6.2: Sumerian

Ancient Near East: Cradle of civilization

by Dr. Senta German

Home to some of the earliest and greatest empires, the Near East is often referred to as the cradle of civilization.

Figure \(\PageIndex{1}\): Map of the Ancient Near East. (Photo: Courtesy of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, via Smarthistory)

The cradle of civilization

Some of the earliest complex urban centers can be found in Mesopotamia between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers (early cities also arose in the Indus Valley and ancient China). The history of Mesopotamia, however, is inextricably tied to the greater region, which is comprised of the modern nations of Egypt, Iran, Syria, Jordan, Israel, Lebanon, the Gulf states and Turkey. We often refer to this region as the Near or Middle East.

What’s in a name?

Why is this region named this way? What is it in the middle of or near to? It is the proximity of these countries to the West (to Europe) that led this area to be termed “the near east.” Ancient Near Eastern Art has long been part of the history of Western art, but history didn’t have to be written this way. It is largely because of the West’s interests in the Biblical “Holy Land” that ancient Near Eastern materials have been be regarded as part of the Western canon of the history of art. An interest in finding the locations of cities mentioned in the Bible (such as Nineveh and Babylon) inspired the original English and French 19th-century archaeological expeditions to the Near East. These sites were discovered and their excavations revealed to the world a style of art which had been lost.

Figure \(\PageIndex{2}\): Entrance to Ninevah Court, Illustration from: Sir Austen Henry Layard, The Ninevah Court in the Crystal Palace (London: Bradbury and Evans, 1854), p. 39. (Image via Smarthistory)

The excavations inspired The Nineveh Court at the 1851 World’s Fair in London (Figure \(\PageIndex{2}\)) and a style of decorative art and architecture called Assyrian Revival. Ancient Near Eastern art remains popular today; in 2007 a 2.25 inch high, early 3rd millennium limestone sculpture, the Guennol Lioness, was sold for 57.2 million dollars, the second most expensive piece of sculpture sold at that time.

Global Connections: The Many Births of Civilizations

Sometimes textbook surveys can be misleading in making it seem that civilization first began in Egypt and Mesopotamia. This is simply not true. In China, a number of distinct cultures developed simultaneously from around 7000 BCE until 1700 BCE. All of these cultures developed along waterways and near the coastal areas, including near the Yangtze River and the Yellow River.

And in the Indus Valley, several settlements developed around the river Indus between 2600 and 1900 BCE. Indus cities have been found and excavated in present-day Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India, and they are collectively known as the Indus Valley Civilization. These archaeological sites demonstrate that the Indus Valley Civilization was highly organized and attentive to urban planning. In India, the site of Dholavira shows a sophisticated system of water management and in Pakistan, Mohenjo-daro and Harappa reveal highly efficient urban settlements. They also had a complex writing system, known as the Indus script, which has yet to be deciphered.

A complex history

Figure \(\PageIndex{3}\): A fishing boat in the Euphrates Southern Iraq. (Photo: Aziz1005, CC BY 4.0)

The history of the Ancient Near East is complex and the names of rulers and locations are often difficult to read, pronounce and spell. Moreover, this is a part of the world which today remains remote from the West culturally while political tensions have impeded mutual understanding. However, once you get a handle on the general geography of the area and its history, the art reveals itself as uniquely beautiful, intimate and fascinating in its complexity.

Geography and the growth of cities

Mesopotamia remains a region of stark geographical contrasts: vast deserts rimmed by rugged mountain ranges, punctuated by lush oases. Flowing through this topography are rivers (see Figure \(\PageIndex{3}\)) and it was the irrigation systems that drew off the water from these rivers, specifically in southern Mesopotamia, that provided the support for the very early urban centers here.

The region lacks stone (for building), precious metals and timber. Historically, it has relied on the long-distance trade of its agricultural products to secure these materials. The large-scale irrigation systems and labor required for extensive farming was managed by a centralized authority. The early development of this authority, over large numbers of people in an urban center, is really what distinguishes Mesopotamia and gives it a special position in the history of Western culture. Here, for the first time, thanks to ample food and a strong administrative class, the West develops a very high level of craft specialization and artistic production.

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Mesopotamia: Civilization Begins

Courtesy of The Getty Museum

Ancient Mesopotamia, centered in present-day Iraq, occupies a unique place in the history of human culture. It is there, around 3400–3000 BC, that all the key elements of urban civilization first appear in one place: cities with monumental infrastructure and official bureaucracies overseeing agricultural, economic, and religious activities; the earliest known system of writing; and sophisticated architecture, arts, and technologies.

These developments were concentrated in southern Mesopotamia, where the dominant ethnic and linguistic group until about 2000 BCE was the Sumerians, famous today for their hero-king Gilgamesh of Uruk, the treasures found in the Royal Tombs at Ur, and the strikingly beautiful statues of Gudea, ruler of Lagash. By at least 2700 BC, the Sumerians lived alongside Akkadians, whose king Sargon established the first lasting Mesopotamian empire, and whose Semitic language evolved into the dialects of the Babylonians and Assyrians. It was those cultures, adapting and extending the Sumero-Akkadian heritage, that built the great cities of Babylon and Nineveh, famed for their towering ziggurats, temples, palaces, and city walls; composed evocative creation myths, epics, hymns, and poems; and laid the foundations for future mathematics and astronomy.

Figure \(\PageIndex{4}\): Statue of Gudea, c. 2090 BCE. Diorite, 17 3/8 x 8 1/2 x 11 5/8 in. (44 x 21.5 x 29.5 cm). Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. (Photo: Metropolitan Museum, public domain)

For some three thousand years, Mesopotamia remained the preeminent force in the Near East. In 539 BCE, however, Cyrus the Great captured Babylon and incorporated Mesopotamia into the Persian Empire. Periods of Greek and Parthian rule followed, and by about 100 CE, Mesopotamian culture had effectively come to an end.

First Writing

The earliest known writing emerged in southern Mesopotamia around 3400 BC, originating as a system of pictographs that evolved by 2600 BCE into the distinctive wedge-shaped script we call "cuneiform." It was used initially to record the Sumerian language, and from about 2400 BCE Akkadian, which split into two dialects, Assyrian and Babylonian, around 2000 BCE. Over the next two thousand years, the use of cuneiform scripts—both the Mesopotamian version and new forms adapted or invented to write some fifteen other languages—spread to Iran, Armenia, Syria, Turkey, Lebanon, Israel, Jordan, and Egypt. For much of this period, Babylonian remained the international diplomatic language between the region’s "great kings." Cuneiform finally died out in the late first century CE, overtaken by the simpler alphabetic scripts of Aramaic and Greek.

Figure \(\PageIndex{5}\): Cuneiform Tablet, c. 2039 BCE. Terracotta, 2 1/16 x 1 x 4 7/16 in. (5.2 x 2.6 x 11.3 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Louis Glover in memory of Charles T. Thurman, 74.71.5. (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, CC-BY-2.0)

The vast majority of cuneiform writing was inscribed on clay tablets, which could also be impressed with a seal that acted like a signature. The hundreds of thousands of texts discovered by archaeologists include royal inscriptions, law codes, treaties, and literature, as well as everyday records such as receipts, contracts, letters, and incantations that reveal the intimate details of Mesopotamian social, religious, and economic life to an extent unmatched by any other ancient culture.

Extensive libraries of cuneiform texts were kept in temples and palaces, where scribes copied and recopied canonical compositions for millennia. Some kings, such as Shulgi of Ur (ruled 2094-2047 BCE) and Ashurbanipal of Assyria (ruled 668-627 BCE), claimed to read many languages and to be able to write cuneiform themselves.

First Cities

In the late fourth millennium BCE, the first settlements that clearly qualify as cities emerged in Sumer (southern Mesopotamia). Preeminent among these was Uruk (biblical Erech), which by 3000 BCE had grown into a walled city of over two square miles, with around a hundred thousand inhabitants. The economic basis of this transformative urban growth was intensive irrigation agriculture, requiring rigorous canal maintenance that was directed by the major temple estates.

The early cities of Sumer boasted monumental temples and palaces, decorated with statues of gods, kings, and worshippers. They were also centers of innovation and learning, where priests trained in sacred rituals, divination, exorcism, astronomy, and mathematics; where praise poems and mythological tales celebrating rulers and deities were studied and copied for posterity; and where law codes were created, international treaties were struck, and financial contracts were signed.

Some cities—notably Agade (location unknown), Ur, Babylon, and Nineveh— became imperial capitals that were renowned and feared throughout the ancient world. Indeed, when Alexander the Great conquered Mesopotamia in 331 BCE, Babylon was still regarded as the most spectacular of all cities.

First Kings

According to Sumerian creation myths, kingship "descended from heaven," and the gods determined the order in which cities and their rulers held sway. A bearded figure known today as the "priest-king" appears in art around 3300 BC, but it is not until about 2700 BCE that texts explicitly refer to rulers, who are titled en (lord), lugal (king, literally "great man"), or ensi (governor), according to local tradition. The ruler’s primary obligations were to lead in battle, to ensure the favor of the gods through temple building and regular offerings, to maintain the city walls and irrigation canals for agriculture, and to enforce justice.

Figure \(\PageIndex{6}\): Stele of Ushumgal and Shara-igizi-Abzu, 2900–2700 BCE. Gypsum alabaster, H 8 7/8 x W 5 3/4 x D 3 3/4." Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. (Photo: Metropolitan Museum, public domain) This stele features Ushumgal, a priest of the god Shara, and his daughter, who are entering into a land transaction, as recorded by the Sumerian inscription, in cuneiform, on the stone.

The Sumerians were organized as a patchwork of city-states until around 2340 BCE, when Sargon of Akkad established the first true and lasting empire—one that all later Mesopotamian kings would seek to emulate. Eras of strength and empire under the Third Dynasty of Ur (2112-2004 BCE), the Babylonian kings Hammurabi (ruled 1792-1750 BC) and Nebuchadnezzar II (ruled 605-562 BCE), and the kings of Assyria (880-612 BC) alternated with periods of invasion by foreigners from the Iranian highlands (Guti, Kassites, Medes) and tribal nomads from the northwest (Amorites, Aramaeans)—but these too adopted and sustained Mesopotamian culture. The conquest of Babylon by Cyrus the Great in 539 BCE marked the end of native control of Mesopotamia and its incorporation into even larger empires ruled by the Persians, Greeks, and Parthians.

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White Temple and ziggurat, Uruk

by Dr. Senta German

A gleaming temple built atop a mud-brick platform, it towered above the flat plain of Uruk.

Figure \(\PageIndex{7}\): Archaeological site at Uruk (modern Warka) in Iraq. (Photo: SAC Andy Holmes (RAF)/MOD, Open Government License v1.0)

Visible from a great distance

Figure \(\PageIndex{8}\): Digital reconstruction of the White Temple and ziggurat, Uruk (modern Warka), c. 3517-3358 BCE. (Photo: © artefacts-berlin.de; scientific material: German Archaeological Institute, via Smarthistory)

Uruk (modern Warka in Iraq)—where city life began more than five thousand years ago and where the first writing emerged—was clearly one of the most important places in southern Mesopotamia. Within Uruk, the greatest monument was the Anu Ziggurat on which the White Temple was built. Dating to the late 4th millennium BCE (the Late Uruk Period, or Uruk III) and dedicated to the sky god Anu, this temple would have towered well above (approximately 40 feet) the flat plain of Uruk (see Figure \(\PageIndex{7}\)), and been visible from a great distance—even over the defensive walls of the city. A ziggurat is a built raised platform with four sloping sides—like a chopped-off pyramid. Ziggurats are made of mud-bricks—the building material of choice in the Near East, as stone is rare. Ziggurats were not only a visual focal point of the city, they were a symbolic one, as well—they were at the heart of the theocratic political system (a theocracy is a type of government where a god is recognized as the ruler, and the state officials operate on the god’s behalf). So, seeing the ziggurat towering above the city, one made a visual connection to the god or goddess honored there, but also recognized that deity’s political authority.

Figure \(\PageIndex{9}\): Remains of the Anu Ziggurat, Uruk (modern Warka), c. 3517-3358 BCE. (Photo: Geoff Emberling, by permission, via Smarthistory) Because they were made of mud-brick, ziggurats like this one were susceptible to erosion and today lack the defintion they once had.

Excavators of the White Temple estimate that it would have taken 1500 laborers working on average ten hours per day for about five years to build the last major revetment (stone facing) of its massive underlying terrace (the open areas surrounding the White Temple at the top of the ziggurat). Although religious belief may have inspired participation in such a project, no doubt some sort of force (corvée labor—unpaid labor coerced by the state, or slavery) was involved as well.

Figure \(\PageIndex{10}\): Digital reconstruction of the two-story version of the White Temple, Uruk (modern Warka), c. 3517-3358 BCE. (© artefacts-berlin.de; scientific material: German Archaeological Institute, via Smarthistory)

The sides of the ziggurat were very broad and sloping but broken up by recessed stripes or bands from top to bottom (Figure \(\PageIndex{8}\)), which would have made a stunning pattern in morning or afternoon sunlight. The only way up to the top of the ziggurat was via a steep stairway that led to a ramp that wrapped around the north end of the Ziggurat and brought one to the temple entrance. The flat top of the ziggurat was coated with bitumen (asphalt—a tar or pitch-like material similar to what is used for road paving) and overlaid with brick, for a firm and waterproof foundation for the White temple. The temple gets its name for the fact that it was entirely white washed inside and out, which would have given it a dazzling brightness in strong sunlight.

The White Temple

The White temple was rectangular, measuring 17.5 x 22.3 meters and, at its corners, oriented to the cardinal points. It is a typical Uruk “high temple (Hochtempel)” type with a tri-partite plan: a long rectangular central hall with rooms on either side (plan). The White Temple had three entrances, none of which faced the ziggurat ramp directly. Visitors would have needed to walk around the temple, appreciating its bright façade and the powerful view, and likely gained access to the interior in a “bent axis” approach (where one would have to turn 90 degrees to face the altar), a typical arrangement for Ancient Near Eastern temples.

Figure \(\PageIndex{11}\): Section through the central hall of the “White Temple,” digital reconstruction of the interior of the two-story version White Temple, Uruk (modern Warka), c. 3517-3358 BCE. (Photo: © artefacts-berlin.de; scientific material: German Archaeological Institute, via Smarthistory)

The northwest and east corner chambers of the building contained staircases (unfinished in the case of the one at the north end) (Figure \(\PageIndex{11}\)). Chambers in the middle of the northeast room suite appear to have been equipped with wooden shelves in the walls and displayed cavities for setting in pivot stones which might imply a solid door was fitted in these spaces. The north end of the central hall had a podium accessible by means of a small staircase and an altar with a fire-stained surface (Figure \(\PageIndex{12}\)). Very few objects were found inside the White Temple, although what has been found is very interesting. Archaeologists uncovered some 19 tablets of gypsum on the floor of the temple—all of which had cylinder seal impressions and reflected temple accounting. Also, archaeologists uncovered a foundation deposit of the bones of a leopard and a lion in the eastern corner of the Temple (foundation deposits, ritually buried objects and bones, are not uncommon in ancient architecture).

Figure \(\PageIndex{12}\): Interior view of the two-story version of the “White Temple,” digital reconstruction of the White Temple, Uruk (modern Warka), c. 3517-3358 BCE. (Photo: © artefacts-berlin.de; scientific material: German Archaeological Institute, via Smarthistory)

To the north of the White Temple there was a broad flat terrace, at the center of which archaeologists found a huge pit with traces of fire (2.2 x 2.7m) and a loop cut from a massive boulder. Most interestingly, a system of shallow bitumen-coated conduits were discovered. These ran from the southeast and southwest of the terrace edges and entered the temple through the southeast and southwest doors. Archaeologists conjecture that liquids would have flowed from the terrace to collect in a pit in the center hall of the temple.

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Warka Vase

by Dr. Senta German

One of the most precious artifacts from Sumer, the Warka Vase was looted and almost lost forever.

Figure \(\PageIndex{13}\): Ancient Near Eastern sites, with the borders of modern countries and modern capitals. (Map via Smarthistory)

Picturing the ruler

So many important innovations and inventions emerged in the Ancient Near East during the Uruk period (c. 4000 to 3000 BCE and named after the Sumerian city of Uruk). One of these was the use of art to illustrate the role of the ruler and his place in society. The Warka Vase, c. 3000 BCE, was discovered at Uruk (Warka is the modern name, Uruk the ancient name), and is probably the most famous example of this innovation. In its decoration we find an example of the cosmology of ancient Mesopotamia.

Figure \(\PageIndex{14}\): Warka Vase, c. 3500-3000 BCE. Alabaster, 105 cm high. National Museum of Iraq. (Photo via Smarthistory)

The vase, made of alabaster and standing over three feet high (just about a meter) and weighing some 600 pounds (about 270 kg), was discovered in 1934 by German excavators working at Uruk in a ritual deposit (a burial undertaken as part of a ritual) in the temple of Inanna, the goddess of love, fertility, and war and the main patron of the city of Uruk. It was one of a pair of vases found in the Inanna temple complex (but the only one on which the image was still legible) together with other valuable objects.

Given the significant size of the Warka Vase, where it was found, the precious material from which it is carved and the complexity of its relief decoration, it was clearly of monumental importance, something to be admired and valued. Though known since its excavation as the Warka “Vase,” that term does little to express the sacredness of this object for the people who lived in Uruk five thousand years ago.

The relief carvings on the exterior of the vase run around its circumference in four parallel bands (or registers, as art historians like to call them) and develop in complexity from the bottom to the top.

Figure \(\PageIndex{15}\): Warka Vase (detail showing the bottom three registers). (Photo: Hirmer Verlag, via Smarthistory)

Beginning at the bottom, we see a pair of wavy lines from which grow neatly alternating plants that appear to be grain (probably barley) and reeds, the two most important agricultural harvests of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in southern Mesopotamia. There is a satisfying rhythm to this alternation, and one that is echoed in the rhythm of the rams and ewes (male and female sheep) that alternate in the band above this. The sheep march to the right in tight formation, as if being herded—the method of tending this important livestock in the agrarian economy of the Uruk period.

The band above the sheep is a blank and might have featured painted decoration that has since faded away. Above this blank band, a group of nine identical men march to the left. Each holds a vessel in front of his face, and which appear to contain the products of the Mesopotamian agricultural system: fruits, grains, wine, and mead. The men are all naked and muscular and, like the sheep beneath them, are closely and evenly grouped, creating a sense of rhythmic activity. Nude figures in Ancient Near Eastern art are meant to be understood as humble and low status, so we can assume that these men are servants or slaves (the band above displays the slave owners).

Figure \(\PageIndex{16}\): Drawing, top register, Warka Vase (reconstructing some missing areas), by Jo Wood, after M. Roaf, from Leaving No Stones Unturned: Essays on the Ancient Near East and Egypt in Honor of Donald P. Hansen (Eisenbrauns, 2001), p. 17. (Image via Smarthistory)

The top band of the vase is the largest, most complex, and least straightforward. It has suffered some damage but enough remains that the scene can be read. The center of the scene appears to depict a man and a woman who face each other. A smaller naked male stands between them holding a container of what looks like agricultural produce which he offers to the woman. The woman, identified as such by her robe and long hair, at one point had an elaborate crown on her head (this piece was broken off and repaired in antiquity).

Figure \(\PageIndex{17}\): Warka Vase (detail of the top register showing a naked man offering a container to a female figure). (Photo: Hirmer Verlag, via Smarthistory)

Behind her are two reed bundles, symbols of the goddess Inanna, whom, it is assumed, the woman represents. The man she faces is nearly entirely broken off, and we are left with only the bottom of his long garment. However, men with similar robes are often found in contemporary seal stone engraving and based upon these, we can reconstruct him as a king with a long skirt, a beard and a head band. The tassels of his skirt are held by another smaller scaled man behind him, a steward or attendant to the king, who wears a short skirt.

The rest of the scene is found behind the reed bundles at the back of Inanna. There we find two horned and bearded rams (one directly behind the other, so the fact that there are two can only be seen by looking at the hooves) carrying platforms on their backs on which statues stand. The statue on the left carries the cuneiform sign for EN, the Sumerian word for chief priest. The statue on the right stands before yet another Inanna reed bundle. Behind the rams is an array of tribute gifts including two large vases which look quite a lot like the Warka Vase itself.

Figure \(\PageIndex{18}\): Warka Vase (detail of the top register showing rams carrying statues and gifts). (Photo: Hirmer Verlag, via Smarthistory)

What could this busy scene mean? The simplest way to interpret it is that a king (presumably of Uruk) is celebrating Inanna, the city’s most important divine patron. A more detailed reading of the scene suggests a sacred marriage between the king, acting as the chief priest of the temple, and the goddess—each represented in person as well as in statues. Their union would guarantee for Uruk the agricultural abundance we see depicted behind the rams. The worship of Inanna by the king of Uruk dominates the decoration of the vase. The top illustrates how the cultic duties of the Mesopotamian king as chief priest of the goddess, put him in a position to be responsible for and proprietor of, the agricultural wealth of the city state.

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Backstory

Figure \(\PageIndex{19}\): Broken-off foot of vase, tossed over, National Museum of Iraq, May 2003. (Photo: Joanne Farchakh, via Smarthistory)

The Warka Vase, one of the most important objects in the Iraq National Museum in Baghdad, was stolen in April 2003 with thousands of other priceless ancient artifacts when the museum was looted in the immediate aftermath of the American invasion of Iraq in 2003. The Warka Vase was returned in June of that same year after an amnesty program was created to encourage the return of looted items. The Guardian reported that “The United States army ignored warnings from its own civilian advisers that could have stopped the looting of priceless artifacts in Baghdad….”

Even before the invasion, looting was a growing problem, due to economic uncertainty and widespread unemployment in the aftermath of the 1991 Gulf War. According to Dr. Neil Brodie, Senior Research Fellow on the Endangered Archaeology of the Middle East and North Africa project at the University of Oxford, “In the aftermath of that war…as the country descended into chaos, between 1991 and 1994 eleven regional museums were broken into and approximately 3,000 artifacts and 484 manuscripts were stolen….” The vast majority of these have not been returned. And, as Dr. Brodie notes, the most important question may be why no concerted international action was taken to block the sale of objects looted from archaeological sites and cultural institutions during wartime.

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Standing Male Worshipper (Tell Asmar)

by Dr. Steven Zucker and Dr. Beth Harris

One of a group buried in a temple almost 5,000 years ago, this statue’s job was to worship Abu—forever. This is the transcript of a conversation conducted at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.

Figure \(\PageIndex{20}\): Standing Male Worshipper (votive figure), c. 2900-2600 BCE, from the Square Temple at Eshnunna (modern Tell Asmar, Iraq). Gypsum alabaster, shell, black limestone, bitumen, 11 5/8 x 5 1/8 x 3 7/8″ / 29.5 x 10 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. (Photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

Steven: Almost 5,000 years ago somebody carefully buried a small group of alabaster figure in the floor of a temple.

Beth: And we’re looking at one of those figures now. The Metropolitan Museum of Art calls this a standing male worshipper. He was buried along with 11 other figures for a total of 12, most of them male.

Figure \(\PageIndex{21}\): Standing male worshipper (detail of face and upper body). (Photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

Steven: We’re looking at one of the smaller figures. They range from just under a foot to almost three feet.

Beth: The temple where these were buried was in a city called Eshnunna in the northern part of ancient Mesopotamia.

Steven: What is now called Tell Asmar. The figures from Tell Asmar are widely considered to be the great expression of early dynastic Sumerian art. And we think the temple was dedicated to the god Abu.

Beth: At this time, the third millennium BCE, in this area around the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, some of the earliest cities in the world emerged and writing emerged. This is a watershed in human history. The cities had administrative buildings, temples, palaces, many of which have been unearthed by archeologists.

Steven: This is the transitional period right after the Bronze Age, the tail end of the Neolithic, when civilizations are founded in the great river valleys around the world. And he’s adorable.

Beth: He is adorable. His wide eyes and his sense of attentiveness are very appealing I think but of course, he wasn’t meant to be looking at us. He was meant to be attentive to a statue, a sculpture of a god who was believed to be embodied in the sculpture.

Steven: In fact, we believe that the person for whom this was a kind of stand-in was also embodied in this figurine.

Beth: So an elite member of ancient Sumerian culture paid to have this sculpture made and placed before the god to be a kind of stand-in to perhaps continually owner prayers, to be continually attentive to the god.

Steven: His hands are clasped together, he stands erect, his shoulders are broad so there is a sense of frontality.

Beth: Even though he is carved on both sides he was meant to be seen from the front. Although that term “meant to be seen” is a funny one.

Steven: Well he was meant to be seen by a God. You can see that the hair is parted at the center of the scalp and comes down in wavelets or perhaps braids that spiral down and then frame the central beard which is quite formal and cascades down in a series of regular waves. His hands are clasped just below the beard. His shoulders are really broad, his upper arms very broad and then there’s very fine incising at the bottom of his skirt.

Beth: But it’s odd to me how cylindrical the bottom part of his body is and how flattened out the torso is.

Steven: If you look at the face carefully, you can see that the very large eyes are in fact inlaid shell and in the center, the pupils are black limestone. And you can also see that there is an incising of the eyebrows that might have originally been inlaid as well.

Beth: This is really different from Egyptian culture which emerges at the same time. In Egyptian culture, the sculptures primarily represent the pharaoh—the king—and indicate his divinity, but in the ancient Near East, we have these votive images of worshippers but not so much of the kings, at least during this early dynastic period. The figures at Tell Asmar that were unearthed are very similar. They’re not meant to be portraits of a specific person but a symbol of that person.

Steven: But he does look very humble, his mouth is closed, his lips are sealed together and of course he is wonderfully attentive.

Beth: And the fact that his hands are clasped I think makes him seem more humble as well.

Steven: There are some interesting subtle choices that whoever carved this made. Look at the way that the skirt extends out and attaches itself to the forearms a bit wider than we would expect.

Figure \(\PageIndex{22}\): Standing male worshipper (detail of back), Tell Asmar. (Photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

Beth: And the torso, it’s just this almost V-shape. There is a sense of geometric patterning here and not the naturalistic forms of the body.

Steven: If you look at the back of the figure you can see that there is a little cleft that’s been carved in horizontally. And there’s also what seems to be the indication perhaps of a tied belt that hangs down.

Beth: You understand, I think, the artist’s decision not to make a naturalistic figure because a naturalistic figure before the god might give a sense of someone just visiting, just passing through, but this idea of a static, symmetrical, frontal, wide-eyed figure gives a sense of timelessness of a figure that is forever offering prayers to the god.

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Cylinder seals

by Dr. Senta German

Cuneiform was used for official accounting, governmental and theological pronouncements and a wide range of correspondence. Nearly all of these documents required a formal “signature,” the impression of a cylinder seal.

Signed with a cylinder seal

A cylinder seal is a small pierced object, like a long round bead, carved in reverse (intaglio) and hung on strings of fiber or leather. These often beautiful objects were ubiquitous in the Ancient Near East and remain a unique record of individuals from this era. Each seal was owned by one person and was used and held by them in particularly intimate ways, such as strung on a necklace or bracelet.

When a signature was required, the seal was taken out and rolled on the pliable clay document, leaving behind the positive impression of the reverse images carved into it. However, some seals were valued not for the impression they made, but instead, for the magic they were thought to possess or for their beauty.

Figure \(\PageIndex{23}\): Cylinder Seal (with modern impression), royal worshipper before a god on a throne with bull’s legs; human-headed bulls below, c. 1820-1730 BCE. Hematite, H. 0.8 in. (2 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. (Photo: Metropolitan Museum, public domain)

The first use of cylinder seals in the Ancient Near East dates to earlier than the invention of cuneiform, to the Late Neolithic period (7600–6000 BCE) in Syria. However, what is most remarkable about cylinder seals is their scale and the beauty of the semi-precious stones from which they were carved. The images and inscriptions on these stones can be measured in millimeters and feature incredible detail.

The stones from which the cylinder seals were carved include agate, chalcedony, lapis lazuli, steatite, limestone, marble, quartz, serpentine, hematite and jasper; for the most distinguished there were seals of gold and silver. To study Ancient Near Eastern cylinder seals is to enter a uniquely beautiful, personal and detailed miniature universe of the remote past, but one which was directly connected to a vast array of individual actions, both mundane and momentous.

Figure \(\PageIndex{24}\): Cylinder Seal (with modern impression), hunting scene, c. 2250-2150 BCE. Chert, H. 1 1/8 in (2.8cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. (Photo: Metropolitan Museum, public domain)

Why cylinder seals are interesting

Art historians are particularly interested in cylinder seals for at least two reasons. First, it is believed that the images carved on seals accurately reflect the pervading artistic styles of the day and the particular region of their use. In other words, each seal is a small time capsule of what sorts of motifs and styles were popular during the lifetime of the owner. These seals, which survive in great numbers, offer important information to understand the developing artistic styles of the Ancient Near East.

The second reason why art historians are interested in cylinder seals is because of the iconography (the study of the content of a work of art). Each character, gesture and decorative element can be “read” and reflected back on the owner of the seal, revealing his or her social rank and even sometimes the name of the owner. Although the same iconography found on seals can be found on carved stelae, terracotta plaques, wall reliefs and paintings, its most complete compendium exists on the thousands of seals which have survived from antiquity.

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Standard of Ur and other objects from the Royal Graves

by The British Museum

At the center of Ur, a rubbish dump grew over the centuries—it evolved into a cemetery for the elite.

Figure \(\PageIndex{25}\): Postcard, printed; photograph showing archaeological excavations at Ur, with Arab workmen standing for scale in the excavated street of an early second millennium BCE residential quarter. (Photo: © Trustees of the British Museum, via Smarthistory)

The city of Ur

Known today as Tell el-Muqayyar, the “Mound of Pitch,” the site was occupied from around 5000 BCE to 300 BCE. Although Ur is famous as the home of the Old Testament patriarch Abraham (Genesis 11:29-32), there is no actual proof that Tell el-Muqayyar was identical with “Ur of the Chaldees.” In antiquity the city was known as Urim.

The main excavations at Ur were undertaken from 1922-34 by a joint expedition of The British Museum and the University Museum, Pennsylvania, led by Leonard Woolley. At the center of the settlement were mud brick temples dating back to the fourth millennium BCE. At the edge of the sacred area a cemetery grew up which included burials known today as the Royal Graves. An area of ordinary people’s houses was excavated in which a number of street corners have small shrines. But the largest surviving religious buildings, dedicated to the moon god Nanna, also include one of the best preserved ziggurats, and were founded in the period 2100-1800 BCE. For some of this time Ur was the capital of an empire stretching across southern Mesopotamia. Rulers of the later Kassite and Neo-Babylonian empires continued to build and rebuild at Ur. Changes in both the flow of the River Euphrates (now some ten miles to the east) and trade routes led to the eventual abandonment of the site.

The royal graves of Ur

Close to temple buildings at the center of the city of Ur, sat a rubbish dump built up over centuries. Unable to use the area for building, the people of Ur started to bury their dead there. The cemetery was used between about 2600-2000 BCE and hundreds of burials were made in pits. Many of these contained very rich materials.

Figure \(\PageIndex{26}\): Cylinder seal of Pu-abi, from Ur, c. 2600 BCE. Lapis lazuli, 4.9 x 2.6 cm. (Photo: © Trustees of the British Museum, via SmartHistory)

In one area of the cemetery a group of sixteen graves was dated to the mid-third millennium. These large, shaft graves were distinct from the surrounding burials and consisted of a tomb, made of stone, rubble and bricks, built at the bottom of a pit. The layout of the tombs varied, some occupied the entire floor of the pit and had multiple chambers. The most complete tomb discovered belonged to a lady identified as Pu-abi from the name carved on a cylinder seal found with the burial.

The majority of graves had been robbed in antiquity but where evidence survived the main burial was surrounded by many human bodies. One grave had up to seventy-four such sacrificial victims. It is evident that elaborate ceremonies took place as the pits were filled in that included more human burials and offerings of food and objects. The excavator, Leonard Woolley thought the graves belonged to kings and queens. Another suggestion is that they belonged to the high priestesses of Ur.

The Standard of Ur

This object was found in one of the largest graves in the Royal Cemetery at Ur, lying in the corner of a chamber above the right shoulder of a man. Its original function is not yet understood.

Leonard Woolley, the excavator at Ur, imagined that it was carried on a pole as a standard, hence its common name. Another theory suggests that it formed the soundbox of a musical instrument.

When found, the original wooden frame for the mosaic of shell, red limestone and lapis lazuli had decayed, and the two main panels had been crushed together by the weight of the soil. The bitumen acting as glue had disintegrated and the end panels were broken. As a result, the present restoration is only a best guess as to how it originally appeared.

The main panels are known as “War” and “Peace.” “War” shows one of the earliest representations of a Sumerian army. Chariots, each pulled by four donkeys, trample enemies; infantry with cloaks carry spears; enemy soldiers are killed with axes, others are paraded naked and presented to the king who holds a spear.

Figure \(\PageIndex{27}\): War (detail), The Standard of Ur, 2600-2400 BCE. Shell, red limestone, lapis lazuli, and bitumen (original wood no longer exists), 21.59 x 49.53 x 12 cm. British Museum. (Photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

The “Peace” panel depicts animals, fish and other goods brought in procession to a banquet. Seated figures, wearing woolen fleeces or fringed skirts, drink to the accompaniment of a musician playing a lyre. Banquet scenes such as this are common on cylinder seals of the period, such as on the seal of the “Queen” Pu-abi, also in the British Museum (Figure \(\PageIndex{26}\)).

Figure \(\PageIndex{28}\): Peace (detail), The Standard of Ur, 2600-2400 BCE. Shell, red limestone, lapis lazuli, and bitumen (original wood no longer exists), 21.59 x 49.53 x 12 cm. British Museum. (Photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

Queen’s Lyre

Leonard Woolley discovered several lyres in the graves in the Royal Cemetery at Ur. This was one of two that he found in the grave of “Queen” Pu-abi. Along with the lyre, which stood against the pit wall, were the bodies of ten women with fine jewelry, presumed to be sacrificial victims, and numerous stone and metal vessels. One woman lay right against the lyre and, according to Woolley, the bones of her hands were placed where the strings would have been.

The wooden parts of the lyre had decayed in the soil, but Woolley poured plaster of Paris into the depression left by the vanished wood and so preserved the decoration in place. The front panels are made of lapis lazuli, shell and red limestone originally set in bitumen. The gold mask of the bull decorating the front of the sounding box had been crushed and had to be restored. While the horns are modern, the beard, hair and eyes are original and made of lapis lazuli.

Figure \(\PageIndex{29}\): Queen’s Lyre (reconstruction), from Ur, 2600 BCE. Wooden parts, pegs and string are modern; lapis lazuli, shell and red limestone mosaic decoration, set in bitumen and the head (but not the horns) of the bull are ancient; the bull’s head in front of the sound box is covered in gold; the eyes are lapis lazuli and shell and the hair and beard are lapis lazuli; panel on front depicts lion-headed eagle between gazelles, bulls with plants on hills, a bull-man between leopards and a lion attacking a bull; edges of the sound-box are decorated with inlay bands; eleven gold-headed pegs for the strings, 112.5 x 72. 7 cm (body). (Photo: © Trustees of the British Museum, via Smarthistory)

This musical instrument was originally reconstructed as part of a unique “harp-lyre,” together with a harp from the burial, now also in The British Museum. Later research showed that this was a mistake. A new reconstruction, based on excavation photographs, was made in 1971-72.

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Articles in this section:

• Dr. Senta German, "Ancient Near East: Cradle of civilization," in Smarthistory, August 8, 2015 (CC BY-NC-SA)
• The Getty Museum, "Mesopotamia: Civilization Begins," for the Getty Museum (Reproduced by permission of the Getty Museum)
• Dr. Senta German, "White Temple and ziggurat, Uruk," in Smarthistory, August 8, 2015 (CC BY-NC-SA)
• Dr. Senta German, "Warka Vase," in Smarthistory, September 28, 2017 (CC BY-NC-SA)
• Dr. Steven Zucker and Dr. Beth Harris, "Standing Male Worshipper (Tell Asmar)," in Smarthistory, December 16, 2015 (CC BY-NC-SA)
• Dr. Senta German, "Cylinder seals," in Smarthistory, August 8, 2015 (CC BY-NC-SA)
• The British Museum, "Standard of Ur and other objects from the Royal Graves," in Smarthistory, December 18, 2015 (CC BY-NC-SA)