Scientific research on Nebuchadnezzar II's palace from an architectural point.

1. Ro
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History of Architecture and Arts
Nzeer Al-Durobi
Dr.Shrief Al-said
Palace
of
Nebuchadnezzar II

2. Table of Content
1. Introduction
2. Materials
3. Palace Description
- East entrance
- Eastern courtyard
- Gate building between
east and west courtyards
- Western courtyard
- West courtyard hall
4. Ishtar Gate
5. Procession Way
6. Hanging Gardens
7. Royal buildings plank
8. Resources
1
2 – 3
4
5
- East entrance
- Eastern courtyard
6 – 12
rd hall
13 – 14
15 – 16
17 – 19
20
21

3. Nebuchadnezzar has a large palace that contains several castles, and in the
center of it is a large distinctive castle that he chose for himself, which
archaeologists called (the palace of the main castle) to distinguish the parts of the
great palace. The palace was built with better materials than those used in the
grandiose southern castle.
Nebuchadnezzar said: (My palace in Babylon was not enough to my royal
antiques, and because my heart is full of reverence and awe to my Lord Marduk,
so I did not change the street of my safe city that I love, because of the expansion
of my royal residence, nor did I demolish its sacred temple, and did not destroy its
canal, and I took into consideration. Length and width at the time of constructing
my new residence to protect the wall of Babylon at a distance of 490 cubits beside
Nimti Elil, and I constructed two large dams of asphalt and burnt bricks, and a
fortress on the height of the mountain. ). So the palace is located in the north,
outside the heart of the city, and the walls protect the city from enemy attacks.
I nt roduc t ion
Figure 1. Imaginary image of
King Nebuchadnezzar
Source: Google
Figure 2. Marduk temple, the great ancient goddess of the Babylonians
Source: Google
2

4. Unfortunately, the palace has not been completely excavated.
Nebuchadnezzar and the later kings used to place slogans of victory,
monument, and the like on the main entrance. The entrance was to the
east, coming from the large open square, which was located between the
palace and the wall of the procession Street. There are two parts behind
each other, and each section has a large courtyard located as usual in front
of the main hall in the south, and between the two courtyards is the gate
building that connects them to each other with a large hall in front and
another small back, exactly on the same eastern main entrance, and the
rows of numerous small rooms and corridors extend here and there. There
are no stand-alone houses like the existing ones in the Southern Citadel,
as it indicates the existence of a large number of independent residential
apartment complexes in one way or another.
Figure 3. Plan of the palace of the main castle of Nebuchadnezzar. Source: Google
Figure 4. King Nebuchadnezzar as
killing a lion is inscribed on the main
gate Source: the book "the mystery of
the hanging garden of Babylon"
Figure 5. Some inscriptions decorating the entrance to the
palace. Source: the book "the mystery of the hanging garden
of Babylon"
3

5. Mat erials
Nebuchadnezzar was especially proud of the speedy
completion of this building in a period of (15) days, which
indicates continuous and regular activity, and that a huge
amount of workers were used to work stacked side by side
so that every square meter had one worker. Contractors
must then have sufficient experience and practice to deal
with these conditions. The building is still standing today, to
a height of (+15.36) meters, and it does not show any signs
of rapid construction. The lime mortar - used at that time in
construction - is very pure and white in color and very solid,
especially in the middle and upper sections. As for the lower
parts, it is somewhat gray, and on the edges of the fence it
forms a band 3 to 4 centimeters wide of reddish lime mortar
that acquires hydraulic features By adding red clay powder
to it, it prevents moisture from seeping into the fences, and
here and there we find layers of papyrus over the mortar. It
seems that the Babylonians did rely on asphalt alone to
prevent moisture, and this asphalt was replaced by clay
with a width of 10 cm below the roof of the foundations
porch at the edge - and this prevents moisture infiltration. Its
heat is so high that it always sticks not only to the lower
basement bricks, but also to the upper ones, very adhesion,
and it is so strong that, to this day, we cannot separate stone
from stone without breaking the two stones.
4
Figure 6. A group of pictures taken in
Nebuchadnezzar Palace in Iraq showing the
materials used in different places in the
palace Source: Google

6. Pala c e Plan
5
These parts of the palace will be explained in more details next slides
Figure 7. Plan of the palace of the main castle of Nebuchadnezzar. Source: Nomination Dossier

7. The main gate, which is 4.15 meters wide, is located
approximately in the middle of the eastern front. The width of the
front wall of the entrance hall is 3.52 meters. A strip of width of
one meter extends along the eastern front and has been cutting it
from the bricks to a depth (+30 and 7 meters) above the level of
the porch roof. This band is separated from the balcony wall by a
sinuous notch, as we can clearly see this at a close distance in
the south, and the balcony must have been supported by a better
stone tape, while its mortar was not resistant, which was
tempting thieves to go to greater depths in this position. We also
notice at the southern castle gate building between the middle
courtyard and the main courtyard a wall paved to the wall on
which a staircase was built, apparently, reaching the roof, and
one could reach from the large front room to the small middle
room of the gate after go through the large door, and the length
of the middle room only 7.33 meters. And there is a corridor 2.72
meters wide south of the gate building, and this corridor
represents the link from the courtyard to the group of south-
eastern rooms, and the remainder at the courtyard door is the
northern façade with a width of 2.10 m and the southern façade
with a width of 2.82 meters, and from this corridor two other
corridors of equal width each start 2.72 meters to the south.
Eas t Ent ran c e
6
Figure 8. Picture showing the main entrance to
Nebuchadnezzar Palace
Source: Nomination Dossier

8. The foundations of the courtyard appeared in the western part, which are extended in the form of strips 3 meters wide and at least two meters
thick, and the length of these blocks consisting of yellow bricks built with white lime mortar is approximately 7.5 meters. As for the remainder of
the front wall of the hall at the southern side of the courtyard in the east and west, with a width of 12 stones (= 4.16 meters). We do not know
whether the wall is covered by an arch, because the southern wall of the room, which can be used for inference, was buried. The southern wall
and the western wall have not been excavated, but there are some stones from the southern wall in its eastern part that indicate an
approximate position, and the location of the western wall is also determined roughly through the adjacent western room.
Eas t ern Co u rt y ard
7
Figure 9. A three-dimensional view of Nebuchadnezzar's Palace
Source: Google

9. The section generally consists of a large entrance room, a small exit room, and the front wall of the large room, width of 6 stones (= 2.16
meters). The northern wall has two doors, one of which leads to a small room, the area of ​​which is two square meters and has three doors.
One of these doors leads on the left to a small room connected to the gate room, and this in turn leads to another room that seems to have
had no other entrance. As for the second door of the small room, it leads straight to another room with three doors, and for that room an
entrance leads to the courtyard and another northern entrance leads into a room with three doors, and from this room we can enter the left
into a room whose walls remain up to the level of the door. The seals on the walls are the seven-line seals of Nebuchadnezzar, which are
heavily carved. Bricks are found with a three-line seal at the pillars next to the small room in the far north.
Gate Building Between East and West Courtyards
8
Figure 9. The gate between east and west courtyards
Source: the book "the mystery of the hanging garden of
Babylon"
Figure 10. Plan of the palace of the main castle of Nebuchadnezzar. Source: Google
Figure 11. The lion inscription, which was repeated in
several locations in the palace
Source: Google

10. looters in this area have dug all the
walls, so they are irregular in their
extension lines and most of them are
crumbling. Many parts have been cut off
from the exit compartment in the gate
building and the remaining parts are
from the southern and western wall. The
room to the south of the entrance room
was severely devastated, leaving only
the northwest corner, and in any case it
was a short corridor extending from it
towards the south and leading to the
secondary room of the hall at the
eastern courtyard. The striking thing
about the palace tradition is the
closeness and abundance of the doors
lined up side by side.
9
Figure 12. A recent photo showing a location of the gate between east and
west courtyards. Source: Nomination Dossier
Figure 13. Arabic inscriptions on the wall. Source: Google

11. Its length from north to south is 35 meters, and from east to
west 33 meters. The height of the porch is +7.63 meters. But
for the sites under which the wall, which is 17 meters thick
and whose upper edge reaches a height of 6.80 meters, is
at 8.05 meters. The old fortification wall was solidly
constructed and had deep foundations, but it was canceled
during the construction of the palace. We do not know how
deep its foundations were, as excavations were carried out
at the entrance to the thick wall until the groundwater level at
that time reached + zero, and did not reach the bottom. The
lime mortar used here is gray in color.
The seals are rare but was there an inscription: (Ba-B-Y-Lu)
on broken yellow bricks. Nothing remains of the foundations
of the courtyard on the porch walkway, unlike the eastern
courtyard, where the foundations remained up to a height
+12.66 meters, which is of course much higher.
Westren Courtyard
10
Figure 14. A picture showing the western courtyard. Source: Google
Figure 15. Inscriptions found during excavation operations. Source: Google

12. The hall is a simple transverse room, containing a flat corner
opposite the door, which is the place that was designated for a
statue or a bed for rest. As it appears, first in the west of the
castle, that the hall is doubled, and secondly, both of these
rooms are enlarged on the narrow sides of a secondary room, in
addition to the throne corner, which was originally flat, has been
expanded to a square back room. One cannot believe that the
columns of such walls were so far from each other that they only
carried one great load, or that there were separate columns or
columns between them. However, the walls between the
columns in the middle hall remain so high that one is forced to
categorically reject the latter idea. It is absolutely inconceivable
from a methodological point that all the master plans, along with
all the door columns and other details of all Babylonian
buildings, had deep, well-defined roots in the layers of
foundations. The eastern wall of the side room contains three
corridors, which in turn lead to short corridors.
Westren Courtyard Hall
11
Figure 16. A picture showing
the western courtyard hall.
Source: Google

13. A drainage channel runs along the wall.
The corridors of the transverse and joint
bricks (semi complete and complete) at
the corners and axes. The cracks of the
solution and tension in the walls are
very regular, except that a square brick
at the beginning of the course changes
the pattern of uniformity and it is
repeated in all the spaces stacked on
top of each other as a result of the
presence of that piece of bricks that was
necessary to close the drainage
channel. And the thickness of the wall,
which is 1.75 meters, itself also contains
five stones and a piece of patchwork, so
it seems as if the architect wanted to
make the five stones as 2 / 4.1 cubits.
The walls of this region are covered with
countless modern graffiti: Arabic,
Turkish, Hebrew, Greek, Armenian,
German, French and English names of
visitors who immortalized themselves
here.
12
Figure 18. Engravings on the outer wall of the palace. Source: Google
Figure 17. Imaginary image of King Nebuchadnezzar. Source: Google

14. The Ishtar Gate was constructed circa 575
BCE. It was the eighth gate of the city of
Babylon (in present day Iraq) and was the
main entrance into the city. The Ishtar Gate
was part of Nebuchadnezzar's plan to beautify
his empire's. The Ishtar Gate is named so,
because it was dedicated to the Babylonian
goddess Ishtar. The animals represented on
the gate are young bulls (aurochs), lions, and
dragons (sirrush). These animals are symbolic
representations of certain deities: lions are
often associated with Ishtar, bulls with Adad,
and dragons with Marduk. Respectively, Ishtar
was a goddess of fertility, love, and war.
Marduk was the chief or national god of
Babylon.
Ishtar Gate
13

15. The front of the gate is adorned with glazed bricks with
alternating rows of dragons and bulls. The beasts are
furnished in yellow and brown tiles, while the bricks
surrounding them are blue. The blue enameled tiles are
thought to be of lapis lazuli, but there is some debate to
this conjecture. The gates measured more than 11.5 m
high with a vast antechamber on the southern side. The
Ishtar gate was excavated between 1902 to 1914 CE
during which 13.7 m of the original foundation of the
gate was discovered. The gate was originally a double
gate, but the Pergamon Museum only utilizes the
smaller, frontal part. The second gate is currently in
storage. Originally, the gate had a door and roof made
of cedar and bronze, which was not built for the
reconstruction. A smaller reconstruction of the Ishtar
Gate was built in Iraq under Saddam Hussein as the
entrance to a museum. However, this reconstruction
was never finished due to war.
14
Figure 19. Ishtar Gate. Source: Google
Figure 20. dragons inscribed on the Ishtar Gate.
Source: Google
Figure 22. bulls inscribed on the Ishtar Gate. Source: Google
Figure 21. lions inscribed on the Ishtar Gate. Source: Google

16. 1- The part located south of the Ishtar Gate:
A 10-meter-wide street extends approximately 12 meters from the eastern wall of the southern fortress, and this street is Babel Street for the procession of the great god
Marduk, which Nebuchadnezzar paved with shadows (stone tiles from the mountains) and tiles (Tormina Panda) which are breccia stones with red veins And white. The
New Years eve parade was launched on it, coming from the Isakela Temple in the south, passing the castle and from the Ishtar Gate towards the house of new year
celebrations. A secondary street branches off from the aforementioned street, on which a brick niche stands, diverging from the street’s axis to the east, and it must have
served the ceremonies of the celebrations procession.
(2) The part located to the north of the Ishtar Gate:
The thickness of the wall in the west of the street is 13 meters, its western wall is flat, and it has towers, and the part confined between two towers diverges towards the
back by 1.38 meters, and in this part a gate with a width of 3.95 meters, this gate reaches the space between the old wall and the new wall, which is 17 m thick. And the
fence accompanying the street in the east. On the sides, the tiles with red and white veins formed what looked like a sidewalk, and the tiles had cracks filled with asphalt.
The walls of the ramparts overlooking the Procession Street were decorated with a wall pattern consisting of prominent lions.
Procession Way
15

17. 16
Figure 23. new photo of procession way.
Source: Google
Figure 25. new photo of procession way.
Source: Nomination Dossier
Figure 24. Lion inscriptions along the procession way..
Source: Google
Figure 26. Imaginary image of procession way..
Source: Google

18. The Hanging Gardens of Babylon the fabled gardens which adorned the capital of the Neo-Babylonian Empire, built by its greatest king
Nebuchadnezzar II (r. 605-562 BCE). One of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, they are the only wonder whose existence is disputed
amongst historians. The majority of scholars agree that the idea of cultivating gardens purely for pleasure, as opposed to the production of food,
originated in the Fertile Crescent, where they were known as a paradise. From there the notion would spread throughout the ancient
Mediterranean so that by Hellenistic times even private individuals, or at least the wealthier ones, were cultivating their own private gardens in
their homes.
Hanging Gardens
17

19. Gardens were not just about flowers and plants,
either, as architectural, sculptural, and water
features were added, and even the views were a
consideration for the ancient landscape gardener.
Gardens became such a desired feature that fresco
painters, such as those at Pompeii, covered entire
walls of villas with scenes which gave the illusion
that on entering a room one was also entering a
garden. All of these outdoor pleasant places, then,
owed their existence to ancient Mesopotamia and,
above all, to the magnificent Hanging Gardens of
Babylon.
18 Figure 28. A modern building based on the concept of hanging gardens.
Source: Google
Figure 27. Two imaginary pictures of
the Hanging Gardens of Babylon
Source: Google

20. When the canals, weir, tunnel, dam and bridge-style aqueduct with corbelled
stone arches, all designed and constructed by Nebuchadnezzar’s engineers, were
traced and published in 1935, scholars were amazed that such an extensive and
well-planned scheme existed in the early 7th century bc It was not then
fashionable to be concerned with the economics of ancient Mesopotamian cities;
art and architecture, alongside texts, were the main focus of study
More than 2,000 years of accumulated expertise lay behind the
engineering required for the supply of water to Babylon, its
orchards and its citadel with the Hanging Garden. An effective
control of water was always crucial to the growth and continuity
of cities and agriculture in Mesopotamia.
Engineering for Water Management
19
Figure 29. Sketch to show a water-raising screw..
Source: : the book "the mystery of the hanging garden of Babylon"
Figure 28. Diagram to show a qanat: aerial view and side section.
Source: : the book "the mystery of the hanging garden of Babylon"

21. After the excavations, he discovered the
Nebuchadnezzar Writing Tablet, which
archaeologists called the (writing tablet
parallel to the stone writing tablet), which
is the most famous and accurate tablet
written for Nebuchadnezzar, and the tablet
is concerned with the three royal palaces
(the southern castle - the main castle -
and Babylon) in addition to mentioning
their majestic temples in Babylon and
Borsba, and then the city wall.
Royal buildings plank
The Tablet states as the following:
My heart drove me to build a palace of the Babel Palace style to protect Babylon in Kalab (Ginkal), bricks burnt to the north, and Aba Dana was built
with asphalt and baked bricks. Inside, it is 60 cubits long, towards Sippar. And she prepared a high ground for him, its foundation at the chest of the
underworld facing the water. Its ridge is sturdy ... and raised its summit and linked it to the palace and raised its summit like lofty mountains. And its
roof is made of huge cedar trunks, its doors are of cedar wood clad with copper, and their thresholds and axes are made of bronze
20
Figure 30. Diagram to show a qanat: aerial view and side section.
A variety of inscriptions written in the Akkadian language
Source:: Google

22. Resources
21
‫ﻛﺗﺎب‬
‫اﻟﻘﻼع‬
‫اﻟﻣﻠﻛﯾﺔ‬
‫ﻓﻲ‬
‫ﺑﺎﺑل‬ the mystery of the hanging
garden of Babylon
Nomination Dossier for Inscription of the
Property on the World Heritage List
January 2018

23. THANKS FOR YOUR TIME