DISCOVERIES AT UR.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20366, 21 September 1929, Page 16 (Supplement)

DISCOVERIES AT UR.

MORE: ANTIQUITIEB.

MR. WOOLLEY'S TREASURES.

RELICS OF "THE FLOOD-" *

ESCAPE OF WALLED CITIES

There recently was on view at tho British Museum tho annual exhibition of antiquities discovered in the past season by Mr. C. L. Woolley at tho Ur of tho Chaldee.s, writes Dr. 11. R. Hall, keeper of Egyptian antiquities in tho British Museum, in the Observer. While not 60 sensational in its measure of works of Sumei'ian art in gold as tho exhibition of last year, it is in every way as interesting, and contains objects of capital importance for the history of art and early civilisation. In tho centre of tho exhibition hall are shown great harps, or rather lyres, of gold, of silver, and' of inlay or wood. One of these with inlaid sounding box has as its chiei ornament a great golden head of a boarded bull, which is in gome ways tho most important work of art yet discovered at Ur, it has stylo as well as energy. Another, of silver, is adorned with a most remarkablo group of deer rising on their hind legs to browse on high water plants. i Another harp, also of silver, is remarkable for tho fact that its tuning tubes aro still in position. Anothor has only its bull head remaining, but its original form is shown in plaster poured into the holo in the earth which contained its wooden framo that now has disappeared. The form of these lyres is confirmed by tho actual representation of one on a remarkable gold cylinder seal exhibited in a side caso.

Two Curious Works of Art.

In another caso are two very curious works of art—two goats rising iu tho samo way to browso on plants. Both were found crushed and deformed by the weight of earth that had lain on them for 5000 years; ono is shown as found, tho other has been restored to its original shapo Tho fleeco of the goats is shown in locks made out of shell and lapis lazuli; tho plants on which they feed are of gold overlaid on wood. Many bodies of women of tho royal harem slain in honour of a dead king wero found, and soveral of their crushed skulls aro shown with their golden headdresses and their bead necklaces of gold, silver, and lapis, as they wero found; a gruesomo but most interesting sight. A great quantity of golden ribands, flower, etc.. belonging to other headdresses of tho same kind is shown, and ono elaborate golden headdress of barbaric splendour has a special caso to itself.

The famous inlaid " standard " of lapis and shell inlay was exhibited again this year, becauso a new fragment of it has since been discovered ami is now incorporated in it. It would bo impossible here to enumerate all the remarkable objects that Mr. Woolley has brought back and has prepared with his usual skill for exhibition. Eventually they will b(> divided, <l3 before, between tho three museums of Bagdad—which takes the lion's share —London, and Philadelphia. The British and tho American museums share the cost of the excavations equally upon an exact " fifty-fifty" basis, and share equally those antiquities that. Bagdad does not require.

Story o! " The Delugo."

A new feature this year was the exhibition of cuneiform 'tablets found, and of the specimens that illustrate Mr. Woolley's discovery of archaeological proof —as ho considers it—of tho reality of a great prehistoric flood in Southern Babylonia, which, in his opinion, is identical with the famous Flood of Babylonian legend, which undoubtedly must have been tho original of tho Biblical account of the Deluge. Cuneiform scholars have, of course, long been familiar with this, and have always considered that tho story, like most traditions, was based upon fact, a real historical " deluge" of very great extent whi"ch remodelled early Babylonian history, bringing tho pro-dynastic period of tho chalcolithic makers of painted pottery to an end and ushering in the historic age.

Now, Mr. Woolley at Ur—and it is understood~»Professor Langdon's expedition also at Kish, have, iu the view of the excavators, discovered archaeological proof of it. Mr. Woolley considers, inter alia, that the flood was not powerful enough to penotrate into the walled cities, but only inundatod tho whole countryside and swept away its population. In tho Nimrod gallery, close by, were exhibited the results of Mr. Guy Brunton's expedition of 1928, carried out under the auspices of the British Museum, including important relics of the earliest pre-dynastic culture of Egypt, tho " Badarian " ' and, oven more ancient, a " Tasian stage now first identified by Mr. Brunton, where people show a skull form quite distinct from that of tho ordinary pre-dynastic folk. This find will open a fruitful course of discussion among archaeologists.