As the introductory lecture to his collection of observations on ancient religion, Sayce begins this extract with a consideration of the difficulties of knowing what can be deduced from ancient Mesopotamian religion. Extracted from Sayce's "Origin and Growth of Religion", this booklet will be of interest to those who research the early period of the field of Assyriology in order to learn where various concepts about Mesopotamian religious life have their genesis. This is a Gorgias Press 2009 release.