Page 117 - The Art & Architecture of the Ancient Orient_Neat

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PART ONE: MESOPOTAMIA

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Figure 38. Weather-god and dragon, from Nimrud

satisfaction of power, but also the vain attempts to establish justice and peace by means
of a terror planned as retribution of resistance. The larger and more formal designs, of
which plate 89 gives an example, proclaim the sanctity of the king’s priestly person.
They show, for instance, Assurnasirpal beside the sacred tree, often repeated on either
side of it for the sake of symmetry, while winged genii or griffin-demons sprinkle him
with holy water.28 Plate 90 shows such a group without the king. This slab was appro­
priately placed in the niche behind the throne in the north-west palace at Nimrud. Its
design recalled the supernatural protection which the king enjoyed and had the effect of
a splendid wall tapestry. Similar designs were embroidered on the royal garments
(Figure 41).
It is strange that the king is never depicted in a ritual act, if we exclude such details as
!
the libation over the game killed in the hunt, for in Assyrian times the responsibility of
the king for the actions of the people as a whole was stressed to an unusual degree. The
king was manipulated almost like a talisman - or he became the scapegoat, charged be­
fore the gods with all the sins of the community. Hence liis time was largely taken up .
with penitence and prophylactic magic.29 Of these acts nothing is recorded in the
imagery of the Assyrian palaces.
Only one relief with a mythological scene has been preserved. It was found in the
temple of the god Ninurta at Nimrud (Figure 38). A winged god or genius holds a
thunderbolt and seems to pursue a dragon. But the impression of conflict may well be

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