A Commentary on the Cuneiform Inscriptions of Babylonia and Assyria
Including Readings of the Inscription on the Nimrud Obelisk, and a Brief Notice of the Ancient Kings of Nineveh and Babylon

This short work of 1850 summarises the progress of Sir Henry Rawlinson in the decipherment of Assyrian cuneiform inscriptions.

Henry Creswicke Rawlinson (Author)

9781108077477, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 25 September 2014

96 pages, 1 b/w illus.
21.6 x 14 x 0.6 cm, 0.13 kg

This publication released to a wider audience the work on Assyrian inscriptions of Sir Henry Rawlinson (1810–95), who had begun his career in the East India Company in Persia and Afghanistan, where his exceptional linguistic skills were recognised. He had been studying the monumental, trilingual (in Old Persian, Elamite and Babylonian) Behistun inscription of Darius the Great since 1836, and, building on the earlier research of Georg Friedrich Grotefend, delivered a summary of his progress in decipherment to the Royal Asiatic Society early in 1850. He intended to follow it up with a longer book, but was anxious to gain credit for primacy (which was questioned at the time and still remains controversial), and so published this short work in March 1850. It states Rawlinson's theories, and offers a linguistic and archaeological background to his work, along with his interpretation of king lists and other inscriptions.

Preliminary notice
Text.

Subject Areas: Archaeology by period / region [HDD]