"Ashurbanipal Fred Parhad 1988 Assyrian King Ashurbanipal built a vast library containing 30,000 clay scrolls covering a variety of topics in his palace in Nineveh. It was the first systematically organised library in the world and is the best known of Ashurbanipal's accomplishments and was considered by the king himself to be his greatest achievement. The library was assembled at Ashurbanipal's command, with scribes being sent throughout his empire to collect and copy texts of every type and genre from the libraries of the temples. Most of the collected texts were observations of events and omens, texts detailing the behaviour of certain men and of animals, texts on the movements of celestial objects, etc. Present in the library were also dictionaries for Sumerian, Akkadian and other languages and many religious texts, such as rituals, fables, prayers and incantations. When Nineveh was destroyed by fire in 612 BC the library was buried beneath the ruins of the palace and deemed lost. Excavations in the 19th century uncovered the contents of the library and the material has been translated thereby adding to our understanding of human civilisation. The sculptor Parhad has depicted King Ashurbanipal holding a clay tablet representing his library and cradling a lion signifying his bravery and strength. "