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Religious Drama in Ancient Mesopotamia
Jan. 7th, 2018 02:14 pmBack to Egypt shortly.
Mesopotamian religion involved ritual performances, such as recreations of mythical battles, such as the fight between Marduk and Tiamat from Enuma Elish. But in this chapter by Thorkild Jacobsen, it was the Sacred Marriage Drama, and related fertility dramas, that interest me.
Mesopotamian religion involved ritual performances, such as recreations of mythical battles, such as the fight between Marduk and Tiamat from Enuma Elish. But in this chapter by Thorkild Jacobsen, it was the Sacred Marriage Drama, and related fertility dramas, that interest me.
The Sacred Marriage Drama, writes Jacobsen, "is patterned after the normal Ancient Mesopotamian wedding ritual". The bridegroom goes to the door of the bride's father's house, bringing gifts of food, seeking entrance. The bride, "bathed and dressed in all her finery", opened the door. The couple were separately escorted to the bridal chamber; the next morning they oversaw a feast.
The earliest evidence of the ritual is preserved on the Warka Vase, which depicts the god Dumuzi at the door of Eanna, Inanna's temple, with Inanna ready to open it and welcome him. An Old Babylonian text "is styled as a blow-by-blow account of a well-placed observer keeping worshipers farther back informed about what is going on." Inanna prepares by taking jewels from a pile of dates, then goes to the door of the giparu (the temple storehouse) to let Dumuzi in. She dispatches messengers to her father, asking to have the bridal bed prepared and Dumuzi escorted to it. The hymn Iddin-Dagan A also details the ritual.
Jacobsen writes that there are three further fertility dramas, which he calls the Mourning Drama, the Road of No Return Drama, and the Search and Fetching Drama.
The Mourning Drama was "a procession into the desert to Dumuzi's raided camp to mourn the slain god", with his widow (Inanna), mother (Ninsun), and sister (Geshtinanna). One such drama may have involved "Nin-gipar 'The Lady of the Giparu' (ie Inanna), and Nin-ibgal, another form of Inanna... and the goddess Igi-zi-bar-ra, known to be the personified harp of Inanna". (p 85)
The Road of No Return Drama was similar, with the god Damu's mother and sister searching for him after his death. Their search takes them to the netherworld, where Damu's sister eventually stays, to be both sister and "mother" to him. (I'll save notes on this for a separate posting.)
The Search and Fetching Drama has the god's mother seeking to find the nurse she left her son with - a tree. A procession returns him to his father Enki. In this drama "the god is identified with a variety of other fertility figures" and with deceased kings.
Jacobsen discusses the changes in Mesopotamian religion and religious drama. IIUC originally the whole community would have participated in ritual; in time, as natural forces became anthropomorphised as deities, those deities were represented in ritual and drama, reflecting the community's own practices, while the community looked on. There also seems to have been a shift from considering Dumuzi as the source of plenty to Inanna as the one who provided the king, and thus the community, with plenty - responding to the king's sexual allure and prowess.
The Battle Dramas appear in the First Millennium BCE. They included a footrace which recreated Ninurta's pursuit of Anzu. Fertility dramas, including the sacred marriage of Nabu and Nana at Borsippa, were still performed. Some fertility dramas may have changed their meaning to become understood as battle: as Jacobsen notes, "the fact that a rite survives does not guarantee that it preserves its original meaning".
Which observation led to this interesting remark:
"The death and lament drama of Dumuzi seems very likely to have retained its purpose of strengthening emotional ties with the god - especially in the case of Dumuzi of the grain where the death of the god has been brought about by his worshipers and where the rite of lament is therefore one of great ambivalence and covert guilt." (p 75)
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Jacobson, Thorkild. "Religious Drama in Ancient Mesopotamia". in Hans Goedicke and J. J. M. Roberts (eds). Unity and Diversity: essays in the history, literature, and religion of the ancient Near East. Papers presented at a symposium held at Johns Hopkins University, Jan. 9-12, 1973. Johns Hopkins University Press, 1975.
Two interesting snippets, from:
van Wyk, Susandra J. The concealed crime of the naditu priestess in §110 of the Laws of Hammurabi. Journal for Semitics 24/1 (2015) 109-145.
Herbordt, Susan. "Neo-Assyrian Royal and Administrative Seals and Their Use." in H. Waetzoldt and H. Hauptmann (eds), Assyrien im Wandel der Zeiten, 39 RAI Heidelberg July 1992, HSAO 6 (1997) 279-283.
"... there is good reason to assume the scorpion to be a symbol associated with the administration of the queen -- at least in the reign of Sennacherib. A symbolic meaning of the scorpion in this context is not clear. Since late Kassite times, it was used as a symbol for the goddess Išḫara, who shows a variety of characteristics from being a goddess of love, mother goddess and goddess of extispicy to being war goddess."
(Herbordt's references are in German, alas.)
Stol, Marten and F. A. M. Wiggermann. Birth in Babylonia and the Bible: Its Mediterranean Setting. Styx, Groningen, 2000.
This book quotes a passage from Atrahasis:
And remarks: "We know from other texts that Ištar, the goddess of love, in marriage has the name Išḫara. Incantations show that she was a married goddess under this name: 'What Ištar does for Dumuzi, what Nananja does for her mate, what Išḫara does for her husband.' In a number of 'bed-scenes' we also see a scorpion; we assume that in these scenes the couple thus indicated is to be married. Her temple has the name 'House of the womb (šassuru)."
(Curse my inability to read German, or I'd be able to further pursue the references...)
van Wyk, Susandra J. The concealed crime of the naditu priestess in §110 of the Laws of Hammurabi. Journal for Semitics 24/1 (2015) 109-145.
"I translate MÍ.É.GAL as 'consort' or 'wife' rather than 'queen' because it is clear that the Assyrians themselves conceived of a 'queen' (šarratu) as either a goddess, or a woman (always foreign) who actually ruled, such as the queen of the Arabs mentioned in Esarhaddon's annals."
"Another emblem associated with MÍ.É.GAL as the scorpion, a motif that has been found in both official and private contexts on numerous items from the women's quarters of various palaces. The scorpion symbol is associated with Išhara (the goddess representing Ištar in her married state) and is usually found only on items related to women."
In pursuit of Išḫara the married Ishtar, I followed van Wyk's reference about the scorpions to three articles:"Another emblem associated with MÍ.É.GAL as the scorpion, a motif that has been found in both official and private contexts on numerous items from the women's quarters of various palaces. The scorpion symbol is associated with Išhara (the goddess representing Ištar in her married state) and is usually found only on items related to women."
Herbordt, Susan. "Neo-Assyrian Royal and Administrative Seals and Their Use." in H. Waetzoldt and H. Hauptmann (eds), Assyrien im Wandel der Zeiten, 39 RAI Heidelberg July 1992, HSAO 6 (1997) 279-283.
"... there is good reason to assume the scorpion to be a symbol associated with the administration of the queen -- at least in the reign of Sennacherib. A symbolic meaning of the scorpion in this context is not clear. Since late Kassite times, it was used as a symbol for the goddess Išḫara, who shows a variety of characteristics from being a goddess of love, mother goddess and goddess of extispicy to being war goddess."
Stol, Marten and F. A. M. Wiggermann. Birth in Babylonia and the Bible: Its Mediterranean Setting. Styx, Groningen, 2000.
This book quotes a passage from Atrahasis:
"At the moment of (their) marriage,
let Ištar rejoice in the House of ....
Nine days let there be made merry,
let them name Ištar 'Išḫara'."
And remarks: "We know from other texts that Ištar, the goddess of love, in marriage has the name Išḫara. Incantations show that she was a married goddess under this name: 'What Ištar does for Dumuzi, what Nananja does for her mate, what Išḫara does for her husband.' In a number of 'bed-scenes' we also see a scorpion; we assume that in these scenes the couple thus indicated is to be married. Her temple has the name 'House of the womb (šassuru)."
(Curse my inability to read German, or I'd be able to further pursue the references...)
Barton's androgynous Ishtar
Jul. 16th, 2017 05:57 pmYou read something over breakfast thinking, this is short, it'll only take a minute, and before you know it you're embroiled.
This short article from the year 1900 suggests that Ishtar was originally an androgynous deity before being "split" into male and female aspects. Similarly, Barton argues, Enlil and Ninlil were originally one and the same god. This intriguing idea is based on three pieces of evidence: one, in South Arabia, the goddess Athtar became the god Athtar, the deity's female aspect becoming a separate goddess, Shamsu; an inscription which Barton argues should read in part "the king of countries, the god Ishtar, the lady, the goddess Ishtar"; and an incantation in which both Enlil and Ninlil are called "mother-father". Barton also mentions Phoenician inscriptions referring to "Ashtart of the name of Baal" and "Tanit of the face of Baal".
This is appealing, but I don't quite know what to do with it. I can't find any citations of this article (which makes me wonder how I found it in the first place); apparently no-one else has built on this idea (although Barton discussed it further in his 1902 book A Sketch of Semitic Origins: Social and Religious). Connections suggest themselves: the primordial Aztec creator deity Ometeotl, both male and female, who can also appear as a male god, Ometecuhtli, and a goddess, Omecihuatl. OTOH, the Egyptian god Atum seems to have started off male and acquired female characteristics as a necessary part of being a creator.
There's also a mention of a Phoenician idol of a bearded goddess (Tanit, but with Baal's face?). I tried randomly searching for "bearded goddess" and came up with various examples, including a bearded Isis (which I will ETA), and the bearded Aphrodite / Aphroditus / Hermaphroditus, and his/her festival in which men and women swapped clothes - shades of the transvestism apparently involved in Inanna's rituals. Scholars have argued over whether Anat wore a beard. (Which I will also ETA because I can't lay hands on the photocopies right now.)
ETA: After much faffing about I found a section on Anat's beard in Neal H. Walls' book The Goddess Anat in Ugaritic Myth. There's a description of the god El mourning the slain Baal in a series of ritual actions, which includes shaving his beard and whiskers. Then Anat goes through the same series of steps. IIUC what El does, literally, is to "cut his cheeks and chin", where the word for "chin" is also used to mean "beard". So in Anat's case, she "gashed her cheeks and chin". Walls remarks: "the comparative evidence for bearded goddesses is dubious". I shall pursue this question. (Does Sekhmet's ruff count?)
ETA: Here's bearded Isis (click for larger size):
This is a plate from Symbolik und Mythologie der alten Völker: besonders der Griechen (Symbolism and mythology of the Ancient Peoples, Especially the Greeks) by Friedrich Creuzer. This in turn reproduces an illustration from Nachträge zu meinem Werke betitelt "Reise zum Tempel des Jupiter Ammon in der libyschen Wüste" (Supplements to my work titled "Journey to the Temple of Jupiter Ammon in the Libyan Desert) (whew!) by Heinrich Karl Minutoli. Here, alas, the trail runs out: Minutoli tells us that this is a relief in the Palazzo Grimani in Venice, and that is Graeco-Roman, but gives no further information.
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Barton, George A. An Androgynous Babylonian Divinity. Journal of the American Oriental Society 21, 1900, pp. 185-187
Walls, Neal H. The Goddess Anat in Ugaritic Myth. Scholars Press, Atlanta GA, 1992.
This short article from the year 1900 suggests that Ishtar was originally an androgynous deity before being "split" into male and female aspects. Similarly, Barton argues, Enlil and Ninlil were originally one and the same god. This intriguing idea is based on three pieces of evidence: one, in South Arabia, the goddess Athtar became the god Athtar, the deity's female aspect becoming a separate goddess, Shamsu; an inscription which Barton argues should read in part "the king of countries, the god Ishtar, the lady, the goddess Ishtar"; and an incantation in which both Enlil and Ninlil are called "mother-father". Barton also mentions Phoenician inscriptions referring to "Ashtart of the name of Baal" and "Tanit of the face of Baal".
This is appealing, but I don't quite know what to do with it. I can't find any citations of this article (which makes me wonder how I found it in the first place); apparently no-one else has built on this idea (although Barton discussed it further in his 1902 book A Sketch of Semitic Origins: Social and Religious). Connections suggest themselves: the primordial Aztec creator deity Ometeotl, both male and female, who can also appear as a male god, Ometecuhtli, and a goddess, Omecihuatl. OTOH, the Egyptian god Atum seems to have started off male and acquired female characteristics as a necessary part of being a creator.
There's also a mention of a Phoenician idol of a bearded goddess (Tanit, but with Baal's face?). I tried randomly searching for "bearded goddess" and came up with various examples, including a bearded Isis (which I will ETA), and the bearded Aphrodite / Aphroditus / Hermaphroditus, and his/her festival in which men and women swapped clothes - shades of the transvestism apparently involved in Inanna's rituals. Scholars have argued over whether Anat wore a beard. (Which I will also ETA because I can't lay hands on the photocopies right now.)
ETA: After much faffing about I found a section on Anat's beard in Neal H. Walls' book The Goddess Anat in Ugaritic Myth. There's a description of the god El mourning the slain Baal in a series of ritual actions, which includes shaving his beard and whiskers. Then Anat goes through the same series of steps. IIUC what El does, literally, is to "cut his cheeks and chin", where the word for "chin" is also used to mean "beard". So in Anat's case, she "gashed her cheeks and chin". Walls remarks: "the comparative evidence for bearded goddesses is dubious". I shall pursue this question. (Does Sekhmet's ruff count?)
ETA: Here's bearded Isis (click for larger size):
This is a plate from Symbolik und Mythologie der alten Völker: besonders der Griechen (Symbolism and mythology of the Ancient Peoples, Especially the Greeks) by Friedrich Creuzer. This in turn reproduces an illustration from Nachträge zu meinem Werke betitelt "Reise zum Tempel des Jupiter Ammon in der libyschen Wüste" (Supplements to my work titled "Journey to the Temple of Jupiter Ammon in the Libyan Desert) (whew!) by Heinrich Karl Minutoli. Here, alas, the trail runs out: Minutoli tells us that this is a relief in the Palazzo Grimani in Venice, and that is Graeco-Roman, but gives no further information.
__
Barton, George A. An Androgynous Babylonian Divinity. Journal of the American Oriental Society 21, 1900, pp. 185-187
Walls, Neal H. The Goddess Anat in Ugaritic Myth. Scholars Press, Atlanta GA, 1992.
A chapter on Hittite birth rituals, discussing "binding" in sorcery and mythology:
"Here [Text F in Beckman's catalogue] the goddess IŠTAR speaks to the goddess Malliya, who speaks to the goddess Pirwa, she she in turn to Kamrusepa, who 'yoked her horses and drove to the Great River, whom she conjured by incantation'. Then all that had been bound was loosed, through the ritual agency of Kamrusepa.
This goddess is found frequently in the circle of IŠTAR (ie the Hurrian Shausuga), Malliya (a river goddess), Pirwa and Askasepa, the 'genius' of the Gateway. Pirwa, both god and goddess, honoured by songs in Nesite and Luwian, is described as the god upon a Silver Horse and depicted in the iconography of Kültepe/Kanesh with chariot and team of horses... The logographic writing IŠTAR represented a deity, at once male and female, of War and Love." (All emphases mine.)
What caught my eye here, of course, was the hints of gender ambiguity; but also - look at all those goddesses! The article goes on to describe Kamrusepa's healing a newborn child and calming the anger of "the Hattic god Telepinus".
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Beckman, Gary M. Hittite birth rituals. Wiesbaden, O. Harrassowitz, 1983.
Pringle, Jackie. "Hittite Birth Rituals". in Averil Cameron and Amélie Kuhrt. Images of Women in Antiquity. Croom Helm, London and Sydney, 1983.
"Here [Text F in Beckman's catalogue] the goddess IŠTAR speaks to the goddess Malliya, who speaks to the goddess Pirwa, she she in turn to Kamrusepa, who 'yoked her horses and drove to the Great River, whom she conjured by incantation'. Then all that had been bound was loosed, through the ritual agency of Kamrusepa.
This goddess is found frequently in the circle of IŠTAR (ie the Hurrian Shausuga), Malliya (a river goddess), Pirwa and Askasepa, the 'genius' of the Gateway. Pirwa, both god and goddess, honoured by songs in Nesite and Luwian, is described as the god upon a Silver Horse and depicted in the iconography of Kültepe/Kanesh with chariot and team of horses... The logographic writing IŠTAR represented a deity, at once male and female, of War and Love." (All emphases mine.)
What caught my eye here, of course, was the hints of gender ambiguity; but also - look at all those goddesses! The article goes on to describe Kamrusepa's healing a newborn child and calming the anger of "the Hattic god Telepinus".
__
Beckman, Gary M. Hittite birth rituals. Wiesbaden, O. Harrassowitz, 1983.
Pringle, Jackie. "Hittite Birth Rituals". in Averil Cameron and Amélie Kuhrt. Images of Women in Antiquity. Croom Helm, London and Sydney, 1983.
Inanna/Ishtar and the ball game
Mar. 3rd, 2016 11:59 amSome choice Inanna/Ishtar bits from an article on the Sumerian ball game (as played by Gilgamesh in his Epic):
"The hymnic passage of the bilingual Exaltation of Ištar states: 'O Inana/Ištar, make fight and combat ebb and flow like a skipping rope (ešemen2 /keppû)! O lady of battle, make the fray clash together like pukku (the Akkadian version adds: and mekkû)" (George, 2003:898). The idea is that for the goddess of war, the fierce battle is enjoyable like a dance or game." (p 285) The pukku and mekkû, which Gilgamesh makes from the roots of the ḫuluppu tree which Inanna plants and waters, are a ball and mallet, which parallel the ring and rod which are the symbols of royalty.
"The cultic lament Uruammairrabi contains a similar passage about the goddess, in which she boasts: 'I send heads rolling like heavy balls (pukku); I play with my skipping rope whose cord is multi-coloured'." P. Lapinkivi argues that the keppû is not a skipping rope, but a "whip(ping) top". In either case, "its associations to pukku and the cult of the goddess are well attested." (p 286)
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Annus, Amar and Mari Sarv. "The Ball Game Motif in the Gilgamesh Tradition and International Folklore". in Robert Rollinger and Erik van Dongen (eds). Mesopotamia in the ancient world: impact, continuities, parallels: proceedings of the Seventh Symposium of the Melammu Project held in Obergurgl, Austria, November 4-8, 2013. Münster, Ugarit-Verlag, 2015.
George, A.R. The Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic. Introduction, Critical Edition and Cuneiform Texts. Oxford, 2013.
Lapinkivi, P. The Neo-Assyrian Myth of Ištar's Descent and Resurrection. States Archives of Assyria Cuneiform Texts 6. Publications of the Foundation for Finnish Assyriological Research 1. Helsinki, 2010.
"The hymnic passage of the bilingual Exaltation of Ištar states: 'O Inana/Ištar, make fight and combat ebb and flow like a skipping rope (ešemen
"The cultic lament Uruammairrabi contains a similar passage about the goddess, in which she boasts: 'I send heads rolling like heavy balls (pukku); I play with my skipping rope whose cord is multi-coloured'." P. Lapinkivi argues that the keppû is not a skipping rope, but a "whip(ping) top". In either case, "its associations to pukku and the cult of the goddess are well attested." (p 286)
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Annus, Amar and Mari Sarv. "The Ball Game Motif in the Gilgamesh Tradition and International Folklore". in Robert Rollinger and Erik van Dongen (eds). Mesopotamia in the ancient world: impact, continuities, parallels: proceedings of the Seventh Symposium of the Melammu Project held in Obergurgl, Austria, November 4-8, 2013. Münster, Ugarit-Verlag, 2015.
George, A.R. The Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic. Introduction, Critical Edition and Cuneiform Texts. Oxford, 2013.
Lapinkivi, P. The Neo-Assyrian Myth of Ištar's Descent and Resurrection. States Archives of Assyria Cuneiform Texts 6. Publications of the Foundation for Finnish Assyriological Research 1. Helsinki, 2010.
The KUR.GAR.RA or kurgarrû
Feb. 20th, 2016 12:13 pmContinuing with Mesopotamian cultic personnel: the kurgarrû held a "recognized office" rather than a temporary role (so was the saĝ-ur-saĝ, but the same evidence is lacking for the assinnu). Kurgarrû and assinnu often appear together, in lists and in rituals. In the Descent of Inanna, the kurgarrû and kalatura are sent to rescue the goddess, but in the Descent of Ishtar, it's Asushanamir the assinnu.
The kurgarrû, like some other "cultic officials", carried weapons. Henshaw cites lines from "Inanna and Ebiḫ", in which the god An says: "to the kurgara I have given the gír 'sword or dagger' and ba-da-ra ["club", "prod", "knife"] / to the gala I have given the drum and the li-li-is / for the pi-li-pi-li I have changed the sex".
(Interesting that it's An, not Inanna, doing the changing - "either a garment change, or a role change, or a literal sex change". It's Henshaw's parsimonious view the pili-pili carried the spindle when he played a female role, and a weapon when he played a male role. OTOH, the ETCSL gives a different translation: "I have transformed the pilipili cult performers." ETA: According to Jarle Ebeling, in pi-li-pi-li saǧ šu bal mu-ni-ak, the verb saǧ šu bal can mean "to turn something on its head / to turn something upside down". Betty De Shong Meador describes the transformation as "ritual head-overturning".)
Also in the kurgarrû's arsenal: the naglabu "razor", quppû "knife", ṣurtu "flint knife", and the belu / tillu also worn by the assinnu - all of which ulluṣ kabtat ᵈIštar, "delight the heart of Ishtar". An ershemma lamenting Dumuzi states: "the kurgarra of his city did not brandish the sword". "Elsewhere", says Henshaw, "one finds that these are not merely ceremonial weapons, but are covered with blood." Some authors suggest this is the result of self-mutilation; Henshaw believes it's part of a "war game". For example, in one rite, the kurgarrû and others "play war (lit. 'battlefield'), ie, act out a battle in dramatic liturgical form".
The kurgarrû also carry "instruments symbolic of the female": the pilaqqu "spindle, distaff or hair-clasp", whip, and comb. An astrologial prophecy tells us: "If Adad in the midst of the constellation Great Bear (gave a cry) and it rained cardamom (and they became?) men, then the kurgarrûs will sit in the house and the kurgarrûs will give birth to men." With epic litotes Richard Henshaw describes this as "difficult", but points out it does refer to the kurgarrû's "female role".
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Ebeling, Jarle. "Multiword-verb combinations with and without ak". in Jarle Ebeling and Graham Cunningham (eds). Analysing literary Sumerian: corpus-based approaches. London, Oakville, CT, Equinox, 2007.
Henshaw, Richard A. "Appendix Three: The assinnu, kurgarrû and Similar Functionaries". in Female and male - the cultic personnel: the Bible and the rest of the ancient Near East. Allison Park, Pa, Pickwick Publications, 1994.
The kurgarrû, like some other "cultic officials", carried weapons. Henshaw cites lines from "Inanna and Ebiḫ", in which the god An says: "to the kurgara I have given the gír 'sword or dagger' and ba-da-ra ["club", "prod", "knife"] / to the gala I have given the drum and the li-li-is / for the pi-li-pi-li I have changed the sex".
(Interesting that it's An, not Inanna, doing the changing - "either a garment change, or a role change, or a literal sex change". It's Henshaw's parsimonious view the pili-pili carried the spindle when he played a female role, and a weapon when he played a male role. OTOH, the ETCSL gives a different translation: "I have transformed the pilipili cult performers." ETA: According to Jarle Ebeling, in pi-li-pi-li saǧ šu bal mu-ni-ak, the verb saǧ šu bal can mean "to turn something on its head / to turn something upside down". Betty De Shong Meador describes the transformation as "ritual head-overturning".)
Also in the kurgarrû's arsenal: the naglabu "razor", quppû "knife", ṣurtu "flint knife", and the belu / tillu also worn by the assinnu - all of which ulluṣ kabtat ᵈIštar, "delight the heart of Ishtar". An ershemma lamenting Dumuzi states: "the kurgarra of his city did not brandish the sword". "Elsewhere", says Henshaw, "one finds that these are not merely ceremonial weapons, but are covered with blood." Some authors suggest this is the result of self-mutilation; Henshaw believes it's part of a "war game". For example, in one rite, the kurgarrû and others "play war (lit. 'battlefield'), ie, act out a battle in dramatic liturgical form".
The kurgarrû also carry "instruments symbolic of the female": the pilaqqu "spindle, distaff or hair-clasp", whip, and comb. An astrologial prophecy tells us: "If Adad in the midst of the constellation Great Bear (gave a cry) and it rained cardamom (and they became?) men, then the kurgarrûs will sit in the house and the kurgarrûs will give birth to men." With epic litotes Richard Henshaw describes this as "difficult", but points out it does refer to the kurgarrû's "female role".
__
Ebeling, Jarle. "Multiword-verb combinations with and without ak". in Jarle Ebeling and Graham Cunningham (eds). Analysing literary Sumerian: corpus-based approaches. London, Oakville, CT, Equinox, 2007.
Henshaw, Richard A. "Appendix Three: The assinnu, kurgarrû and Similar Functionaries". in Female and male - the cultic personnel: the Bible and the rest of the ancient Near East. Allison Park, Pa, Pickwick Publications, 1994.
The assinnu
Feb. 17th, 2016 10:37 pm(Long ago (June 2011) I started a series of postings about the ancient Mesopotamian assinnu which I made a hash of, so this is a do-over!)
Richard Henshaw (1994) groups the assinnu with the kurgarrû, the kulu'u, the saĝ-ur-saĝ, the pilipili (pilpilû), and similar cultic functionaries who are "a kind of actor in the cultic drama". He remarks that, unlike most professional titles, many of these can't be translated; possibly they're foreign loanwords, or pre-Sumerian words.
Like many Akkadian words, assinnu was actually written down using Sumerian signs; someone reading a tablet out loud would have said "assinnu" when they saw LÚ.UR.SAL or UR.MUNUS. The LÚ indicates it's the name of a profession; SAL and MUNUS both mean 'woman'. Martti Nissenen (1998) says that: "UR.SAL, or 'man-woman', should actually be read "'dog-woman', 'dog' representing masculinity in a despicable sense" (147n45). I've often encountered this assumption in the literature - that 'dog' in terms like the Sumerian saĝ-ur-saĝ or the Akkadian keleb must be derogatory. However, UR also appears in terms like ur.mah "lion" and ur.saĝ "hero, champion"; more than one scholar has wondered if the saĝ-ur-saĝ is a type of ur-saĝ. (Henshaw says that it's not "bitch", which was written SAL.UR.) Drawing on the online Sumerian Lexicon, Saana Teppo points out that "'dog' can also mean a young man, a servant, a warrior, or an enemy".
In various cultic texts, we get glimpses of the assinnu's religious jobs, including chanting, singing, and dancing. In one ritual, the assinnu and the kurgarrû wear the belû / tillu (possibly a scabbard?) of the goddess Narudu. (Any relation to the saltier of Atargatis, I wonder?) In another, "... the assinnu is found setting a brick down in the House of Lament... He lights a fire over it and roasts on it various meats, fish, and other items. He pours a libation of beer and places seven loaves on the fire. The ritual ends with him singing the Love Lyric 'When I saw you in the Equlû.'" (One of several tasks for the assinnu and the kurgarrû during the month of Simanu, as described by A.R. George, who remarks that they were probably busy the year round.)
Martti Nissinen (2003) describes letters from Mari which mention prophecies delivered by assinnus attached to the temple of Annunitum ("a manifestation of the warrior aspect of Ishtar" - Wilson). (Prophets are often grouped with assinnu in "lexical and administrative lists".) Åke W. Sjöberg quotes passages describing saĝ-ur-saĝs carrying "the corvée basket" and yokes, which "show that the saĝ-ur-saĝ (when corresponding to the assinnu) had duties other than only cultic assignments".
Richard Henshaw cautiously outlines the evidence for the assinnu's sexuality. The Epic of Erra contains a line referring to the assinnu and the kurgarrû in Anum and Ishtar's temple, the Eanna:
ša ana šupluh nišī Ištar zikrusunu uterru ana ain [nišūti]
"The translation of this is ambiguous," cautions Henshaw: "'those who in order to bring about awe/religious awe in people, Ishtar turned their maleness into femaleness'... Nothing more appears in this text to indicate the nature of this change".
In a text describing "sexual advances, sexual dreams, etc", there's a line "something like: 'if a man suffers physically in prison, and like an assinnu the desire to copulate is taken away from him..." (This impotence could mean sterility rather than erectile dysfunction.) And another line: "... if a man approaches (for sexual purposes) an assinnu..." (Henshaw cautions that many lines of the text describe the "fantastic actions" in dreams rather than "actual cases".)
Of the Descent of Ishtar and Asushanamir, Henshaw says, "Why the assinnu could pass through the gate and confront the queen... is not explained in the text, but I propose that being of in-between sex made him impervious to the sexual rites and power that Ereshkigal, following the example of her sister, could impose upon him." (She herself is a pretty sexy goddess.)
One text pairs the assinnu with the sinnišānu: "The form of this word can be explained as the word for woman, sinništu, with the feminine ending" replaced by the masculine ending -ānu, perhaps to be understood "man-woman". Elsewhere, a curse promises to "(turn) his maleness like (that of) a sinnišānu".
One text, says Henshaw, includes a possible reference to a female assinnu - that is, "the feminine form of the noun assinnu" - and another mentions a female kurgarru.
Concluding his appendix on the assinnu and co, Henshaw remarks: "Many of the texts discussed in this section are cryptic; indeed, I think they were meant to be." Scholars sometimes seem to have drawn great, and sometimes questionable, conclusions about these cultic personnel from very small scraps of information.
ETA: More on the assinnu's unclear sexuality from Prophecy and Society in Ancient Israel. Robert R. Wilson cites the lines from the Epic of Erra above and notes that "This has been variously been interpreted to mean that the assinnu was a eunuch, transvestite, male cult-prostitute, or pederast. However, none of these interpretations can unambigously be supported by reference to other texts [therefore] some scholars hold that the assinnu was simply an actor who took a female role in cultic dramas." Assinnus appear in three of the Mari letters, and in one of them, the assinnu Šelebum goes into a trance in Annunitum's temple before giving a prophet warning meant for the king. Wilson suggests that, during the trance, Šelebum was possessed by the goddess, and therefore would have spoken and acted in a feminine way; and that this might have been a regular part of the assinnu's job.
__
George, Andrew "Four temple rituals from Babylon." in George, A R and Finkel, I L, (eds). Wisdom, Gods and Literature: Studies in Assyriology in Honour of W. G. Lambert. Winona Lake, Indiana, Eisenbrauns, 2000, pp. 259-299.
Henshaw, Richard A. "Appendix Three: The assinnu, kurgarrû and Similar Functionaries". in Female and male - the cultic personnel: the Bible and the rest of the ancient Near East. Allison Park, Pa, Pickwick Publications, 1994.
Kessler Guinan, A. Auguries of Hegemony: The Sex Omens of Mesopotamia. Gender & History, 9: 462–479, 1997.
Nissinen, Martti. "Introduction". in Prophets and prophecy in the ancient Near East, Martti Nissinen with contributions by C.L. Seow and Robert K. Ritner ; edited by Peter Machinist. Atlanta, Ga, Society for Biblical Literature, 2003.
Nissenen, Martti. Homoeroticism in the Biblical World. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1998.
Sjöberg, Åke W. A Hymn to Inanna and her Self-Praise. Journal of Cuneiform Studies 40(2) autumn 1988.
Wilson, Robert R. Prophecy and society in ancient Israel. Philadelphia, Fortress Press, 1980.
Richard Henshaw (1994) groups the assinnu with the kurgarrû, the kulu'u, the saĝ-ur-saĝ, the pilipili (pilpilû), and similar cultic functionaries who are "a kind of actor in the cultic drama". He remarks that, unlike most professional titles, many of these can't be translated; possibly they're foreign loanwords, or pre-Sumerian words.
Like many Akkadian words, assinnu was actually written down using Sumerian signs; someone reading a tablet out loud would have said "assinnu" when they saw LÚ.UR.SAL or UR.MUNUS. The LÚ indicates it's the name of a profession; SAL and MUNUS both mean 'woman'. Martti Nissenen (1998) says that: "UR.SAL, or 'man-woman', should actually be read "'dog-woman', 'dog' representing masculinity in a despicable sense" (147n45). I've often encountered this assumption in the literature - that 'dog' in terms like the Sumerian saĝ-ur-saĝ or the Akkadian keleb must be derogatory. However, UR also appears in terms like ur.mah "lion" and ur.saĝ "hero, champion"; more than one scholar has wondered if the saĝ-ur-saĝ is a type of ur-saĝ. (Henshaw says that it's not "bitch", which was written SAL.UR.) Drawing on the online Sumerian Lexicon, Saana Teppo points out that "'dog' can also mean a young man, a servant, a warrior, or an enemy".
In various cultic texts, we get glimpses of the assinnu's religious jobs, including chanting, singing, and dancing. In one ritual, the assinnu and the kurgarrû wear the belû / tillu (possibly a scabbard?) of the goddess Narudu. (Any relation to the saltier of Atargatis, I wonder?) In another, "... the assinnu is found setting a brick down in the House of Lament... He lights a fire over it and roasts on it various meats, fish, and other items. He pours a libation of beer and places seven loaves on the fire. The ritual ends with him singing the Love Lyric 'When I saw you in the Equlû.'" (One of several tasks for the assinnu and the kurgarrû during the month of Simanu, as described by A.R. George, who remarks that they were probably busy the year round.)
Martti Nissinen (2003) describes letters from Mari which mention prophecies delivered by assinnus attached to the temple of Annunitum ("a manifestation of the warrior aspect of Ishtar" - Wilson). (Prophets are often grouped with assinnu in "lexical and administrative lists".) Åke W. Sjöberg quotes passages describing saĝ-ur-saĝs carrying "the corvée basket" and yokes, which "show that the saĝ-ur-saĝ (when corresponding to the assinnu) had duties other than only cultic assignments".
Richard Henshaw cautiously outlines the evidence for the assinnu's sexuality. The Epic of Erra contains a line referring to the assinnu and the kurgarrû in Anum and Ishtar's temple, the Eanna:
ša ana šupluh nišī Ištar zikrusunu uterru ana ain [nišūti]
"The translation of this is ambiguous," cautions Henshaw: "'those who in order to bring about awe/religious awe in people, Ishtar turned their maleness into femaleness'... Nothing more appears in this text to indicate the nature of this change".
In a text describing "sexual advances, sexual dreams, etc", there's a line "something like: 'if a man suffers physically in prison, and like an assinnu the desire to copulate is taken away from him..." (This impotence could mean sterility rather than erectile dysfunction.) And another line: "... if a man approaches (for sexual purposes) an assinnu..." (Henshaw cautions that many lines of the text describe the "fantastic actions" in dreams rather than "actual cases".)
Of the Descent of Ishtar and Asushanamir, Henshaw says, "Why the assinnu could pass through the gate and confront the queen... is not explained in the text, but I propose that being of in-between sex made him impervious to the sexual rites and power that Ereshkigal, following the example of her sister, could impose upon him." (She herself is a pretty sexy goddess.)
One text pairs the assinnu with the sinnišānu: "The form of this word can be explained as the word for woman, sinništu, with the feminine ending" replaced by the masculine ending -ānu, perhaps to be understood "man-woman". Elsewhere, a curse promises to "(turn) his maleness like (that of) a sinnišānu".
One text, says Henshaw, includes a possible reference to a female assinnu - that is, "the feminine form of the noun assinnu" - and another mentions a female kurgarru.
Concluding his appendix on the assinnu and co, Henshaw remarks: "Many of the texts discussed in this section are cryptic; indeed, I think they were meant to be." Scholars sometimes seem to have drawn great, and sometimes questionable, conclusions about these cultic personnel from very small scraps of information.
ETA: More on the assinnu's unclear sexuality from Prophecy and Society in Ancient Israel. Robert R. Wilson cites the lines from the Epic of Erra above and notes that "This has been variously been interpreted to mean that the assinnu was a eunuch, transvestite, male cult-prostitute, or pederast. However, none of these interpretations can unambigously be supported by reference to other texts [therefore] some scholars hold that the assinnu was simply an actor who took a female role in cultic dramas." Assinnus appear in three of the Mari letters, and in one of them, the assinnu Šelebum goes into a trance in Annunitum's temple before giving a prophet warning meant for the king. Wilson suggests that, during the trance, Šelebum was possessed by the goddess, and therefore would have spoken and acted in a feminine way; and that this might have been a regular part of the assinnu's job.
__
George, Andrew "Four temple rituals from Babylon." in George, A R and Finkel, I L, (eds). Wisdom, Gods and Literature: Studies in Assyriology in Honour of W. G. Lambert. Winona Lake, Indiana, Eisenbrauns, 2000, pp. 259-299.
Henshaw, Richard A. "Appendix Three: The assinnu, kurgarrû and Similar Functionaries". in Female and male - the cultic personnel: the Bible and the rest of the ancient Near East. Allison Park, Pa, Pickwick Publications, 1994.
Kessler Guinan, A. Auguries of Hegemony: The Sex Omens of Mesopotamia. Gender & History, 9: 462–479, 1997.
Nissinen, Martti. "Introduction". in Prophets and prophecy in the ancient Near East, Martti Nissinen with contributions by C.L. Seow and Robert K. Ritner ; edited by Peter Machinist. Atlanta, Ga, Society for Biblical Literature, 2003.
Nissenen, Martti. Homoeroticism in the Biblical World. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1998.
Sjöberg, Åke W. A Hymn to Inanna and her Self-Praise. Journal of Cuneiform Studies 40(2) autumn 1988.
Wilson, Robert R. Prophecy and society in ancient Israel. Philadelphia, Fortress Press, 1980.
The gala-priest
Feb. 16th, 2016 06:17 pmIn "Genre, Gender, and the Sumerian Lamentation", Jerrold S. Cooper discusses the origins of the lamentation genre and the gala-priests who performed laments.
Cooper writes that the gala is "attested from the Fara [Early Dynastic IIIa] period... and at Lagash in the late-pre-Sargonic period and under Gudea the gala is associated with funerals". For example, mourners at Queen Baranamtara's funeral included "numerous gala"; Gudea's Statue B describes a general shut-down of funerals in Girsu during which "the gala did not set up his balag-drum and bring forth laments from it". (The balag-drum, Cooper points out, is the source of the name for the most common of the gala's laments, the balag; the term balag-di means "lamentation performer". "The gala first appears five hundred years prior to Ur III, and the balag-performer is attested five hundred years earlier still, in the earliest cuneiform lexical lists".)
In both examples above, "the gala is accompanied by women lamenters. Women may actually have served as gala in Presargonic Lagash, as they did later in the Diyala region". In cultures around the world and throughout time, funeral laments, as well as love songs and wedding songs, are the "musical province par excellence of women". Cooper notes that Inanna and Dumuzi appear in songs for both marriages and funerals, and that in some cultures these two rites have similarities. "That Inanna-Ishtar should be at the nexus of love and death is very fitting for a deity who is patron of both prostitution [sexuality, certainly] and battle. She is also associated with transformation and inversion... and weddings and funerals are the only two transformative rituals in ancient Mesopotamia of which we are aware."
Cooper's thesis is that the official lamentations developed from women's songs, much as Ancient Greek women's funeral laments were "brought under control and channeled into male-dominated ritual or literary enterprise"; female mourners were "joined by male colleagues who eventually replaced them". (Similarly, "the other realm of women's performance and Emesal usage, courtship and wedding song, came to be, at least for the elite, dominated by male performers.") Emesal is only used in Sumerian literature for the speech of women and goddesses, and for ritual laments, sung by galas. (A possibility about Emesal is that it was the local dialect of Lagash, and could only be written down "once Sumerian orthography fell under the influence of phonetic semitic orthography [which] could express dialectal differences", which is why no Emesal texts appear until the Old Babylonian period.)
This association with women, says Cooper, could explain "the ambiguous image of the gala - a ridiculous figure of uncertain sexuality according to some literary texts; a respected cleric with a wife and children in many documents". (Though personally I'm not convinced that the gala's "ridiculous" nature isn't a projection by modern authors.) Cooper points out that galas might have had different roles depending on historical period, context, and which deity they were serving. He also disputes that the logogram for gala, UŠ.TUŠ, should be read GÌŠ.DÁR, "penis + anus" - "the interpretation is not compelling, and other suggest themselves." (An example of projection? Here's another - the chief gala was in charge of "prostitutes", géme-kar-kíd. géme means female worker or slave, but the translation of kar-kíd (ḫarimtu) as "prostitute" has been challenged, as Cooper acknowledges; it may only mean "unmarried woman".)
(I thought of the cihuacoatl, the male deputy of the Aztec emperor, who was named after the snake goddess Cihuacoatl, "Snake Woman" - and speculation that the office might originally have belonged to women.)
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Cooper, Jerrold S. Genre, Gender, and the Sumerian Lamentation. Journal of Cuneiform Studies 58(2006) pp 39-47.
Cooper writes that the gala is "attested from the Fara [Early Dynastic IIIa] period... and at Lagash in the late-pre-Sargonic period and under Gudea the gala is associated with funerals". For example, mourners at Queen Baranamtara's funeral included "numerous gala"; Gudea's Statue B describes a general shut-down of funerals in Girsu during which "the gala did not set up his balag-drum and bring forth laments from it". (The balag-drum, Cooper points out, is the source of the name for the most common of the gala's laments, the balag; the term balag-di means "lamentation performer". "The gala first appears five hundred years prior to Ur III, and the balag-performer is attested five hundred years earlier still, in the earliest cuneiform lexical lists".)
In both examples above, "the gala is accompanied by women lamenters. Women may actually have served as gala in Presargonic Lagash, as they did later in the Diyala region". In cultures around the world and throughout time, funeral laments, as well as love songs and wedding songs, are the "musical province par excellence of women". Cooper notes that Inanna and Dumuzi appear in songs for both marriages and funerals, and that in some cultures these two rites have similarities. "That Inanna-Ishtar should be at the nexus of love and death is very fitting for a deity who is patron of both prostitution [sexuality, certainly] and battle. She is also associated with transformation and inversion... and weddings and funerals are the only two transformative rituals in ancient Mesopotamia of which we are aware."
Cooper's thesis is that the official lamentations developed from women's songs, much as Ancient Greek women's funeral laments were "brought under control and channeled into male-dominated ritual or literary enterprise"; female mourners were "joined by male colleagues who eventually replaced them". (Similarly, "the other realm of women's performance and Emesal usage, courtship and wedding song, came to be, at least for the elite, dominated by male performers.") Emesal is only used in Sumerian literature for the speech of women and goddesses, and for ritual laments, sung by galas. (A possibility about Emesal is that it was the local dialect of Lagash, and could only be written down "once Sumerian orthography fell under the influence of phonetic semitic orthography [which] could express dialectal differences", which is why no Emesal texts appear until the Old Babylonian period.)
This association with women, says Cooper, could explain "the ambiguous image of the gala - a ridiculous figure of uncertain sexuality according to some literary texts; a respected cleric with a wife and children in many documents". (Though personally I'm not convinced that the gala's "ridiculous" nature isn't a projection by modern authors.) Cooper points out that galas might have had different roles depending on historical period, context, and which deity they were serving. He also disputes that the logogram for gala, UŠ.TUŠ, should be read GÌŠ.DÁR, "penis + anus" - "the interpretation is not compelling, and other suggest themselves." (An example of projection? Here's another - the chief gala was in charge of "prostitutes", géme-kar-kíd. géme means female worker or slave, but the translation of kar-kíd (ḫarimtu) as "prostitute" has been challenged, as Cooper acknowledges; it may only mean "unmarried woman".)
(I thought of the cihuacoatl, the male deputy of the Aztec emperor, who was named after the snake goddess Cihuacoatl, "Snake Woman" - and speculation that the office might originally have belonged to women.)
__
Cooper, Jerrold S. Genre, Gender, and the Sumerian Lamentation. Journal of Cuneiform Studies 58(2006) pp 39-47.
Sacred Marriage and the Devotees of Ištar
Feb. 12th, 2016 02:23 pmIn this chapter from Sacred Marriages, Saana Teppo (now Saana Svärd) describes the assinnu, the kurgarrū, and the kulu'u (or gala), and their role in the worship of Ishtar. "in their ecstatic performances," she writes, "they were joined with Ishtar in a union comparabable to sacred marriage... they fulfilled the same function as the king in the sacred marriage ritual: they ensured the blessing of the goddess for the country."
"It seems that all three groups of cultic functionaries were born as men (or hermaphrodites [that is, intersex people]), but... their appearance was either totally feminine, or they had both male and female characteristics. [All three are] recorded in the literature of the Sumerian period [and] continued to appear in Akkadian texts up to the Seleucid and Persian eras." They were rained for their ritual duties: "ecstatic dance, music, ritual plays, and performances", in which they wore female dress and makeup and carried masks, spindles, and weapons. Teppo admits that the "evidence for this from Mesopotamia is not overwhelming", but it is possible that, like the galli and the hijra (?), the cultic performers mutilated themselves to achieve "an altered state of consciousness in which they could achieve union with the divine - a sacred marriage". (Perhaps the weapons were for mock or ritual battles? One of the love lyrics W.G. Lambert translates, perhaps describing a ritual, includes the lines 'Battle is my game, warfare is my game,' he/she will utter and the Assinnu-priest will go down to battle, he will ... a jig [...]".)
In the Sumerian version of the Descent of Inanna, Enki creates the kurgarrū and "the kalaturru (GALA.TUR, which can be translated as 'young kulu'u')" from dirt under his fingernails and dispatches them to rescue Inanna. In the Assyrian version, Ea creates the assinnu Asushanamir for the same purpose.
Teppo discusses the possibility that the assinnu, kurgarrū, and kulu'u performed sex work connected with Ishtar worship; I'm going to put that aside for now, because I still haven't fully got to grips with the recent overturning of the long-standing assumption that every priestess (and almost every woman!) in Mesopotamia was a sex worker. I will note, though, that the "kulu'u is called Ištar's 'sweet bedfellow' (ṣālitu ṭābu) and 'lover' (ḫabbubu)."
(ETA: Henshaw (p 300) discusses this last, translating the lines from a "namburbi text addressed to Ishtar": "come enter our house / with you may enter the beautiful one / who sleeps with you / your lover and your kulu'u." Henshaw notes: "it couldn't be three separate people invited in!" Oddly, that was exactly how I read it - although I think Henshaw's interpretation is probably right.)
Teppo suggests that the assinnu's role in healing is explained by Asushanamir's helping to bring Ishtar back to life. Assinnus could also be prophets (and there are three Neo-Assyrian prophets who, though are not called assinnus, are described as being both men and women). The kurgarrus performed a "war dance" "with knives, swords, and clubs", and played "ritual games with skipping ropes and bawdy speech". The assinnu and the kurgarrū are often found in each other's company, such as at liminal moments - the New Year's Festival, and eclipses.
The kulu'u or gala was originally a lamentation chanter, listed alongside "female mourners and wailers" and using the female literary dialect, Emesal. (Possibly they replaced female singers, retaining "the female forms of the profession".) An Old Babylonian poem describes Enki creating the gala to soothe Inanna's heart. Galas peformed in temples, at funerals, and possibly at court. The chief gala (GALA.MAḪ) was a high-ranking official; there may have been gala guilds, gala families, and female galas. (There's possible evidence of a female assinnu and a female kurgarrū.) But some galas were slaves, and the galas could be forced to do corvée work for the temple.
Ishtar could change someone's sex or gender, as noted in Inana C (aka The Stout-Hearted Lady, Lady of Largest Heart), the hymn Išme-Dagan K, and The Epic of Erra, which says of Ishtar and the kurgarru and assinnu: "Who changed their masculinity into femininity to make the people of Ištar revere her. The dagger-bearer, bearers of razors, pruning-knives, and flint blades, who frequently do abominable [ie "taboo acts, forbidden to regular persons] to please the heart of Ištar." Which said, nobody knows for sure whether some or all of the assinnus, kurgarrūs, and kulu'us were castrated (and if so, to what extent). (Eunuchs, ša-rēši, were a separate category of persons.)
So these cultic personnel had an established, institutional role, but how well were they treated as individuals? Some of Teppo's evidence that they were marginalised doesn't quite convince me. Enki created them from the dirt under his fingernails, but then, he created the human race out of lowly clay (maybe there was a bit left over :). The curse placed on Asushanamir is pretty unequivocal, though, damning the assinnu to a homeless city life, and someone is insulted with the remark "He is a kulu'u and not a man" - a reminder that "in practical terms Mesopotamian society was strongly patriarchal and had fairly inflexible gender categories," as Teppo remarks. She goes on to say: "There was very little toleration for individuals who did not conform to the expected male and female roles." (I wish she'd given some evidence for Mesopotamian gender non-conformity!) Perhaps these "third gender" roles "existed specifically because the roles of men and women were so clearly defined" - they represented "an outlet, a means for society to deal with people who could not, for whatever reason, function in society as men and women."
__
Lambert, W.G. "The Problem of the Love Lyrics". in Hans Goedicke and J. J. M. Roberts (eds). Unity and diversity: essays in the history, literature, and religion of the ancient Near East. Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1975. (p 105)
Teppo, Saana. "Sacred Marriage and the Devotees of Ishtar". in Martti Nissinen and Risto Uro (eds). Sacred marriages: the divine-human sexual metaphor from Sumer to early Christianity. Winona Lake, Indiana, Eisenbrauns, 2008. pp 75-92.
"It seems that all three groups of cultic functionaries were born as men (or hermaphrodites [that is, intersex people]), but... their appearance was either totally feminine, or they had both male and female characteristics. [All three are] recorded in the literature of the Sumerian period [and] continued to appear in Akkadian texts up to the Seleucid and Persian eras." They were rained for their ritual duties: "ecstatic dance, music, ritual plays, and performances", in which they wore female dress and makeup and carried masks, spindles, and weapons. Teppo admits that the "evidence for this from Mesopotamia is not overwhelming", but it is possible that, like the galli and the hijra (?), the cultic performers mutilated themselves to achieve "an altered state of consciousness in which they could achieve union with the divine - a sacred marriage". (Perhaps the weapons were for mock or ritual battles? One of the love lyrics W.G. Lambert translates, perhaps describing a ritual, includes the lines 'Battle is my game, warfare is my game,' he/she will utter and the Assinnu-priest will go down to battle, he will ... a jig [...]".)
In the Sumerian version of the Descent of Inanna, Enki creates the kurgarrū and "the kalaturru (GALA.TUR, which can be translated as 'young kulu'u')" from dirt under his fingernails and dispatches them to rescue Inanna. In the Assyrian version, Ea creates the assinnu Asushanamir for the same purpose.
Teppo discusses the possibility that the assinnu, kurgarrū, and kulu'u performed sex work connected with Ishtar worship; I'm going to put that aside for now, because I still haven't fully got to grips with the recent overturning of the long-standing assumption that every priestess (and almost every woman!) in Mesopotamia was a sex worker. I will note, though, that the "kulu'u is called Ištar's 'sweet bedfellow' (ṣālitu ṭābu) and 'lover' (ḫabbubu)."
(ETA: Henshaw (p 300) discusses this last, translating the lines from a "namburbi text addressed to Ishtar": "come enter our house / with you may enter the beautiful one / who sleeps with you / your lover and your kulu'u." Henshaw notes: "it couldn't be three separate people invited in!" Oddly, that was exactly how I read it - although I think Henshaw's interpretation is probably right.)
Teppo suggests that the assinnu's role in healing is explained by Asushanamir's helping to bring Ishtar back to life. Assinnus could also be prophets (and there are three Neo-Assyrian prophets who, though are not called assinnus, are described as being both men and women). The kurgarrus performed a "war dance" "with knives, swords, and clubs", and played "ritual games with skipping ropes and bawdy speech". The assinnu and the kurgarrū are often found in each other's company, such as at liminal moments - the New Year's Festival, and eclipses.
The kulu'u or gala was originally a lamentation chanter, listed alongside "female mourners and wailers" and using the female literary dialect, Emesal. (Possibly they replaced female singers, retaining "the female forms of the profession".) An Old Babylonian poem describes Enki creating the gala to soothe Inanna's heart. Galas peformed in temples, at funerals, and possibly at court. The chief gala (GALA.MAḪ) was a high-ranking official; there may have been gala guilds, gala families, and female galas. (There's possible evidence of a female assinnu and a female kurgarrū.) But some galas were slaves, and the galas could be forced to do corvée work for the temple.
Ishtar could change someone's sex or gender, as noted in Inana C (aka The Stout-Hearted Lady, Lady of Largest Heart), the hymn Išme-Dagan K, and The Epic of Erra, which says of Ishtar and the kurgarru and assinnu: "Who changed their masculinity into femininity to make the people of Ištar revere her. The dagger-bearer, bearers of razors, pruning-knives, and flint blades, who frequently do abominable [ie "taboo acts, forbidden to regular persons] to please the heart of Ištar." Which said, nobody knows for sure whether some or all of the assinnus, kurgarrūs, and kulu'us were castrated (and if so, to what extent). (Eunuchs, ša-rēši, were a separate category of persons.)
So these cultic personnel had an established, institutional role, but how well were they treated as individuals? Some of Teppo's evidence that they were marginalised doesn't quite convince me. Enki created them from the dirt under his fingernails, but then, he created the human race out of lowly clay (maybe there was a bit left over :). The curse placed on Asushanamir is pretty unequivocal, though, damning the assinnu to a homeless city life, and someone is insulted with the remark "He is a kulu'u and not a man" - a reminder that "in practical terms Mesopotamian society was strongly patriarchal and had fairly inflexible gender categories," as Teppo remarks. She goes on to say: "There was very little toleration for individuals who did not conform to the expected male and female roles." (I wish she'd given some evidence for Mesopotamian gender non-conformity!) Perhaps these "third gender" roles "existed specifically because the roles of men and women were so clearly defined" - they represented "an outlet, a means for society to deal with people who could not, for whatever reason, function in society as men and women."
__
Lambert, W.G. "The Problem of the Love Lyrics". in Hans Goedicke and J. J. M. Roberts (eds). Unity and diversity: essays in the history, literature, and religion of the ancient Near East. Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1975. (p 105)
Teppo, Saana. "Sacred Marriage and the Devotees of Ishtar". in Martti Nissinen and Risto Uro (eds). Sacred marriages: the divine-human sexual metaphor from Sumer to early Christianity. Winona Lake, Indiana, Eisenbrauns, 2008. pp 75-92.
Rider on the storm
Jan. 1st, 2016 07:11 pmInanna's magnificence was certainly distracting as I tried to read about an Old Babylonian tigi-hymn to Inanna (BM 96739, CT 36, 33-34). The hymn is about Inanna's investiture of Dumuzi and by extension the Babylonian king with authority, and scholar Daniel Foxvog examines its astronomical references, but as usual I got caught up on lines like these:
As for the astronomical bit: Foxvog discusses the constellations associated with various deities, including Orion (Papsukkal aka Ninshubur), Aries (Dumuzi/Tammuz), and Anunitu, "the eastern fish of Pisces" (Inanna / Ishtar). He suggests an astronomical interpretation of one of the concluding lines of the hymn: "Heaven shall beget him [Dumuzi] (anew) each month on the day of the new moon like the Moon (himself)". "The sun moves through the entire zodiacal belt of constellations over the course of a year, but the moon makes the same circuit monthly," he explains. In an idealized lunar calendar, "the moon would return each month to its starting point in its apparent course through the zodiacal belt, and the first visibility of the new crescent would invariable coincide with the first visibility of Aries. In this way, for the purposes of a priestly hymnographer uninterested in the details, the sky could indeed be said to 'give birth' every month to both Suen and Amaušumgalanna/Aries on the day of the new moon." (I'm not qualified to comment on the accuracy of the astronomy here!)
Foxvog gives a table of the correspondences between the Mesopotamian and Classical zodiac - here's a simplified version:
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Foxvog, Daniel. "Astral Dumuzi". in The Tablet and the scroll: Near Eastern studies in honor of William W. Hallo. CDL Press, Bethesda MD, 1993.
Lady, though (first) joyfully formed beautifully by Ningal for delight,Fabulous stuff! Inanna is also described as "mounted upon the storm winds", which IIRC is more characteristic of a male war-god such as Yahweh ("him who rides on the clouds", Psalm 68:4). But, as Foxvog points out, despite her awesome power she is a benevolent figure in this hymn (as she is in many others): "Could this be a memory of a time before her syncretism with Ištar?" (Dumuzi, by contrast, is an unusually martial figure.)
She then provided you with the power to destroy, like a dragon (ušumgal).
... from your mother's very womb you have girded on the utug and mitum maces.
Lady, the matters of your heart are greater than all heaven and all earth, who can know (anything) about you,
And at your word, a doubled cord that cannot be cut, the whole heaven is consumed.
As for the astronomical bit: Foxvog discusses the constellations associated with various deities, including Orion (Papsukkal aka Ninshubur), Aries (Dumuzi/Tammuz), and Anunitu, "the eastern fish of Pisces" (Inanna / Ishtar). He suggests an astronomical interpretation of one of the concluding lines of the hymn: "Heaven shall beget him [Dumuzi] (anew) each month on the day of the new moon like the Moon (himself)". "The sun moves through the entire zodiacal belt of constellations over the course of a year, but the moon makes the same circuit monthly," he explains. In an idealized lunar calendar, "the moon would return each month to its starting point in its apparent course through the zodiacal belt, and the first visibility of the new crescent would invariable coincide with the first visibility of Aries. In this way, for the purposes of a priestly hymnographer uninterested in the details, the sky could indeed be said to 'give birth' every month to both Suen and Amaušumgalanna/Aries on the day of the new moon." (I'm not qualified to comment on the accuracy of the astronomy here!)
Foxvog gives a table of the correspondences between the Mesopotamian and Classical zodiac - here's a simplified version:
| Aries | ram |
| Taurus (Pleiades) | bull |
| Orion and Gemini | men |
| Cancer | water (perhaps the Tigris and Euphrates) |
| Leo | lion |
| Virgo | grain |
| Libra | scales |
| Scorpio | scorpion |
| Sagittarius | (tablet is damaged) |
| Capricorn | goat |
| Aquarius | figure |
| Pisces | (tablet is damaged) |
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Foxvog, Daniel. "Astral Dumuzi". in The Tablet and the scroll: Near Eastern studies in honor of William W. Hallo. CDL Press, Bethesda MD, 1993.
Finding Inanna / Ishtar
Dec. 30th, 2015 10:45 pmIf we don't include the Deities and Demigods Cyclopedia*, the first time I encountered the goddess Inanna, aka Ishtar, was the remarkable book Inanna Queen of Heaven and Earth: Her Stories and Hymns from Sumer, co-written by scholar Samuel Noah Kramer and folklorist and storyteller Diane Wolkstein. It presents an accurate but accessible "portrait" of the goddess through ancient Mesopotamian literature, as well as background info from Kramer and a slightly dodgy analysis by Wolkstein (about which Kramer was later scathing). It was one of my first Pagan-ish books, bought from a New Age bookshop some time in the early-to-mid nineties, around the time I was starting to discover Wicca, though I'm not sure which came first - Kramer and Wolkstein's Inanna or Starhawk's description of the Great Goddess in The Spiral Dance.
I had fallen rather in love with the cosmically** powerful character of Phoenix from the X-Men comics - particularly in her incarnation of Dark Phoenix. A friend once pointed out that Dark Phoenix is, literally, expressing the uncontrollable rage of a victim of rape. Without making that comparison - at school the continual attacks were rarely physical, let alone sexual - what could be more attractive to a young woman unable to escape or stop the bullying than her unrestrained, uncontrollable, shameless, gleeful destructiveness?
The other figure that had caught hold of my soul was Hundra, the eponymous barbarian warrior from a sort of paella sword-and-sorcery flick - an unapologetically feminist story, despite all the titillation. At about the same time I watched the video with a friend, I stumbled across a poem which I now understand was a parody - although til this day I still don't know which poet was being parodied - which contained the line: "the weasel burst, in colours past belief". Somehow my increasingly hypomanic mind fused all of this together into the character of the Weasel, who then appears throughout my adolescent art and poetry.
So I was very ready to encounter the queen who kicked over the mountain Ebih when it failed to show her proper respect, who sent her own husband to hell for the same crime. "You fasten combat and battle to your side", writes Wolkstein. But to my surprise, on looking through the book as I write up this personal account, there's very little reference to Inanna's impulsive, conflict-loving nature, her annihilating wrath - of the monster who eats corpses on the battlefield like a dog. That must have come when I discovered Enheduanna's poems Lady of Largest Heart and The Exaltation of Inanna. But how did I get from the regal lover of Kramer and Wolkstein's book to that Hundra - Dark Phoenix figure? Is there any way to reconstruct that path at this point?
* Or whatever that children's book was that taught me the word "Mesopotamia" and the idea of a stratified society, with people called "artisans" somewhere in the middle. Must try to figure out what that was.
** This is actually a word.
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Kramer, Samuel Noah and Diane Wolkstein. Inanna Queen of Heaven and Earth: Her Stories and Hymns from Sumer. Harper and Row, New York, 1983.
I had fallen rather in love with the cosmically** powerful character of Phoenix from the X-Men comics - particularly in her incarnation of Dark Phoenix. A friend once pointed out that Dark Phoenix is, literally, expressing the uncontrollable rage of a victim of rape. Without making that comparison - at school the continual attacks were rarely physical, let alone sexual - what could be more attractive to a young woman unable to escape or stop the bullying than her unrestrained, uncontrollable, shameless, gleeful destructiveness?
The other figure that had caught hold of my soul was Hundra, the eponymous barbarian warrior from a sort of paella sword-and-sorcery flick - an unapologetically feminist story, despite all the titillation. At about the same time I watched the video with a friend, I stumbled across a poem which I now understand was a parody - although til this day I still don't know which poet was being parodied - which contained the line: "the weasel burst, in colours past belief". Somehow my increasingly hypomanic mind fused all of this together into the character of the Weasel, who then appears throughout my adolescent art and poetry.
So I was very ready to encounter the queen who kicked over the mountain Ebih when it failed to show her proper respect, who sent her own husband to hell for the same crime. "You fasten combat and battle to your side", writes Wolkstein. But to my surprise, on looking through the book as I write up this personal account, there's very little reference to Inanna's impulsive, conflict-loving nature, her annihilating wrath - of the monster who eats corpses on the battlefield like a dog. That must have come when I discovered Enheduanna's poems Lady of Largest Heart and The Exaltation of Inanna. But how did I get from the regal lover of Kramer and Wolkstein's book to that Hundra - Dark Phoenix figure? Is there any way to reconstruct that path at this point?
* Or whatever that children's book was that taught me the word "Mesopotamia" and the idea of a stratified society, with people called "artisans" somewhere in the middle. Must try to figure out what that was.
** This is actually a word.
__
Kramer, Samuel Noah and Diane Wolkstein. Inanna Queen of Heaven and Earth: Her Stories and Hymns from Sumer. Harper and Row, New York, 1983.
Inanna snippet
May. 13th, 2014 08:10 pmThe final lines of a Sumerian hymn to Ninkasi, the goddess of beer:
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Civil, M. A hymn to the beer goddess and a drinking song. Biggs, R.D. and J.A. Brinkman (eds). Studies Presented to A. Leo Oppenheim. Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, 1964.
šà-dinanna ki-bi ba-ab-gi4The author's footnote: "'Queen of heaven' translates ga-ša-an-an-na which is nothing but the Emesal form of dinanna." He adds that Emesal, the women's language, is used to indicate male and female speakers in different parts of the hymn.
šà-ga-ša-an-an-na-ke4 ki-bi ba-eb-gi4
The heart of Inanna is happy again,
The heart of the queen of heaven is happy again!
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Civil, M. A hymn to the beer goddess and a drinking song. Biggs, R.D. and J.A. Brinkman (eds). Studies Presented to A. Leo Oppenheim. Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, 1964.
Four millennia of Inanna/Ishtar
Dec. 29th, 2012 08:32 pmSqueezing in a few notes before New Year's Day, when I start writing my novel in earnest. This time for sure! :D
Fourth Millennium BCE
(roughly, the Uruk Period, 4000-3100)
Westenholz: "Inanna first appears in the late fourth millennium as the patron deity of Uruk, the first urban centre on the Mesopotamian alluvium". (But Beaulieu suggests 'Inanna and Enki' could "reflect the rise of Uruk to hegemony during the second half of the 4th millennium, when Inanna's city replaced Eridu as the main center of urban civilization in the southern alluvium.") She appears in four manifestations, each with its own temple and cult:
Third Millennium BCE
(including the Early Dynastic period, Sargon's Akkad, and the Ur III period)
Westenholz: Lots of local forms of the goddess, each with its own epithet: "In Kish she was known as Inanna-GAR, in Zabalam, as Inanna-Zabalam." It's in this millennium that the complex identification of the Sumerian Inanna with the semitic Ishtar takes place, and Enheduanna composes her hymns. Inanna was assigned a daughter (Nanaya) and three sons (Lulal, Latarak, and Shara), "although her maternity is of no consequence".
Beaulieu: Inanna is Uruk's most important deity - even superseding An. (Beaulieu discusses their relationship and relative status at length - I'll save that for another posting.) She is closely associated with the fortune of the city and its kings, as described in "the epic cycle centred on Enmerkar, Lugalbanda, and Gilgameš". The name Innin for Ishtar dates from this millennium.
Second Millennium BCE
(including the Old Babylonian and Middle Babylonian periods)
Westenholz: "The multiplication of manifestations... reaches its zenith... a cult of Inanna and/or Ishtar is performed in most major cities". (Beaulieu: the Canonical Temple List includes >79 temples dedicated to local Ištars.) Moreover, her character changes from a "troublesome young woman" into "the queen of heaven". But though Ishtar is the most prominent goddess, she and the other goddesses come second to the male gods. (Early in the millennium her astral manifestation is Ishtar-kakkabum "Ishtar the Star"; by the end it's Ishtar-kakkabi "Ishtar of the Stars". Just throwing this in 'cos I like it.)
Westenholz and Beaulieu: From the Middle Babylonian, cities have two major goddesses, a "lady" (beltu) and a "queen" (šarratu); Ishtar usually takes one of these roles. For example, at Babylon, Marduk's consort was Zarpanitu and Ishtar-of-Babylon was his "paramour". But at the same time, the two goddesses were identified - similarly, in late Uruk, Antu absorbed Ishtar's attributes (this syncretism is described in the hymn The Exaltation of Ishtar - not to be confused with Enhueduanna's Exaltation of Inanna!).
First Millennium BCE
(including the Neo-Babylonian period)
Beaulieu: "The tutelary goddess of Uruk appears under five different appellations in texts from the Eanna archive: Ištar, Ištar-of-Uruk, the Lady-of-Uruk (Beltu-ša-Uruk, Innin, and Beltiya." "In Neo-Babylonian Uruk it was Ištar who fulfilled the role of lady (beltu), and Nanaya that of queen (šarratu)." Nebuchadnezzar II states that he returned Ishtar to Uruk and restored her temple, Eanna - I'll save the possible abduction of the goddess ("who drives a team of seven lions") for another posting.
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Beaulieu, Paul-Alain. The Pantheon of Uruk during the Neo-Babylonian Period. Leiden ; Boston : Brill : STYX, 2003.
Westenholz, Joan Goodnick. "Inanna and Ishtar in the Babylonian World". in
Leick, Gwendolyn (ed). The Babylonian World. New York : Routledge, 2007.
Fourth Millennium BCE
(roughly, the Uruk Period, 4000-3100)
Westenholz: "Inanna first appears in the late fourth millennium as the patron deity of Uruk, the first urban centre on the Mesopotamian alluvium". (But Beaulieu suggests 'Inanna and Enki' could "reflect the rise of Uruk to hegemony during the second half of the 4th millennium, when Inanna's city replaced Eridu as the main center of urban civilization in the southern alluvium.") She appears in four manifestations, each with its own temple and cult:
- Inanna the Princely (NUN)
- Inanna of the Morning (húd)
- Inanna of the Evening (sig)
- Inanna of the Mountain (kur)
Third Millennium BCE
(including the Early Dynastic period, Sargon's Akkad, and the Ur III period)
Westenholz: Lots of local forms of the goddess, each with its own epithet: "In Kish she was known as Inanna-GAR, in Zabalam, as Inanna-Zabalam." It's in this millennium that the complex identification of the Sumerian Inanna with the semitic Ishtar takes place, and Enheduanna composes her hymns. Inanna was assigned a daughter (Nanaya) and three sons (Lulal, Latarak, and Shara), "although her maternity is of no consequence".
Beaulieu: Inanna is Uruk's most important deity - even superseding An. (Beaulieu discusses their relationship and relative status at length - I'll save that for another posting.) She is closely associated with the fortune of the city and its kings, as described in "the epic cycle centred on Enmerkar, Lugalbanda, and Gilgameš". The name Innin for Ishtar dates from this millennium.
Second Millennium BCE
(including the Old Babylonian and Middle Babylonian periods)
Westenholz: "The multiplication of manifestations... reaches its zenith... a cult of Inanna and/or Ishtar is performed in most major cities". (Beaulieu: the Canonical Temple List includes >79 temples dedicated to local Ištars.) Moreover, her character changes from a "troublesome young woman" into "the queen of heaven". But though Ishtar is the most prominent goddess, she and the other goddesses come second to the male gods. (Early in the millennium her astral manifestation is Ishtar-kakkabum "Ishtar the Star"; by the end it's Ishtar-kakkabi "Ishtar of the Stars". Just throwing this in 'cos I like it.)
Westenholz and Beaulieu: From the Middle Babylonian, cities have two major goddesses, a "lady" (beltu) and a "queen" (šarratu); Ishtar usually takes one of these roles. For example, at Babylon, Marduk's consort was Zarpanitu and Ishtar-of-Babylon was his "paramour". But at the same time, the two goddesses were identified - similarly, in late Uruk, Antu absorbed Ishtar's attributes (this syncretism is described in the hymn The Exaltation of Ishtar - not to be confused with Enhueduanna's Exaltation of Inanna!).
First Millennium BCE
(including the Neo-Babylonian period)
Beaulieu: "The tutelary goddess of Uruk appears under five different appellations in texts from the Eanna archive: Ištar, Ištar-of-Uruk, the Lady-of-Uruk (Beltu-ša-Uruk, Innin, and Beltiya." "In Neo-Babylonian Uruk it was Ištar who fulfilled the role of lady (beltu), and Nanaya that of queen (šarratu)." Nebuchadnezzar II states that he returned Ishtar to Uruk and restored her temple, Eanna - I'll save the possible abduction of the goddess ("who drives a team of seven lions") for another posting.
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Beaulieu, Paul-Alain. The Pantheon of Uruk during the Neo-Babylonian Period. Leiden ; Boston : Brill : STYX, 2003.
Westenholz, Joan Goodnick. "Inanna and Ishtar in the Babylonian World". in
Leick, Gwendolyn (ed). The Babylonian World. New York : Routledge, 2007.
Sumerian goddesses
May. 29th, 2012 09:45 pmTikva Frymer-Kensky, outlining the role of goddesses in Sumerian civilisation:
ETA: The same volume contains Frymer-Kensky's take on the Inanna-Dumuzi love songs. She notes that this "Lolita-Inanna" (pp 83-88) is very different to the Inanna of other sources: "... there is nothing defiant about her, nothing angry, nothing dangerous, nothing wild. She is the conventional well-brought-up daughter... There is no hint in this girl-child of the complex Inanna that she will later become."
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Frymer-Kensky, Tikva. "Goddess: Biblical Echoes". in Studies in Bible and Feminist Criticism. Philadelphia, Pa. : Jewish Publication Society ; London : Eurospan [distributor], 2006. pp 69-82.
- "The second millennium... was a time of tremendous transformation... Religion was transformed in a way that continually and constantly diminished the role of goddesses... Female deities that had control over certain cultural events and activities in the early period, let's say in 2300 BCE, become sidekicks by the later period." (p 70) (She goes on to note that the Babylonians were "prudes" who "desexualized" creation - a forerunner of the sexless Biblical deity, who is a "talking torso" (p 78-9).)
- Goddesses take the same roles as human women: "the mother, the sister, the mother-in-law, the daughter... and the wife. The mother is wonderful. There is no dark side to the mother in Mesopotamian mythology." The mother is dedicated and loyal, the sister similarly loyal. "Even the mother-in-law is a lovely figure. She is particularly the friend of the daughter-in-law. If you can imagine such a thing. She is her key ally in the house." (pp 70-1)
- The wife is a more obscure figure. The "prototype of all wives" (p 71) is the goddess of spinning and weaving, Uttu, crucial in the introduction of culture to humanity. There's an obvious contrast with the bride Inanna's systematic rejection the entire process of textile production - "Anything connected to making clothing, basically, was a woman's job." (p 74) Even elite women had to oversee the making of textiles, but Inanna has no such "economic duties". (By contrast, in Genesis, human beings are not taught culture but invent clothing, agriculture etc for themselves (p 79), becoming not spectators in a cosmic game but its players (p 80).)
- Although there are references to two minor children of Inanna, she never becomes a "mother figure". "She is eternally young and nubile - the Playboy bunny - the object of love and the personification of lust." But with no womanly chores to use her energy, Inanna is restless and power-hungry. "She is known by the epithet of 'the one who walks about'. Only demons and Inanna walk about." (p 75)
- Pondering the possible origins of figures like Lady Wisdom, Frymer-Kensky speculates that all such female figures might have their origin in early childhood, where an "all-wise" mother "brings us into civilization". She points out that "transformational" skills, such as making food, clothing, and beer, are the business of goddesses, but so are divination, singing, and dancing - the "cultural arts" in general. (Eventually, the god Enki assimilates all the goddesses' powers in these areas.) (pp 81-82)
ETA: The same volume contains Frymer-Kensky's take on the Inanna-Dumuzi love songs. She notes that this "Lolita-Inanna" (pp 83-88) is very different to the Inanna of other sources: "... there is nothing defiant about her, nothing angry, nothing dangerous, nothing wild. She is the conventional well-brought-up daughter... There is no hint in this girl-child of the complex Inanna that she will later become."
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Frymer-Kensky, Tikva. "Goddess: Biblical Echoes". in Studies in Bible and Feminist Criticism. Philadelphia, Pa. : Jewish Publication Society ; London : Eurospan [distributor], 2006. pp 69-82.
As the saying goes...
Mar. 24th, 2012 09:09 pmThere's a Sumerian proverb cited as evidence that the gala-priest was a "sacred catamite", which goes like this:
Having barely dipped my toe in the ocean of Sumerian, I have no way of judging between the two scholars, but I can say two things: (a) Jacobsen's interpretation is at least intelligible, and (b) I can't help wondering if Gordon's interpretation might be a self-fulfilling prophecy - that if you already think of the gala as a homosexual sacred prostitute, you'll use that belief to help you interpret proverbs about him. This does seem to be what has happened with the female "sacred prostitute" of Mesopotamia in many cases.
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Gordon, Edmund I. Sumerian proverbs: glimpses of everyday life in ancient Mesopotamia. New York : Greenwood Press, 1968.
"When the kalûm-priest wiped his anus, (he said) 'I must not excite that which belongs to my lady Inanna!'"Now the thing about Sumerian is that it's notoriously tricky to translate. That's Gordon's interpretation of the proverb, but the same volume gives Jacobsen's translation of exactly the same Sumerian phrases:
"As the saying goes: If the kalû-priest slips as he is sitting down, (he will immediately say): 'It is a visitation from (lit. 'a thing of') my mistress Inanna; far be it from me that I rise!"Jacobsen interprets this as meaning that the gala turns "even the most trivial things" into "divine portents so that he can make a thing of them". Flipping heck, could this version of the proverb be any more different?!
Having barely dipped my toe in the ocean of Sumerian, I have no way of judging between the two scholars, but I can say two things: (a) Jacobsen's interpretation is at least intelligible, and (b) I can't help wondering if Gordon's interpretation might be a self-fulfilling prophecy - that if you already think of the gala as a homosexual sacred prostitute, you'll use that belief to help you interpret proverbs about him. This does seem to be what has happened with the female "sacred prostitute" of Mesopotamia in many cases.
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Gordon, Edmund I. Sumerian proverbs: glimpses of everyday life in ancient Mesopotamia. New York : Greenwood Press, 1968.
Athena and the Amazons
Mar. 2nd, 2012 01:23 pmDid some heavy-duty reading yesterday. We pass the gleanings on to you!
In her chapter "Athena and the Amazons", Susan Deacy explores the paradoxical nature of Athena: patroness of patriarchy, the goddess of Greek civilisation; and yet at the same time armed and armoured, not just unmarried but refusing marriage, and closely associated with those back-to-front barbarians, those "enemies of Greek civilisation", the Amazons. Though the Amazons are long defeated, and Athena is firmly on the side of Athens and its men, these contradictions produce a restless tension, which I think speaks to the basic problem of oppressing people: keeping them oppressed.
According to Diodorus Sicilius, Athena leads the Amazon army; like them, she clings "tenaciously to manliness (andreia) and virginity (parthenia)." She remarks that Jean-Pierre Vernant (in Myth and Society in Ancient Greece) "has demonstrated that prior to marriage, the parthenos might be deemed not to be properly and exclusively feminine, capable of assuming warrior attributes and characteristics". Goddess and Amazons both "exhibit female behaviour not regulated by marriage" - they're not under men's control. In Amazon society, Diodorus tells us, men are strictly confined to the home because otherwise they might try to take over. Oh what a giveaway!
Anywho, there are obvious parallels here with Inanna/Ishtar, who although a wife, performs no domestic duties and bears no children, and prefers to spend her time fighting and generally making trouble. As the embodiment of what women aren't supposed to be, she reinforces what they are supposed to be... mostly. Again there's this tension, this instability: people don't fall tidily into the roles society dictates for them, especially if those roles are lesser ones. They have to be constantly put back in their place.
(Also intriguing: Diorodus says the Gorgons were an entire race of warrior women!)
ETA: If this discussion is accurate, the Amazons are still being killed off today, at least in the world of comics...
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Deacey, Susan. "Athena and the Amazons: mortal and immortal femininity in Greek myth". in Lloyd, Alan B. (ed) What is a God?: studies in the nature of Greek divinity. London, Duckworth; Swansea, Classical Press of Wales, 1997.
In her chapter "Athena and the Amazons", Susan Deacy explores the paradoxical nature of Athena: patroness of patriarchy, the goddess of Greek civilisation; and yet at the same time armed and armoured, not just unmarried but refusing marriage, and closely associated with those back-to-front barbarians, those "enemies of Greek civilisation", the Amazons. Though the Amazons are long defeated, and Athena is firmly on the side of Athens and its men, these contradictions produce a restless tension, which I think speaks to the basic problem of oppressing people: keeping them oppressed.
According to Diodorus Sicilius, Athena leads the Amazon army; like them, she clings "tenaciously to manliness (andreia) and virginity (parthenia)." She remarks that Jean-Pierre Vernant (in Myth and Society in Ancient Greece) "has demonstrated that prior to marriage, the parthenos might be deemed not to be properly and exclusively feminine, capable of assuming warrior attributes and characteristics". Goddess and Amazons both "exhibit female behaviour not regulated by marriage" - they're not under men's control. In Amazon society, Diodorus tells us, men are strictly confined to the home because otherwise they might try to take over. Oh what a giveaway!
Anywho, there are obvious parallels here with Inanna/Ishtar, who although a wife, performs no domestic duties and bears no children, and prefers to spend her time fighting and generally making trouble. As the embodiment of what women aren't supposed to be, she reinforces what they are supposed to be... mostly. Again there's this tension, this instability: people don't fall tidily into the roles society dictates for them, especially if those roles are lesser ones. They have to be constantly put back in their place.
(Also intriguing: Diorodus says the Gorgons were an entire race of warrior women!)
ETA: If this discussion is accurate, the Amazons are still being killed off today, at least in the world of comics...
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Deacey, Susan. "Athena and the Amazons: mortal and immortal femininity in Greek myth". in Lloyd, Alan B. (ed) What is a God?: studies in the nature of Greek divinity. London, Duckworth; Swansea, Classical Press of Wales, 1997.
Gender in Mesopotamia
Mar. 28th, 2011 08:06 pmHave recently read a couple of extremely interesting chapters from Sex and Gender in the Ancient Near East.
In one, Kathleen McCaffrey points out: "In our culture, gender tends to be regarded as a biological constant, but not all cultures share this belief." She points to the "third and fourth gender categories" recognised "in localities as diverse as India, Thailand, the Phillipines, Oman, Polynesia, Nigeria, the Balkans, Brazil and among Native American tribes" and modern Iran and Iraq. For these cultures, "genitals are not an essential sign of gender", but rather "social role and status" - the person's dress, occupation, and behaviour signify their gender.
If the Mesopotamians took a similar approach, then applying "Western taxonomic classifications" to the evidence will result in confusion. McCaffrey discusses Inanna/Ishtar's ability to change men into women and vice versa; scholars have debated whether this involved a physical change, such as castration, or perhaps referred to hermaphroditism or intersexuality. But perhaps this is only the Western "common sense" assumption that sex = genital sex. (OTOH, that curse invoking Ishtar of Alalakh implies a physical change - or is that a matter of interpretation?)
McCaffrey points to a number of examples which seem confusing to "Western gender logic", such as the statue of Ur-Nanshe, who appears female but has a masculine name and dress, and evidence from art and graves that some men at Hasanlu wore women's garments.
In the same book, Stephanie Dalley (in "Evolution of Gender in Mesopotamian Mythology and Icongraphy with a Possible Explanation of ša rešen, 'the man with two heads'") discusses creation mythology. Very briefly summarised, the first creatures are sexless or bisexual; the division into male and female, and sexual reproduction, arises later. She suggests that, for Babylonian thinkers, this might have been the result of translating from Sumerian into Akkadian - from a language with the genders "animate" and "inanimate" into a language with the genders "male" and "female". "... for them words were deeply rooted in the actual nature of the things they described... the change in noun categories would mirror a change in the objects which these nouns represented". (Similarly, she suggests, this could explain apparent inconsistencies in divine gender, such as male deities with Nin- in their names, and Shapash/Shamash, Ishtar/Athtar, and Tiamat/Yam.)
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McCaffrey, Kathleen. "Reconsidering Gender Ambiguity in Mesopotamia: Is a Beard Just a Beard?". in Parpola, S. and R. M. Whiting (eds). Sex and Gender in the Ancient Near East. Proceedings of the 47th Rencontre Assyriolgique Internationale, Helsinki, July 2-6, 2001. Compte rendu, Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale 47. Helsinki : Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project, 2002.
In one, Kathleen McCaffrey points out: "In our culture, gender tends to be regarded as a biological constant, but not all cultures share this belief." She points to the "third and fourth gender categories" recognised "in localities as diverse as India, Thailand, the Phillipines, Oman, Polynesia, Nigeria, the Balkans, Brazil and among Native American tribes" and modern Iran and Iraq. For these cultures, "genitals are not an essential sign of gender", but rather "social role and status" - the person's dress, occupation, and behaviour signify their gender.
If the Mesopotamians took a similar approach, then applying "Western taxonomic classifications" to the evidence will result in confusion. McCaffrey discusses Inanna/Ishtar's ability to change men into women and vice versa; scholars have debated whether this involved a physical change, such as castration, or perhaps referred to hermaphroditism or intersexuality. But perhaps this is only the Western "common sense" assumption that sex = genital sex. (OTOH, that curse invoking Ishtar of Alalakh implies a physical change - or is that a matter of interpretation?)
McCaffrey points to a number of examples which seem confusing to "Western gender logic", such as the statue of Ur-Nanshe, who appears female but has a masculine name and dress, and evidence from art and graves that some men at Hasanlu wore women's garments.
In the same book, Stephanie Dalley (in "Evolution of Gender in Mesopotamian Mythology and Icongraphy with a Possible Explanation of ša rešen, 'the man with two heads'") discusses creation mythology. Very briefly summarised, the first creatures are sexless or bisexual; the division into male and female, and sexual reproduction, arises later. She suggests that, for Babylonian thinkers, this might have been the result of translating from Sumerian into Akkadian - from a language with the genders "animate" and "inanimate" into a language with the genders "male" and "female". "... for them words were deeply rooted in the actual nature of the things they described... the change in noun categories would mirror a change in the objects which these nouns represented". (Similarly, she suggests, this could explain apparent inconsistencies in divine gender, such as male deities with Nin- in their names, and Shapash/Shamash, Ishtar/Athtar, and Tiamat/Yam.)
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McCaffrey, Kathleen. "Reconsidering Gender Ambiguity in Mesopotamia: Is a Beard Just a Beard?". in Parpola, S. and R. M. Whiting (eds). Sex and Gender in the Ancient Near East. Proceedings of the 47th Rencontre Assyriolgique Internationale, Helsinki, July 2-6, 2001. Compte rendu, Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale 47. Helsinki : Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project, 2002.
The wab-Sekhmet
Jan. 12th, 2011 05:58 pmA few notes from The Physicians of Pharaonic Egypt and The House of Life (Per Ankh): Magic and Medical Science in Ancient Egypt, both by Paul Ghalioungui.
In Physicians, Ghalioungui lists numerous flavours of physicians, including specialists like oculists, dentists, and "embalmers and bandagers", as well as "medical auxiliaries", such as the manicurist. There's a lot of overlap between the categories. The main types were the lay physician (swnw), magician-physician, and priest-physician, including priests of Sekhmet. He gives several examples of these wab-Sekhmet who were also doctors.
Magic and Medical Science opens with a detailed discussion of magic and how it works, and the difference between magic and "sacerdotal medicine". "The [magician] constrains the spirits by his charms. The [priest] gains the assistance of the gods by negotiating it in return for his submission to certain rules of behaviour." (p 14) Gods involved in healing, other than Sekhmet, included Thoth, Isis, Horus, Khonsu, the deified Imhotep, and Duau of Heliopolis, patron of "numerous oculist-priests". Seth, usually out of favour, was seen as "a source of sickness and epidemics". Tawaret and Neith protected mothers. (p 15-16)
( The per-ankh, or House of Life )The House of Life opens with a detailed discussion of magic and how it works, and the difference between magic and "sacerdotal medicine". "The [magician] constrains the spirits by his charms. The [priest] gains the assistance of the gods by negotiating it in return for his submission to certain rules of behaviour." (p 14) Gods involved in healing, other than Sekhmet, included Thoth, Isis, Horus, Khonsu, the deified Imhotep, and Duau of Heliopolis, patron of "numerous oculist-priests". Seth, usually out of favour, was seen as "a source of sickness and epidemics". Tawaret and Neith protected mothers. (p 15-16)
"If no material causes could be found to account for a disease, then occult agencies were assumed... These evil spirits had a chief who introduced them into the body and guided them in its interior. The Egyptians called him the 'great slanderer', like the Greeks who called him diabolos, the slanderer. These devils, these envoys of Sekhmet, carried with them 'the wind of the pest of the year'." They disguised themselves and "hid in the corners of the house", necessitating the exorcism of doors and windows. But often, an illness sent as a punishment could only be cured by the responsible god. (p 62)
Physicians (p 9) makes a comparison I don't think I've encountered before:
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Ghalioungui, Paul. The House of Life (Per Ankh): Magic and Medical Science in Ancient Egypt. Amsterdam, B.M. Israel, 1973.
— The Physicians of Pharaonic Egypt (Sonderschrift (Deutsches Archaeologisches Institut. Abteilung Kairo) 10). Cairo, Al-Ahram Center for Scientific Translations; Springfield, Va, Available from the U.S. Dept. of Commerce, National Technical Information Service, 1983.
In Physicians, Ghalioungui lists numerous flavours of physicians, including specialists like oculists, dentists, and "embalmers and bandagers", as well as "medical auxiliaries", such as the manicurist. There's a lot of overlap between the categories. The main types were the lay physician (swnw), magician-physician, and priest-physician, including priests of Sekhmet. He gives several examples of these wab-Sekhmet who were also doctors.
Magic and Medical Science opens with a detailed discussion of magic and how it works, and the difference between magic and "sacerdotal medicine". "The [magician] constrains the spirits by his charms. The [priest] gains the assistance of the gods by negotiating it in return for his submission to certain rules of behaviour." (p 14) Gods involved in healing, other than Sekhmet, included Thoth, Isis, Horus, Khonsu, the deified Imhotep, and Duau of Heliopolis, patron of "numerous oculist-priests". Seth, usually out of favour, was seen as "a source of sickness and epidemics". Tawaret and Neith protected mothers. (p 15-16)
( The per-ankh, or House of Life )The House of Life opens with a detailed discussion of magic and how it works, and the difference between magic and "sacerdotal medicine". "The [magician] constrains the spirits by his charms. The [priest] gains the assistance of the gods by negotiating it in return for his submission to certain rules of behaviour." (p 14) Gods involved in healing, other than Sekhmet, included Thoth, Isis, Horus, Khonsu, the deified Imhotep, and Duau of Heliopolis, patron of "numerous oculist-priests". Seth, usually out of favour, was seen as "a source of sickness and epidemics". Tawaret and Neith protected mothers. (p 15-16)
"If no material causes could be found to account for a disease, then occult agencies were assumed... These evil spirits had a chief who introduced them into the body and guided them in its interior. The Egyptians called him the 'great slanderer', like the Greeks who called him diabolos, the slanderer. These devils, these envoys of Sekhmet, carried with them 'the wind of the pest of the year'." They disguised themselves and "hid in the corners of the house", necessitating the exorcism of doors and windows. But often, an illness sent as a punishment could only be cured by the responsible god. (p 62)
Physicians (p 9) makes a comparison I don't think I've encountered before:
"At least in two instances a healing statue of her [Sekhmet's] Asian counterpart, Ishtar, was sent to Egypt, and Jonckheere (1951, 31) laid stress on the similarities between the two goddesses: same weapons, same husband (Ptah) and worship in the same city, Memphis." (p 9). [That's: Jonckheere, F. A la recherche du chirurgien Egyptien. Chronique d'Egypt 51 1951 pp 28-45. I'm all over it.]ETA: According to Ghalioungui, two female physicians are known by name: the swnw.t Peseshet, who had the title imy(.t)-r3 swnw.t, "Lady Overseer of Lady Physicians"; and the t3-syn Tawe, a midwife from around 300 BC.
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Ghalioungui, Paul. The House of Life (Per Ankh): Magic and Medical Science in Ancient Egypt. Amsterdam, B.M. Israel, 1973.
— The Physicians of Pharaonic Egypt (Sonderschrift (Deutsches Archaeologisches Institut. Abteilung Kairo) 10). Cairo, Al-Ahram Center for Scientific Translations; Springfield, Va, Available from the U.S. Dept. of Commerce, National Technical Information Service, 1983.
The EEF Guide to Internet Resources for Ancient Egyptian Texts
Paleolithic Notation Bibliography: "...over 400 academic articles, books, dissertations, and related publications (excluding book reviews and non-academic material) that discuss or evaluate the theory that some Paleolithic (primarily European Upper Paleolithic) artifacts contain non-representational graphic marks that served as tallies, calendars, astronomical notations, numerals, or other mnemonic devices."
The Brooklyn Museum's Mut Precinct stuff - reports, photos, dig diary, etc.
Mexican Saints (including La Santa Muerte), National Geographic May 2010
Sigmund Freud's collection of antiquities includes a ripping Syrian Ishtar.
Finally, here's Sekhmet being a supportive Mrs Ptah. Aw.
Paleolithic Notation Bibliography: "...over 400 academic articles, books, dissertations, and related publications (excluding book reviews and non-academic material) that discuss or evaluate the theory that some Paleolithic (primarily European Upper Paleolithic) artifacts contain non-representational graphic marks that served as tallies, calendars, astronomical notations, numerals, or other mnemonic devices."
The Brooklyn Museum's Mut Precinct stuff - reports, photos, dig diary, etc.
Mexican Saints (including La Santa Muerte), National Geographic May 2010
Sigmund Freud's collection of antiquities includes a ripping Syrian Ishtar.
Finally, here's Sekhmet being a supportive Mrs Ptah. Aw.
