The Expedition began its third consecutive season at Nimrud on March 7th, 1951, and continued until the end of April. On an average approximately 200 workmen were employed, considerably more than in the two previous seasons, and this greater effort was correspondingly rewarded. The larger scale on which we were enabled to work was due to the support of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, and we wish to take this opportunity of thanking the Trustees for their generosity and the Director, Mr. Francis Henry Taylor, for the interest which he has taken in the Expedition. We are similarly indebted to the friendly co-operation of Mr. Charles Wilkinson who discussed the project with us in England in 1950. The Trustees approved the suggestion that Mr. Kelly Simpson of the Egyptian Department should join us on the dig; we welcomed him as a friend no less than as a valued member of our staff. This association with our American colleagues has thus proved to be a most happy and successful venture.

A Fortunate and rare discovery has given us a new and complete inscribed stela of the well-known Assyrian king Aššur-naṣir-pal II (Pls. II-VI). This monument was found in its original position within a few feet of the excavations of his palace made by Layard and Rassam. The sandstone block had been erected near the doorway (Fig. 1) leading to the throne-room, and was inscribed with details of the ceremonies and festivities celebrating the formal opening of the palace in the year 879 B.C. The discovery itself occurred in April, 1951, during last season's work at Nimrud; as a result we are now able to write additional details into the history of the ancient Assyrian military capital. The new text is of especial interest because it also gives us for the first time a complete list of trees planted in the royal orchards set out near the city, and what may well prove to be the oldest extant Assyrian menu. A detailed account is given of the food prepared for the entertainment of 69,574 persons during the ten days' festivities. This information, together with many other particulars not hitherto available from the records of this reign, gives this text an unusual significance. Our interest in the Assyrian monarchy is heightened by the insight now given into the peaceful and far-sighted activities of this ruler whose reign is known mostly, but unfortunately, from its display of military might and “frightfulness.”

The most important of the rich and varied pieces of carved ivory discovered at Nimrud during 1949 and 1950 have already been illustrated and discussed in previous numbers of this Journal. The photographs which accompany this article, Plates XII-XVIII, illustrate the remainder of what still needed to be published from those two seasons: anything omitted is probably too much mutilated or fragmentary to be worth describing.

This well-preserved cylinder, illustrated on Plate XIX, is reported to have been found by a ploughman about I mile west of the tall, not far from the east bank of the river Tigris and close to the modern village of Nimrud at a point where the ground bears traces of Assyrian debris. It is hoped later on that it may be possible to examine this ground in order to determine whether or no this inscription is likely to have originated there. The cylinder was brought by shaikh Abdullah Nejaifi to Miss B. Parker, the secretary-librarian of the British School of Archaeology in Iraq, in the spring of 1951. Miss Parker made a preliminary study of the text, and prepared a transliteration and translation of it. During the course of the season, while Miss Parker was fully occupied as photographer and assistant epigraphist, I was asked to prepare a final version and copy (Plates XX-XXI) for publication.

The inscriptions found at Nimrud (Kalḫu) during the last season were notable for their variety and historical interest rather than for their quantity. The largest and most important discovery was a stela of Aššur-naṣir-pal II located in a recess to the left of the doorway leading into the throne-room of the North-West Palace, the construction and dedication of which it records. This has given many new details, especially concerning the royal hunt, the lay-out of the city park and the lavish ten-day entertainment given to 69,574 guests when the reconstruction of Kalḫu had been completed in 879 B.C. This text has been published in full on pages 29-39, and illustrated on Plates VII-XI. Two other inscriptions of the same king found this season were already known from the earlier excavations of Layard in the throne-room (1845-7). These were the large two-stepped throne base inscribed with the usual standard inscription of Aššur-naṣir-pal but giving additional details of his expedition to the Mediterranean (ND. 1122) and a stone tablet with the common “Inscription from the Wall of Calah” (ND. 1121) of which duplicates have been found in previous seasons.