Zigga-what? Tower of Babel and Jacob's Ladder

I've always envisioned the Tower of Babel to be shaped like a cylinder with little windows here and there...like some kind of medieval tower. I've also considered Jacob's ladder to be just that...a ladder. But they may not have been.

Instead, both of them may have been ziggurats, like the one below.

It's a little blurry, but you get the idea. I'm not very sure where this ziggurat was from but this is more like what the Tower of Babel and Jacob's Ladder looked like. Growing up, I would hear about the story of Jacob's Ladder and picture angels sliding up and down a ladder Batman and Robin style, kind of like the one below:

I never understood how multiple angels could go up and go down the ladder simultaneously. It didn't seem like they would have much elbow room. Jacob's vision makes a bit more sense when we think of angels climbing and descending the steps of a ziggurat instead of the rungs of a ladder.

At any rate, ziggurats were quite popular in the late 3rd millennium B.C. If we place Jacob historically in the 1900-1600 B.C. area, this would make him contemporary with the Mesopotamian usage of ziggurats.