Classicly

The Babylonian Story of the Deluge as Told by Assyrian Tablets from Nineveh. The Discovery of the Tablets at Nineveh by Layard, Rassam and Smith.

In 1845–47 and again in 1849–51 Mr. (later Sir) A. H. Layard carried out a series of excavations among the ruins of the ancient city of Nineveh, "that great city, wherein are more than sixteen thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left; and also much cattle" (Jonah iv, II). Its ruins lie on the left or east bank of the Tigris, exactly opposite the town of Al-Mawsil, or Môsul, which was founded by the Sassanians and marks the site of Western Nineveh.