“The short and narrow cylinder-seals . . . bearing monotonous friezes of schematized animals or geometric designs . . . were [later] replaced . . . by longer and wider seals with totally different compositions depicting either ‘banquet scenes’ or ‘animal-contest scenes’. . . . There were also some religious motifs, such as the sun-god on a boat. . . . Some seals, notably those of kings, were made of lapis-lazuli or other semi-precious stones, or even of gold, and they were sometimes capped with silver at both ends. An important novelty was the appearance . . . of the first short cuneiform inscriptions on cylinder-seals.”

—Georges Roux, Ancient Iraq, third edition, 1992.