occupation. Remains are perhaps more frequent on the opposite side of
the Tigris; at any rate they are more striking and more important.
Bavian, Khorsabad, Shereef-Khan, Neb-bi-Yunus, Koyunjik, and Nimrud,
which have furnished by far the most valuable and interesting of the
Assyrian monuments, all lie east of the Tigris; while on the west two
places only have yielded relics worthy to be compared with these, Arban
and Kileh-Sherghat.

It is curious that in Assyria, as in early Chaldaea, there is a special
pre-eminence of four cities. An indication of this might seem to be
contained in Genesis, where Asshur is said to have "builded Nineveh," and
the city Rehoboth, and Calah, and Resen; but on the whole it is more
probable that we have here a mistranslation (which is corrected for us
in the margin), and that three cities only are ascribed by Moses to the
great patriarch. In the flourishing period of the empire, however, we
actually find four capitals, of which the native names seem to have been
Ninua, Calah, Asshur, and Bit-Sargina, or Dur-Sargina (the city of
Sargon)--all places of first-rate consequence. Besides these principal
cities, which were the sole seats of government, Assyria contained a
vast number of large towns, few of which it is possible to name, but so
numerous that they cover the whole face of the country with their ruins.
Amomig; them were Tarbisa, Arbil, Arapkha, and Khazeh, in the tract
between the Tigris and Mount Zagros; Haran, Tel-Apni, Razappa (Rezeph),
and Amida, towards the north-west frontier; Nazibina (Nisibis), on the
eastern branch of the Khabour; Sirki (Circesium), at the confluence of
the Khabour with the Euphrates; Anat, on the Euphrates, some way below
this junction; Tabiti, Magarisi, Sidikan, Katni, Beth-Khalupi,etc., in
the district south of the Sinjar, between the lower course of the
Khabour and the Tigris. Here, again, as in the case of Chaldaea, it is
impossible at present to locate with accuracy all the cities. We must