Dagan

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Dagān ( Sumerian d BE, Akkadian d dagana / daganu, d Da-gan, Hebrew דגון, Dagon ) is a deity revered in Mesopotamia and Syria , whose cult especially in the 3rd and 2nd millennium BC. Chr. Was widespread. The form of the name Dagon explained phonetically by change of ā to ō in Hebrew. It has been adopted in the Greek and Latin Bible translations and is therefore also common in German and English-language Bible translations as well as in theological specialist literature. As a result, the spelling Dagon can also be found for characters modeled on the deity in literature and film.

swell

Since no epic sources on Dagān have come down to us, research has to be based primarily on personal names and lists of victims. Dagān is mainly known from Syria and is very rarely documented in Babylonia. In the Levant it is proven by the lists of gods from Ugarit and the Old Testament ( 1 Sam 5,1–17 EU , Ri 16,23ff  EU ), and there is also a mention in the Amarna letters  .

The main sources are the archives of Mari , Ebla and Emar . Another, albeit very late and not necessarily reliable source is Philo von Byblos .

Derivation of the name

Albright derives the name from the root dg , 'cloudy', 'rainy' and considers Dagān to be a weather god. According to Eusebius of Caesarea, Philo von Byblos translated an "ancient" Phoenician work by a certain Sanchuniathon , which was written before the fall of Troy . He describes Dagān as the inventor of agriculture and the plow, probably due to the equation of the god's name with dgn , grain, which according to Albright is not to be kept. Jerome then suggested the etymology dāg (fish), with which a connection to the Oannes des Berossus was to be established. Albright considers this to be a folk etymology .

Identifications and interpretation

Dagān was equated with the Sumerian d BE, certainly with the d BE of Tuttul , with Enlil and, since Schmökel, with the weather god Adad , who is married to d Šala . However, not all references to d BE refer to Dagān. Grayson assumes that the Assyrian Šarru martum (lord of the land), mentioned for example in inscriptions by Šamši-Adad I. , corresponds to Dagān. Dagān was also equated with the Hurrian Kumarbi . The argument that makes a connection about an unnamed god in Yazılıkaya who bears an ear of wheat is controversial.

Dagān will u. a. interpreted as a weather , vegetation and specific grain god . An equation as an underworld god is made by allegedly deriving from Hittite tekan and Urindo-European * ghdem , earth. Laroche identifies him with the Hittite Kummarbi, Joseph Eddy Fontenrose with El . J.-M. Durand considers the name to be an Amurri word for totality.

Overall, Dagān seems to be a rather faceless high god , comparable to Anu or El , to whom great power is ascribed, but which did not particularly stimulate the mythopoetic idea. Only the fact that Dagān appeared in the Bible, his attribution to the allegedly Indo-European sea ​​people of the Philistines and the unsecured etymology of Jerome ensured him greater interest.

family

Dagan was called the father of the gods. In Babylonia Išḫara ( be-le-t bi-rim ) was the wife of Dagān (u), who is sometimes also the wife of Hadad . In the Ur-III period , Hʾabu-Ri-tum is also associated with Dagān, but also with the underworld god Malkum . Also Ninkur , Ninhursanga and Šala be connected to Dagan. His son was the weather god Addu-Baʾal, in the Ugaritic religion he was the father of Ba'al . Durand believes that he can prove a paternity of the Dagān for Adad for Mari, but there is no clear evidence here. Also HEPAT ( d IM ù he'-ba-at) was referred to as the daughter of Dagan, but it is also the wife of his son Adad.

Representations

Because of the alleged derivation of the name from “fish”, a number of Phoenician coins depicting mermen and other aquatic hybrids were assigned to Dagān and at the same time used to support the thesis of its fish nature. However, these assignments are not supported by epigraphic evidence. The assignment of priests with a fish-shaped cover to Dagān is not proven by inscriptions.

cult

Proportion of theophoric personal names with the component “Dagān” in the Onomasticon, Middle Syrian period, according to Feliu

In Ebla , Dagān sheep, but also various types of textiles and weapons such as daggers and their scabbards, silver, less often gold or tin, were sacrificed. The metal was partly used to decorate statues.

Dagān is also a common part of personal names. They follow the usual pattern, documented for example are Abum-Dagān (Dagān is the father), Ibbi-Dagān (Dagān has named), Irām-Dagān (loved by Dagān) and Pû-Dagān (word of the Dagān). In the name, the name of the god is written syllabically, in contrast to other practice.

Individual regions

Babylonia

The earliest evidence of the veneration of Dagān comes from the 8th year of Amar-Su'ena's reign , further evidence comes from the reign of Šu-Su'en and Ibbi-Su'en . Dagān is often associated with Išḫara here . A cult is documented in Ur and Nippur and often appears to be associated with members of the royal family. In Nippur, the Dagān cult was celebrated in the palace, a separate temple is not documented. But there was a common temple for Dagān and Išḫara ( É d Da-ga-nu ù d Iš-ḫa-ra ), the exact location of which is unknown, Markus Hilgert also assumes Nippur. In the Ur-III period, Dagān also helped Naram-Sin to conquer Syria. In a text that has been preserved in a copy from Nippur , Sargon I prostrates himself before Dagān of Tuttul , who promises him the conquest of the Syrian cities of Mari, Jarmuti and Ebla (the upper country) up to the Cedar Mountain ( Amanos ) (Feliu 2003, 43). The cult of Dagān may have been introduced in the south by Taram-Uram , daughter of King Apil-kīn of Mari, who was married to Šulgi , but it never really took off.

Syria

In Emar , Dagān is described as lord of the seed, the quiver and the field. Pettinato considers Dagān to be the main god of Ebla . But it never appears in ritual texts, the name of the god is limited to lexical lists and administrative documents. A divine letter of Jasmaḫ-Adad to Dagān is known from Mari .

Dagān was considered the lord (bēl) of Tuttul, a temple of Bel has been documented since Sargonid times. His wife was Šalaš here .

The d BE of Ganana was equated by Archi with Dagān, but this is now also questioned. Feliu would rather equate him with Adad . In Terqa there was a temple of Dagān in Amurrian times. In a letter to Zimri-Lim , Dagān is called Lord of Terqa. The king Šunuḫru-Ammu of Hana mentioned in a years name a libation for the Dagan of the Hurrians . Šamši-Adad I of Assyria, who performed funeral rituals ( kispum ) in Terqa , calls himself a follower of Dagān in his official title and built the temple Ekisaga (Temple of Invocation) there. As a personal name, however, God is rare here.

From Ugarit -Texten is dgn probably known Dagnu pronounced. The god here is the father of Ba'al (whose most common nickname is bn.dgn , son of Dagnu). On the other hand, Ba'al, like his sister Anat, is a child of Els , which Fontenrose (1957) suggests that El and Dagān / Dagnu are identical. Against this, however, speaks that El and Dagnu enjoyed independent cultic veneration.

Ashkelon

The veneration of Dagān in Ashkelon can be proven via names (Jamir-Dagān and Dagān-takala from the Amarna letters ). A place called Beth Dagān , "House of Dagān", was located south of Joppa according to Flinders Petrie (cf. Beth Dagon Jos 15.41  EU ).

Because of the derivation of the god's name from dāg "fish", the images of fish-bodied beings on coins are often interpreted as dagān. However, this must be checked in each individual case.

Bible

The Philistines bring the stolen Ark of the Covenant to the Temple of Dagon. Its broken statue lies on the floor. Two altars or statue bases can be seen in the upper right of the temple interior. Wall painting in the synagogue of Dura Europos from the middle of the 3rd century

Dagān is also mentioned in the Bible as Dagon ( Judges 16.23-31  EU and 1 Sam 5.1-7  EU ); Hebrew דָּגוֹן dāgôn orדָּגֹן dāgōn . In Gaza , the captive and blinded judge Samson is supposed to play in front of the Philistines on the occasion of a great festival of sacrifice for Dagon and tears down the central pillars of the house, whereby he and a large part of the people are slain. Dagon appears here as the main deity of the Philistines.

1 Sam 5  EU describes how the Ark of the Covenantcapturedin the battle of Eben-Ezer is keptin the Dagon temple in Ashdod , next to the statue of the god himself. On the first night, the statue of Dagon falls at the foot of the Ark of the Covenant, with its head on the ground. The statue was put up again, after the second night it was found overturned and the statue's head and hands cut off on the threshold, whereupon the Philistines removed it from the temple. Since then, the priests of Dagon and all believers no longer stepped on the threshold of the temple ( 1 Sam 5.5  EU ). This is usually interpreted as a sign of the superiority of YHWH , who forces Dagon to prostrate and ultimately kills ritually. According to Joseph Eddy Fontenrose, however, the loss of head and limbs reveals Dagon's fish nature. The famous picture in the synagogue of Dura Europos shows Dagon in human form.

In 1 Makk 10.84  EU it is reported how Jonathan destroyed a Dagon temple in Ashdod : “... they ... fled to Ashdod and hurried to the temple of the idol Dagon to save their lives there. But Jonathan sacked the city of Ashdod and the surrounding areas and set them on fire. He also burned down the idol temple with all who had fled into it. And the number of those killed and burned was about eight thousand men. "

Aftermath

Because of his supposed fishtail, Dagān was sometimes equated with Berossos ' demon Oannes , an abgal .

John Milton describes Dagon as a fallen angel ( Paradise Lost , Book 1, 457) with a human upper body and the lower body of a fish.

The character of Dagon at HP Lovecraft in a short story of the same name (filmed in 2001 in Dagon ) is probably based on Milton's description.

In the late Lovecraft tale, The Shadow Over Innsmouth , Dagon is a god of the residents of Innsmouth , a fictional cursed New England town. He had children with the women there, his descendants have a fishy appearance, which Lovecraft's first-person narrator, who more or less accidentally stumbles upon the city that other people avoid, describes as the Innsmouth look . In the further course they become so repulsive and inhuman (half fish, half frog) that they barricade themselves in houses until they go into the sea to live there forever. At the end of the story, the narrator realizes that he has Innsmouth blood in himself and is beginning to transform and decides to go into the sea as well.

In Lovecraft's tale The Fisherman from Falcon Point , a fisherman frees a woman with gills under her ears and webbed toes and fingers from his net. She thanks him and dives away. In the inn no one believes his story. The fisherman separates himself and disappears completely after three years. He is later rediscovered in the sea near Innsmouth: He has gills under his ears and sings a song of praise to Dagon together with other dogs and then goes into hiding with them.

Lovecraft's story Innsmouth Clay is also about Dagon: on Innsmouther Strand, the sculptor Corey finds blue clay from which he forms a sea goddess with webbed gills and gills that also grow for him; a drinking buddy tells him about a city under the sea ( R'lyeh ) and the beings Thulu and Dagon; Soon after, Corey disappears, only to be spotted weeks later in the sea on Devil's Reef: with scaly skin, half fish, half human.

The astronomical object Dagon , which circles Fomalhaut , the brightest star in the constellation Southern Pisces, was named after Dagān .

literature

  • Bradley L. Crowell: The Development of Dagan: a Sketch. In: Journal of Ancient Near Eastern Religions 1, 2001, pp. 32-83. ( online )
  • Lluís Feliu: The God Dagan in Bronze Age Syria . Brill, Leiden et al. 2003, ISBN 90-04-13158-2 , ( Culture and history of the ancient Near East 19), (also: Univ., Diss. Barcelona 2000).
  • Arvid S. Kapelrud: Baal in the Ras Shamra Texts. CEC Gad, Copenhagen 1952.
  • Paul L. Watson: The Death of "Death" in the Ugaritic Texts . In: Journal of the American Oriental Society 92, 1972, 1, ISSN  0003-0279 , pp. 60-64.
  • Rachel Wischnitzer : The "Closed Temple" panel in the synagogue of Dura-Europos . In: Journal of the American Oriental Society 91, 1971, 3 ISSN  0003-0279 , pp. 367-378.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Example: Lexicon for Theology and Church , 2006 edition, ISBN 978-3-451-22012-8 , Volume 2, page 1374.
  2. ↑ a b c W. F. Albright , Gilgames and Engidu, Mesopotamian Genii of Fecundity. Journal of the American Oriental Society 40, 1920, 319, note 27.
  3. ↑ Hartmut Schmökel : The god Dagan: origin, spread and essence of his cult. Robert Noske University Press, Borna / Leipzig 1928.
  4. ↑ Lluís Feliu: The God Dagan in Bronze Age Syria. Leiden: Brill 2003, 37.
  5. ↑ Grayson (1969, 21).
  6. ↑ Liliu 2003, 282.
  7. ↑ due to Arabic dagga , dágâ , dagana , WF Albright, Gilgames and Engidu, Mesopotamian Genii of Fecundity. Journal of the American Oriental Society 40, 1920, 319, note 27
  8. ↑ John F. Healey, in: JNSL 5, 1977, 43-51.
  9. ^ Joseph Eddy Fontenrose : Dagon and El, in: Oriens 10/2, 1957, 277-279.
  10. ↑ a b Markus Hilgert: erubbatum in the temple of Dagān: A Ur III temporal document from Drēḥim. In: Journal of Cuneiform Studies 46, 1994, 32.
  11. ↑ a b Markus Hilgert: erubbatum in the temple of Dagān: A Ur III temporal document from Drēḥim. In: Journal of Cuneiform Studies 46, 1994, 36.
  12. ^ Albert Kirk Grayson : Assyrian Royal inscriptions. Wiesbaden 1972, p. 27.
  13. ↑ Amanda H. Podany , The Land of Ḫana. Kings, chronology and scribal tradition. Bethesda, CDL-Press 2002, 52.
  14. ^ Albert Kirk Grayson, Assyrian Royal inscriptions (Wiesbaden 1972), 25.
  15. ↑ John F. Healey: Art. Dagon. In: K. van der Toorn, B. Becking, Pieter W. van der Horst (eds.): Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible. 2nd Edition. Leiden / Boston / Cologne 1999, pp. 216-219.
  16. ↑ Manfred Görg , Dagon , in: Neues Bibel-Lexikon Volume I, Zurich 2001, ISBN 978-3545230767 , p. 378.
  17. ↑ Wolfgang Zwickel: Dagons severed head (1 Samuel V 3-4) , in: Vetus Testamentum 44 (1994), 239-249.
  18. ^ Wikisource .
  19. ↑ August Derleth , HP Lovecraft : Der Fischer von Falcon Point , in: ders. Et al., Azathoth · Vermischte Schriften , Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt a. M. 1989, p. 157.
  20. ↑ HP Lovecraft , Innsmouth-Ton , in: ders. Et al., Azathoth · Vermischte Schriften , Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt a. M. 1989, p. 182.