Hey…check out this cool Aladdin's Lamp I scored on this past mission. I really got lucky scoring this. We were hauling ass up Tampa as usual, and there was all kinds of crazy stuff going on, it was about like a war movie with helicopters and tanks. Anyway, we're passing a tank column and just as I pass an Abrams, an IED goes off and his side and he swears away from it and into me. He knocked me off a bit, but I recovered OK, but not in time before I'd ran through a guard rail alongside the highway. The steel rail flew all over and didn't hurt my truck, but a piece of it went right under the truck behind me and through his oil pan.

We rolled out of the action and it was several miles before he noticed his oil pressure dropping. So we pulled off Tampa to find a safe spot to inspect the damage. It just happened to be in front of this little Iraqi shop, all made of brick with an open front and thatch roof. It was probably 7 feet high and 15 foot by 15 foot, no plumbing or electricity of course. It was what I would call an Iraqi Junk Shop, but I don't know, it may have been pretty nice in their perspective.

So, as they were taking off his trailer, hooking it up to a Bobtail, and putting the tow bar on his tractor to be towed, I took a look in this store. There were tons of very old Arabian things, mostly cookware and decorative stuff. Most were made of copper and had references to ancient Babylon, Sumerian, and Arabia in general. This place was a treasure trove. I would have loved to hauled all of it out of there; this junk would be worth a fortune on Ebay. However, the guy spoke no English and would not accept American money. He kept showing Iraqi Dinars when we tried to offer him money for something. I was so pissed I wasn't going to be able to score any of it, especially when I found this cool Aladdin's Lamp. I decided to try to trade him something for it. He ended up accepting a pocket watch I bought for $10 in the Atlanta Airport. Can you believe that? What luck!!

This thing is very old, made of copper, and has three ancient symbols on it. I'll explain the symbols below if you're interested.

Let me know what you think of it. Now that I have this, I only need to find one of those flying carpets and my business will be done here in Islam.

--Stacy

Images on lamp:

The Lion of Babylon

Large and splendidly carved in basalt, reminds us again that the lion was the symbol of the goddess Ishtar. In the sculpture, the lion's back has marks indicating that it was meant for a precious saddle upon which the goddess Ishtar would stand.

The Stone of Hammurabi

Perhaps the most remarkable and influential creation of its time, Hammurabi's code is the oldest set of laws known to exist. Hammurabi, king and chief priest of Babylonia from 1792-1750 B.C., expanded his empire greatly before focusing his energies toward wealth and justice for his people. He created a code protecting all classes of Babylonian society, including women and slaves. He sought protection of the weak from the powerful and the poor from the rich. The carving on the stone on which the code is written depicts Hammurabi receiving the divine laws from the sun god, the god most often associated with justice. This stone was unearthed by French archaeologists at S_sa, Iraq (ancient Elam), in 1901-02. The black diorite rock is 2.4 m high and had been broken into three pieces.
Hammurabi's Code is 44 columns of text, 28 paragraphs of which contain the actual code. There are 282 laws (possibly more have been rubbed off) that probably amend common Babylonian law rather than define it. It describes regulations for legal procedure, fixes rates on services performed in most branches of commerce and describes property rights, personal injury, and penalties for false testimony and accusations. It has no laws regarding religion.
The Code of Hammurabi is significant because its creation allowed men, women, slaves, and all others to read and understand the laws that governed their lives in Babylon. It is unique in that laws of other civilizations were not written down, and thus could be manipulated to suite the rulers that dictated them. The Code is particularly just for its time. Although it follows the practice of "an eye for an eye", it does not allow for vigilante justice, but rather demands a trial by judges. It also glorifies acts of peace and justice done during Hammurabi's rule. It symbolizes not only the emergence of justice in the minds of men, but also man's rise above ignorance and barbarism toward the peaceful and just societies still pursued today. In the words of Hammurabi as carved on the stone, "Let any oppressed man who has a cause come into the presence of my statue as king of justice, and have the inscription on my stele read out, and hear my precious words, that my stele may make the case clear to him; may he understand his cause, and may his heart be set at ease!"
The Spiral at the Great Mosque of Samarra
Built around 848-849, the Great Mosque was the Abbasid capital in central Iraq. It is one of the largest mosques taking up 240 x 160 m, and was built with baked bricks. The most famous feature is the spiral minaret, also called the Malwiyya. The minaret reach up 52 meters and may have been influenced by the earlier Mesopotamian ziggurats.