SPLENDORS OF UR

Evening Star, Issue 19788, 11 February 1928, Page 2

SPLENDORS OF UR

A RICH DISCOVERY PRINCE'S GRAVE UNCOVERED Mr C. Leonard Woolley writes iffl the London ‘ Times ’;— Field archaeology is always a matter of ups and downs, and during the last three weeks the joint expedition of thp British Museum and of the museum of the University of Pennsylvania has had its fill of both. Throughout that time we have been finding graves of the ordinary class which contain , objects in themselves good enough to make the season a success, but two outstanding events have tended to put all others in the shade. At the close of last year I had decided that we were at last on tho track of a Royal grave, and with any luck should find the remains of one of the earliest kings of Ur. By tho time of our return here the weathering of the exposed soil had thrown into relief certain features of stratification which seemed to confirm the theory, and we started digging with high hopes. Nor were wc deceived. At a depth of nearly 25ft we found, not the usual body wrapped in matting at the bottom of an earth shaft, nor a. coffin of wicker-work, but a great tomb massively constructed in unhewn limestone, tho walls more than dft thick, the roof a corbelled vault of stone resting on wooden beams—and when one remembers from how far stone had to he imported into this alluvial nlain, and how costly a. material it has always been, one must admit that only a. king could afford such a restingplace. A DISA.PRO INTMENT. The tomb consisted of .two chambers —a. large outer room for tho attendants, who, it would seem, wore buried with their master, and a. smaller inner room for tho king himself. Great was our disappointment to find, on pulling away the stone of the fallen roof, that both had been rifled; before the timbers in the roof had had time to rot men had broken into tho chambers and carried off all the treasures which they had contained. In the inner chamber only a few scattered beads and copper implements were left for our gleaning; in the outer one bodv was virtually undisturbed, and still preserved its head-ornaments of gold and silver and strings of beads, while by another was a heap of copper vessels—mostly crushed by the fall of tho roof—and among these a fine silver howl with fluted sides. We had found that of which wo were in search, and had learnt from it much about the burial customs of tho earliest kings, but the crowning reward of Royal treasure had been snatched from ns.

While disgust yet rankled luck turned. A slender copper rod stuck upright in the soil led us down to a tomb shaft, at the bottom of which numerous vessels in copper and stone began to show up. Along one side of our cutting the imprint of the wooden side of a coffin could be distinguished —the wood itself perished long since —and wc were wondering whether we were working in the grave proper or outside it when a startling discovery solved (ho question for us. THE FIND. The gang working next door at a higher level came on a copper spearhead upright in the earth; following this down we laid bare a, gold-mountrl shaft, and found that the spear had been set at the farther corner of the coffin, which had still to bo dug out. In lact, the pit for the grave was about 7ft square, and the coffin, which measured some 6ft din by 2ft, was piaccd against one side, the free space along three sides of it being used for offerings to the dead. Against each end spears were planted upright in the ground; ranged along the side away from the coffin were vases of alabaster, steatite, and day; at the foot end were forty or fifty metal vessels piled together, many of them now so corroded info each other that we could not separate thorn, but from (ho mass we have recovered throe silver howls, fluted copper bowls, pots, and cauldrons. Nearer to the coffin wore tools and weapons of copper—chisels and saws, lance-points, axeheads, a mass of studded copper which may have been a shield, and daggers. One dagger had a silver hilt now ruined by corrosion, one a gold handle with a broad lunate top, one a handle of gold and silver with its guard and pommel enriched with gold studs. _ln strange contrast to these was a little group of flint arrow-heads. At the head of flic coffin was a. collection of more precious vessels. Resting on a big copper platter was a tall libation-vase of silver, exactly the vase that we see represented on Very early relicts; by this was a large bowl of pale gold or olcctrum, and inside that we found a small clectrum drinkingcup and an oval bowl of bright gold, beautifully fluted and engraved.

TREASURES OF THE COFFIN. All these things were in tiie nature of offerings made to or for the dead, and were not necessarily his personal property; the mere ultimate belongings lay inside the coffin. At the feet lay a silver lamp. Behind the hip—the hotly, terribly decayed, lay half on its back, half on its left side, with the legs bent up as usual—was a, mass of beads in gold and lapis lazuli, many of them very large and the stones selected for their line color: among them were lapis amulets in tne forms of a ram and a frog, and a copper pin with a head in the shape of a monkey, exquisitely modelled in gold. On the other side was a mass of earrings in gold and silver, finger-rings, a gold pin with lapis head, a wreath of gold mul-berry-leaves strung on rows of lapis and carnelian heads, a gold and lapis bracelet, and, hidden among these, an clectrnm axe-head. Round the waist was a .silver belt from which hung a dagger with a gold blade and a handle of silver and gold, in a silver sheath, and a wdietstone of lapis on a gold ring. By the shoulders were a lamp and two bowls of gold, and on tho right side an electrum double axe. But the most astonishing thing was the headdress, which had fallen from the broken skull, and lay by the shoulder; tin's tvas a peruke in red gold, a complete covering for tho head from the forehead to tho nape of the neck, modelled and engraved to represent the hair. The hair is parted in the middle and brought down in crisp waves over the ears, a long heavy tress is wound round the head above a plain fillet of ribbon, and at the back there is a small chignon; the ears arc modelled and pierced, and below them are cheekpieces, on which are shown the formal curls of the whiskers.

On each of the gold vessels found in the coffin is inscribed the name of the owner, Mes-ka lam-dug. No title is given, and the name does not appear on any list of kings, but the name ‘‘Good Hero of the Land” might well be Royal from its meaning, and in form would accord with known names of early kings. But it would be safest not to assume too much. The wearer of the golden peruke can hardly have been a commoner, but he need not have reigned; the furnishing of this grave sets it far above all others that we have found, but the grave itself is of normal type and contrasts strongly with the stone-built tomb which we found plundered. Mcs-kalam-dug was probably a prince of the Royal blood living some little while before the First Dynasty of Ur, about doOO b.c., and history would have nothing to say about him; but bis tomb has made history for us by 1 browing new light on the splendors of the early days of Hi