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The Dating of a Chariot Ivory from Nimrud Considered Once Again

Recently David Ussishkin has raised once more the question of the chronology of the Nimrud ivories,' specifically those found in room SW7 at Fort Shalmaneser. Among other evidence, he discussed two chariot scenes that Professor Mallowan had compared in detail in an attempt to establish a date for these ivories.2 One of these scenes is on a carved ivory plaque belonging to the head of a bed from room SW7, the other on a Neo-Hittite stone relief from Sakgag6zii in northern Syria.3 Mallowan had arrived at a date of 730-20 B.c.-either late in the reign of Tiglath Pileser III (745-727 B.C.) or during the short reign of his successor, Shalmaneser V (726-722 B.C.). Ussishkin, on the other hand, using precisely the same material, comes to quite different conclusions, giving the ivories a date of 800 B.c., or even in the last quarter of the ninth century B.C. For Assyria, however, the scene on the ivory relief is a hybrid in more ways than one, and we are therefore inclined to believe that Ussishkin's early dating cannot be sustained. What Ussishkin has also apparently failed to realize is that, if his chronology were correct, the plaque would constitute a true contribution to the history of the development of the chariot. When a representation of an object combines features from more than one period, it may be explained in one of two ways: the object depicted may itself be transitional, revealing the successive adoption of changing elements, or the artist may be consciously or unconsciously copying details from the art of several periods, rather than " drawing from life." Let us consider again the two scenes in question. The ivory plaque shows a wild-bull hunt with four men in a chariot moving to the right; three of them face forward: the driver, the archer, and another figure whose head and waist are just visible behind these. The archer aims at one of the two bulls fleeing in front. The fourth figure leans over the shield hung at the rear of the chariot and plunges a spear into the neck of an attacking bull. On the stone relief only a bowman and a driver are in the chariot, which advances to the right towards a lion. Two figures on the ground, one before and one behind the lion, are spearing it.