It was sixty cubits on a side, and rose like a square pillar that bore the weight of heaven. Around it wound a gently inclined ramp, cut into the side, that banded the tower like the leather strip wrapped around the handle of a whip. No; upon looking again, Hillalum saw that there were two ramps, and they were intertwined. The outer edge of each ramp was studded with pillars, not thick but broad, to provide some shade behind them. In running his gaze up the tower, he saw alternating bands, ramp, brick, ramp, brick, until they could no longer be distinguished. And still the tower rose up and up, farther than the eye could see; Hillalum blinked, and squinted, and grew dizzy. He stumbled backwards a couple steps, and turned away with a shudder.
Hillalum thought of the story told to him in childhood, the tale following that of the Deluge. It told of how men had once again populated all the corners of the earth, inhabiting more lands than they ever had before. How men had sailed to the edges of the world, and seen the ocean falling away into the mist to join the black waters of the Abyss far below. How men had thus realized the extent of the earth, and felt it to be small, and desired to see what lay beyond its borders, all the rest of Yahweh’s Creation. How they looked skyward, and wondered about Yahweh’s dwelling place, above the reservoirs that contained the waters of heaven. And how, many centuries ago, there began the construction of the tower, a pillar to heaven, a stair that men might ascend to see the works of Yahweh, and that Yahweh might descend to see the works of men.
It had always seemed inspiring to Hillalum, a tale of thousands of men toiling ceaselessly, but with joy, for they worked to know Yahweh better. He had been excited when the Babylonians came to Elam looking for miners. Yet now that he stood at the base of the tower, his senses rebelled, insisting that nothing should stand so high. He didn’t feel as if he were on the earth when he looked up along the tower.
Should he climb such a thing?
On the morning of the climb, the second platform was covered, edge to edge, with stout two-wheeled carts arranged in rows. Many were loaded with nothing but food of all sorts: sacks filled with barley, wheat, lentils, onions, dates, cucumbers, loaves of bread, dried fish. There were countless giant clay jars of water, date wine, beer, goat’s milk, palm oil. Other carts were loaded with such goods as might be sold at a bazaar: bronze vessels, reed baskets, bolts of linen, wooden stools and tables. There was also a fattened ox and a goat that some priests were fitting with hoods so that they could not see to either side, and would not be afraid on the climb. They would be sacrificed when they reached the top.
Then there were the carts loaded with the miners’ picks and hammers, and the makings for a small forge. Their foreman had also ordered a number of carts be loaded with wood and sheaves of reeds.
Lugatum stood next to a cart, securing the ropes that held the wood. Hillalum walked up to him. ‘From where did this wood come? I saw no forests after we left Elam.’
‘There is a forest of trees to the north, which was planted when the tower was begun. The cut timber is floated down the Euphrates.’
‘You planted an entire forest?’
‘When they began the tower, the architects knew that far more wood would be needed to fuel the kilns than could be found on the plain, so they had a forest of trees planted. There are crews whose job is to provide water, and plant one new tree for each that is cut.’
Hillalum was astonished. ‘And that provides all the wood needed?’
‘Most of it. Many other forests in the north have been cut as well, and their wood brought down the river.’ He inspected the wheels of the cart, uncorked a leather bottle he carried, and poured a little oil between the wheel and axle.
Nanni walked over to them, staring at the streets of Babylon laid out before them. ‘I’ve never before been even this high, that I can look down upon a city.’
‘Nor have I,’ said Hillalum, but Lugatum simply laughed.
‘Come along. All of the carts are ready.’
Soon all the men were paired up and matched with a cart. The men stood between the cart’s two pull rods, which had rope loops for pulling. The carts pulled by the miners were mixed in with those of the regular pullers, to ensure that they would keep the proper pace. Lugatum and another puller had the cart right behind that of Hillalum and Nanni.
‘Remember,’ said Lugatum, ‘stay about ten cubits behind the cart in front of you. The man on the right does all the pulling when you turn corners, and you’ll switch every hour.’
Pullers were beginning to lead their carts up the ramp. Hillalum and Nanni bent down and slung the ropes of their cart over their opposite shoulders. They stood up together, raising the front end of the cart off the pavement.
‘Now pull,’ called Lugatum.
They leaned forward against the ropes, and the cart began rolling. Once it was moving, pulling seemed to be easy enough, and they wound their way around the platform. Then they reached the ramp, and they again had to lean deeply.
‘This is a light wagon?’ muttered Hillalum.
The ramp was wide enough for a single man to walk beside a cart if he had to pass. The surface was paved with brick, with two grooves worn deep by centuries of wheels. Above their heads, the ceiling rose in a corbelled vault, with the wide, square bricks arranged in overlapping layers until they met in the middle. The pillars on the right were broad enough to make the ramp seem a bit like a tunnel. If one didn’t look off to the side, there was little sense of being on a tower.
‘Do you sing when you mine?’ asked Lugatum.
‘When the stone is soft,’ said Nanni.
‘Sing one of your mining songs, then.’
The call went down to the other miners, and before long the entire crew was singing.
As the shadows shortened, they ascended higher and higher. Shaded from the sun, with only clear air surrounding them, it was much cooler than in the narrow alleys of a city at ground level, where the heat at midday could kill lizards as they scurried across the street. Looking out to the side, the miners could see the dark Euphrates, and the green fields stretching out for leagues, crossed by canals that glinted in the sunlight. The city of Babylon was an intricate pattern of closely set streets and buildings, dazzling with gypsum whitewash; less and less of it was visible, as it seemingly drew nearer the base of the tower.
Hillalum was again pulling on the right-hand rope, nearer the edge, when he heard some shouting from the upward ramp one level below. He thought of stopping and looking down the side, but he didn’t wish to interrupt their pace, and he wouldn’t be able to see the lower ramp clearly anyway. ‘What’s happening down there?’ he called to Lugatum behind him.
‘One of your fellow miners fears the height. There is occasionally such a man among those who climb for the first time. Such a man embraces the floor, and cannot ascend further. Few feel it so soon, though.’
Hillalum understood. ‘We know of a similar fear, among those who would be miners. Some men cannot bear to enter the mines, for fear that they will be buried.’
‘Really?’ called Lugatum. ‘I had not heard of that. How do you yourself feel about the height?’
‘I feel nothing.’ But he glanced at Nanni, and they both knew the truth.
‘You feel nervousness in your palms, don’t you?’ whispered Nanni.
Hillalum rubbed his hands on the coarse fibers of the rope, and nodded.
‘I felt it too, earlier, when I was closer to the edge.’
‘Perhaps we should go hooded, like the ox and the goat,’ muttered Hillalum jokingly.