Empires of the Plain: Henry Rawlinson and the Lost Languages of Babylon

by Lesley Adkins

From 1827 Henry Rawlinson, fearless soldier, sportsman and imperial adventurer of the first rank, spent twenty-five years in India, Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan in the service of the East India Company. During this time he survived the dangers of disease and warfare, including the disastrous First Anglo-Afghan War. A gifted linguist, fascinated by history and exploration, he became obsessed with cuneiform, the world's earliest writing. An immense inscription high on a sheer rock face at Bisitun in the mountains of western Iran, carved on the orders of King Darius the Great of Persia over 2,000 years ago, was the key to understanding the many cuneiform scripts and languages. Only Rawlinson had the physical and intellectual skills, courage, self-motivation and opportunity to make the perilous ascent and copy the monument.

Here, Lesley Adkins relates the story of Rawlinson's life and how he triumphed in deciphering the lost languages of Persia and Babylonia, overcoming his brilliant but bitter rival, Edward Hincks. While based in Baghdad, Rawlinson became involved in the very first excavations of the ancient mounds of Mesopotamia, from Nineveh to Babylon, an area that had been fought over by so many powerful empires. His decipherment of the inscriptions resurrected unsuspected civilizations, revealing intriguing details of everyday life and forgotten historical events. By proving to the astonished Victorian public that people and places in the Old Testament really existed (and, furthermore, that documents and chronicles had survived from well before the writing of the Bible), Rawlinson became a celebrity and assured his own place in history.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Language, Biography, Archaeology, Ancient History, Linguistics

424 pages, Hardcover

First published December 13, 2003

Reviews

[Claire · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fascinating and engrossing read. I've read a lot about ancient Mesopotamia but before reading this book I knew little of the incredible story behind the translation of cuneiform writing. It's amazing to think that only two hundred years ago almost nothing was known about the civilisations of Mesopotamia other than what was written in the Old Testament. While at times I yearned for more detail about the actual process of translation, I think it's better for the general reader that Adkins focuses on the story of Rawlinson's life and of cuneiform translation rather than on the particulars of the translation process. The story centres not just around Rawlinson's own career as an officer of the East India Company army and a self-taught translator of cuneiform, but also on the contemporaneous first-time excavations of Mesopotamian cities such as Nimrud, Ninevah, Khorsabad and Borsippa. Adkins vividly portrays the many and varied personalities in the book, including Henry Rawlinson, the archaeologist Austen Henry Layard, and Rawlinson's bitter and jaded (but inspired) rival Edward Hincks. The author's liberal use of letters and diary entries also provides a sense of immediacy to the events and personalities under discussion. This book is a must read for anyone interested in ancient Mesopotamia or archaeology in general, in the translation of ancient texts and languages, or in British involvement in India, Persia and Afghanistan in the 19th century.

[Avery · Rating 3 out of 5]

An irritating read that I had to push through to the end. The subject is fascinating and could make for top-quality reading: Henry Rawlinson's discovery of cuneiform and ancient Babylon, true Indiana Jones type stuff. The problem is that the author doesn't really know what kind of information to supply about the discovery. Exactly the wrong kinds of background information are supplied: lengthy play-by-play summaries of diaries and letter exchanges, and irritatingly spotty passages about other research into cuneiform going on in Europe at the time. The suspense and excitement of discoveries and competitions is thereby muted.

As Stephen Jay Gould has written, science is often a matter of slow consensus-building rather than eureka moments, and the author seems to be making the case that cuneiform worked this way. But surely there were moments of realization when Rawlinson and others first recognized that the Babylonian king chronologies overlapped with the Bible, or that some tablets were over 3000 years old. These moments are only hinted at in the narrative. Worth reading if you really want to know about the subject. Will hesitatingly keep my purchase, but it's better to skim this book at the library.

[Betawolf · Rating 4 out of 5]

An engaging and thorough biography of Henry Rawlinson, with a particular focus on the contributions made by him and others in deciphering the cuneiform writing system once used throughout ancient Mesopotamia. Adkins is gifted a brilliant and well-documented subject, and handles him appropriately, with large portions of every chapter being made up of artfully-inserted quotations from journals, letters, and old publications. Having both private and public writing to supplement the narrative of Rawlinson's recorded movements and achievements, the reader gets a more intimate sense of the man -- the insecurities of his private self-assessments, the sometimes calculated bravado, the cautious tone of his scholarship, and his occasional failures to rise above pride.

The book was less directly instructive on the topic of cuneiform than I had hoped. In review, I think I have actually picked up a fair amount, but it is in the main part from tidbits scattered throughout the biography slotting into prior reading. Adkins focuses on the scholarly history of the subject slightly more than the subject itself, so you will find a great deal about the disputes between Hincks and Rawlinson as to who had priority in discovering an important piece of a puzzle, and far less about the development itself. This is perfectly fine -- the book isn't a primer on cuneiform -- but makes some of the academic drama a little harder to follow. It does not help matters that many of the names given to the languages expressed in various cuneiform scripts were wrong, so the quotes refer to an array of languages that it is hard to keep straight in your head (quick, was Rawlinson's erroneous guess at 'Scythic' actually what we now call Akkadian, or was it the other language that they at one time called Akkadian (Sumerian), and which of those is also what they refer to as Elamite?).

There are several elements of Rawlinson's life that are worth commenting on. First, the strange and sad fact that on being shipped off to a foreign country when quite young, Rawlinson was understandably melancholy about being separated from his large family, and wrote to them frequently, but for over a year not one of them bothered to return his post. As a Brit who counts the time between speaking to my family in months, this still seemed pretty cold, and was never really explained -- were they all that sick of him? Was this calculated to help him focus on his new career? The effect on Rawlinson was at any rate easy to see. Second, I was struck by how much of a scholarly life Rawlinson was able to lead while serving in the military; it was a significant enabler for him, not only putting him on the ground by significant sites, but also allowing a surprising amount of free time for expeditions. The Empire was, it seemed, very much a place for adventurers of all kinds. Third, the regrettable rivalry between Rawlinson and Hincks was given a fair amount of focus, and it was disappointing to hear that this was never overcome. Rawlinson and Hincks were at their best cordial toward each other in acknowledging accomplishments, and at their worst petty and paranoid, with Rawlinson hoarding primary materials to his own advantage and Hincks moaning bitterly about every slight, however accidental. I had hoped that, at least when it came to the matter of Hincks finding funding to continue his studies, Rawlinson might magnanimously help out his peer, whom he if nothing else surely acknowledged as one of the most accomplished philologists tackling the problem -- but no, Rawlinson let jealousy and pride get the better of him, and actively worked against Hincks from his pinnacle in the public eye and the regard of institutions like the British Museum.

The scholarly environment of the period was one of the most interesting features to see in action. Journals publishing incomplete articles, chapters of books that take so long to prepare that the language outlined in Chapter 1 might be heavily revised by the time Chapter 7 is published, the effect of communication delays from Iraq on the perception of academic priority -- all of it rather weird and wonderful. There is however a much stronger sense that the people involved in the conversation really are experts, despite (or perhaps because of) the fact many of them were self-trained and fitting the work around other concerns.

This was on the whole enjoyable reading, and I would probably follow it up with more. As an archaeologist, Adkins seems worth reading on other archaeological history -- I note her Keys of Egypt is on a similar topic.

[Maureen · Rating 2 out of 5]

I found this a difficult read. The material was very interesting and Rawlinson a very interesting character: the intrepid, multi-talented British explorer, soldier and statesman of the type that kept the British Empire going for a long time. Readers interested in the politics of Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and Russia and the surrounding areas will find the history of interest. But I thought that there was a narrative level missing, some way of more easily navigating all of the detail. Great credit to the author, though, for assembling the information and painting the picture of Rawlinson.

[Lili Kyurkchiyska · Rating 3 out of 5]

Горещо препоръчвам за хора, които тепърва навлизат в тематиката, тъй като е написана достъпно и то на базата на архивен материал. Полезна е и с това, че дава основна представа за епохата.

[Lucy Cummin · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story of Henry Rawlinson who pioneered the translation of cuneiform, a man of many talents, all crucial: physical endurance, agility, great intelligence and ability to focus. Posted to India at first and finding himself with time on his hands he learned Persian and then was sent to what is now Iraq as a result. There he became fascinated by cuneiform even to clambering around on cliffsides to copy the figures. Twenty years with no return to England he was outstanding as an administrator, admired by all he encountered, and achieved amazing progress in his goals. While there were others on the same path none of them had his combined talents and he must get special credit for putting his outstanding qualities to good use.
Overall as a story, Adkins had no choice but to put in much detail about the pickier aspects of translating, but she does an admirable job at not going in too deep and staying focused on the main elements of Rawlinson's character and story. I spent a good deal of time reading about some of the places mentioned, looking for images and so on, always a good sign with me that I am engaged. Be aware though that this is not an 'exciting' read unless you are obsessed with cuneiform!***1/2

[Holly · Rating 3 out of 5]

I picked this book up in the Geography building at my University, and it then became a reference text for essays within modules such as Geographies of Violence.
After finishing University, I decided to pick up this book and read it cover-to-cover so that I could donate it after the fact.
The overall subject matter of this text did pique my interest, yet I found the book to focus very heavily on the intricacies of language rather than the ‘story’ of Rawlinson’s life and discoveries. I think that perhaps I was inadvertently looking for a non-fiction told like fiction, and instead this book left me reading what felt like a cross between an academic paper on language and Rawlinson’s biography. I unfortunately found myself becoming bored and listless after the first two pages of each chapter, with such chapters needing to be condensed considerably as they become a challenge to complete.

Overall, I was excited about this book after the promise of the first few chapters, but unfortunately I do not find the subtleties and science of language very interesting, and thus I was eager to finish this book and move on. Having said this, I am glad that I have been able to learn about Cuneiform and the collection of people surrounding its discovery and study!

[Sarah · Rating 1 out of 5]

Abandoned on page 112 of 374. Just really dull. It’s all long quotes from sources, no real explanation and nothing that brings anything to life. Chapter 4 on Cuneiform was better and it’s possible that the book improves as more is discussed about the decipherment. However I cannot bear the thought of reading anymore to find out.

[Thomas Womack · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an odd book, in that the underlying tale of the decipherment of cuneiform, the decryption of the Mesopotamian languages, and the discovery that the various Assyrian empires mentioned in the Bible were real places with their own recorded histories, is rather lost in the biography of an admittedly impressive character of Imperial Britain.

[Robin Kuritzky · Rating 4 out of 5]

A detailed and very readable account of one of the great men of the East India Company who led an astounding life of bravery, audacity & scholarship and was the key figure in the deciphering of cuneiform and the languages in which it was written- Assyrian, Babylonian, Elamite and even old Persian.

[John Somers · Rating 4 out of 5]

14/20.

[Shanthanu · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is subtitled ``Henry Rawlinson and the Lost Languages of Babylon'', but there is a lot more Rawlinson and far too less on cuneiform or the ancient languages in question. Having read an account of Champollion's decipherment of Egyptian Hieroglyphs by the same author, I had expected something in the same vein which would describe the process of decipherment and its results in more detail.

As far as a biography of Rawlinson, I felt as another reviewer mentioned there wasn't much of a narrative quality to the book, and read more like a series of disjointed episodes about this heroic Englishman's adventures in the benighted east where he subdues and overcomes the ignorant natives. Also the dozen mentions of Rawlinson's solo free-climb of the Bisitun rock face every time someone else claimed it was unapproachable get a bit old.

All in all, there's some interesting historical information but a bit too uncritical and hagiographical for my tastes.

[Liz · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well-written, really interesting book on the discoveries that we now take for granted, of the ancient Mesopotamian civilizations, their importance & relevance to us today, and of the discoverers thereof, mainly Henry Rawlinson of the East India Company.

[Jessica · Rating 3 out of 5]

Gets off to a sluggish start, but picks up steam in the second half with the introduction of Rawlinson's rival Hincks.

[John · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wish I could have been in or seen those times in history, the awe of those sites.

[Sue · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story of Henry Rawlinson, who combined scholarship with adventure and exploration, to make a significant contribution to the understanding of early languages.

[Ian Hodkinson · Rating 4 out of 5]

A thorough and well researched account of the life and times of Henry Rawlinson who deciphered the cuneiform script used as a written record by a variety of early languages in the Middle East. Rawlinson spent much of his life in Persia, Afghanistan, Iraq and India in the 19th Century - truly one of Britain's finest. Despite being a somewhat dry subject matter, the biographical mixed with the historical and linguistic flows well.