Works of Benjamin Wills Newton (Volume 13) (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: EVIDENCE AS TO THE PRESENT CONDITION OF THE RUINS OF BABYLON ?POSITION OF HILLAH IN THEIR MIDST. Having given in the preceding chapter a sketch of the gradual decay of Babylon, having seen that there is no reason to suppose that its site was at any period entirely depopulated, we have now to consider what the present actual condition of the plain of Babylon is. Is it true that Hillah, with its numerous population, with its gardens and date- groves, is encompassed both on the north-east and on the south-west, and on the east, with the ruins of ancient Babylon ? Are there besides the town of Hillah, villages also and date-groves found scattered amongst these ruins ? Could we draw any plan of the walls of ancient Babylon without Hillah and these villages being included within their compass ? Such is the character of the questions we have to consider. Several European travellers have within the last sixty or seventy years examined the plain of Babylon. Their researches have made us minutely THE NEW YORK POBLIC LIBRARY A8TOR, LtNOX Ili-DKN FOUNDATION acquainted with its condition. It will be my endeavour to make an abstract of these statements, sufficiently precise to show the position which Hillah occupies in relation to the ruins. I shall not attempt greater accuracy or minuteness than is necessary for this purpose. The place which European travellers generally select as their point of departure, when intending to explore the ruins of Babylon, is Bagdad. Bagdad stands on the river Tigris, about forty-eight miles distant from Hillah. In journeying from Bagdad we enter the district of Babylon on the north-north-east. On arriving within about nine miles of Hillah, we pass a caravansary or inn, named Mohawil; and it is just after this point that the northern ruins of...