Assyrian Architecture

Assyrian architecture is the building tradition of the Neo Assyrian Empire, centered on the city of Assur in Mesopotamia and dominant across the Near East from about 911 to 612 BC. Its defining monuments are the royal palace complexes at Nimrud, Khorsabad and Nineveh, entered through gateways guarded by lamassu, colossal stone figures with the body of a bull or lion, a human head and wings. Palace interiors were lined with low relief panels carved in stone and gypsum alabaster, painted and mounted on the walls in horizontal registers to narrate the king's wars, hunts and ceremonies. The style is distinguished from earlier Mesopotamian building by its extensive use of carved stone facing over mud brick construction, at a scale of narrative relief not matched again until Roman column reliefs centuries later.