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The jewelry uncovered this year gives a new perspective to the Assyrian empire's brutish reputation. "What is surprising is the amazing variety," says Herrmann. "It is not just the gold, but the different colors and the use of polychromatic stones." Agrees Curtis of the British Museum: "It revolutionizes the idea we have of the Assyrian court. No one knew they ^ possessed this kind of wealth or that the craftsmanship could be so fine."
The Nimrud find is especially interesting because it was made in sands that had been sifted and resifted by some of the world's most accomplished treasure hunters. Nimrud created a scientific sensation in the 1840s, when the British archaeologist A.H. Layard uncovered the lamassu, colossal, winged bull-men that guarded the palace entrances. One hundred years later, the site was extensively re-excavated by Max Mallowan, whose mystery-writing wife Agatha Christie kept an office at the Nimrud Digs House and composed portions of an Hercule Poirot novel, Murder in Mesopotamia, at the site.
But the mysteries of Nimrud were far from solved. Last year, exploring an inner room of the palace, a team of laborers stumbled across a tomb that contained a small collection of necklaces, earrings and gilded pins. In February, Muzahim was granted permission to extend the explorations. Last April, digging near the spot where Christie plotted her thriller, he found what looked like a piece of pavement. When he and his workers cleared off the dirt, they uncovered a small ceramic pipe resembling an air vent. The "pavement" turned out to be the arched roof of a small rectangular tomb. Inside: a dusty sarcophagus. "I pried the top off with an iron bar," says Muzahim. "There was more dust inside, but when I held up the light, it was reflected back into my eyes by the gold."
Much of that gold turned out to be priceless jewelry draped around the skeleton of a young princess named Yabahya, tentatively identified as the daughter of one of Assyria's most renowned and feared kings, Sargon II. Nearby, still more jewelry and gold ornaments were piled. Mingled with the dried bones were dozens of delicately sculpted gold rosettes, scattered like flowers over the body of the dead princess.
In July, digging a few yards from the original find, Muzahim discovered the roof of another tomb and sarcophagus, which contained only dust. But near the sarcophagus were three bronze containers filled with 22 kg (48.5 lbs.) of gold -- more than 440 pieces in all. From cuneiform clues, archaeologists believe these jewels represent the private collection of an Assyrian queen, perhaps the wife of Ashurnasirpal himself.
Now that the full magnificence of the Nimrud find is known, Muzahim is intensifying his search, hoping to find the tombs of Nimrud's all powerful kings. The hunt is not without its dangers, however. Only after opening Princess Yabahya's grave did Muzahim's team decipher the ancient cuneiform curse inscribed on a marble tablet: "If anyone lays hands on my tomb . . . let the ghost of insomnia take hold of him for ever and ever."