Initially depicted as a goddess in Sumerian times, when it was called Lamma, it was later depicted from Assyrian times as a hybrid of a human, bird, and either a bull or lion—specifically having a human head, the body of a bull or a lion, and bird wings, under the name Lamassu.[3][4] In some writings, it is portrayed to represent a goddess.[5] A less frequently used name is shedu (Cuneiform: 𒀭𒆘, an.kal×bad; Sumerian: dalad; Akkadian, šēdu), which refers to the male counterpart of a lamassu.[6]Lamassu represent the zodiacs, parent-stars or constellations.[7][8]
Goddess Lama
The goddess Lama appears initially as a mediating goddess who precedes the orans and presents them to the deities.[3] The protective deity is clearly labelled as Lam(m)a in a Kassite stele unearthed at Uruk, in the temple of Ishtar, goddess to which she had been dedicated by king Nazi-Maruttash (1307–1282 BC).[9] It is a goddess wearing a ruffled dress and wearing a horned tiara symbolizing the deity, with two hands raised, in sign of prayer. Agnès Spycket proposed that similar female figures appearing in particular in glyptics and statuary from the Akkadian period, and in particular in the presentation scenes (common especially in the Paleo-Babylonian era) were to be considered as Lam(m)a.[10] This opinion is commonly followed and in artistic terminology these female figures are generally referred to as Lam(m)a.[3] From Assyrian times, Lamma becomes a hybrid deity, half-animal, half-human.[3]
Cylinder seal showing the representation of a devotee (center) by goddess Lamma (left), to Ishtar (right). Babylonian, c.18th–17th century BC, Metropolitan Museum of Art
Stele with inscription showing the protective deity Lam(m)a, dedicated by king Nazi-Maruttash to goddess Ishtar, from Uruk (1307–1282 BC). Metropolitan Museum of Art
From Assyrian times, lamassu were depicted as hybrids, with bodies of either wingedbulls or lions and heads of human males.[3] The motif of a winged animal with a human head is common to the Near East, first recorded in Ebla around 3000 BC. The first distinct lamassu motif appeared in Assyria during the reign of Tiglath-Pileser II as a symbol of power.[11][12]
Assyrian sculpture typically placed prominent pairs of lamassu at entrances in palaces, facing the street and also internal courtyards. They were represented as "double-aspect" figures on corners, in high relief. From the front, they appear to stand, and from the side, they walk. In earlier versions, they have five legs, as is apparent when viewed obliquely. Lamassu do not generally appear as large figures in the low-relief schemes running round palace rooms, where winged genie figures are common, but they sometimes appear within narrative reliefs, apparently protecting the Assyrians.[13]
Cast from the original in Iraq, this is one of a pair of five-legged lamassu with lion's feet in Berlin
Lamassu represent the zodiacs, parent-stars, or constellations.[7][8] They are depicted as protective deities because they encompass all life within them. In the Sumerian Epic of Gilgamesh, they are depicted as physical deities as well, which is where the lamassu iconography originates, physical representations or embodiments of divine higher principles associated with specific celestial origins. Although lamassu had a different iconography and portrayal in the culture of Sumer, the terms "lamassu", "alad", and "shedu" evolved throughout the Assyro-Akkadian culture from the Sumerian culture to denote the Assyrian-winged-man-bull symbol and statues during the Neo-Assyrian Empire. Eventually, female lamassu were identified as "apsasû".[4]
The motif of the Assyrian-winged-man-bull called Aladlammu and Lamassu interchangeably is not the lamassu or alad of Sumerian origin, which were depicted with different iconography.[clarification needed] These monumental statues were called aladlammû or lamassu which meant "protective spirit".[4][clarification needed] In Hittite, the Sumerian form dlamma is used both as a name for the so-called "tutelary deity", identified in certain later texts with the goddess Inara, and a title given to similar protective deities.[14]
The lamassu is a celestial being from ancient Mesopotamian religion bearing a human head, symbolising intelligence; a bull's body, symbolizing strength; and an eagle's wings, symbolizing freedom. Sometimes it had the horns and the ears of a bull. It appears frequently in Mesopotamian art. The lamassu and shedu were household protective spirits of the common Assyrian people, becoming associated later as royal protectors, and were placed as sentinels at entrances.[15] The Akkadians associated the god Papsukkal with a lamassu and the god Išum with shedu.
To protect houses, the lamassu were engraved in clay tablets, which were then buried under the door's threshold. They were often placed as a pair at the entrance of palaces. At the entrance of cities, they were sculpted in colossal size, and placed as a pair, one at each side of the door of the city, that generally had doors in the surrounding wall, each one looking toward one of the cardinal points.
A man with a bull's body is found among the creatures that make up Aslan's army in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis. He appears at the Stone Table, challenging the White Witch "with a great bellowing voice". In the film Alexander (2004), lamassu are seen at the Ishtar Gate in Babylon. In the Disney film Aladdin (1992), a gold lamassu can be found in the scene where Aladdin and Abu enter the cave in the desert to find the lamp.[citation needed]
Michael Rakowitz, a Northwestern University professor of Art Theory & Practice, won a Fourth Plinth commission to recreate the Lamassu that stood in Nineveh, Iraq, from 700 BC until it was destroyed by ISIS in 2015. Rakowitz's sculpture was displayed in London's Trafalgar Square from 2018 to 2020.[16]
The lamassu is also often used as a representation of Assyrian culture by the modern Assyrian people, and use it to pay homage to their ancient ancestry.[17]
Cuneiform script on the back of a lamassu in the University of Chicago Oriental Institute
Modern impression of Achaemenidcylinder seal, fifth century BC. A winged solar disc legitimises the Achaemenid emperor, who subdues two rampant Mesopotamian lamassu figures
The entrance of a fire temple in Fort Mumbai displaying a lamassu
↑Black, Jeremy; Green, Anthony (2003). An Illustrated Dictionary: Gods, Demons and Symbols of Ancient Mesopotamia. The British Museum Press. ISBN978-0-7141-1705-8.
12Hewitt, J.F. (1901). History and Chronology of the Myth-Making Age. James Parker and Company. p.85.
12King, Leonard W. (1902). Enuma Elish Vol 1 & 2: The Seven Tablets of Creation; The Babylonian and Assyrian Legends Concerning the Creation of the World and of Mankind. Luzac and Co. p.78.
↑Collon, Dominique (1975). The Seal Impressions from Tell Atchana/Alalakh. Butzon & Bercker. p.181. ISBN978-3-7887-0469-8. The deity which we have here called the Babylonian Goddess has been identified as the goddess Lama thanks to an inscription found at Uruk. Agnes Spycket has discussed the textual references to this interceding deity, and the way she is represented in art.
↑Spycket, Agnès (1960). "La Déesse Lama". Revue d'Assyriologie et d'archéologie orientale. 54 (2): 73–84. ISSN0373-6032. JSTOR23294909.
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