The Assyrians were familiar with inclined ways, which they used almost always in their attacks on walled places, and which in many cases they constructed either of brick or stone.

The Egyptians certainly employed them for the elevation of large blocks; and probably in the earlier times most nations who affected massive architecture had recourse to the same simple but uneconomical plan.

The crane and pulley were applied to this purpose later.

In the Assyrian sculptures we find no application of either to building, and no instance at all of the two in combination.
Still each appears on the bas-reliefs separately--the crane employed for drawing water from the rivers, and spreading it over the lands, the pulley for lowering and raising the bucket in wells.

[PLATE LXXXIX., Fig.