Two colossal sphinxes guard the gateway of the principal edifice, and their presence proves with certainty how predominant was Egyptian influence even at this considerable distance from the banks of the Nile.  They are not the ordinary sphinxes, with a human head surmounting the body of a lion couchant on its stone pedestal; but, like the Assyrian bulls, they are standing, and, to judge from the Hathorian locks which fall on each side of their countenances, they must have been intended to represent a protecting goddess rather than a male deity.  A remarkable emblem is carved on the side of the upright to which their bodies are attached; it is none other than the double-headed eagle, the prototype of which is not infrequently found at Telloh in Lower Chaldaea, among remains dating from the time of the kings and vicegerents of Lagash.

[Illustration:  218.jpg TWO BLOCKS COVERED WITH BAS-RELIEFS IN THE EUYUK PALACE]

     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph.

The court or hall to which this gate gave access was decorated with bas-reliefs, which exhibit a glaring imitation of Babylonian art; we can still see on these the king, vested in his long flowing robes, praying before an altar, while further on is a procession of dignitaries following a troop of rams led by a priest to be sacrificed; another scene represents two individuals in the attitude of worship, wearing short loin-cloths, and climbing a ladder whose upper end has an uncertain termination, while a third person applies his hands to his mouth in the performance of some mysterious ceremony; beyond these are priests and priestesses moving in solemn file as if in the measured tread of some sacred dance, while in one corner we find the figure of a woman, probably a goddess, seated, holding in one hand a flower, perhaps the full-blown lotus, and in the other a cup from which she is about to drink.  The costume of all these figures is that which Chaldaean fashion had imposed upon the whole of Western Asia, and consisted of the long heavy robe, falling from the shoulders to the feet, drawn in at the waist by a girdle; but it is to be noted that both sexes are shod with the turned-up shoes of the Hittites, and that the women wear high peaked caps.

[Illustration:  219.jpg MYSTIC SCENE AT EUYUK]

     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph.

The composition of the scenes is rude, the drawing incorrect, and the general technique reminds us rather of the low reliefs of the Memphite or Theban sculptors than of the high projection characteristic of the artists of the Lower Euphrates.  These slabs of sculptured stone formed a facing at the base of the now crumbling brick walls, the upper surface of which was covered with rough plastering.  Here and there a few inscriptions reveal the name, titles, and parentage of some once celebrated personage, and mention the god in whose honour he had achieved the work.

[Illustration:  220.jpg AN ASIATIC GODDESS]