. Chinese clay figures. Sculpture -- China; Arms and armor, Chinese; China -- Antiquities. History of the Rhinoceros 87 Archaeologists are agreed that the rhinoceros (Fig. 4)1 is represented on the black obelisk of Salmanassar ( 860—824) in company with an elephant, human-looking apes, and long-tailed monkeys. This tribute- picture suggests to I. Kennedy2 the first certain evidence of Baby- lonian intercourse with India. The animals formed part of the tribute of the Muzri, an Armenian tribe living in the mountains to the north-east of The rhinoceros is called in the inscrip- tion
. Chinese clay figures. Sculpture -- China; Arms and armor, Chinese; China -- Antiquities. History of the Rhinoceros 87 Archaeologists are agreed that the rhinoceros (Fig. 4)1 is represented on the black obelisk of Salmanassar ( 860—824) in company with an elephant, human-looking apes, and long-tailed monkeys. This tribute- picture suggests to I. Kennedy2 the first certain evidence of Baby- lonian intercourse with India. The animals formed part of the tribute of the Muzri, an Armenian tribe living in the mountains to the north-east of The rhinoceros is called in the inscrip- tion an "ox of the river Sakeya," and Kennedy criticises its repre- sentation as "very ugly and ill- ; Indeed, it is no more and no less than a bull, and, as far as natural truth is concerned, much in- ferior to the Chinese sketches. It even has cloven bull-feet, while one of the Chinese drawings has correctly three toes,4 and the single FlG' 4' . . , , Rhinoceros from Obelisk of Salmanassar clumsy horn rises on its forehead (from 0. Kel]eri Antike Tierweit,.. n 1 After O. Keller, Die antike Tierwelt, Vol. I, p. 386 (Leipzig, 1909). 2 The Early Commerce of Babylon with India (Journal R. As. Soc, 1898, p. 259). 3 According to J. Marquart (Untersuchungen zur Geschichte von Eran, II, p. ioi, Leipzig, 1905), who discusses the same passage in the inscription of Salmanas- sar II, Muzri is the name of a country and mountain-range (Muzur Mountains) west of the Euphrates, and comprising also a part of the mountainous region south of the river. Marquart translates "cattle of the river ; Others, like Schrader, Hommel, and W. Max Muller (see B. Meissner, Assyrische Jagden, p. 20, Leipzig, 1911) identify Muzri with Egypt. Kennedy does not explain how the rhinoceros could have gotten into that region from India; and it may have been, after all, an African species, although the single horn would rather point to India; the elephant, however, in bis opini
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