The First Dog People

Because this is a dog year in the Chinese zodiac, and because dogs are now helping sniff out looted artifacts from Iraq and Syria, plus I love dogs, it seems a good time to talk about how Sumerians, Akkadians, Assyrians, and Babylonians–Mesopotamians–were all major dog people.

The first dog people.

Sit, Ur-Gi, Sit

Babylonian man who’s clearly a dog person, and his dog. (Source)

It is commonly believed (and seemingly supported by tangible evidence to an amateur) that soon after the dog (ur-gi in Sumerian) was first domesticated, the dog collar was developed in Egypt. But, as with a lot of things, it is actually ancient Sumer where that took place.

Archaeological evidence from Egypt dates further back than that from Mesopotamia, but in an article at Ancient History, titled, “Dogs in Ancient Egypt,” Joshua J. Mark still writes that dog collars and leashes were of Sumerian origin:

“The dog collar and leash were most likely developed by the Sumerians earlier although evidence for both of these in Mesopotamia appears later than 3500 BCE in objects like a golden Saluki pendant from Ur dated to 3300 BCE.” (Source)

Further, in another Ancient History article, titled, “Dogs & Their Collars in Ancient Mesopotamia,” Mark reiterates the belief that Mesopotamia was where domesticated dogs in collars first appeared, even, curiously, after declaring the difficulty of saying so with certainty:

“In the same way that scholars debate the origin of the dog and its first domestication, it is difficult to say with certainty that the people of Mesopotamia were the first to invent the collar. It is probable, even quite likely, that the collar – like people’s relationship with dogs themselves – developed independently in many different regions at different times. Even so, as far as the collar’s depiction in ancient art is concerned, the earliest come from Mesopotamia.” (Source)

Well, who am I to argue? Regardless of where dogs first began donning collars and getting led on leashes, Mesopotamians domesticated dogs for practical purposes like everyone else; security for their dwellings and their herds, as well as hunting.

But as we will find out, that package came with a lot more perks, and as we know…it was pretty freakin’ great.

This plaque found at the palace at Nineveh depicts Assyrian hunters with their hounds. (Source)

But let’s start at the beginning of this relationship.

To enter an ancient Mesopotamian city or village was to see collared dogs roaming freely, cleaning up carrion messes while guarding those human dwellings, along with the assets essential to their survival within them. They wore collars, because though they spent their days roaming free, they each had a master who cared for them and considered them the family pet.

Such an arrangement created the perfect environment in which the relationship between humans and dogs went beyond that of practicality and became one of companionship and love, the relationship all dog people have with their pooches today.

Good Dogs

Statue of a very good Mesopotamian dog, c. 5000-1000 BCE. (Source)

Though surely there were mutts, there were three main breeds of dog we know existed in ancient Mesopotamia; the Greyhound (which includes the Saluki type), the Dane, and the Mastiff. Mark quotes historian Wolfram Von Soden, whom I attribute the last statement to, describing the types of dogs and for what practical purposes they were each best suited:

“As far as we can tell, there were only two main breeds of dog: large greyhounds which were used primarily in hunting, and very strong dogs (on the order of Danes and mastiffs), which in the ancient Orient were more than a match for the generally smaller wolves and, for that reason, were especially suitable as herd dogs.” (Source)

Further descriptions of the types of dogs found in Mesopotamia come from inscriptions such as one from the Ur III Period (2047 – 1750 BCE), describing large mastiff-like creatures coming into the city with their handlers, wearing thick collars and leashes that one can only guess were made of leather.

For a clearer picture of what the dogs of Mesopotamia looked like, here is this simple video.

They Liked Them & Put Collars on Them

Plaque from Sippar depicting a man leading a large dog on a leash, possibly a Mastiff, dating to the Old Babylonian Period (2000 – 1600 BCE). Note the wide collar, rope tied twice around the dog’s neck. (Source)

Pretty much all depictions of dogs from Mesopotamia showed them wearing collars, all of which were wide to protect the animal’s neck. The earliest version of the collar was probably just rope that was wound around the dog’s neck multiple times (as in the image above) or a piece of sturdy cloth, which then probably evolved to the leather version I mentioned earlier.

According to Mark, though people from all rungs of the social ladder owned dogs in ancient Mesopotamia, dogs belonging to masters of the upper class wore collars that not only bore their names, but also their masters’.

The significance of the collar goes beyond its practicality, then. Mark, in the “Dogs & Their Collars in Ancient Mesopotamia” article, writes that the dog collar also served as a sort of testament to people’s inclination to spoil their pooches whom they felt were worthy of such an accessory.

Mesopotamian Belly Rubs

When looking at all there is to look at, whether art or any kind of literature featuring dogs from ancient Mesopotamia–and especially knowing their collars sometimes bore their names–it’s easy to see that the status of our best friend was high in more ways than one.

Today we have our pooches’ pictures on our phone lock screens, and that’s just scratching the surface of how we worship them. Well, Mesopotamians worshiped their dogs, too. Sometimes literally. Sometimes by having their image on the equivalent of the Mesopotamian phone lock screen – cylinder seals. Cylinder seals were used to identify individuals in writing, like a signature. Dogs making it into a person’s signature further drives home the importance of the intimate relationship people had with their dogs.

This cylinder seal dating back to the 2nd millenium BCE, features a male worshiper with a dog. Note the collar on the dog. (Source)

Best Friends with Benefits

Dogs were first and foremost domesticated for practical purposes, but alongside the universal ones, Mesopotamians got a few extra magical ones. They equaled, and were synonymous with, protection, not just in the practical ways in which we still rely on them, but also in the spiritual and supernatural sense; they protected humans against angry gods, ghosts, evil spirits, and demons.

The golden pendant of the saluki from Uruk, c. 3300 BCE, housed at the Louvre in Paris. (Source)

The labyrinthine pantheon Mesopotamians worshiped, and their belief that every deed done or not done counted and every action had a reaction, made them take very practical and serious measures to protect themselves from any vengeful gods, or worse, demons.

Along with incantations and prayers, physical objects were produced as a line of defense. The golden dog pendant pictured above is a protective amulet that was worn or carried by its owner. In the ruins of Nineveh, dog statuettes with inscriptions saying they are for protection were found buried beneath an entrance to the North Palace. At the city of Kalhu (Nimrud), five dog figurines made of clay, known as The Nimrud Dogs, were also found with the same kind of inscriptions identifying them and their purpose.

Clay dog figurines found buried underneath a North Palace entryway at Nineveh. Inscriptions on their bodies include declarations such as: “Loud is his bark!” (Source)

It was during Hammurabi’s reign (c. 1792 – 1750 BCE) that the practice of creating clay or bronze figures of dogs took off in ancient Mesopotamia, not to be cute and have the likenesses of pets to decorate with, but for security. Such sacred knickknacks were buried in multiples beneath entrances to buildings, including those of palaces, as mentioned above. Rituals preceded these burials, during which incantations were recited to awaken the protective spirit of the dog in the object being buried.

Dogs and Gods

A plaque dating back to the reign of Babylonian king Nabu-mukin-apli, 978-943 BCE, showing Gula with one of her pooches. (Source)

In her book, The Healing Goddess Gula: Towards an Understanding of Ancient Babylonian Medicine, Barbara Böck writes about Lamashtu, a demon whose “specialty is killing babies,” among other horrible things. To protect their babies from Lamashtu, Mesopotamians called on Gula and her dogs.

Gula, among other things, was the goddess of healing and dogs. She is always either depicted with a dog at her side (as shown above) or as a dog herself; it was during the Old Babylonian Period (c. 2000- 1600 BCE) that her symbol became simply the dog.

When Gula was called upon through an incantation to keep Lamashtu from snatching a baby, her dogs faced the demon and threatened her:

“We are not just any dog, we are dogs of Gula, poised to flay your face, tear your back to pieces, and lacerate your ankles.” (Source)

You’ll note that Gula is primarily the goddess of healing, though she wears a few more hats, including that of being the goddess of dogs, but what do those things have to do with each other so that they exist in one deity?

Well, dogs were the sacred companions of Gula because they were healers themselves. The saliva of dogs, which Mesopotamians observed could heal wounds, was valued as medicine.

Another part of Gula that the Mesopotamian view of dogs drew from is the fact that the goddess was also associated with the underworld and transformation, things people experience after death. Dogs in this context were the companions of the dead on their journey to the afterlife, where they might have to face demons or other unsavory characters they need protecting from.

It’s a very bittersweet thing, the heights the relationship between dogs and humans reached, especially when you take into consideration that it was children whom dogs accompanied the most on their journeys to the afterlife. (No, I’m not crying, you are.)

Going back to the part about her being the goddess of dogs, Gula protected them (along with cats…this goddess is my kind of goddess), and as Böck writes, a partially-preserved prayer to Gula makes it clear that not doing right by a dog, alive or dead, is really not okay with her:

“He has shown great disrespect which before Gula…

[He saw…] but pretended not to notice it. He saw a wounded dog but he pretended [not to notice it].

He saw [a…dog] but pretended not to notice it. The dogs [were] fighting…

[…they were wai]ling and he saw it but pretended not to notice it…

[He saw a dead dog] but did not bury it and threw it to the ground…

…the dogs were fighting but he did not remove them…” (Source)

Keep in mind, we’re talking about a deity associated with the underworld, which means it’s best to not anger her, or you might need to find another way to protect yourself from harm. And you might as well forget about a dog coming to your rescue then.

Long Before Lassie

Saluki.

Domesticated dogs in collars and on leashes also made plenty of appearances in Mesopotamian literature. Samuel Noah Kramer, author of History Begins at Sumer, wrote that dogs are referred to in 83 proverbs and fables.

In The Epic of Gilgamesh and The Descent of Inanna, we see that Gula was not the only deity accompanied by dogs. In the former, the goddess Inanna (Ishtar) makes her appearance accompanied by seven hunting dogs wearing collars and being led on leashes. In the latter, the god Dumuzi (Tammuz) keeps a royal retinue that includes domesticated dogs in the underworld where he resides.

These dogs are the protectors and companions of these deities, and especially in the case of Inanna, who was often called upon for protection. The dogs were that extra level of divine protection.

As Kramer notes, according to Mark, along with such elevated roles in mythology, dogs were also the subject of fables that showcased loyalty, unconditional love, and the protective nature of our best friends to impart wisdom, as fables do. In fact, some of Aesop’s fables were not his at all, but rather Sumerian ones written centuries before Aesop (c. 620 – 564 BCE) was even alive, but that’s another topic for another time. Two such fables were, Why the Dog is Subservient to Man and The Show Dog, which are summarized quite well here, but essentially highlight the attributes of dogs, such as loyalty, unconditional love, and fierce protectiveness.

The interesting aside I want to point to is that Mesopotamians had dog shows, and this is something that, according to Kramer, helps support the idea that domestication and the collar in Mesopotamia predated those things in Egypt.

All Dogs Go To Heaven

Dog paw prints accidentally and wonderfully left in clay, from Ur, c. 2047-2030 BCE. (Source)

At Gula’s most prominent temple at Isin, where dogs considered sacred roamed and were taken care of by the priests and priestesses there, underneath the ramp leading up to the building, 30 actual dogs were found buried.

Böck writes that although the dogs might have been sacrificial, it is also possible they were just the sacred dogs of the temple whose burial was simply a way to honor them after their natural passing, as Gula liked.

Of course, I choose to believe the latter option.

I choose to believe the latter option, because I can’t imagine that even in the harsh world of antiquity, where live animals were often buried with their owners in order to accompany them to the afterlife, anyone could stomach a stand-alone sacrifice of a protector, healer, and best friend. I choose to believe that the dog has always, from day one, held a large chunk of humanity’s collective heart. I choose to believe we’re all dog people if we all knew what our ancestors figured out about the creature that is love itself.

Sources and further reading:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saluki

https://www.ancient.eu/article/1031/dogs-in-ancient-egypt/

https://www.ancient.eu/article/1175/dogs–their-collars-in-ancient-mesopotamia/

https://archive.org/details/Kramer1956HistoryBeginsAtSumer

https://www.ancient.eu/article/215/inannas-descent-a-sumerian-tale-of-injustice/

https://www.ancient.eu/Inanna/

http://www.gatewaystobabylon.com/gods/lords/lordumuzi.html

https://www.ancient.eu/Gula/

https://www.ancient.eu/article/1001/the-nimrud-dogs/

https://www.ancient.eu/article/846/cylinder-seals-in-ancient-mesopotamia—their-hist/

https://books.google.com/books?id=Tfd0AQAAQBAJ&pg=PA39&dq=he+has+shown+great+disrespect+which+before+gula&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiKkZf_-oLaAhUX92MKHedFB0YQ6AEIKTAA#v=onepage&q=he%20has%20shown%20great%20disrespect%20which%20before%20gula&f=false

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isin

http://www.ancientneareast.net/mesopotamian-religion/lamastu-lamashtu/

 

Dates in Mesopotamia

Date palms were very much a part of the Mesopotamian landscape and everyday life. (Source)

The Coachella Valley in California is known for being the home of a certain music festival, but few people booking their first trip to that festival realize it is also home to countless date farms.

Dates are the oldest-cultivated fruit, but they only made it to California after 1898, when the US Department of Agriculture sent out some guys to collect exotic plants from around the world to bring back for cultivation in America, including mangoes, avocados and, you guessed it, dates.

Inspired by One Thousand and One Arabian Nights, a book that had enchanted many stateside with its stories of Aladdin and Sinbad, set against a landscape rich with date palms, the men charged with bringing back dates went straight to Baghdad, Iraq.

Date palms in Coachella Valley, Calif. Dorothea Lange/Library of Congress, via NPR.

And so started the date’s journey from Mesopotamia to California. (Source)

Googling Dates

Sumerians first began their relationship with the date palm, a tree that towered up to 100 feet and could live up to 200 years, as early as 4000 BC, 5,000 years ago. Over time, they wound up with some 150 words to describe the different types of date palm and their different parts, a fact apparent in what Karen Rhea Nemet-Nejat refers to as the ancients’ “lexical texts,” in her book, Daily Life in Ancient Mesopotamia.

Nonetheless, they called the date palm (phoenix dactylifera) gishimmar, and its fruit, zulum.

Gishimmar and zulum might sound (and look) like perfectly Sumerian words to the untrained in Sumerian (me), but they are not. According to a German Assyriologist by the name of Benno Landsberger, these words are words from a pre-Sumerian language. This implies that the date palm and its fruit were a thing humans knew about before Sumerians became cultivators. Some sources I came across, including this resourceful HortScience paper from ChihCheng T. Chao and Robert Kreuger, place India alongside Mesopotamia as the origin of the idea to cultivate the date palm. Further, the Biblical Archaeology Society says in an article, “The earliest-known date seeds were found in Indus Valley settlements dating to the sixth millennium B.C., suggesting that dates originated in the East and were carried to the Near East and Egypt.”

This (Mesopotamia) Must Be the Place!

On the Natural History of the Date Palm Phoenix dactylifera page, Geoff Sanderson writes that the date palm needs “its feet in running water and its head in the fire of the sky.”

Such criteria made Lower Mesopotamia in the Tigris and Euphrates delta—where summers are dry, winters are mild, and irrigation was already a thing—the perfect location for the date palm to thrive and become a symbol of fecundity and success, as well as a vital part of the economy.

Even with the perfect conditions Lower Mesopotamia provided a date palm, however, it still took the plant four to six years from planting time to bear fruit, along with some 15 to 20 years to reach full productivity. To give some perspective, full productivity for a date palm is an annual output of about 45 pounds (20kg) of fruit per tree. For a plant that played such a vital economic role to so many people, it’s hard to imagine that such yields were enough to, one, support such thriving civilizations, and two, reach quintessence status.

Moreover, a natural palm grove features an even split of half female and half male trees. Such groves rely on Mother Nature to carry the males’ pollen to the females’ flowers via the wind or pollinating fauna. Needless to say, date palm yields were dependent upon which way the wind blew or how frisky a bee felt, something no bustling civilization could (or should, if it could help it) rely on.

Enter the quintessential Sumerian genius that increased yields and established a practice still in use today: artificial pollination.

We Should Date More!

To combat the uncertainty of nature, Sumerians took up artificial pollination. It sounds a lot more complicated than it was/is; all it took was grabbing a male plant, climbing up a female’s trunk and smearing the pollen from the male plant onto the female’s flowers. This not only ensured maximum yields regardless of Mother Nature’s whims, it also allowed for cultivators to have a lot more of the productive female trees per acre in their groves than male ones (a ratio of 49 females to one male).

Artificial pollination in ancient Mesopotamia’s palm groves is not much different from artificial pollination in today’s palm groves, even in California. (Source)

To this day, the Sumerian way of ensuring high date-palm yields is in use, as described in this NPR piece, “Forbidding Fruit: How America Got Turned On To The Date”:

“And they still hand-pollinate dates today to ensure a reliable, successful crop. Francisco Paniagua was a palm worker, or palmero, for decades and is now a farmer with an orchard … During the spring pollinating season, he climbs up into the fronds of 50-foot female date palms. He works his way around the spiky branches of the crowns, spraying little puffs of yellow pollen gathered from the flowers of a male palm tree onto each flower of the female trees. (Source)”

The Importance of Being a Date Palm

“The sacred tree in Assyrian mythology is a palm that symbolizes Ishtar connecting heaven, the crown of the tree, and earth, the base of the trunk.” (Source)

It is believed that the date palm may have represented fertility in humans in ancient Mesopotamia. (Source) This is a safe assumption to make, considering the symbolism of the sacred marriage ritual which took place each spring for the Sumerians and all those following them.

For the sacred marriage each spring, people gathered at the new year festival and watched the king’s procession from his palace to the city’s temple of Inanna (Ishtar), where he would meet up with the Mesopotamian goddess of fertility (represented by a high priestess) and be led into the temple to consummate the symbolic marriage of the god Dumuzi (Tammuz) and goddess of fertility. This is a symbolic effort to ensure that the coming year is a productive one.

According to the Pass the Flamingo blog:

“[Dumuzi’s] marriage to the goddess Inanna symbolized the annual date-harvest and storage; Inanna was the date-cellar, [Dumuzi] the fruit.”

Dumuzi’s association with the date palm extends to him being worshiped as Ama-ushumgal-anna, the power of the date-palm, by cities across Mesopotamia whose economies relied heavily on the date palm. Further, Inanna was considered “the one who makes the dates be full of abundance.” Both Dumuzi and Inanna are represented by date-palm paraphernalia; Dumuzi a date cluster or heart of palm, and Inanna a palm frond.

Inanna depictions, including two implying the consummation of the sacred marriage between her and Dumuzi, a god of the underworld. (Source)

Dumuzi and Inanna weren’t the only gods associated with date palms and their fruit. Mylitta, the Babylonian moon goddess of love, beauty, fertility and childbirth, is also represented by the date palm.

And from the gods, the importance of the date palm only becomes more prominent through its presence in the most technical of texts that dealt with practical matters, the Code of Hammurabi. In an article I found on JSTOR about date culture, A.H. Pruessner writes about the extent of this importance:

“The rather large space devoted to the subject of date culture in the Code of Hammurabi testifies to the important position which it occupied in the agricultural life of his empire.”

And in their paper, “The Date Palm (Phoenix dactyliferaL.): Overview of Biology, Uses, and Cultivation,” Chao and Kreuger further mention the Code of Hammurabi’s mention of “laws pertaining to date culture and sales.”

Pruessner includes some such laws, which you can read starting on page 216 of the JSTOR PDF document, “Date Culture in Ancient Babylonia.” Sinan Antoon also gives us an idea of what those laws might have been in his novel, The Baghdad Eucharist:

“Cutting down a palm tree was punishable by a fine under the Code of Hammurabi. Another section of the code warned date palm farmers against neglecting their orchards and enjoined them to be vigilant about pruning and pollination.” (Source)

So, the date palm was important in ancient Mesopotamia. Let’s dive deeper into why it was so.

Got a Date?

Really, date palms needed only to stand there to be useful (oh, to be a date palm!) and provide value to their cultivators; their groves provided a canopy that shielded less-keen-on-the-fire-sky crops from the hot sun.

The date palm’s sprout also brought something to the dinner table; a vegetable vaguely described as not unlike celery, which can only be the delicious heart of palm.

Then there’s the date’s plethora of benefits, as listed by Chao and Kreuger:

• Iron
• Potassium
• Calcium
• Chlorine
• Copper
• Magnesium
• Sulfur

All these nutrients, plus 16 amino acids and vitamins A, B1 and B2, no doubt played a part in the date palm’s ability to produce antidotes for ailments like sore throats and intestinal issues. (Source)

Then we have the date’s high sugar content. We may villainize sugar today, but in the ancient world, sugar, and a lot of it, was prized for its ability to be a preservative while also, of course, satisfying a sweet tooth. That sweet tooth was satisfied through a sweet sap known as lal that came from the dates, and was a less dear sweetener than honey.

I feel this is a good spot to mention that one royal delicacy was dates from the Mesopotamian province of Hatra, stuffed with almonds.

Even date date pits were valuable, for they could either serve as food for livestock or could be made into decorative jewelry. In fact, to further drive home the latter, such pits were found in the Royal Cemetery at Ur.

Dates found at the Royal Cemetery at Ur. (Source)

And if all that doesn’t impress you, perhaps knowing that dates were also used to make alcoholic beverages will.

All this and we haven’t even gotten to the date palm’s resourcefulness as a building and manufacturing material, thanks to its by-products of leaves, fiber and timber.

Weaving palm fronds to make everything, from baskets to roofs. (Source)

Palm trunks were used to construct the temple of the moon god at Ur, and Mesopotamian homes were constructed with the palms’ trunks and fronds. Needles and thread came from the date palm, which surely helped in the production of baskets, mattresses and rope.

Nemet-Nejat writes that the date palm was unique for all its features. “Its position was unique, because every part of the date palm could be used,” she writes. Chao and Kreuger iterate further: “It is said that there are as many uses of dates as there are days in a year.”

The Picture of a Date Palm

So, the date palm was obviously the MVP tree in Mesopotamia and is to Mesopotamia what the olive tree is to the Mediterranean. Why else would there be a word dedicated to describing something specific, as Naomi F. Miller states on the University of Pennsylvania Museum’s Sex Life of the Date page: “…there is even a word, defined in the Pennsylvania Sumerian Dictionary, that refers to an item of jewelry in the form of the flowering branch of the date palm.” (I cannot find this word, but I trust it is in that dictionary.)

A. Leo Oppenheim further explains in his book, Ancient Mesopotamia: Portrait of a Civilization: “No other fruit tree has received similar attention,” Oppenheim writes. “Only in groves of date palms did the garden play an important economic role in Mesopotamia. The date palm was the only essential fruit tree in the region.”

Babylonian literature dating back to 2000 BC describes a quarrel between a date palm (likely of the Halawi or Zahidi varieties, as both originated in Mesopotamia, according to the Medjool Date Palms website) and a tamarisk tree in the internal courtyard of a palace. The argument centers around who’s better:

“The two trees, brother and sister, are quite different; the tamarisk and the palm-tree compete with each other. They argue and quarrel together. The tamarisk says: ‘I am much bigger!’ And the date-palm argues back, saying: ‘I am much better than you! You, o tamarisk, are a useless tree. What good are your branches? There’s no such thing as a tamarisk fruit! Now, my fruits grace the king’s table; the king himself eats them, and people say nice things about me. I make a surplus for the gardener, and he gives it to the queen; she, being a mother, nourishes her child upon the gifts of my strength, and the adults eat them too. My fruits are always in the presence of royalty.’

The tamarisk…his speech is even more boastful…the date-palm counters by pointing out that her fruits are the central offering in the cult; once they have been taken from the tamarisk dish, the bowl used to collect up the garbage.” (Source)

In the JSTOR article where I found the above excerpt, Stephanie Dalley argues that the Hanging Gardens of Babylon were not built in Babylon as has been the belief for centuries, but rather at Nineveh in Assyria, which was known as “old Babylon” in 700 BC. I mention this seemingly irrelevant detail, because to support her argument, Dalley includes insight and details about the date palm in Mesopotamia that I hadn’t come across anywhere else.

For instance, Dalley writes that it was actually Sennacherib who had built the Hanging Gardens of Babylon at Nineveh, adding that the date palm’s trunk served as inspiration for the design of the irrigation system in the gardens. The texture of said trunk also served as a decorative motif for columns. She also mentions that for a city to have a palm grove was a source of pride for that city, pointing to the prologue of the Epic of Gilgamesh:

“…[It] boasts of the famous city Uruk, saying: ‘One square mile is city, one square mile is orchards, one square mile is claypits.’ … By ‘orchards,’ date-palm groves are probably implied.”

Live Long and Prosper

The date palm continues to be important in modern-day Mesopotamia, aka Iraq.

It is part of the landscape, towering over gardens and prominent in art (as you’ve noticed by All Mesopotamia’s logo, designed by Nadia Khafaji). Its fruit is celebrated with festivals and is a staple of the Iraqi sweet tooth that can be satisfied with the date or through the quintessentially Iraqi date syrup/molasses known as dibis.

One of the most famous folk songs from Iraq is “Above the Date Palms.”

The date palm has a definite (albeit decently long) lifespan, but it has immortalized the Sumerian genius of working with nature and helping it along for humanity’s benefit.

 

Shaduppum, A City Full of Surprises.

Shaduppum. Ain’t it a beauty?

In 1945, on the southeastern outskirts of Baghdad, the ancient city of Shaduppum was discovered at Tell Harmal.

Excavations soon got underway, led by Iraqi archaeologist Taha Baqir, and Muhammed Ali Mustafa of the Iraqi Department of Antiquities. (Source) The excavations unearthed an Old Babylonian city with a collection of close to 3,000 tablets.

Now, with so many tablets in its hold, it’s no wonder Shaduppum’s patron god is that of writing and record-keeping, and that it was an administrative hub for Babylonia.

First Things First

Although it was established as early as the late third millenium BC, during the days of Sargon of Akkad, Shaduppum didn’t rise to prominence until the second millennium BC, when it served as a Babylonian accounting hub.The city’s name reflects this, by translating into “the treasury,” or “accountant’s office.”

Within Shaduppum’s walls, private homes, one administration building, and seven temples were unearthed, some reconstructed. Of the seven temples, a large one dedicated to Nisaba, the Sumerian goddess of writing and record-keeping, and her consort, sits just inside the city’s gates. That temple’s entrance was guarded by two roaring terra-cotta lions.

One of the terra-cotta lions at Shaduppum, on display at the Iraqi National Museum.

That Terra-cotta lion with his buddy guarding the temple of Nisaba in the city of Shaduppum. (Source)

 

Accountants aren’t all about numbers!

So, almost 3,000 tablets were unearthed at Shaduppum, but only a few weren’t of an administrative nature, and you’ll find that the nature of these non-administrative tablets is a little surprising.

I find it surprising, anyway, that a city with such a cut and dry purpose had a copy of The Epic of Gilgamesh, the world’s oldest written work of literature, in its vaults. It was some nine decades after the standard Akkadian version of the ancient poem was discovered in Ashurbanipal’s library at Nineveh, that two tablets of it were unearthed at Shaduppum.

The next surprise is actually two surprises in one.

You see, Iraqi archaeologist Taha Baqir also discovered a set of laws some two centuries older than the Code of Hammurabi at Shaduppum. The Laws of Eshnunna were written in Akkadian on two tablets, marked A and B, dating back to 1930 BC. That’s the first surprise regarding this find. The second one might make you do a double take…

The Laws of Eshnunna, Eshnunna being the city north of Ur where they originated, were promoted by that city’s ruler, Bilalama. In 1948, a year after Baqir’s discovery, Albrecht Goetze translated and published the laws, revealing that though Bilalama had some two-hundred years on Hammurabi, he was a little more progressive than the man whose laws inspired the Ten Commandments. That’s right. Unlike Hammurabi, whose punishments usually featured maiming, if not death, Bilalama implemented a monetary, fine-based penal system. But don’t get too comfortable with Bilalama’s laws, because the more serious offenses, including sexual ones, were punishable by death. That’s pretty progressive!

Shamash: These aren’t the first laws. Hammurabi: What?! Wait–. Shamash: Shhh. Now smile for the chiseler! 

Poor Hammurabi.

Stealing some Greek thunder

Hammurabi was not the only one whose thunder is stolen by tablets at Tell Harmal. The one-upping found in Shaduppum’s collection of tablets didn’t even stop at Mesopotamia’s borders, for it extended all the way to the Greek realm, delivering the two bombshells I’m going to talk about now.

Now, even if you used math class (or history) as nap time, the names Euclid and Pythagoras should sound familiar to you. And if not (it’s okay), I’ll refresh your memory: Euclid of Alexandria is the father of geometry, and Pythagoras of Samos proved that  in a right-angled triangle, aka, the Pythagorean Theorem.

The tablets that steal a bit of Greek mathematician thunder. Sorry, Bros.

Though the fact still remains that Euclid and Pythagoras gave us the official real deal, complete with proof and universal mathematical truths, two tablets dating to the early second millennium BC deliver the same newsflash Hammurabi got about his laws: Kinda’ been there, kinda’ done that.

The algebraic-geometry on one tablet (the one on the left in the picture above) features work similar to Euclid’s, dealing with the hypotenuse of a right-angle triangle. The other tablet features a problem with a rectangle whose length and width are calculated using what is essentially the Pythagorean Theorem.

Pythagoras: *A long, deep, deep, deep SIGH*

Sorry, Bros.

Another look at Shaduppum

So, the first round of excavations at Tell Harmal was fruitful, but a second round in 1997 turned out to be all about details. The Iraqi Department of Antiquities and Heritage allowed more excavations at Tell Harmal that year, this time by a joint effort between Baghdad University and the German Archaeological Institute.

Because of Shaduppum’s relatively late rise to prominence, in the spring of 1997 and autumn of 1998, the collaborative project took a closer look at the rock layers of the city, confirming different ages in the multiple building layers.

Most interestingly, stratigraphy of the city’s walls showed it was not fortified until the rise of Babylonia in the second millennium BC, suggesting that its rise to prominence was quite significant–it went from being a city so inconsequential it lacked fortification, perhaps, to a city with pronounced walls. Evidence also suggested then that the city had been destroyed by fire and destruction around the time of Hammurabi, then rebuilt.

It’s a very interesting project that you can read more about here.

A city of consequence

There remains much we don’t know about Shaduppum, that we may never know, but one thing is clear: Shaduppum was a city that had a little bit of everything that made it a Mesopotamian city worth a look.

 

Sources and Further Reading

http://www.miglus.de/Themen/Harmal/harmal.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eshnunna

http://books.google.com/books?id=1C4NKp4zgIQC&pg=PA29&lpg=PA29&dq=tell+harmal+city+of+agade&source=bl&ots=Ss36wkEcA9&sig=sN53Fql2w0iVsHKZpsJrwvwwPpc&hl=en&sa=X&ei=XS15U7bNK4iRqAb76YCQAQ&ved=0CGMQ6AEwCA#v=onepage&q=tell%20harmal%20city%20of%20agade&f=false

https://allmesopotamia.wordpress.com/?s=sargon+the+great

http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/akka/hd_akka.htm

http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/articles/o/old_babylonian_period.aspx

http://proteus.brown.edu/mesopotamianarchaeology/994

http://www.ezida.com/cats/lion%20t1.jpg

http://www.goddessaday.com/mesopotamian/nisaba

http://www.fofweb.com/History/HistRefMain.asp?iPin=MESP0046&SID=2&DatabaseName=Ancient+and+Medieval+History+Online&InputText=%22Nisaba%22&SearchStyle=&dTitle=Shaduppum&TabRecordType=All+Records&BioCountPass=0&SubCountPass=4&DocCountPass=0&ImgCountPass=0&MapCountPass=0&FedCountPass=&MedCountPass=0&NewsCountPass=0&RecPosition=3&AmericanData=&WomenData=&AFHCData=&IndianData=&WorldData=&AncientData=Set&GovernmentData=

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epic_of_Gilgamesh

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_of_Hammurabi

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albrecht_Goetze

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euclid

http://cojs.org/cojswiki/index.php/Tell_Harmal_Mathematical_Tablets

http://www.miglus.de/Themen/Harmal/1997/1997.html

 

Breasts in Mesopotamia

It took me a minute, but since it’s October, and October is Breast Cancer Awareness month, I decided to look and see what I could find about breasts in Ancient Mesopotamia, aside from the obvious fact that Mesopotamian women had them.

After some research, I’ve found that breasts were quite prominent in the land between two rivers.

A statue from Samarra, ca. 6000 BC, believed to be of a mother goddess, with exaggerated breasts being held up for prominence. (Source)

Life and Breasts

To start, the Babylonians and Assyrians concentrated on what appears to be essentially the lifeline of a newborn child by listing the beginning of the life cycle as “a child at the breast.” Notice it is not just “a child is born,” but “a child at the breast.” This speaks volumes, especially when attached to all the other things I found.

As expected, Mesopotamians associated the female form with fertility. Many statues believed to be those depicting fertility have been unearthed throughout Mesopotamia. They usually feature mother goddesses with prominent breasts held up suggestively with folded arms underneath (see above), while some statues feature only one of the breasts being held up as if it were an offering. (Source)

Akkadian female figurines, ca. 2334-2147 BC. Note the figurine on the left holding up only one breast. (Source)

Emphasis was also placed on breasts in erotic scenes, as pictured below.

Lovers in an embrace. Note the woman holding her breast. (Source)

Mythological Breasts

The prominence of breasts in Ancient Mesopotamian culture is also evident in the descriptions of the defining characteristics of mythological figures. For instance, a characteristic of Lilith, a female demon who snatches and kills children, also a bearer of disease, illness and death, is described as having no milk in her breasts and unable to bear children. Nonetheless, Lilith’s epithet was “the beautiful maiden,” and would appear in men’s erotic dreams.

Although this relief is believed to be depicting Ishtar or Ereshkigal, it was thought to depict Lilith at one time. It serves as a good example of the demoness’s characteristics including woman’s breasts, bird talons for feet, and wings. (Source)

Lamashtu is another such demon, and her breasts are a prominent part of her description. She has the head of a lion, donkey’s teeth and a hairy body, but unlike Lilith, she is portrayed nursing a pig and a dog from her bare breasts. Instead of being the subject of erotic dreams, however, Lamashtu was bringer of nightmares, and was also considered bad news to children and their mothers, so much so that amulets were used to ward off her evil, particularly during childbirth. (Source)

Lamashtu had a lion’s head, donkey’s teeth and ears, naked breasts, a hairy body, long fingers and nails, and bird talons. She clutched snakes in her hands while nursing a piglet and a puppy at her breasts. Her image was put on metal or stone plaques with incantations to ward off her evil. Amulets were worn of the demon Pazuzu, who was believed to be the only one able to keep Lamashtu away from pregnant women, as she was believed to kill unborn babies by touching their mothers’ wombs seven times, or kidnapping them once they are born. (Source)

Even so, breasts were still a source of good nourishment in mythology, and it wasn’t just for humans (or mammals). The breasts of Nissaba, the Sumerian goddess of grain, served to nourish the fields ready for planting.

Breast Feeding

Of course, breasts were also associated with child bearing, but there is a flip side. On the one hand it was a source of nourishment for babies, serving as their lifeline, for up to three years. On the other hand, a woman’s breasts were also a birth control tool.

A woman’s fertility is relatively low while she is breastfeeding, and so the concept of the wet nurse became widespread in Mesopotamia, as it helped nourish newborn babies with breast milk when their mothers were unable to provide them with it, and it also helped keep the wet nurses themselves from getting pregnant during the time they were nursing.

Hammurabi (1728-1686 BC) wrote a law covering the category of wet nursing, in which a two to three-year contract is held between a wet nurse and her employer, and gives her the right to sell the child of that employer should she not be compensated properly. Yikes! (Source)

Breast Cancer in Mesopotamia?

Ancient Mesopotamians also believed that disease came from demons that would enter a person’s body through any opening and begin attacking certain areas. Babylonians believed that each body part was attacked by a designated demon, and the demon that attacked the breasts was Alu, a night-dwelling demon, who when not attacking breasts was bent on terrifying those trying to sleep. (Source)

A final piece I gathered in putting this post together is one that I feel is especially indicative of the prominence of the breast in Mesopotamia. In the ruins of the ancient city of Nuzu, in northeast modern-day Iraq, excavations unearthed an infant buried under a private home, its remains inside a jar in the shape of a woman’s breast. (Source, page 94)

So, having said all that, I think it’s safe to say that breasts were almost revered in Mesopotamian culture. And for all the right reasons, too. Do you agree? Let us know in the comments!

Sources and further reading:

http://www.academia.edu/873588/Womens_Roles_in_Ancient_Mesopotamia, page 94

http://factsanddetails.com/world.php?itemid=1521&catid=56&subcatid=363  (under “Mesopotamian Hygiene, Perfume and Sex”)

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-d88npMh9sPo/TXDRGLhUeNI/AAAAAAAAAnw/9sGn7Xh-1XU/s1600/sumerian-love.jpg

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lamashtu

http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/sumer_anunnaki/esp_sumer_annunaki15e.htm

http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/sumer_anunnaki/esp_sumer_annunaki12e.htm

http://orthocj.com/2006/06/historical-perspective-on-breast-feeding-and-nursing/

http://www.answers.com/topic/alu-demon

http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~duchan/new_history/ancient_history/mesopotamia.html

 

Part II: Hammurabi!

As part of “The Mesopotamians” band he is the lead singer with sharply side-swept hair, one visible eye, and a ring in his lower lip. They Might Be Giants (TMBG) made him out to look part hipster, part emo, and at least to me, made his personality reminiscent of that of Ralph from The Lord of the Flies (LOF).

He is Hammurabi.

Clearly the picture above shows that Hammurabi was nothing like the lead singer of The Mesopotamians, but perhaps if Hammurabi lived today, he might just be a guy named Ralph who’s a natural leader, maybe a lawyer or a judge or a law professor, maybe even the president of a very wise nation, who leads by doing right even in the face of a not-so-right society, with hipster hair and the face of an emo accented with a lip ring. Who knows?

(I mean, I don’t even know if Hammurabi’s hairstyle in the video was just a way to camouflage his other eye, which he might have had to give for an eye? Are TMBG trying to tell us that Hammurabi was so just that he did not exempt even himself from the Lex Talionis?)

What we do know is that there’s only one Hammurabi, and he was like the new sheriff in town, or Ralph in LOF. He was really into keeping everyone civilized and under control.

He was a great military leader who transformed a small city-state into one of the greatest empires the world has ever known. He was also one heck of an administrator. It is even said that he personally oversaw navigation, irrigation, agriculture, tax collection, and the erection of many temples and other buildings in Mesopotamia, which left him super busy, I’m sure.

He even wrote about all the stuff he did in some 55 letters that were discovered, and the letters give a glimpse into what he had to deal with as the king of an eventual empire; on the side, Hammurabi had to deal with floods, making changes to the Babylonian Calendar and taking care of livestock.

Hammurabi built only the second extensive empire in Mesopotamia, and ruled it justly by first allowing the leaders of the city-states he’d conquered to continue to rule over their city-states. He in turn ruled over them with laws that were fair enough to keep his reign as the first king of the Babylonian Empire relatively peaceful.

Hammurabi was a generally peaceful guy. No blood was shed for his acquirement of the throne. Hammurabi succeeded his father to the throne of Babylon when it was still just a city-state around what scholars believe to be 1792 BC. This made him the sixth king of the city-state of Babylon, and nothing too special.

But then, around 1786 BC, Hammurabi began working, or dictating to scribes scribing over tablets that measured eight feet in height and seven feet in width, rather, on what we know today as the Code of Hammurabi. Most people have heard of this big deal thing for humanity, or know of Hammurabi through it, and it is what made Hammurabi one of the most recognized leaders of the ancient world, and the lead singer of The Mesopotamians. Not to mention pretty special.

Hammurabi’s Code

The most recognizable ancient artifact the world over has got to be the Code of Hammurabi stele on which 282 laws, or judgments, are written in Akkadian Cuneiform script. The stele has a bas relief at the top that depicts Hammurabi standing before the throne on which it is believed the sun-god Shamash (also the god of justice), or as some have speculated, even Marduk, the patron deity of the city of Babylon, sits. It is this illustration that tells the story of how Hammurabi came to be the authority on what were dubbed the dinat mesarim or “just verdicts”.

Hammurabi’s Code dealt with every aspect of Mesopotamian life, from trade to incest, and it is where the Lex Talionis or “Law of Retaliation,” or the “eye for an eye, tooth for tooth” deal first appeared. The Code of Hammurabi also introduced the idea of the presumption of innocence until guilt is proven, which gave the accused and accuser the opportunity to present evidence.

Hammurabi introduces the purpose of his laws, which are really more like judgements, in this way:

“To promote the welfare of the people, I, Hammurabi, the devout, god-fearing prince, cause justice to prevail in the land by destroying the wicked and the evil, that the strong might not oppress the weak.”

No doubt when we look at certain offenses and the corresponding punishments, Hammurabi’s judgments may seem severe by our standards, seeing as how the punishments varied from disfigurement (he really meant eye for an eye, guys!) to just plain old death:

“If anyone steals the minor son of another, he shall be put to death.”

And although Hammurabi introduces his Code as a tool that stops the strong from oppressing the weak, it still maintained the social classes:

“If a man strikes the cheek of a freeman who is superior in rank to himself, he shall be beaten with 60 stripes with a whip of ox-hide in the assembly.”

(A side note) My favorite lyric in the song “The Mesopotamians” that drives home further the brand of justice, or logic, Hammurabi implemented throughout his Code is this:

This is my last stick of gum/

I’m going to cut it up so everybody else gets some/

Except for Ashurbanipal, who says my haircut makes me look like a Mohenjo-Daroan.

On the Job

Over a span of some 42 years after he took the job of king, Hammurabi did his daddy proud, as he went from being the sixth king of a mere city-state, to the king of an empire he himself established by conquering other Mesopotamian warring city-states, including Sumer, Akkad and others to the south of Babylon around 1760 BC. He did this by knowing when to move in on his opponent, and when to stand back and strengthen not only his offense, but also his defense; he spent a lot of time heightening walls and improving fortifications of his cities, and continued to do so until the very end of his reign.

As a result of his smart strategies, Hammurabi was even bring Assyria under his empire, a strong opponent he had to wait and build strength to acquire, and even northern Syria. He built and kept his empire with his military prowess first, and diplomatic justice wielding persona second.

Although his reign was relatively peaceful, Hammurabi still had to fight wars, particularly in the last 14 years of his rule. The wars ranged from acquiring more city-states to his empire, including the city of Larsa, which helped him acquire older Sumerian cities in the south. In 1763 he fought to protect his empire’s access to metal-producing areas in Iran.

An Innovator and Humanitarian

Hammurabi was also an innovator and all-around improver. He built temples, dug canals and improved the irrigation process by implementing perhaps the world’s first use of windmills.

“King Hammurabi of Babylon used wind powered scoops to irrigate Mesopotamia.” (Source)

No doubt the improvement in irrigation kept city-states happy, and mostly peaceful, considering they were fighting each other for fertile agricultural land to begin with.

Hammurabi also promoted astronomy, mathematics and literature. I’m guessing he probably also promoted literacy, and I surmise this from the fact that his code of laws was put on public display for everyone to read.

He was really a humanitarian

The Legacy of Hammurabi

When Hammurabi died an old and sick man around 1750 BC, he left his empire to his son, and for humanity an eternal legacy.

Although the dates of his reign are questioned, they do seem to coincide with biblical accounts that give him a possible place in the Bible as Nimrod, the great grandson of Noah. The Ten Commandments and the justice system as a whole are also linked to Hammurabi and his Code.

Under Hammurabi’s rule, Mesopotamians enjoyed a time during which all sorts of amenities flourished, marking the Babylonian Empire as one with strong influences still seen today. When he died, no one was able to do what he did as well as he did, but it was going to be okay, because we’re still talking about him today and living by many laws he set in stone that continue to define our humanity.

Hammurabi on Supreme Court Frieze. (Source)

 

That’s a pretty great king, and a pretty great lead singer of a band like The Mesopotamians.

Sources and Further Reading:

http://www.hyperhistory.net/apwh/bios/b1hammurabi.htm

http://www.harris-greenwell.com/HGS/Hammurabi

http://www.thenagain.info/WebChron/MiddleEast/Hammurabi.html

http://www.ancient.eu.com/hammurabi/

http://ancienthistory.about.com/cs/people/p/Hammurabi.htm

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07125a.htm

http://www.ivt.ntnu.no/offshore2/?page_id=266

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/ancient/hamcode.asp

 

“The Mesopotamians”

Since I try to keep things fun around here, even though it doesn’t seem like it at first glance (I wrote about asphalt!), I thought I’d use a fun song to introduce a mini-series of posts that will elaborate on what this song, “The Mesopotamians” by They Might Be Giants, is about…

Actually, I should say I will be elaborating on who this song is about, because the day has come when someone gives a damn!

Sargon, Hammurabi, Ashurbanipal and Gilgamesh had plenty scratched down onto the clay about them in the kingdoms where they not-so-secretly reigned, and I’ve taken it upon myself to relay all the highlights of what was written to you.

To get you started, you can find the song’s lyrics here, and a general (and very enthusiastic) analysis of those lyrics here.

Stay tuned! (And sorry about getting the song stuck in your head. That’s tough.)