Aššur (deity)

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Symbol of the god Aššur

Aššur ( d Aš-šur, Akkadian / Assyrian Ashshur) was first the city god of Aššur and later the realm god of the Assyrian Empire ( ilu aššurû ). THING A-sur

Surname

A-šur or Aš-su 3 r, neo-Assyrian often abbreviated as Aš, also An-ša 3 r, an-šár, Old Babylonian A-usar. Nicknames include bêlu rabû (great lord), ab ilâni (father of the gods), šadû rabû (great mountain), Enlil of the gods and ilu aššurû (god of Aššur). In ancient Assyrian times it is often referred to only as bēlī or ilum / ilī .

family

Aššur was considered the husband of the Ninlil , who was later equated with Ištar . In the Neo-Assyrian period, Aššur is also considered the father of the Ištar. Seruʿa was his daughter or wife in Neo-Assyrian times, and in post-Assyrian times Seruʿa was venerated as his wife. Since Šarrum-ken II. Was Zababa ( Ninurta ) son of Ashur, as confirmed by an oracle request Also Šulmanu was a son of Azur.

iconography

Aššur on a winged bull (excavations from Assur)

The wild goat is considered a sacred animal of the god Aššur, it is represented by horned cones. Such horn cones can be found, for example, in the palace of Aššur-nâṣir-apli II and on the gates of Balawat in the palace of Šulmanu-ašared III. Assur stands mostly on a winged lion with horns and a scorpion tail ( abūbu ), also known as the lion dragon , which is otherwise assigned to Ninurta.

The ancient Assyrian attributes of Assur are patru and šugariaū , but the meaning of the terms is unclear, perhaps with patru an iron dagger is meant. In New Assyrian times, the Assyrian weapon ( kakru ) is of particular importance, which was worshiped as such and is mentioned in the formulas of oaths. Presumably, she was also carried on campaigns, analogous to the Šuri of the Urartian god Ḫaldi . In Central Assyrian times the god is usually depicted tholos with a feather . On New Assyrian reliefs , Aššur is depicted as an archer with a crown of horns in a winged sun , which was originally a symbol of the sun god Šamaš.

The thesis of an aniconical veneration of the Aššur is considered outdated, as texts mention a cult statue, even if no one has been found so far.

temple

Aššur only had a temple in Aššur, for which the provinces were responsible in turn in a fixed scheme. Aššur lives in the Ešarra and the Éḫursagkurra (É-ḫur-sag-kur-kur-a, "mountain house of the countries"). The Assyrian ruler celebrated the New Year in Ešarra . When Šulmanu-ašared I rebuilt the Éḫursagkurkurra, he deposited precious stones, silver, gold, iron, copper, tin and fragrant herbs in the foundations. The Ešarra also had cult areas for his wife Ninlil.

Tukultī-Ninurta I. built an Aššur temple in Kār-Tukultī-Ninurta , but this was apparently perceived as sacrilege and the temple was abandoned after its builder was murdered.

The Ešarra temple in Aššur with the central sanctuary Éḫursagkurra was excavated by the German Orient Society from 1903.

cult

Hymns to Aššur have been handed down by Tukulti-Ninurta I. and Aššur-bani-apli . Aššur is therefore the mighty God who determines the destinies, omniscient and extremely strong. Hymns to other gods, such as Ninurta , Enlil , Marduk and Ea , were also transferred to Aššur.

origin

Since Assur is later also called d en-lil by Aššur, he was perhaps originally an earth or mountain god , this is also indicated by his worship in É-ḫur-sag-kur-kur-a and the nickname šadû rabû (Great Mountain). He may have been the god of Mount Ebih southeast of the Tigris ( Ǧabāl Maḫul or Ǧabāl Ḫamrin ). A temple stood on Mount Ebi. The mountain is rich in wild goats and other wild animals. MacKenzie took the view, based on general considerations, that Aššur was originally a fertility god, but there is little convincing evidence for this. Over time, Aššur has been attributed to myths and attributes of other high gods , particularly Ninurta and later Marduk.

history

Neo-Assyrian cylinder seal depicting the Aššur, Louvre

The name Aššur is documented from the Ur III period to the Parthian period. The god Aššur was the embodiment of the city of Aššur. In the Neo-Assyrian period, Aššur became the god of the Assyrian Empire. He was now considered to be the embodiment of Enlil and Šamaš . In the Neo-Assyrian period, Aššur took the place of the Babylonian main god Marduk in Assyrian religious and literary sources .

After a time in which Aššur no longer appears in the sources, Aššur is venerated again in the Parthian period up to the 3rd century AD. There was also an Anšar temple in Uruk until Persian times. Aššur was also represented in the Hittite pantheon. Aššur is also mentioned in Urartian inscriptions since the reign of Rusa Erimenaḫi ( stele of Gövelek ). Çilingiroğlu blames deported Assyrians for the introduction of his cult.

literature

  • Angelika Berlejung, The Reduction of Complexity. The theological profile of a deity and its implementation in iconography using the example of the god Aššur in Assyria in the 1st century. In: Brigitte Groneberg , Hermann Spieckermann (Ed.), Die Welt der Götterbilder. Berlin, Walter de Gruyter 2007, 9–56.
  • Helmut Freydank among others: Lexicon Alter Orient. Egypt * India * China * Western Asia . VMA-Verlag, Wiesbaden 1997, ISBN 3-928127-40-3 .
  • Brigitte Groneberg : The gods of the Mesopotamia. Cults, myths, epics . Artemis & Winkler, Stuttgart 2004, ISBN 3-7608-2306-8 .
  • WG Lambert, The God Assur. Iraq 45, 1983, 82-86.
  • Real Lexicon of Assyriology and Near Eastern Archeology , Lemma Aššur .
  • Julian Reade: The cult relief from Assur . In: Mitteilungen der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft 132, 2000, ISSN  0342-118X , pp. 105–112.
  • Eckhard Unger , The symbols of the god Assur. Belleten 119 (29), 1965, 423-483.
  • GW Vera Chamaza, The Omnipotence of Aššur: Developments in Assur theology under the Sargonids Sargon II, Sennacherib and Asarhaddon. Old Orient and Old Testament 295, Münster, Ugarit-Verlag 2002.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b W. G. Lambert, The God Aššur. Iraq 45/1 (Papers of the 29 Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale, London, 5-9 July 1982), 1983, 82f.
  2. ↑ a b Erich Ebeling, Bruno Meissner, Dietz Otto Edzard, Real Lexicon of Assyriology and Near Eastern Archeology: Nab-Nuzi. Walter de Gruyter, 1998, Lemma Ninlil
  3. ↑ Angelika Berlejung, The Reduction of Complexity. The theological profile of a deity and its implementation in iconography using the example of the god Aššur in Assyria in the 1st century. In: Brigitte Groneberg, Hermann Spieckermann (Ed.), Die Welt der Götterbilder. Berlin, Walter de Gruyter 2007, 25
  4. ↑ WG Lambert, The God Aššur. Iraq 45/1 (Papers of the 29 Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale, London, 5-9 July 1982), 1983, 82
  5. ↑ a b Angelika Berlejung, The Reduction of Complexity. The theological profile of a deity and its implementation in iconography using the example of the god Aššur in Assyria in the 1st century. In: Brigitte Groneberg, Hermann Spieckermann (Ed.), Die Welt der Götterbilder. Berlin, Walter de Gruyter 2007, 14
  6. ↑ a b Angelika Berlejung, The Reduction of Complexity. The theological profile of a deity and its implementation in iconography using the example of the god Aššur in Assyria in the 1st century. In: Brigitte Groneberg, Hermann Spieckermann (Ed.), Die Welt der Götterbilder. Berlin, Walter de Gruyter 2007, 18
  7. ↑ Angelika Berlejung, The Reduction of Complexity. The theological profile of a deity and its implementation in iconography using the example of the god Aššur in Assyria in the 1st century. In: Brigitte Groneberg, Hermann Spieckermann (Ed.), Die Welt der Götterbilder. Berlin, Walter de Gruyter 2007, 21
  8. ↑ Leo Oppenheim, Lexical investigations on the Cappadocian letters. Archive for Orient Research 12, 1937-38, 343
  9. ↑ Radomír Pleiner / Judith K. Bjorkman, The Assyrian Iron Age: The History of Iron in the Assyrian Civilization. Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 18/3, 1974, 286, note 8
  10. ↑ Angelika Berlejung, The Reduction of Complexity. The theological profile of a deity and its implementation in iconography using the example of the god Aššur in Assyria in the 1st century. In: Brigitte Groneberg, Hermann Spieckermann (Ed.), Die Welt der Götterbilder. Berlin, Walter de Gruyter 2007, 19
  11. ^ JN Postgate, The Land of Assur and the Yoke of Assur. World Archeology 23/3, 1992, 251
  12. ↑ Radomír Pleiner / Judith K. Bjorkman, The Assyrian Iron Age: The History of Iron in the Assyrian Civilization. Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 18/3, 1974, 286
  13. ↑ A. Haller / Walter Andrae, The Sanctuaries of the God Assur and the Sin-Šamaš-Tempel in Assur (Scientific publications of the German Orient Society 67; Berlin 1955); H. Galter, The building activity of Sennacherib at the Assur temple ", Orientalia NS 53, 1984, 433-41
  14. ↑ VAT 10103
  15. ↑ a b c Angelika Berlejung, The Reduction of Complexity. The theological profile of a deity and its implementation in iconography using the example of the god Aššur in Assyria in the 1st century. In: Brigitte Groneberg, Hermann Spieckermann (Ed.), Die Welt der Götterbilder. Berlin, Walter de Gruyter 2007, 26
  16. ↑ WG Lambert, The God Aššur. Iraq 45/1 (Papers of the 29 Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale, London, 5-9 July 1982), 1983, 84.
  17. ↑ Donald Alexander Mackenzie, Myths of Babylonia and Assyria 1915, 339, http://www.sacred-texts.com/ane/mba/mba20.htm
  18. ↑ Angelika Berlejung, The Reduction of Complexity. The theological profile of a deity and its implementation in iconography using the example of the god Aššur in Assyria in the 1st century. In: Brigitte Groneberg, Hermann Spieckermann (Ed.), Die Welt der Götterbilder. Berlin, Walter de Gruyter 2007, 12
  19. ↑ Altan Çilingiroğlu, Rusa, Son of Argishti: Rusa II or Rusa III? Ancient Near Eastern Studies 45, 2008, 21-29