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Primary sourceArtifact19th century engraving of an ancient original

Sill of a Door from Khorsabad

Jules Bourgoin · 19th century engraving of an ancient original

A carved stone threshold from a palace of Ashurbanipal, shown here in a 19th-century engraving of the object now in the Louvre.

This threshold is recorded as coming from a palace built by Ashurbanipal, a surviving fitting of his royal architecture.

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Engraved line drawing of a door sill from Khorsabad, shown in the Louvre. A rectangular slab with a dense geometric lattice of interlocking diamonds and rosettes in the center, bordered by a band of rosettes and a lower band of standing figures in rows. Caption reads Fig. 96, Sill of a door, from Khorsabad, Louvre, Length 40 inches, Drawn by Bourgoin.
Jules Bourgoin, engraving of a door sill from Khorsabad, published 1884. Original in the Louvre, Paris.

About this source

What it is

This is an engraved line drawing by Jules Bourgoin, a professor at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, showing a carved stone door sill from Khorsabad. The actual threshold has been in the Louvre since 1855 and is recorded as coming from a palace of Ashurbanipal.

The drawing shows a rectangular slab with a dense geometric pattern of diamonds and rosettes, bordered by rows of standing figures.

Why it matters

Thresholds like this were part of the physical fabric of Assyrian royal palaces. This surviving fitting is evidence of the scale and decoration of the palaces Ashurbanipal built, and shows how 19th-century scholars and artists recorded Assyrian remains for European audiences.

Look closer

  • Why do you think this object was drawn rather than photographed?
  • What does the geometric pattern suggest about the craftsmanship of the palace?
  • What is lost by seeing a drawing of the object rather than the object itself?

This artifact is part of the curated material that grounds the AI version of Ashurbanipal on Humy.ai — when students ask about related events, the AI can quote it and cite it.

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