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Thus distinguished, both as a hunter and as a warrior, Asshur-izir-pal, nevertheless, excelled his predecessors most remarkably in the grandeur of his public buildings and the free use which he made of the mimetic and other arts in their ornamentation.
The drawing is rather freer and more spirited than that of the sculptures of Asshur-izir-pal; animal forms, as camels, oxen, sheep, and goats, are more largely introduced, and there is somewhat less formality in the handling. But the change is in no respect very decided, or such as to indicate an era in the progress of art.
We cannot prove that ornamental bas-reliefs did not exist before the time of Asshur-izir-pal; indeed the rock tablets which earlier monarchs set up were sculptures of this character; but to Asshur-izir-pal seems at any rate to belong the merit of having first adopted bas-reliefs on an extensive scale as an architectural ornament, and of having employed them so as to represent by their means all the public life of the monarch.
Asshur-izir-pal mentions this great work as his in his annals; and he was likewise commemorated as its author in the tablet set up in the tunnel by Sennacherib, when, two centuries later, he repaired it and brought it once more into use.
During the time of the Upper dynasty, cavalry appears to have been but little used. Tiglath-Pileser I. in the whole of his long Inscription has not a single mention of them, though he speaks of his chariots continually. In the sculptures of Asshur-izir-pal, the father of the Black-Obelisk king, while chariots abound, horsemen occur only in rare instances.
Shalmaneser II., the son of Asshur-izir-pal, who may probably have been trained to arms under his father, seems to have inherited to the full his military spirit, and to have warred with at least as much success against his neighbors.
A remarkable work, probably erected by this monarch, and set up as a memorial of his reign at the same city, is an obelisk in white stone, now in the British Museum. On this monument, which was covered on all its four sides with sculptures and inscriptions, now nearly obliterated, Asshur-izir-pal commemorated his wars and hunting exploits in various countries.
Asshur-izir-pal uses expressions as if he were Anu's special votary, calling himself "him who honors Anu," or "him who honors Anu and Dugan." His son, the Black-Obelisk king, assigns him the second place in the invocation of thirteen gods with which he begins his record.
The draperies of Asshur-izir-pal in the north-west palace at Nimrud, are at once more minutely labored and more tasteful than those of any later time. Besides elegant but unmeaning patterns, they exhibit human and animal forms, sacred trees, sphinxes, griffins, winged horses, and occasionally bull-hunts and lion-hunts.
In his third expedition, which was in his second year, Asshur-izir-pal turned his arms to the north, and marched towards the Upper Tigris, where he forced the kings of the Nairi, who had, it appears, regained their independence, to give in their submission, and appointed them an annual tribute in gold, silver, horses, cattle, and other commodities.
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