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Eze_23:12-15
Its distinctly represented that the Jews were much struck by the fine persons of the Assyrian warriors, who are described as “all of them desirable (or handsome) young men;” and scarcely less by their splendid and becoming raiment, and their general appearance, especially their cavalry; “captains and rulers clothed most gorgeously, horsemen riding; upon horses.” The impressions we derive from the sculptures of Nineveh fully correspond with these intimations; and in describing the Assyrians as there represented, the same terms might be employed. As here seen they were clearly a fine race of men, with strongly-marked and noble features, and with robust frames, full of animal life and vigor. They are visibly men of action rather than of thought. We see little that is intellectual, or only of such intellect as is found to accompany and suffices to direct physical power. They seem, in fact, the model of a military people, born to fight and used to conquer.
Among people of this order, we always find a great love of richness and splendor in dress and ornament, and, accordingly, there is no nation represented in ancient sculptures which exhibits so much gorgeousness of dress, and variety and splendor of ornament. As Layard remarks, “The Assyrians were celebrated at a very early period for the magnificence and luxury of their apparel: ‘The Assyrian garments’ became almost a proverb; and having first been borrowed by the Persians, descended at a later time even to the Romans.” These robes, as portrayed in the sculptures, confirm the traditions of their beauty and costliness, The dress of the higher classes is richly adorned with tasteful embroidery; and in its form, in all classes, realizes the difficult idea of a dress graceful yet suited for action—an idea in which the nations of modern Europe, with all their pretensions to superior taste, have in nearly all ages so signally and egregiously failed. Whatever admits of ornament in the dress, the weapons, the trappings of horses, is ornamented; and although the effect is “gorgeous,” it does not make the same adverse impression as the tawdry and unmeaning magnificence of modern eastern princes, because every ornament is not only tasteful in itself but appropriate in its application. It is not an unmeaning adjunct, like a jewel in a swine’s snout or in a Hindu rajah’s turban, but is made a part of, and a finish to, that to which it is applied. We hear much now about “art-manufacture” in the application of art to the ornamentation of dress, weapons, and utensils. The ancient Assyrians understood the principles of this art very well, or rather their correct taste guided them right where most other ancient nations failed.
Further, we are told that the Jews personated in Aholibah, “saw portrayed upon the walls the images of the Chaldeans portrayed with vermilion, girded with girdles upon their loins, exceeding in dyed attire upon their heads, all of them princes to look at, after the manner of the Babylonians of Chaldea, the land of their nativity.”
The Babylonian remains which exist, show that there was a close analogy between the Assyrians and Babylonians in appearance, dress, and customs; we may, therefore, safely borrow from the former illustrations of what belonged to the latter.
From the last clause of the quotation Mr. Layard is led to think, indeed, that the prophet, who must have seen the sculptures of Nineveh, had in view the figures of the Chaldeans as represented in them among the other subjects of the Assyrian empire. There is reason in this; for the intimation seems to declare, that the images portrayed were not in Chaldea, but were “after the manner of the Babylonians of Chaldea, the land of their nativity.” In this case, it is quite possible that the very figures we see in our museums, and represented in books, are some of the very same on which the eyes of the prophet had rested, and to which he here referred. But, it may be said, these are sculptures, and the prophet refers to color—to painting; and the passage suggests rather such painted chambers as we find among the Egyptians, and the like of which have not been found in Assyria. There may have been such, which have not been spared like the sculptures; or there may be such yet discovered. But the intimation of the prophet is sufficiently met by the very remarkable fact—remarkable to us, but not to the ancients, with whom the practice was general—that the Assyrians applied color to heighten the effect of their sculptures, and that the prevalence of a red color is clearly indicated in the Khorsabad remains. The colors now traceable on the sculptures are simply red, blue, and black; and these only on the hair, beard, and a few accessories. Mr. Bonomi (after Botta) raises the question, Whether we are to understand that these were the only colors employed; and that they were only used in those places where we find their traces, while the remaining portions of the figures, and the back-ground of the bas-reliefs, were entirely colorless? To this he answers, that we are still without facts to enable us to give a decided answer. “But it appears probable, that the colors were more varied, and that the whole surface of the bas-reliefs was covered with them. Thus, on the bricks there are other tints than red, blue, and black—we find yellow, white, green, etc.; and there is no reason why the Assyrians should have employed the latter colors in their bricks and not in their sculptures.” The prophet’s intimation certainly best agrees with the supposition, that the figures were colored in the parts in which no color now appears; but that the colors, being less lasting than the others, have been destroyed by the conflagration to which the buildings were subjected at the time of their destruction, or by time, and the earth in which they have so long been buried. Of the Assyrian red, Mr. Layard says that it exceeds in brilliancy that of the Egyptians, which was merely an earthy bole.—It nearly approaches to vermilion in the sculptures of Khorsabad, and has a brilliant crimson or lake tint in those of Nimroud.
The special reference which the prophet makes to the headdress of these figures, receives remarkable illustration from the elaborate and highly ornamented head-dresses of the principal figures in the Nineveh sculptures; specimens of which may be seen in some of the figures given in this volume. This was a part of dress in foreigners which was equally calculated to attract the attention of the Jews, who themselves usually went about with bare heads. There is nothing in Scripture to indicate that any head-covering was worn, except the crowns of the kings, the helmets of warriors, and the “bonnets” of the priests: and that they are sometimes represented as covering their heads with their mantles, would alone seem to indicate that the head had no proper covering of cap or turban. This appears strange to us; and suggests ideas of colds on the one hand, and of headaches and sunstrokes on the other. But it is attested historically, and by existing sculptures, that the people of many other ancient nations went commonly with uncovered heads. The Asiatic foreigners represented in the Egyptian monuments are generally bare-headed when not equipped for war; and this is especially the case with the Syrian peoples so represented. The Egyptians themselves—that is, the great body of the nation—servants, workmen, laborers, and even the priests (when not actually officiating)—went not only without caps, but without hair; and we see men laboring in the brickfields, under an all but tropical sun, with shaven heads. The Greeks and Romans, also, were a bare-headed people generally, though there exist some memorials which would intimate that, among the latter, the peasantry sometimes sheltered their heads from the weather under a kind of hood.
It is all a matter of habit and training; and people who are used to it may, and do, go bare-headed, under any climate, without detriment to their health. It is possible even in this climate; for the numerous boys of Christ’s Hospital, in London and Hertford, who are remarkably healthy, and more than commonly exempt from colds and headaches, go bare-headed in all weathers, though they spend much of their time in the open air all the year round. With them it is an acquired habit, for they do not enter the school till they are eight years old.
In Siam, at the present day, and notwithstanding the tropical heat, the people of all ranks not only go with uncovered, but with shaven heads; and it is stated, that the French (Romish) missionaries in that country follow this custom without detriment to their health. Note:
“The priests adapted themselves in many ways to the usages and customs of the natives themselves; and most strikingly so in one respect—that of never wearing any covering on their head, and never sitting in canoes that were covered over; these are two customs which the Siamese priesthood and the royal family never deviate from; for they deem it sacrilege to suppose anything should intervene between the lofty canopy of heaven and their own bald pates, excepting in their watts and temples, which are presumed to be hallowed, or in the palaces of the royal family, which are also holy, as containing anointed and sacred kings.
“How these French priests, some of whom had almost come direct from their own country to these parts, managed to avoid getting a coup de soleil, while skulking up and down the river with their bare heads exposed to the vertical rays of the sun that parched up the very earth, and quite baked the clay alongside the banks of the river—this has been ever a mystery. The glare alone was sometimes sufficient to give me a headache; and yet these Catholic priests were about the healthiest set of all those residing at Bangkok.”—Neals’s Residence in Siam. London, 1852.
A habit which is practicable in such diverse climates as those of England and Siam, is scarcely to be regarded as strange in any intermediate climates.