place its antiquity at a point fifteen centuries prior to the time of
Christ.
Mr. Kennet Loftus,
the first European who has visited the ancient ruins of
Warka, in Mesopotamia,
writes thus: "Warka is no doubt the Erech of Scripture, the
second city of Nimrod, and it is the
Orchoe of the
Chaldees. The mounds within the walls
afford subjects of high interest to the historian; they are filled, or I may
say composed, of coffins piled upon each other to the height of forty-five
feet."
"The coffins are of baked clay, covered with green
glaze, and embossed with the figures of warriors, &c., and within are
ornaments of gold, silver, iron, copper, and glass."
Layard, in his discoveries among
the ruins of Nineveh and Babylon, in
chapter 8th, says: "In this chamber were found two entire glass bowls,
with fragments of others. The glass, like all others that come from
the ruins, is covered with pearly scales, which, on being removed, leave
prismatic, opal-like colors of the greatest brilliancy, showing, under
different lights, the most varied tints. This is a well-known effect
of age, arising from the decomposition of certain component parts of the
glass. These bowls are probably of the same period as the small bottle
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