At Susa, the ancient , named 'Shushan the Palace' in the Book of Daniel, situated in Persia, once the ancient capital of Elam, the excavators, workin… - Claude Hermann Walter Johns

The ancient authors, who founded the Science of History, whose names remain household words amongst us still, such as Herodotus or Xenophon, have transmitted to modern times some far-off echoes of the fame of . Many scattered references in classical writers serve to show the impression that its wealth and power had made on the Greek imagination. Aeschylus and Aristophanes, Aristotle and others, will be recalled. After Alexander the Great had included it in his conquests, a closer acquaintance with its still marvellous remains and magnificent traditions enhanced its interest for many writers less generally known: Arrian, , Pausanias may be named.

The value to a great Empire, such as that of , or of , of an accurate record of the available population, its resources and occupations, must always have been appreciated. We now know that from very early times (the third millenium B. C.) ample material existed for such a . Estates were carefully surveyed and the areas of the fields estimated from actual measurements, correct to the last finger-breadth. The boundaries, names of neighbours, of roads, canals, streets, or public buildings, adjoining, were exactly stated. The class of land, corn-field, vineyard, orchard, or pasture, the names of the tenants or serfs and the average yield were set down. Boundary stones engraved with the minutest details of the adjoining estate, and often bearing a short abstract of its recent history, were erected. So many of these monuments have already found their way to European Museums that it is perhaps not too much to say that were an accurate survey now made of Babylonia, with a notice of the landmarks and boundary stones still in situ, and probably easily to be recovered, we should be able to map out every town and village, road and canal, and most of the fields in that ancient centre of the world's history.

As the study of paved the way for those changes of thought which went to form the and remade Europe, so now the study of the languages and literature of ancient Egypt and Babylonia is likely to revolutionize our views of the Bible.