Basic HTML Version
What Are You Looking At?
Of the many challenges that face modern tour guides,
from the endless enquiries as to the whereabouts of your
umbrella to managing the vexing individual who exists in
a slightly different time dimension to the rest of the group
(a “friend of HG Wells”), no modern dilemma matches
the peril faced by history’s first recorded tour guides.
The ancient Egyptian tour guides who, 3000 years ago,
showed visitors around the temple of Horus at Edfu
deciphering the inscriptions and telling the stories of the
gods despite this rather dramatic sign:
"Those of you who shall read these words, shall not
do so aloud except for the high priest, lest your Ka be
consumed by Set."
Ka being the “vital spark” that leaves the body upon death
and Set the god of deserts, storms, foreigners, darkness
and chaos. Crikey! I believe there’s a similar sign in
Buckingham Palace where guiding is also banned although
if they really want to avoid log jams of people they might
want to rethink the tiny-shiny-things-in-glass-cases
exhibitions (such as Faberge eggs and diamonds) that
create bottlenecks most years.
But it is back to my beloved Babylon that we go, to the
earliest civilization on earth, to find the earliest form
of leisure tourism. Over 4000 years ago Babylon was
already the world’s largest city: the capital of the world’s
first great empire. We know that the city attracted visitors
because there are records of a public museum of historic
antiquities. We don’t know much more than that and much
of what we do know tends to contradict itself somewhat
but it is almost inconceivable that Babylon, so full of
wonders, had no tour guides. Certainly it would have been
a marvellous place to guide.
A Day Out in Babylon
Ideally you’d want to approach with your visitors across
the arid desert to capture the excitement of that first sight
of the massive city walls and the top of the 300-foot high
ziggurat; as breath taking as a first sight of Ely Cathedral
across the Fens would have been to mediaeval visitors.
Arriving at the massive city walls we’ll follow Procession
Avenue, a street lined with huge brick animals, leading
into the city beneath the Ishtar Gates, which are beautifully
decorated with dragons and bulls in honour of the god
Marduk. Here we’ll pause for refreshments: the Ishtar
Gate is clustered with stalls and shops offering fresh fruits,
pomegranate juice, cheese and bread.
We’ll walk towards the centre of the city through a very
ordered grid of narrow, unpaved streets. Every now and
then the city authorities cover these streets with a fresh
layer of clay but there’s no municipal refuse service so
the clay buries the accumulated rubbish thrown from the
houses. Over the years (this city is already some 1700
years old) the level of the streets has risen and the residents
have built steps down to their front doors. A highlight of
our walk is the new Hanging Gardens of Babylon laid out
on a series of rising roof terraces by the river. The current
King, Nebuchadnezzar II, has married many princesses
from the surrounding kingdoms but his favourite is
Amyitis, Princess of the Medes, whose people have helped
defeat the Assyrians. The princess comes from the lush
green hills of Persia so to soften her home-sickness and
2
The Kettle
is a free monthly online magazine - subscribe now