about 45 deg. 40' E. Excavations conducted here for
six months, from Christmas of 1903 to June 1904, for the university of
Chicago, by Dr Edgar J. Banks, proved that these mounds covered the site
of the ancient city of Adab (Ud-Nun), hitherto known only from a brief
mention of its name in the introduction to the Khammurabi code (c. 2250
B.C.). The city was divided into two parts by a canal, on an island in
which stood the temple, E-mach, with a _ziggurat_, or stage tower. It
was evidently once a city of considerable importance, but deserted at a
very early period, since the ruins found close to the surface of the
mounds belong to Dungi and Ur Gur, kings of Ur in the earlier part of
the third millennium B.C. Immediately below these, as at Nippur, were
found the remains of Naram-Sin and Sar-gon, c. 3000 B.C. Below these
there were still 35 ft. of stratified remains, constituting
seven-eighths of the total depth of the ruins. Besides the remains of
buildings, walls, graves, &c., Dr Banks discovered a large number of
inscribed clay tablets of a very early period, bronze and stone tablets,
bronze implements and the like. But the two most notable discoveries
were a complete statue in white marble, apparently the most ancient yet
found in Babylonia (now in the museum in Constantinople), bearing the
inscription--"E-mach, King Da-udu, King of Ud-Nun"; and a temple refuse
heap, consisting of great quantities of fragments of vases in marble,
alabaster, onyx, porphyry and granite, some of which were inscribed, and
others engraved and inlaid with ivory and precious stones.
(J. P. Pe.)

BISON, the name of the one existing species of European wild ox, _Bos
(Bison) bonasus_, known in Russian as _zubr_. Together with the nearly
allied New World animal known in Europe as the (North) American bison,
but in its own country as "buffalo," and scientifically as _Bos (Bison)
bison_, the bison represents a group of the ox tribe distinguished from
other species by the greater breadth and convexity of the forehead,
superior length of limb, and the longer spinal processes of the dorsal
vertebrae, which, with the powerful muscles attached for the support of
the massive head, form a protuberance or hump on the shoulders. The
bisons have also fourteen pairs of ribs, while the common ox has only
thirteen. The forehead and neck of both species are covered with long,
shaggy hair of a dark brown colour; and in winter the whole of the neck,
sh