# Part B — The Babylon side of the "Hanging Gardens" question Working copies of the raw fetched pages (`raw_B/`, the file names cited below) are not included in this folder. Line numbers refer to the saved text extractions. Verbatim quotations are in quotation marks; anything paraphrased is unmarked. Items I could not verify are flagged **[NOT VERIFIED]** or **[OCR-RECONSTRUCTED]**. ## 0. Source base and access notes Primary/secondary texts fetched (file names in `raw_B/`): - **RINBE 1/1** (Novotny & Weiershäuser 2024, Nabopolassar + Nebuchadnezzar II from Babylon), open access: https://epub.ub.uni-muenchen.de/118421/1/RINBE1-1_OA.pdf → `RINBE1-1.txt` (pdfminer; line numbers cited). **RINBE 2** (Weiershäuser & Novotny 2020): https://epub.ub.uni-muenchen.de/73674/1/RINBE2_OAPDF.pdf → `RINBE2.txt`. - **RIBo Babylon 7 Akkadian glossary (K)** via Wayback `https://web.archive.org/web/2025id_/https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/ribo/babylon7/cbd/akk/k.html` → `wb_ribo_gloss_k.html`. - **Langdon, VAB 4 (1912)**: archive.org `neubabylonischen-konigsinschriften` → `langdon_vab4.txt`. **Koldewey, *The Excavations at Babylon* (1914)**: archive.org `ldpd_10797913_000` → `koldewey1914.txt`. - **Pedersén, *Babylon: The Great City* (Zaphon 2021, OA)**: https://www.zaphon.de/WebRoot/Store28/Shops/83179382/MediaGallery/Pedersen-Babylon-Zaphon-2021-100dpi.pdf → `pedersen2021_babylon.txt` (printed page numbers embedded; pdf page = printed + 1). **Pedersén, *The South Palace Archives in Babylon* (2025)**: archive.org `pedersen-2025-babylon-archives-nebuch-ii` → `pedersen2025_archives.txt`. - **Bichler & Rollinger 2005** ("Die Hängenden Gärten zu Ninive…", AOAT 325, 153–217), pre-publication PDF http://www.achemenet.com/pdf/in-press/Haengende-Garten.pdf → `achemenet_haengende_garten.txt` (printed page numbers embedded). - **Finkel 1988** in Clayton & Price, *Seven Wonders*: archive.org `peter-clayton-martin-price-the-seven-wonders-of-the-ancient-world` → `clayton_price_1993.txt` — **OCR unusable for continuous text**. - Classical/biblical: Curtius (Rolfe Loeb, archive.org `quintus-curtius-rufus-history-of-alexander-loeb-two-in-one-volume-rolfe`) `curtius_rolfe.txt`; Diodorus 2, 17 and Strabo 16.1 (LacusCurtius) `diod2A.txt`, `diod17D.txt`, `diod17F.txt`, `strabo16A.txt`; Greek of Diod. 2.10, Jos. *Ap.* 1.141, Strabo 16.1.5 (Perseus) `diod2_10_gk.html`, `josephus_apion_gk.html`, `strabo16_1_5_gk.html`; Arrian 3.16, 7.17–26 (Wikisource) `arrian_extracts.txt`; Plutarch *Alex.* 35, 73–77 (LacusCurtius) `plut_alex_p5.txt`, `plut_alex_p10.txt`; Josephus Whiston `josephus_apion1.html`, `josephus_ant10.html`; Eusebius *PE* 9.41 (tertullian.org) `eusebius_pe9.html`, *Chronicle* (attalus) `eusebius_chron4.html`; Herodotus 1.178/184, Xenophon *Anab.* 3.4 (Perseus); Judith 1:1 LXX/KJV (Wikisource); Isaiah/Nahum (Sefaria API) `sefaria_*.json`. - Paywalled journals, abstracts only: Reade 2000 (`reade2000.pdf`, HTML), Wiseman 1983 (`wiseman1983.pdf`, HTML), Stevenson 1992 (`stevenson1992_cc.html`). Reviews/synthesis: Potts, *NYRB* 26 Sept 2013 `nybooks_potts.txt`; Livius.org `livius_hg.html`. **Not accessible** (paywalled / lending-only / 403): Wiseman 1985 *Nebuchadrezzar and Babylon* (archive.org lending → 401); Dalley 2013 *The Mystery of the Hanging Garden of Babylon* (lending → 401; Google Books 403); Dalley 1994 *Iraq* 56 (abstract only); Reade 2000 full text; Nagel 1978 *MDOG* 110; Damerji 1981 *Sumer* 37; Alwan 1979/1985 *Sumer*; Rasheed 1991; Streck 2018 (Fs Fischer-Elfert); Koldewey 1925/1931/1932; Wetzel 1938; Da Riva 2012 (Wadi Brisa). Their positions are reported here only as quoted by Pedersén 2021, Bichler–Rollinger 2005, Finkel 1988 and Potts 2013, and are flagged as such. --- ## 1. Nebuchadnezzar II's building inscriptions: is there a garden? ### 1.1 Corpus searched RINBE 1/1 (2024) edits Nabopolassar and the Nebuchadnezzar II inscriptions from Babylon (Nbk. 1–56: Tower of Babel Stele, East India House Inscription = Nbk. 2, stone blocks/paving stones, "Hofkalender" prism = Nbk. 11, cylinders Nbk. 12–56). The remaining Babylon texts, other cities and the Levantine rock inscriptions "(Wadi Brisa and Nahr el-Kalb ...)" are reserved for RINBE 1/2 (`RINBE1-1.txt` 3618–3626, 3702–3714); Wadi Brisa (Da Riva 2012) was therefore **not** re-read **[NOT VERIFIED]**. The RIBo Babylon 7 text pages were unreachable; only the glossary snapshot was obtained. ### 1.2 Lexical result: garden words - **kirû "garden/orchard"** in the whole online RIBo *Babylon 7* corpus (Neo-Babylonian dynasty): the glossary page (`wb_ribo_gloss_k.html`) lists "kirû [(FRUIT) PLANTATION] (N) 2 instances. Written forms: GIŠ.KIRI₆; GIŠ.KIRI₆.MEŠ. Normalized forms: kirâti; kirî". Both instances belong to Nabonidus (below, §1.6). **kirimāḫu** ("pleasure garden", Sennacherib's word) is absent from the glossary. - **RINBE 1/1 full text:** zero occurrences of `GIŠ.KIRI` (grep), and zero of "Amanus"/"ḫamānu". The English words "garden(s)"/"orchard(s)" occur in Nebuchadnezzar's texts only in offering lists (§1.5). - **Langdon VAB 4 glossary** (German): *musarû* "Garten", *sippatu* "Obstgarten" — both used only in offering/produce contexts (Nbk. Nr. 19 p. 155/161, Nr. 20 p. 169; `langdon_vab4.txt` lines 8180–8185, 8462–8467, 8908–8913). ### 1.3 The palace passages (the texts Berossus paraphrases) **Nbk. 2 (East India House Inscription) vii 34–56** — the South Palace: "the palace, a building (that is) an object of wonder for the people, the bond of the land, a holy kummu-building ... (extending) from Imgur-Enlil to Lībil-ḫegalla, the eastern canal, from the bank of the Euphrates River to Ay-ibūr-šabû — which Nabopolassar ... had created with (sundried) brick(s) ..., its foundation(s) had become weak on account of flood water" (`RINBE1-1.txt` 13344–13358). Note vii 36: George (BTT p. 359) and Beaulieu take *bīt tabrâti nišī*, "House (That Was) an Object of Wonder", as the palace's ceremonial name (13382–13383). Commentary: "45,000-m2 royal residence ... This 600-room building was constructed anew in its entirety by Nebuchadnezzar II because it suffered from water damage (due to the high water table)" (13375–13380). **Nbk. 2 viii 27–ix 2** — the North Palace, the passage Berossus follows. Transliteration (13575–13596): > `i-ta-at né-mé-et-ti-dEN.LÍL / ša-al-ḫe-e KÁ.DINGIR.RA.KI / a-na ki-da-a-nim / 2 ka-a-ri da-nu₄-tim / i-na ku-up-ri ù a-gur-ri / BÀD ša-da-ni-iš e-pú-uš-ma / i-na bé-e-ri-šu-un / pí-ti-iq a-gur-ri e-ep-ti-iq-ma / i-na re-e-ši-šu ku-um-mu ra-ba-a / a-na šu-ba-at šar-ru-ti-ia / i-na ku-up-ri ù a-gur-ri / ša-qí-iš e-pú-uš-ma / it-ti É.GAL AD ú-ra-ad-di-ma / in ITI ša-al-mu i-na UD ŠE.GA / i-šid-sa i-na i-ra-at ki-gal-lu / ú-ša-ar-ši-id-ma / re-e-ši-ša ú-za-aq-qí-ir / ḫu-úr-sa-ni-iš / i-na 15 u₄-um ši-pí-ir-ša / ú-ša-ak-li-il-ma / ú-ša-pa-a šu-bat be-lu-ti` Translation (13627–13640): "...embankments using bitumen and baked brick, wall(s that were) as (solid as) a mountain. (viii 52–ix 2) I fashioned a baked brick structure between them and, on top of it, I built to a great height a large kummu-building as the residence of my royal majesty using bitumen and baked brick. I added (it) to the palace of my father and, in a favorable month, on an auspicious day, I secured its foundation on the surface (lit. 'breast') of the netherworld and raised its superstructure as high as a mountain. I completed its construction in (just) fifteen days and made the seat of my lordly majesty resplendent." ix 3–18: "I had (beams of) hard cedar originating from the high mountains (Lebanon), thick pines, and the best selection of cypress stretched (over it) for its roof. At each of its gates, I fixed doors (made) of musukkannu-wood, cedar, cypress, ebony, and ivory..." (13642–13647; Akkadian in the duplicate Nbk. 23: `GIŠ.EREN da-nu₄-tim ṣi-i-ti ša-di-i e-lu-ti / GIŠ.a-šu-ḫu pa-ag-lu-tim ù GIŠ.šur-i-ni ni-is-qu`, 22030–22038). ix 19–28: "Alongside the wall of baked brick, I built a great wall using strong stone(s) (and) large (slabs) quarried from the mountains and (then) I raised its superstructure like a mountain" (`BÀD ra-ba-a / i-na NA₄ da-nu₄-tim / ši-ti-iq KUR.KUR GAL.GAL`, 13600–13658). ix 29–44: "I had that building built to be an object of wonder and I filled it with splendor for all of the people to see." The only "mountain" language is the stock simile *šadâniš / ḫursāniš / kīma šadîm* for height; the stone is a *wall*; the trees are *roof beams and doors*. **No planting, no garden, no wife.** **Nbk. 21 ii 21–35** — the same terrace, earlier phase (20761–20771, 20785–20786): "...[(altogether) two] strong embankments, one in front of the other. I secured their foundation(s) directly on the apsû ... and raised their superstructure(s) as high as mountain(s). (ii 33–35) I fashion[ed] a baked brick structure between them like a mountain [and, on t]op of them, I built to a great height a kummu-building (made) of large gegunnûs." Akkadian `ku-um-mu ge-gu-na-a-tim ra-ba-a-tim` (20722); note ii 34: "The interpretation more or less follows Streck, Studies Fischer-Elfert pp. 1118–1120 ('einen gro[ßen] Wohnbereich mit gigunûs')." Pedersén p. 122: "These two words are normally used for the ziggurat and have here a special, more secular, use; kummu is usually the top building of a ziggurat and gigunû is the terraces of the ziggurat or the ziggurat itself" (4579–4582). This is the closest any Nebuchadnezzar text comes to "stepped terraces" — with nothing said to grow on them. **Nbk. 12 ii 12–20** — fortification in the river (16877–16885): "I built a great fortification using bitumen and baked brick at the upper corner of the gate of the goddess Ištar, from the bank of the Euphrates River up to the gate, along the city, on the outside. I secured its foundation directly on the apsû, in the water table far below, (and) raised its superstructure as high as a mountain." Langdon Nbk. Nr. 13 ii 19–24 (`langdon_vab4.txt` 5736–5739): "ließ ich eine große Schanze im Flusse aus Asphalt und Brandziegeln herstellen. Ihr Fundament ließ ich festlegen in der Wassertiefe, ihre Spitze führte ich hoch auf wie ein Waldgebirge"; Koldewey's version (p. 145): "I caused a great fortification to be built in the river (ha-al-zi ra-bi-tim i-na nari) of bitumen and bricks. I raised its foundation on the depths of the water, its top I exalted like the wooded mountains". This is the text tied to the Western Outwork (§3). **"Fifteen days."** RINBE 1/1 (11313–11317): "took '(just) fifteen days' to complete. This, however, does not reflect historical reality since it took significantly longer to construct this extensive palatial structure; fifteen was likely chosen as half of an ideal month"; note viii 64: "Berossos, who clearly had access to Nebuchadnezzar II's inscriptions, also states that the North Palace's construction was completed" in fifteen days (13664). Pedersén p. 122–123: "completed in 15 days (whatever that extremely short period may mean)" (4591). **Neriglissar 3 ii 15–30** (`RINBE2.txt` 7510–7526): the South Palace river wing "collapsed towards the outside of the palace onto the bank of the Euphrates river and its brickwork fell apart. I removed its collapsed walls until I reached the level of the water. With bitumen and baked bricks, I firmly secured its base against water". No garden. ### 1.4 Cedar, Lebanon, Amanus Cedars in Nebuchadnezzar's Babylon texts are explicitly Lebanese (Nbk. 2 ix 3: "hard cedar originating from the high mountains (Lebanon)"). "Amanus" appears in Langdon's corpus only in Nabonidus (Nr. 1 col. i, p. 223: "Mächtige Zederbalken, das Erzeugnis des Amanus", `langdon_vab4.txt` 11683; index 15722: "Amanus, Bg. im Libanon, 222, 10; 230, 22"). In every case the timber is roofing/doors, never "trees of the mountains" transplanted — the contrast with Sennacherib's Nineveh texts (Part A) is total. ### 1.5 "Gardens" only in offering lists Nbk. 37 (C027) ii′ 1–16 (`RINBE1-1.txt` 28994–29003): "...bountiful vegetables — the delights of gardens — red-gold fruits — the bounty of orchards — dates, Dilmun dates, dried fig(s), raisin(s), the finest beer wort, white honey..." The same formula in Langdon Nbk. Nr. 19 and 20: "üppiges Gemüse, Fülle der Gartenbeete, goldig glänzendes Obst, die Pracht der Obstgärten, Datteln, Kaktusfeigen von Tilmun..." (`langdon_vab4.txt` 8181–8184). These are temple-offering catalogues, not constructions. ### 1.6 Nabopolassar, Neriglissar, Nabonidus - Nabopolassar (RINBE 1/1 Nbp. 1–19): no garden/orchard vocabulary at all (grep). - Neriglissar: palace repair only (above). - Nabonidus: the two corpus hits for GIŠ.KIRI₆ are (a) Nabonidus 34 (Egipar at Ur) i 39–41: "its site was in ruins and had turned into rubble. Date palms and fruit orchards were growing inside it" and ii 10–11: "I copiously supplied it with fields, orchards, domestic staff" (`A.ŠÀ.MEŠ GIŠ.KIRI₆.MEŠ SAG.GÉME.ARAD`, `RINBE2.txt` 24103–24107, 24193); (b) Nabonidus 2001 (Adad-guppi stele) ii 56b–iii 4: "oxen, fattened sheep, bread, beer, wine, oil, honey, and fruit(s) of the orchard, all of this, as a funerary offering" (`GURUN GIŠ.KIRI₆`, 30635, 30743–30745). Neither is a royal pleasure garden. ### 1.7 Scholars' statements that no Babylonian text mentions the garden (verified wording) - **RINBE 1/1 (Novotny & Weiershäuser 2024), note to Nbk. 2 viii 27–ix 2** (p. 94; `RINBE1-1.txt` 13512–13519): after quoting Berossus in Rollinger's translation ("In this palace he built high stone terraces and made them appear very similar to mountains, planting them with all kinds of trees, thus constructing and arranging the so-called Hanging Garden, because his wife, who had been raised in the regions of Media, longed for a mountainous scenery"), the editors write: **"The creation of a garden is not mentioned in this inscription, nor in any other extant text of Nebuchadnezzar."** - **Bichler & Rollinger 2005, p. 154** (`achemenet_haengende_garten.txt` 57–58): "Einerseits schweigen die erhaltenen Keilschriftquellen beharrlich über dieses Wunderwerk"; and p. 153 quoting **Jursa 2004a, 77**: "Heute wird diese These nicht mehr aufrechterhalten, und die Hängenden Gärten, in der klassischen Antike immerhin als eines der Sieben Weltwunder angesehen, bleiben trotz vieler Untersuchungen ein ungelöstes Problem" (lines 35–38; n. 3 adds that Strabo "weiß ... nichts" of Nebuchadnezzar and a Median wife — an error traced to Stevenson 1992, 35). - **Livius.org** (`livius_hg.html`, verbatim): "The Hanging Gardens are not mentioned in the thousands of cuneiform tablet from Babylon, not even in the list of monuments that is known as TINTIR is Babylon." - **Finkel 1988** — **[OCR-RECONSTRUCTED]**: the scan is unusable for continuous text. The often-cited sentences (p. 38 "have never been conclusively identified nor, indeed, has their existence been proved"; p. 41 "the unexpected silence on the part of all these native cuneiform texts"; p. 58 "The absence of references to it in cuneiform texts is admittedly a difficulty, graver perhaps than its omission in Herodotus' description of Babylon") **could not be confirmed letter-for-letter** and must be checked in print. - **Dalley 1994** (*Iraq* 56): abstract only **[SECONDARY]**. **Wiseman 1983/1985**: not accessible; his view is reported by Finkel (§3a) and Pedersén n. 59 **[NOT VERIFIED]**. - **Pedersén 2021** does not deny the silence but reads Nbk. 21's *gigunâtu* and the terrace texts as the physical referent of Berossus (§3c). ### 1.8 Berossus, Abydenus, Amytis — and the interpolation question - Josephus, *Ap.* 1.141 (Niese; `josephus_apion_gk.html`): "ἐν δὲ τοῖς βασιλείοις τούτοις ἀναλήμματα λίθινα ὑψηλὰ ἀνοικοδομήσας καὶ τὴν ὄψιν ἀποδοὺς ὁμοιοτάτην τοῖς ὄρεσι, καταφυτεύσας δένδρεσι παντοδαποῖς ἐξειργάσατο καὶ κατεσκεύασε τὸν καλούμενον κρεμαστὸν παράδεισον διὰ τὸ τὴν γυναῖκα αὐτοῦ ἐπιθυμεῖν τῆς ὀρείας διαθέσεως τεθραμμένην ἐν τοῖς κατὰ τὴν Μηδίαν τόποις." Whiston: "it was finished in fifteen days. Now in this palace he erected very high walks, supported by stone pillars, and by planting what was called a pensile paradise ... he rendered the prospect an exact resemblance of a mountainous country. This he did to please his queen, because she had been brought up in Media" (`josephus_apion1.html`; parallel *Ant.* 10.226). - Abydenus in Eusebius *PE* 9.41 (Gifford): "he fortified Babylon with a triple circuit of walls in fifteen days ... His palace too he adorned with trees, and gave it the name of the Hanging Gardens" (`eusebius_pe9.html`); Greek (FGrHist 685 F 6b, quoted B&R n. 67): "τά τε βασιλήια δένδροις ἤσκησε, κρεμαστοὺς παραδείσους ὀνομάσας". - The wife's name only in Eusebius' *Chronicle* (Polyhistor; `eusebius_chron4.html`): "Sardanapallus ... accepted Amyïtis, the daughter of Astyages, as the bride of his son Nebuchadnezzar" — a lacunose passage (B&R 700–708; Potts n. 13: "in a context unrelated to the gardens"). - Interpolation: Livius (after van der Spek): Berossus' list "enumerates a series of monuments in exactly the same sequence as the East India House Inscription", the garden being the sole extra item; "Polyhistor added information from Cleitarchus to Berossus (likely ...)". Potts n. 20: Dalley adopts "a recent view that his description of the gardens is all later interpolation and not to be trusted. The experts are divided, but she is not alone in this view." Pedersén n. 56: "only Beaulieu 2006, van der Spek 2008, Rollinger 2013, 152, and Streck 2018 clearly state that Berossos located the gardens in the North Palace"; n. 59: "Possibly no real garden at all: Beaulieu 2006, van der Spek 2008" (4667–4672, 4695–4700). --- ## 2. Koldewey's "Vaulted Building" (Gewölbebau) in the South Palace ### 2.1 What Koldewey claimed (verbatim, *The Excavations at Babylon* 1914, ch. XIV pp. 91–100; `koldewey1914.txt` 6110–7247) Opening (p. 91): a building "which from every point of view occupies an exceptional place among the buildings of the Citadel and even of the whole city—one might almost say of the entire country. Fourteen cells, similar in size and shape, balance each other on the two sides of a central passage, and are surrounded by a strong wall." The well (pp. 91–92): "In one of these western cells there is a well which differs from all other wells known either in Babylon or elsewhere in the ancient world. It has three shafts placed close to each other, a square one in the centre and oblong ones on each side, an arrangement for which I can see no other explanation than that a mechanical hydraulic machine stood here, which worked on the same principle as our chain pump, where buckets attached to a chain work on a wheel placed over the well. A whim works the wheel in endless rotation. This contrivance, which is used to-day in this neighbourhood, and is called a dolad (water bucket), would provide a continuous flow of water." The stone argument (p. 95): "There are only two places where hewn stone occurs in any large quantity—in the Vaulted Building and on the north wall of the Kasr, and it is remarkable that in all the literature referring to Babylon, including the cuneiform inscriptions, stone is only mentioned as used in two places, in the north wall of the Kasr and in the hanging gardens. The Street and the Euphrates bridge, where stone was also used, do not come under consideration here. Add to this, that the ruins themselves, as well as the written evidence, only speak of one single building that differed from the others to a striking extent, the vaulted building of the Kasr and the κρεμαστὸς κῆπος; and therefore I consider them to be identical. That the identification when studied in detail bristles with difficulties, will surprise no one who has more than once had to bring ancient statements of facts into accordance with discoveries of the present day." He prints the testimonia (Berosus/Josephus, Diodorus 2.10, Strabo 16.1.5, Curtius 5.1) and concedes (p. 98, 7129–7160): "According to Berosus, the hanging gardens must have been on the Kasr, as he places them in a formal and detailed manner in the area of the buildings by which Nebuchadnezzar enlarged the palace of Nabopolassar. **The Principal Citadel may also be taken into consideration in this connection, and the question can only be settled by excavation.** A difficulty that is apparently serious lies in the length of the side of the quadrangle, which is given by Strabo and Diodorus as 4 plethra (about 120 metres). On examining the central building we find this is exactly four times its actual measurement, and any one who holds fast by these figures will naturally reject my hypothesis ... The central building rested on the 16 walls that supported the vaults, and on the 4 walls surrounding them, 20 in all. Thus a non-philologist might readily conclude that the text of Curtius quoted above, 'Haec moles ... durat, quippe XX lati parietes sustinent,' can be correct without the addition of 'pedes' inserted between XX and lati." Function and roof (p. 100, 7217–7247): "it must have been very dark, and can therefore hardly have been used except as a storehouse for all manner of goods ... The large number of tablets found in the stairway chamber on the south side also point to this use, as the inscriptions on them relate to grain ... A layer of reeds and asphalt was placed over a strong roofing of hewn stone, part of which has been found in the ruins, and above this rested two courses of bricks laid in mortar. A lead covering again separated these from the deep layer of earth placed on the top." He closes: "The reason why the hanging gardens were ranked among the seven wonders of the world was that they were laid out on the roof of an occupied building", *pensilia* being "the balconies of the Romans". So Koldewey's identification rested on three things: (a) the concentration of worked limestone, (b) the unusually thick walls (his reading of Curtius' "XX lati parietes"), (c) the triple-shaft well. He himself flagged Berossus' placement in the *new* palace, the four-fold size discrepancy, and the "Principal Citadel" (= North Palace/Hauptburg) as an alternative. ### 2.2 What was actually found there: the "Jehoiachin" archive Pedersén 2025 (`pedersen2025_archives.txt` 837–843, 1998–1999, 260–264, 41503): "A total of 303 clay tablets were registered with Babylon excavation numbers during the German excavations of the vaulted chambers in the northeast corner of the South Palace from October to December 1903 ... Almost all the tablets ... were excavated in the lower part of the small room with the staircase"; find-spot: "in the vaulted building, in the 2nd door opening from west, at the staircase, with remains of asphalted reed mats"; "Weidner 1939 published quite a small part of the archives, four fragmentary tablets ... since they mentioned the biblical king Jehoiachin"; the largest oil ration, "6 litres, was for the biblical king Ya'ukin from Yahudu" ("6 litres for Ya'ukin, king of Ya[hudu] / 2.5 litres for 5 sons of the king of Yahudu"). Pedersén 2021 p. 102 (3897–3910): tablets "dated to Nebuchadnezzar years 10–34, or 595–577 BC ... dealing with large amounts of barley, dates, sesame and sesame oil ... The large amount of barley which arrived in several deliveries, each around 10,000 kur = ca. 1,800 m3, cannot have been stored in the vaulted chambers: they are far too small." ### 2.3 Why the identification was rejected - **Koldewey himself** flagged Berossus' placement in the *new* palace, the four-fold size discrepancy and the "Principal Citadel" (above); for his later doubts Pedersén n. 58 cites "Koldewey 1925, 165–167; Koldewey 1932, 3, 15; Koldewey 1990, 170–171" **[not accessed]**; Livius: he "in the end pointed at the only natural stones he could find. He admitted that he was not convinced himself." - **Gothein 1926** (B&R n. 9, 120–124): "nie und nimmer aber, wie Koldewey glaubt, die hängenden Gärten, die übereinstimmend bergig genannt werden, von denen auch nicht ein Zug der Schilderung, weder in Aufbau noch Größe mit diesen Ausgrabungen übereinstimmt". **Margueron 1992, 75–78** (128–133): "Es erscheint aber sinnvoll, auf die traditionelle Ortszuweisung zu verzichten". **Hrouda 1982, 15** (n. 11): the gardens cannot be at the Gewölbebau because Herodotus, arriving by river, would have had to describe them. **Jursa 2004a, 77**: "Heute wird diese These nicht mehr aufrechterhalten". - **Storage, size, stone** — Pedersén pp. 101–102 (3864–3894): the vaults are "a kind of half-basement created by not filling in a 1,600 m2 area when all other parts of the palace were rebuilt with raised floor levels ... effective storage area of around 500–600 m2 per floor"; "Koldewey wanted to place the 'Hanging Gardens', an opinion that has been questioned by many. His location of the gardens here was said to be based on Greek authors, but on basic points, such as description and size, this was obviously not appropriate"; the limestone (max. 105 × 105 cm) "is the same as for the limestone paving on the nearby Processional Way, this may well have been their original placement" (n. 18: "Koldewey 1931, 44, considered the stones to be part of the sub-construction under the 'Hanging Gardens'"). P. 124–125: "Koldewey clearly acknowledged that Nebuchadnezzar's inscriptions and Berossos were talking about the North Palace, but despite that he placed the Hanging Gardens on the vaulted chambers in the northeast corner of the South Palace for reasons that have not convinced others" (4663–4666). - **Distance from the river** — Potts n. 14: "probably too far from the river and more now favor the 'Western Outwork,' a massively walled building between the palace and the river. Both proposals, however, fall foul of Berossus' clear statement that the garden was in (beside?) not the southern palace but the new one Nebuchadnezzar built immediately to the north". Finkel pp. 55–56 makes the same point via Strabo ("the gardens were situated by the river") — **[OCR-RECONSTRUCTED]**; Strabo's Greek: "ἐπὶ δὲ τῷ ποταμῷ ὁ κῆπος". - **Wetzel 1938, Wiseman 1985, Nagel 1978** are cited for the rejection by Finkel ("notably Dr W. Nagel and Professor D. J. Wiseman", OCR) and Pedersén n. 59 — **[NOT VERIFIED]**. ### 2.4 Later Iraqi work Pedersén p. 102 (3889–3892): "There were Iraqi reconstructions of the central walls of the vaulted chambers in the 1960s followed by the rest of the walls and the vaults around 1980. The lowest floor, at about the original level, was used for that reconstruction"; Iraqi excavations c. 1980 also went below the German levels elsewhere in the palace (3855–3862). Alwan 1979 ("The Vaulted Structures or the so-called Hanging Gardens", *Sumer* 35, 127–136) and 1985 (*Sumer* 41) — **[not accessed]**. B&R p. 155 (107–112): "Fauzi Rasheed sah in dem Gebäude eine Art Kühlhaus, das durch die aufliegenden Gärten isoliert und zur Aufbewahrung von Eis und anderen Waren verwendet worden sei [1991]. Wolfram Nagel wollte darin eine Adaption der Gärten seit persischer Zeit sehen, die sich ursprünglich im Westen der Südburg, wohl im Bereich des Außenwerks, befunden hätten". A 1989 Iraqi competition on irrigating the gardens produced Stevenson 1992 ("It was purely by chance, in 1989, that I saw in a newspaper an article announcing a competition sponsored by the Iraqi government to solve the riddle of how the Hanging Gardens of Babylon were irrigated", `stevenson1992_cc.html`), whose scheme Bagg 2000, 277 called "science fiction" (B&R n. 8). --- ## 3. Alternative locations proposed at Babylon ### (a) Wiseman 1983/1985 — Western Outwork and the terraces north of it Not directly accessible. Finkel 1988 p. 57 quotes Wiseman's proposal; the legible OCR fragments (`clayton_price_1993.txt` 3243–3300, **[OCR-RECONSTRUCTED]**) read: "Wiseman has proposed that the Hanging Gardens be placed 'on, and to the north of, the so-called ... "Western Outwork" building between the Western Palace ... and the R. Euphrates' ... 'Excavations of the "Western Outwork" revealed the lower levels of a small, palace-like building which could have been ... pavilion ... It is probable the [gardens] were ... on terraces to the north protected by walls, and formed an amphitheatre-like layout, visible from the palace itself ... may have reached as far as the bīt-akīti temple and gardens which lay to the north outside the citadel. Nebuchadnezzar claims to have built a structure on superimposed terraces when extending his palace across the double defence walls ... Here were found deep drains suitable also for extensive irrigation. They connected with the Östliche Ausfallvorwerk, which Bergamini has suggested to be a reservoir ...' The Iraqi scholar Dr Mu'ayyad Damerji has pointed out that the massive walls by the river (some 25 m thick) may have been stepped and covered with bitumen and matting to form terraces." B&R p. 156 (159–162, n. 12): "Donald Wiseman rekonstruierte die Anlage im westlichen Uferbereich des sogenannten Nordpalastes, wobei er auch den nördlichen Bereich des Außenwerks miteinbezogen sah (Wiseman 1985, 56–59, Plate II)"; followers Stronach 1989, Novák 1999, Cook 2004, Sack 2004. Pedersén: "Wiseman preferred north of the West Fortification." Wiseman 1983 (*AnSt* 33) opens from Barnett's Ashurbanipal relief: "the garden is drawn as planned around a hill, or high feature, on top of which is a garden house. Watering was by aqueduct and channels" (`wiseman1983.pdf`) — his model for Babylon was explicitly the Assyrian relief. ### (b) Reade 2000, *Iraq* 62, 195–217 ("Alexander the Great and the Hanging Gardens of Babylon") Abstract (verified): "According to Greco-Roman writers, the gardens were located at Babylon (Fig. 1) on a high structure in or beside a palace. They were the gift of one of the kings of Babylon to his Median or Persian wife Amyitis, who was homesick for mountain scenery. No remains of any such structure have yet been confidently identified at Babylon. We are free to speculate on their location, since brick-robbing continued at Babylon for thousands of years and removed all but the foundations of many major buildings. Some nineteenth-century travellers liked to see a relic of the gardens in a solitary evergreen tree which grew near the summit of the Kasr mound..." Body as reported by B&R p. 156 (162–177, nn. 13–24): "Julian Reade wollte in eben diesem Außenwerk den Fundamentbau für die Hängenden Gärten erkennen [2000, 208–213] ... ging Reade von einer Orientierung nach Osten zum Palast hin aus"; six possible Kasr areas (207); the ziggurat (203; Saggs 1974, 770: "the tradition could have arisen from the existence of trees on the ziggurat"); Babil after Rassam (205); the "Kasr tree" (196, 213f.); a restored Greek inscription "[Eukratides] ... who once d[ecorated the hanging terraces with gold an]d adorned [the park]..." (n. 24) — dismissed by B&R as "so viel spekulativem Geist". Reade 2000, 200 (B&R n. 68): "It was the failure to recognize the contribution of Nebuchadnezzar … that especially offended Berossus". Pedersén: "Nagel, Damerji, and possibly also Reade wanted to have the gardens on the West Fortification." ### (c) Pedersén 2021 — the North Palace terraces P. 10: "Reasonable suggestions for the location of the Hanging Gardens in the North Palace will be offered" (450). P. 124 (4642–4649): "The similarity to the Babylonian historical inscriptions concerning the North Palace is obvious and shows that Berossos knew and belonged to the same tradition. What he called his father's palace fits the South Palace and his second palace corresponds to the North Palace. A simple reading of the text would be that he placed what was called the 'Hanging Gardens' in the North Palace." "Earlier Greek authors such as Herodotus ... never mentioned the gardens. ... Diodorus ... gives the length, width and height of the gardens as 4 plethra × 4 plethra × 50 cubits, or approximately 120 × 120 × 23 m, which is not so far from the size of the part of the terrace with the main building of the North Palace" (4651–4656). P. 126 (4703–4717): "a preliminary reconstruction of stepped terraces with trees (Fig. 3.23, 3.32, 6.2). The height of the main terrace is +15 m, the embankment 22 m north of the palace has its upper surface at ±0 m and the water in the canal would be about −3 m"; the local "Athele" tamarisk "said to go back to Babylonian times and to be the remains of the royal gardens ... some 80 m west of the stone lion in the northern part of the area here proposed for the Hanging Gardens". On Dalley (p. 125, 4681–4689): "A few have even opted for the alternative that the gardens were not in Babylon but elsewhere. Budge suggested confusion with Hamadan, and Dalley tried Nineveh" (n. 59: "Outside Babylon: Budge 1920, 297–298; Dalley 2013, for which compare Bichler – Rollinger 2005"); "Streck has collected the arguments for placing the gardens in the North Palace based on cuneiform texts." ### (d) Others (all via B&R pp. 155–156 or Pedersén n. 59 unless noted) - **Nagel 1978/1979**: originally west of the Südburg in the Außenwerk; Gewölbebau a Persian-period adaptation; Xerxes' mother Atossa the rebuilder, honouring her "'Großtante Amyite (sic)', für die Nebukadnezar die ursprünglichen Gärten habe errichten lassen (Nagel 1978, 26)" (B&R n. 11). - **Damerji 1981** ("Where are the Hanging Gardens?", *Sumer* 37) and **Hrouda 1982**: Western Outwork, facing west. - **Stevenson 1992, 46**: between the Südburg and the ziggurat enclosure (B&R n. 17). - **Babil** (Rassam; Reade 2000, 205; Koldewey–Wetzel 1931, 42) and **Amran ibn Ali** (Oppert): "ältere Forschung" (B&R nn. 18–19). - **Ziggurat confusion**: Saggs 1974, 770; Streck 2018 ("Grüne Tempeltürme und die Hängenden Gärten von Babylon"), arguing from *kummu/gigunû* in Nbk. 21 **[not accessed]**. - **No real garden**: Beaulieu 2006, van der Spek 2008 (Pedersén n. 59); Livius: "Cleitarchus' fantastic description of the royal palace" (§6). - **Andrew George**: no location proposal found; his contributions are the palace name *bīt tabrâti nišī* and *Tintir = Babylon* (which lists no garden). --- ## 4. Archaeological positives and negatives at Babylon's palaces (Pedersén 2021 unless noted) | Building | Findings (Pedersén 2021; Koldewey 1914) | Bearing | |---|---|---| | **South Palace** | 45,000 m², c. 600 rooms, rebuilt because of groundwater (RINBE 1/1). Vaults = 1,600 m² half-basement, walls founded +0.8 m, floor c. +4.6 m, three storeys, 500–600 m² usable per floor (pp. 101–102); limestone max. 105 × 105 cm = Processional Way paving. Iraqi excavations c. 1980 went below the German levels (3855–3862). Wells: "A series of such wells has been established for the South Palace" (p. 121). Neriglissar 3: river wing collapsed and was refounded at water level. | Only heavily vaulted structure; but dark storage with a ration archive (§2.2), a quarter of 4 plethra, away from the river. Koldewey's triple-shaft well is the one water-raising feature, inside a storage block. **No tree pits, garden soil or planting evidence reported anywhere at Babylon.** | | **North Palace (Hauptburg)** | Three steps (Nbk. 21, 12, 2/23): embankments 360 → 335 → 490 cubits north of Nēmet-Enlil; *pitiq agurri* with *kummu rabû* and *gigunâtu* (pp. 122–123). Terrace c. +15 m; main building c. 17,000 m², complex ≥ 73,000 m². 13 m-wide canal inside the palace with inlet channels and stone grids under the terrace; Koldewey "assumed that a series of such channels would have been found had the excavation of the main canal been continued in a western direction. They would have allowed a rich supply of water to the North Palace, but also to the South Palace, taken up by means of wells and mechanical lifting facilities, giving ample water supply for the palaces (including possible gardens)" (p. 121, 4533–4541); wells "with one exception not yet for the North Palace". Achaemenid text (Abraham 2004 no. 18): "gardeners (nukaribbu) and water drawers (dālû) are attested for both the large palace (ekallu rabû) and the new palace (ekallu eššu) in Babylon" (4543–4548). "Athele" tamarisk tradition; 19th-c. Kasr tree (Reade). | The one place where terrace vocabulary, Berossus' "second palace", water supply and (Achaemenid) gardeners coincide. But "it is destroyed and there have not been enough proper excavations" (p. 126); slopes unexcavated; ground toward the river "much denuded and largely unexcavated" (Potts n. 14); heavy brick robbing (Reade). **Circumstantial only.** | | **West Fortification / Western Outwork** | c. 22,000 m² (300 × 75–95 m) + 14 m embankment; walls c. 20 m thick. Koldewey p. 144 (9263–9284): "a remarkable building that strikes one by the immense thickness of its walls, 20 to 25 metres in width. It is not yet completely excavated. The upper part has been removed at no very distant period by modern brick robbers ... excellent Nebuchadnezzar bricks laid in asphalt ... a number of dwelling-like chambers. A great stairway or ascending ramp is recognisable in the north-east corner". Dug 1906–07 "only with narrow pits and tunnels"; NW part now under the Saddam palace hill (p. 131, 4890–4896). Texts: *ḫalṣu rabītu ina nāri*. | Candidate of Nagel, Damerji, Hrouda, Wiseman, Reade. For: riverside (Strabo), solid walls, ramp, bitumen. Against: called a *fortification*, no planting mentioned; largely unexcavated; Berossus puts the garden in the new palace (Potts). | | **East Fortification** | c. 55,000 m²; Bergamini 1977: partly a reservoir (Finkel p. 57 OCR; Pedersén p. 132). | Hydraulic hint only. | | **Summer Palace (Babil, +25 m)** | Pedersén §3.7. | Older candidate (Rassam); no modern support. | | **River walls** | Nabopolassar's/Nebuchadnezzar's quays (Koldewey ch. XX–XXII). | Engineering only. | Summary of the physical record: Babylon has produced **no** tree pits, no garden soil, no water-lifting installation beyond Koldewey's triple well and ordinary wells, and no structure that matches the 4-plethra, 50-cubit, stone-beamed, lead-sealed description of Diodorus/Strabo. What it has produced is the textual-archaeological fit between Nbk. 21/Nbk. 2 and the North Palace terrace, which is what both Berossus and Pedersén rely on. --- ## 5. The naming problem from the Babylonian side (brief) - **Judith 1:1** (LXX): "Ναβουχοδονόσορ, ὃς ἐβασίλευσεν Ἀσσυρίων ἐν Νινευῆ τῇ πόλει τῇ μεγάλῃ"; KJV "Nabuchodonosor, who reigned in Nineve, the great city" — a Nebuchadnezzar ruling from Nineveh, in a Hellenistic Jewish novella. - **Diodorus 2.3.2** (Ctesias): Ninus "founded on the Euphrates river a city ... And to the city he gave his own name, Ninus" — Nineveh already displaced onto the Euphrates. **2.10.1**: "οὐ Σεμιράμιδος, ἀλλά τινος ὕστερον Σύρου βασιλέως"; **Curtius 5.1.35**: "Syriae regem Babylone regnantem hoc opus esse molitum memoriae proditum est" (Rolfe n.: "Syria for Assyria"). - **Strabo 16.1.1–3**: Babylonia is part of "Assyria"; "Ninus was the man who founded Ninus in Aturia, and his wife, Semiramis ... founded Babylon"; "the city Ninus was wiped out immediately after the overthrow of the Syrians. It was much greater than Babylon, and was situated in the plain of Aturia" — Nineveh known as a dead city distinct from Babylon. - **Herodotus 1.178**: "the most famous and the strongest was Babylon, where the royal dwelling had been established after the destruction of Ninus". **Xenophon *Anab.* 3.4.7, 10**: Larisa and Mespila "inhabited in ancient times by the Medes" — Nineveh's identity already lost in 401 BC. - **Hebrew prophets**: Nahum 1:1 "מַשָּׂא נִינְוֵה", 3:7 "שֻׁדְּדָה נִינְוֵה"; Isaiah 13:1 "מַשָּׂא בָּבֶל", 14:4 "מֶלֶךְ בָּבֶל", but 14:25 "לִשְׁבֹּר אַשּׁוּר בְּאַרְצִי" inside the Babylon oracle; Isaiah 23:13 "הֵן אֶרֶץ כַּשְׂדִּים זֶה הָעָם לֹא הָיָה אַשּׁוּר יְסָדָהּ לְצִיִּים" (NJPS "Behold the land of Chaldea— This is the people that has ceased to be. Assyria, which founded it for ships..."; note "Meaning of verse uncertain"). Assyria/Babylon are blended in Isaiah 13–14, but Nineveh is never called "Babylon". - **Arab geographers (Yaqut etc.)**: nothing found calling Nineveh "Babylon"; originals not checked **[NOT VERIFIED]**. - **Against Dalley's "second Babylon"**: B&R p. 179 (1374–1382): "So kann Dalley keinen einzigen aus neuassyrischer Zeit stammenden Beleg für eine Gleichsetzung Ninives mit Babylon beibringen! ... Die Quellen wissen davon freilich nichts, wie auch Sanherib seine neue Residenzstadt nie als Babylon bezeichnet hat"; the Assyrian *Enūma eliš* recension "bieten diesbezüglich keinen Hinweis"; §3.2.3 (1802–1807): the classical sources are "alle darin einig, dass die Hängenden Gärten in Babylon zu lokalisieren sind. Wie bereits gezeigt, hält die These einer Verwechslung Babylons mit Ninive einer kritischen Überprüfung nicht stand." Potts: "She points to cuneiform texts in which other Babylonian (not Assyrian) cities receive the epithet 'another/second Babylon': but this goes no way to proving an awareness of this esoteric trope in classical times. Neither do Sennacherib's vague allusions to Nineveh being a new 'Babylon-like' capital in texts that no classical author could have read"; "Despite disagreeing on their builder, all sources give the gardens' location as Babylon." --- ## 6. Alexander's Babylon: do eyewitness-derived narratives mention the garden? **Arrian** (Ptolemy/Aristobulus; `arrian_extracts.txt`): 3.16.3–5 — surrender of "their city, citadel, and money"; order to rebuild "all the temples which Xerxes had destroyed, and especially that of Belus". 7.19 (Aristobulus) — "he cut down the cypresses in Babylonia and with them built another fleet; for in the land of the Assyrians these trees alone are abundant"; harbour for 1,000 ships. 7.22 — "Most of the tombs of the Assyrian kings had been built among the pools and marshes." 7.25 (Royal Diary) — "he was carried upon the couch to the river, where he embarked in a boat and sailed across the river to the park ... he was conveyed from the park into the palace." **No hanging garden anywhere in Arrian**; the παράδεισος lies across the river from the palace. **Plutarch** (`plut_alex_p5.txt`, `plut_alex_p10.txt`): 35.15 — "Harpalus, moreover, when he was left as overseer of the country and was eager to adorn the royal gardens and walks with Hellenic plants, succeeded with all except ivy; this the soil would not support" (the only "royal gardens" of Babylon in the Alexander tradition, ground-level and unremarkable). 73 — ravens, Chaldaeans; 76 (Journals) — bathing-room, "He was carried to the palace on the other side of the river on the twenty-fifth"; 77.1 — "Most of this account is word for word as written in the 'Journals.'" **No hanging garden.** **Diodorus 17** (`diod17D.txt`, `diod17F.txt`): 17.64.4–5 — "remained more than thirty days in the city ... designated Agathon of Pydna to guard the citadel"; 17.112.3 — "he could escape the danger if he re-erected the tomb of Belus which had been demolished by the Persians"; 17.116 — diadem omen. **No hanging garden in book 17**; Diodorus put it in book 2 (the Semiramis/Ctesias section) instead. **Curtius 5.1.17–35** (`curtius_rolfe.txt` 16160–16320): 5.1.24 "Semiramis had founded it, not, as many have believed, Belus, whose palace is still pointed out"; 5.1.26 wall of 365 stadia; 5.1.31–32 "Arcem quoque ambitu XX stadia complexam habent ... Super arcem, vulgatum Graecorum fabulis miraculum, pensiles horti sunt, summam murorum altitudinem aequantes multarumque arborum umbra..." — "On the top of the citadel are the hanging gardens, a wonder celebrated in the tales of the Greeks"; 5.1.33–34 stone pillars, 8-cubit trunks, 50 ft high, "XX pedes lati parietes sustinent XI pedum intervallo distantes"; 5.1.35 (Latin above). **Diodorus 2.10.1** (Oldfather): "There was also, because [sic: 'beside'] the acropolis, the Hanging Garden, as it is called, which was built, not by Semiramis, but by a later Syrian king to please one of his concubines; for she, they say, being a Persian by race and longing for the meadows of her mountains, asked the king to imitate ... the distinctive landscape of Persia." Greek: "παρὰ τὴν ἀκρόπολιν ... χάριν γυναικὸς παλλακῆς ... τὸ γένος Περσίδα". 2.7.3 already contrasts Ctesias' 360 stades with "Cleitarchus and certain of those who at a later time crossed into Asia with Alexander, three hundred and sixty-five stades". **Strabo 16.1.5** (Jones): "this and the hanging garden are called one of the Seven Wonders of the World. The garden is quadrangular in shape, and each side is four plethra in length. It consists of arched vaults, which are situated, one after another, on checkered, cube-like foundations ... constructed of baked brick and asphalt ... alongside these stairs there were screws [κοχλίας], through which the water was continually conducted up into the garden from the Euphrates ... For the river, a stadium in width, flows through the middle of the city; and the garden is on the bank of the river. Here too is the tomb of Belus, now in ruins, having been demolished by Xerxes, as it is said ... Alexander intended to repair this pyramid ... the clearing away of the mound was a task for ten thousand men for two months". **Where the garden sits**: Diodorus "beside the acropolis"; Curtius "on top of the citadel"; Strabo "on the bank of the river" near the tomb of Belus — the three are not obviously the same spot at the real Babylon (the ziggurat is 1 km south of the Kasr), which is why Reade's six Kasr areas, the Western Outwork, and even the ziggurat have all been canvassed. **Clitarchus derivation**: B&R p. 169 (838–872): "Eindeutige Aussagen darüber, welcher der uns verlorenen Alexander-Autoren das Wunderwerk der Hängenden Gärten in seine Schilderung von Babylon aufgenommen haben dürfte, sind kaum mehr möglich. Die Indizien, die auf Kleitarch weisen, wiegen allerdings nicht gering ... Da Curtius nun bei der Schilderung der Stadtmauern exakt jene Angabe zu ihrem Umfang macht, die Diodor dem Kleitarch – im Gegensatz zu Ktesias – zuweist, nämlich 365 Stadien, scheint es klar, dass Curtius bei seiner Schilderung einer Überlieferung folgt, die zumindest von Kleitarch mit beeinflusst ist." Livius: "it seems very likely that the Hanging Gardens are in fact Cleitarchus' fantastic description of the royal palace in Babylon. All our sources can, directly or indirectly, be connected to his biography of Alexander." Reade 2000 argues the opposite (a real terraced garden seen by Alexander's men) — abstract only. Dalley 2013 on Clitarchus: **[NOT ACCESSED]**. Net result for the "did eyewitnesses see it?" question: the Ptolemy/Aristobulus/Ephemerides stratum (Arrian, Plutarch 76–77) records palaces, a *paradeisos* across the river, cypresses, the ruined tomb of Belus and Harpalus' ground-level gardens, but **never a hanging garden**; the hanging garden enters only through the Clitarchan stratum (Diodorus 2.10, Curtius 5.1) and the Berossus/Abydenus stratum. --- ## 7. Verification status ### (i) Verified directly against fetched primary sources (files in `raw_B/`) - Nbk. 2 vii 34–ix 44, Nbk. 12 ii 12–20, Nbk. 21 ii 21–35, Nbk. 23, Nbk. 37; absence of GIŠ.KIRI₆/kirimāḫu/Amanus in RINBE 1/1; RIBo glossary count for kirû; the RINBE editors' "not mentioned in this inscription, nor in any other extant text of Nebuchadnezzar"; the "fifteen days" note; Nabonidus 34 and 2001; Neriglissar 3; Langdon Nbk. 13, 19/20, Nabonidus Nr. 1. - Koldewey 1914 ch. XIV pp. 91–100, ch. XXIII pp. 144–145; Pedersén 2021 pp. 10, 101–102, 121–126, 131–132, nn. 18–19, 49–59; Pedersén 2025 archive N1; Bichler & Rollinger 2005 pp. 153–156, n. 67, 169, 179, §3.2.3. - Josephus *Ap.* 1.141 (Greek/Whiston), *Ant.* 10.226; Eusebius *PE* 9.41, *Chronicle* (Amyïtis); Diodorus 2.3.2, 2.7.3, 2.10 (Greek/Oldfather), 17.64, 17.112, 17.116; Curtius 5.1.24–35 (Latin/Rolfe); Strabo 16.1.1–5 (Greek/Jones); Arrian 3.16, 7.17–26; Plutarch *Alex.* 35, 73–77; Herodotus 1.178, 1.184; Xenophon *Anab.* 3.4.7, 10; Judith 1:1; Isaiah 13:1, 14:4, 14:24–27, 23:13; Nahum 1:1, 3:7. - Abstracts of Reade 2000 and Stevenson 1992; opening of Wiseman 1983; Potts 2013; Livius. ### (ii) Resting on secondary sources only - Wiseman 1985 (via Finkel OCR, B&R n. 12, Pedersén n. 59, Potts n. 14); Reade 2000 body (via B&R nn. 13, 18, 21–24, 68; Pedersén n. 59); Nagel 1978/1979, Damerji 1981, Hrouda 1982, Stevenson 1992 pp. 35–54, Rasheed 1991, Alwan 1979/1985, Bergamini 1977, Gothein 1926, Margueron 1992, Jursa 2004a/b, Saggs 1974, Budge 1920, Seymour 2008/2014, Beaulieu 2006, van der Spek 2008, Streck 2018, Rollinger 2013 (all via B&R, Pedersén or Livius); Koldewey 1925/1932 (via Pedersén n. 58, Livius); Weidner 1939 (via Pedersén 2025); Abraham 2004 no. 18 (via Pedersén p. 121); Dalley 1994/2013's "second Babylon" argument (via B&R §3.2.1, Potts). - Finkel 1988: every quotation is **OCR-reconstructed** from an unusable scan and must be checked against the printed book. ### (iii) Not accessible Wiseman 1985 *Nebuchadrezzar and Babylon* (archive.org lending 401); Wiseman 1983 full text; Dalley 1994 full text; Dalley 2013 (lending 401; Google Books 403; academia.edu 403); Reade 2000 full text (Cambridge Core paywall; Semantic Scholar/unpaywall closed); Stevenson 1992 full text; Nagel 1978 *MDOG* 110 and 1979 *Sumer* 35; Damerji 1981; Alwan 1979/1985; Rasheed 1991; Streck 2018; Koldewey 1925, 1931 (WVDOG 54), 1932 (WVDOG 55); Wetzel 1938 (WVDOG 59); Da Riva 2012 (Wadi Brisa) and RINBE 1/2; RIBo Babylon 7 text pages (oracc unreachable; only the glossary via Wayback); Arabic geographers on Nineveh; Weidner 1939; Abraham 2004.