Bolus two objections only can be argued: these are the absence of any
appearance of stages, or even of a pyramidical shape, from the present
ruin, and its position on the same side of the Euphrates with the
palace. Herodotus expressly declares that the temple of Belus and
the royal palace were upon opposite sides of the river, and states,
moreover, that the temple was built in stages, which rose one above the
other to the number of eight. Now these two circumstances, which do not
belong at present to the Babil mound, attach to a ruin distant from it
about eleven or twelve miles--a ruin which is certainly one of the most
remarkable in the whole country, and which, if Babylon had really been
of the size asserted by Herodotus, might possibly have been included
within the walls. The Birs-i-Nimrud had certainly seven, probably eight
stages, and it is the only ruin on the present western bank of
the Euphrates which is at once sufficiently grand to answer to the
descriptions of the Belus temple, and sufficiently near to the other
ruin to make its original inclusion within the walls not absolutely
impossible. Hence, ever since the attention of scholars was first
directed to the subject of Babylonian topography, opinion has been
divided on the question before us, and there have not been wanting
persons to maintain that the Birs-i-Nimrud is the true temple of
Belus, if not also the actual tower of Babel, whose erection led to the
confusion of tongues and general dispersion of the sons of Adam.

With this latter identification we are not in the present place
concerned. With respect to the view that the Birs is the sanctury
of Belus, it may be observed in the first place that the size of the
building is very much smaller than that ascribed to the Belus temple;
secondly, that it was dedicated to Kebo, who cannot be identified with
Bel; and thirdly, that it is not really any part of the remains of the
ancient capital, but belongs to an entirely distinct town. The cylinders