Adad

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Adad stele from the second half of the 8th century BC BC, found at Arslan Tash , Louvre , Paris , AO 13092
Reconstruction of the Adad Gate in Nineveh

Adad (also “ Hadad ”, Semitic “Hadda”, Sumerian “Iškur”, d IM) is the Mesopotamian weather god (storm god), son of Anu and husband of Ninhursanga or Šala . In the Mesopotamian city of Nineveh , one of the historic gates in the city wall is dedicated to him.

The Semitic weather god Hadda was born in the 3rd millennium BC. Venerated in northern Syria. His shrine was in Aleppo . In Mesopotamia he was venerated around the city of Karkar as a blessing giver. It was called Iškur by the Sumerians , Akkadians and in Babylonia . In southern Mesopotamia, its destructive capabilities such as storm, flood and drought came to the fore. This was mainly due to the fact that he did not “need” Iškur as a weather god in the south, where irrigation and irrigation were not used. Adad's symbolic animal was the bull , his attribute a lightning bolt - either in one hand or alone. In Ugarit he was also depicted with a helmet and two bull horns.

In the Ugaritic - Phoenician area the weather god was often simply called Ba'al , that is, Lord. With the Hurritern the weather god was called " Teššup " and stood at the head of the pantheon . He was with Hebat married, his son was from Kizzuwatna native deity sarruma . Teššup's most important place of worship was Halab . The height of his cult was there in the 2nd millennium BC. BC, in the 1st millennium BC However, adoration can hardly be proven any more. With the Hittites , too , Tarḫunna , as the name of the weather god there probably was, was at the head of the pantheon. In the Luwian language it was called " Tarhunza ", with the Urartians Teišeba.

literature

  • Helmut Freydank u. a .: Lexicon of the Old Orient. Egypt * India * China * Western Asia . VMA-Verlag, Wiesbaden 1997, ISBN 3-928127-40-3 .
  • Sebastian Graetz: The punishing weather god. Considerations on the traditional history of the Adad curse in the ancient Orient and in the Old Testament . Philo, Bodenheim 1998, ISBN 3-8257-0078-X .
  • Brigitte Groneberg : The gods of the Mesopotamia. Cults, myths, epics. Artemis & Winkler, Stuttgart 2004, ISBN 3-7608-2306-8 .
  • Daniel Schwemer: shaping the weather gods. The figures of the weather gods of Mesopotamia and Northern Syria in the age of the cuneiform cultures: materials and studies based on the written sources . Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2001, ISBN 3-447-04456-X . Review (Engl.) ( Memento from 1 October 2006 at the Internet Archive )

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