en amandes, le regard humide et singulierement doux_" would serve in
many respects equally well for a description of the physiognomy of the
Assyrians, as they appear upon the monuments. The traits, in fact, are
for the most part common to the Semitic race generally, and not
distinctive of any particular subdivision of it. They are seen now alike
in the Arab, the Jew, and the Chalaedeans of Kurdistan, while anciently
they not only characterized the Assyrians, but probably belonged also to
the Phoenicians, the Syrians, and other minor Semetic races. It is
evident, even from the mannered and conventional sculptures of Egypt,
that the physiognomy was regarded as characteristic of the western
Asiatic races. Three captives on the monuments of Amenophis III.,
represented as belonging to the Patana (people of Bashan?), the Asuru
(Assyrians), and the Karukamishi (people of Carchemish), present to us
the sane style of face, only slightly modified by Egyptian ideas.
[PLATE. XXXIV., Fig. 1.]

[Illustration: PLATE 34]

White in face the Assyrians appear thus to have borne a most close
resemblance to the Jews, in shape and make they are perhaps more nearly
represented by their descendants, the Chaldaeans of Kurdistan. While the
Oriental Jew has a spare form and a weak muscular development, the
Assyrian, like the modern Chaldaean, is robust, broad-shouldered, and
large-limbed. Nowhere have we a race represented to us monumentally of a
stronger or more muscular type than the ancient Assyrian. The great
brawny limbs are too large for beauty; but they indicate a physical
power which we may well believe to have belonged to this nation--the
Romans of Asia--the resolute and sturdy people which succeeded in
imposing its yoke upon all its neighbors. [PLATE XXXIV., Fig, 2.]