French consul in Mosul, Iraq, and archaeologist whose discovery of the palace of the Assyrian king Sargon II at Dur Sharrukin in 1843 started the large-scale field archaeology of ancient Mesopotamia. He was seeking the vanished cities of Assyria, known at that time only from the accounts of ancient writers and from biblical references. Botta revealed the remains of the great palace of Sargon II (721-505 BC), with its famed winged figures, relief sculptures, and cuneiform inscriptions - but he mistakenly thought he had found ancient Nineveh. The remains tended to disintegrate quickly after being unearthed and one shipment of antiquities was sunk in transit, but another reached Paris and the Louvre. He published "Monuments of Nineveh" in 1949-50 with beautiful illustrations by E.N. Flandin. Later Botta was devoted to deciphering cuneiform.