Like most
ancient nations, as the Egyptians, the Greeks in the heroic times, the
Canaanites, the Syrians, the Jews and Israelites, the Persians, the
Gauls, the Britons, and many others, the Assyrians preferred the chariot
as most honorable, and probably as most safe. The king invariably went
out to war in a chariot, and always fought from it, excepting at the
siege of a town, when he occasionally dismounted and shot his arrows on
foot. The chief state-officers and other personages of high rank
followed the same practice. Inferior persons served either as cavalry or
as foot-soldiers.

The Assyrian war-chariot is thought to have been made of wood. Like the
Greek and the Egyptian, it appears to have been mounted from behind
where it was completely open, or closed only by means of a shield, which
(as it seems) could be hung across the aperture. It was completely
panelled at the sides, and often highly ornamented, as will be seen from
the various illustrations given in this chapter. The wheels were two in
number, and were placed far back, at or very near the extreme end of the
body, so that the weight pressed considerably upon the pole, as was the
case also in Egypt. They had remarkably broad felloes, thin and delicate
spokes, and small or moderate sized axels. [PLATE LXXXIX. Fig. 2], and
[PLATE XC., Figs. 1, 2.] The number of the spokes was either six or
eight. The felloes appear to have been formed of three distinct circles
of wood, the middle one being the thinnest, and the outer one far the
thickest of the three. Sometimes these circles were fastened together
externally by bands of mental, hatchet-shaped. In one or two instances
we find the outermost circle divided by cross-bars, as if it had been
composed of four different pieces. Occasionally there is a fourth
circle, which seems to represent a metal tire outside the felloe,
whereby it was guarded from injury. This tire is either plain or
ornamented.

[Illustration: PLATE 90]

The wheels were attached to an axletree, about which they revolved, in
the usual manner. The body was placed directly upon the axletree and
upon the pole, without the intervention of any springs. The pole started
from the middle of the axle-tree, and, passing below the floor of the
body in a horizontal direction, thence commonly curved upwards till it
had risen to about half the height of the body, when it was again
horizontal for awhile, once more curving upwards at the end. It usually
term