Bel."
Some, including Professor Rawlinson, suppose it be a compound of "El" or
"il," in which case "Bab-El" means the "Gate of God."

It is evident that the story of the Tower of Babal was borrowed by the
Jehovist author of this part of Genesis from the tradition of the famous
unfinished Temple of Belus, one of the wonders of antiquity. "Birs
Nimroud" is thus described by Kalisch:--

"The huge heap, in which bricks, stone, marble, and basalt, are
irregularly mixed, covers a surface of 49,000 feet; while the chief
mound is nearly 300 feet high, and from 200 to 400 feet in width,
commanding an extensive view over a country of utter desolation. The
Tower consisted of seven distinct stages or square platforms, built of
kiln-burnt bricks, each about twenty feet high, gradually diminishing
in diameter. The upper part of the brickwork has a vitrefied appearance;
for it is supposed that the Babylonians, in order to render their
edifices more durable, submitted them to the heat of the furnace;
and large fragments of such vitrefied and calcined materials are also
intermixed with the rubbish at the base. This circumstance may have
given rise to, or at least countenanced, the legend of the destruction
of the Tower by heavenly fire, still extensively adopted among the
Arabians. The terraces were devoted to the planets, and were differently
colored in accordance with the notions of Sabaean astrology--the lowest,
Saturn's, _black_; the second, Jupiter's, _orange_; the third, Mars,
_red_; the fourth, the Sun's, _yellow_; the fifth, Venus's, _white_;
the sixth, Mercury's, _blue_; the seventh, the Moon's, _green_.
Merodach-adan-akhi is stated to have begun it B.C. 1100. It was finished
five centuries afterwards by Nebuchadnezzar, who left a part of its
history on two cylinders, which have lately been excavated on the spot,
and thus deciphered by Rawlinson. 'The building, named the Planisphere,
which was the wonder of Babylon, I have made and finished. With bricks,
enriched with lapis lazuli, I have exalted its head. Behold now the
building, named "The Stages of the Seven Spheres," which was the wonder
of Borsippa, had been built by a former king. He had completed forty-two
cubits of height: but he did not finish the head. From the lapse of time
it became ruined. They had not taken care of the exit of the waters; so
the rain and wet had penetrated into the brickwork. The casing of burnt
brick lay scattered in heaps. Then Merodach, my gre