Page 94 - The Art & Architecture of the Ancient Orient_Neat

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CHAPTER 6

BEGINNINGS OF ASSYRIAN ART
THE
^ CIRCA I35O-IOOO B.C.y

The early history of Assyria is wrapped in obscurity. Early in the eighteenth century
b.c. Shamsi-Adad I had attempted to establish an independent kingdom in the north and
.had succeeded, for a time, in dominating even Mari.1 But Hammurabi of Babylon re­
stored the traditional ascendancy of the south over Assyria. It continued for another 400
years, until, in the turmoil of the Amarna period, Assyria rose above its neighbours and
the Mesopotamian centre of gravity was shifted. The south was weak under the foreign
Kassite Dynasty (see p. 62 above). The Hittites, advancing into Syria, disrupted the king­
dom of Mitamii of which Assyria, at least as far east as Kirkuk, had formed a part (see
p. 68 below). And Egypt, the ally of the Mitannian kings, was absorbed by internal
problems arising out of Akhenaten’s religious revolution. Able rulers succeeding one
another at Assur quietly and gradually established the independence of their homeland
during the second half of the fourteenth century b.c.
Assyrian art was born at this time; the little we know of the earlier (Old Assyrian)
period shows as exclusive a dependence on Babylonia proper as the contemporary works
from Mari. A headless stone statue2 resembles our plate 61A very closely in style; and
the cylinder seals of the period are, for all intents and purposes, part of the glyptic art of
Hammurabi’s Dynasty. But in the fourteenth century an art emerged which, for all its
derivations, possessed an individual character, not only in style but also in subject-
matter. It depicted secular subjects with an interest in actuality for which no incident
seemed too trivial. In religious matters, on the other hand, it displayed a cold formalism,
which did not allow man to meet the gods face to face but only to perform the estab­
lished rites before their statues and emblems. In both respects Assyrian art was to remain
true to its beginnings; they represented, apparently, distinctively Assyrian points of
view, and their prevalence in the art of the fourteenth century b.c. is the more remark­
able because much in it, of a less essential nature, was derivative.
A number of decorative motifs and technical processes are of western origin; they
represent the legacy of Mitannian rule which had united Assyria with Syria. The ties
with the south were stronger and more important; the relation between Assyria and
Babylonia can best be compared with that of the late Roman republic with Greece. In
oth cases cultural dependence was taken for granted, although a difference in outlook
was acknowledged; and force was required to quell the political vagaries of the older
nation.
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