Dura

A valley mentioned only in Daniel (iii. 1). Here Nebuchadnezzar set up a golden image, to the dedication of which he summoned all the officers of his kingdom. The Septuagint (Codex Chisianus) reads περιβόλου ("walls surrounding a city"), and this may be due to the Assyrian "duru" (= a wall). The place is therefore to be looked for in Assyria. Delitzsch("Wo Lag das Paradies?" p. 216) says that, according to Rawlinson, "Cuneiform Inscriptions of Western Asia," iv. 38, 9-11b, there were three places in Babylon called "Dura" (see also Schrader, "C. I. O.T." ii. 128). In one of these places east of Babylon, according to Oppert, ruins of an ancient statue have been found.

E. G. H. G. B. L.