"سرد لرحلة إلى موقع مدينة بابل في ١٨١١، طُبعت الآن لأول مرة: مذكرات على الأطلال؛ مع نقوش من الخرائط المدبئية للمؤلف: ملاحظات على طبوغرافية بابل القديمة،بقلم الرائد رينيل؛ في إشارة إلى المذكرات: مذكرات ثانية على الأطلال؛ في إشارة إلى ملاحظات الرائد رينيل: مع سرد لرحلة إلى برسبوليس: طُبعت الآن لأول مرة، مع كتابات مسمارية نسخت في برسبوليس ولم تُنشر من قبل: كتبها الراحل كلوديوس جيمس ريتش، المحترم، المقيم البريطاني السابق لشركة الهند الشرقية في بغداد. حررته أرملته." [‎٨] (٤٧٤/٨٣)

8 JOURNEY TO BABYLON.
and which, the natives told me, were the remains
of an ancient town ; but they could tell me nothing
further. A little to the east I remarked a very great
range of mounds, on which was a small mosque called
Amran Ibn Ali, who, they pretended, was killed in
this place. Here a man came up to me, of whom I
pui chased a large black stone, with figures and in
scriptions on it'", of which I hope to give a fuller
description elsewhere. I could not persuade him to
tell me the exact place where he found this antique.
These mounds were composed of loose earth, into
which the hoises feet sunk sometimes knee-deep, and
the surface, which exhibited a great deal of nitre,
was covered with potsherds and pieces of brick. The
ram had worn deep furrows, and the excavations
were great, the people of the neighbourhood con
tinually digging very deep in them, to find bricks for
building, a great many of which have writing on
them. After descending these mounds, we passed a
winding road or ravine, about as broad as the Eu
phrates, and we came to another range, higher than
the last in some places, where the people had exca
vated to the depth of more than ten feet. I saw evi
dent vestiges of walls, composed of large bricks,
which had all bitumen on the backs of them, and
were placed on layers of mortar also. I observed no
unburnt biicks oi reeds. r l lie mortar has become
nearly as hard as the brick itself, and seems the same
* Now in the British Museum.— Ed.