'll
known discoverer of Assyrian relics, said;
ain March last | went out again to the
East, as you know | am always doing, for
the purpose of finding out the old cities
which lie buried there. AS | was journey
ing on one occasion, in pursuit OF this OBJ
jcct, | met with an Arab, who told me that
he knew of an old ruined city, the remains
of which were to be found within
five hours of Bagdad-that is to say, taking
the computation of three miles an hour, the
place he knew OF was fifteen miles from
Bagdad. As we were travelling along the
route pointed out by the Arab we came, at
distance of four hours journeying, upon
an old ruin that | had never seen before--a
ruin Of great magnitude-so large, indeed,
that il must be about three miles in circum-
ference. | at first thought that this was the
place Of which my guide had spoken. We
went on ward and at last the Arab showed
me most wonderful ruin. | set TO work
and excavated there, but | found nothing
OF any antiquarian value.
II aiterward went back to the place had
first seen, and commenced thorough
search. The result was that after digging
Tor four days we came upon the top of some
walls. This induced us to persevere with
increased ardor, and we soon found that we
had come upon an enormous building, in
which we began to find inscriptions may
here say that am not an Assyran reader.
am only discoveref of As.yrian relics,
which send to the British museum, where
those who have made Assyriology u study
lntprnrlf a. N |
of all discovered four rooms, and then
came upon fifth. They were what
| should call generally of the As.
syrian or Babylonian order, and paved
with bricks or stones but the fifth room
was paved with asphalt, the discovery of
which brought to my mind Soomon's saw
ing There is nothing new under the SUM-.
Previous to this had always thought that
asphalt was a modern invention. Singular
as this discovery was we dug through the
asphalt, and in short time we We're re-
warded by coming upon a Golfer on which
we found Inscriptions. From this Golfer we
took two cylinders, These were covered
with inscriptions which are supposed to be
the most important records of the oldest
city in the world, founded, as his
torans tell US, by Noah after the
deluge, and where, according to tra-
dition, Noah buried the antediu-
Wan records. Well, | had to como
home, but | left some workmen con.
tinuing the operation at the spot and |
have ascertaned that they have found,
after few days more digging, that in one
ofthe rooms there was a channel, and inside
that channel there were records inscribed
on nearly 10000 tablets. These tablets are
all coming to England, but we can not, OF
course, as yet say what they contain. They
may contain something of even greater /
value than anything that has hitherto been
discovered IN the course Of our eastern |
researches. 1t may be- indeed, that we
shall really find on them the antediuviau |
records of which have spoken. After |
have been out there again | shall he happy |
to give you further information as to this |
interesting discovery on my return. Ihope
to be eoing out in another month, and |
then, trust, shall be able to make still !
further advances on what we have already !
discovered. "-[London Times.