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Fish-Offerings in Ancient Mesopotamia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 August 2014

E. Douglas Van Buren
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The seas which wash the shores of Mesopotamia, the great rivers and the lakes of that land abound in fish of many different kinds, so that fish form an important article of diet of the modern inhabitants as well as of that of their forerunners in very remote times. Therefore it is not strange that fish appear among the decorative motives on painted ceramic pottery, were engraved in stereotyped rows on cylinder seals of the Jamdat Nasr epoch, or were carved as small figurines in bone, shell, and black, white or coloured stones, often with such precise observation of nature that the species delineated can easily be distinguished. Scenes in which water was the important element included fish swimming below a boat, gliding quite illogically up and down the streams welling up from the vase the god Enki holds, or, even more strangely, from that held by figures carved in the round or in relief of Gudea or of water divinities. Apart from fish in the proximity of Enki-Ea, introduced solely to indicate the living quality of the water spurting from the vase he holds, examples of fish in front of or close to a divinity are too numerous in the art of ancient Mesopotamia in almost every epoch necessarily to imply that the fish were attributes of the divinities with whom they appear to be associated (Nos. 1, 2). It is, nevertheless, interesting to note how often a fish is placed close to Ištar in warlike aspect, and holding her tripartite sceptre; there is even a curious scene in which the goddess does not appear in person, but is symbolised by her great tripartite sceptre, beside which a fish is placed, while a short-clad attendant and a divinity leading a female worshipper draw near to pay homage.

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Research Article
Information
IRAQ , Volume 10 , Issue 2 , Autumn 1948 , pp. 101 - 121
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute for the Study of Iraq 1948 

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References

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page 114 note 1 C.C.O., A. 780–781, Plate XC, Figs. 15–16; S.C, Fig. 740.

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page 114 note 4 Speleers, , Bull. Mus. R. d'Art et d'Hist. VIII (1936), p. 136 Google Scholar, Fig. 36, No. 1450.

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page 115 note 1 Porada, , Seal Impressions from Nuzi, p. 82 Google Scholar, Plate XLIV, No. 896.

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page 116 note 3 Samml. Sarre, No. 12, Weber, Altor. Siegelbilder, Fig. 467; V.A.R.S., Plate LXXVIII, No. 663; Mus. Guimet, No. 107; Brett. Coll., No. 118; S.C., Fig. 736.

page 116 note 4 V.A. 2530 and five similar examples, Döllger, , II, p. 217 Google Scholar, note 1; III, Plate XVII, 9.

page 116 note 5 Newell Coll., p. 64, Plate XXX, No. 437.

page 116 note 6 Ménant, Cat. Coll. de Clercq, I, Plate XXXIX, No. 344, bis; S.C., Fig. 737.

page 117 note 1 B.M. 89380, Lajard, Mithra, Plate XVII, 10; S.C., Fig. 726.

page 117 note 2 Walters Art Gallery No. 42–491, Gordon, , Iraq, VI (1939). p. 27 Google Scholar, plate X. No. 82.

page 117 note 3 Newell Coll., p. 64, Plate XXX, No. 440.

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page 117 note 8 Newell Coll., p. 63, Plate XXIX, No. 431.

page 118 note 1 Layard, , Nineveh and Babylon (ed. 1853), p. 343 Google Scholar; (ed. 1867), Plate VI.

page 118 note 2 B.M., 89227, Layard, Mon. of Nineveh, II, Plate LXIX, Fig. 44; Smith, S., Early Hist, of Assyria, p. 330 Google Scholar, Plate XXI, d.

page 118 note 3 I am indebted for information concerning this seal, and for permission to publish the photograph, to the courtesy of Dr. Elie Borowski, who will shortly publish the catalogue of the Layard collection of oriental seals in Orientalia: he, however, is in no sense responsible for the interpretation of the subject here proposed.

page 119 note 1 Heuzey, , Les Origines orientales de l'art, I, p. 194 Google Scholar, Fig. 9.

page 119 note 2 Coll. Poche, Aleppo, No. 3.

page 119 note 3 Fischer und Wiedemann, Talismane, Plate III, No. 17; Furlani, , Il Sacrificio, p. 294 Google Scholar.

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page 120 note 1 See p. 108.

page 120 note 2 Brett Coll., p. iS, Plate XI, No. 121; V.A.R.S., No. 636.

page 120 note 3 Hogarth, Hittite Seals, Plate VI, No. 166; Ménant, Cat. Coll. de Clercq, I, Plate XXXIX, No. 344 bis; Lajard, Mithra, Plate XVII, 10; Coll. Poche No. 3; B.N., No. 340; Heuzey, , Origines Or., I, p. 194 Google Scholar, Fig. 9; Newell Coll., No. 446.

page 120 note 4 Luckenbill, , Ane. Records, II, p. 146 Google Scholar, § 320.

page 120 note 5 Bavian Inscrip. 28; Luckenbill, op. cit., p. 150, § 335.

page 120 note 6 Gadd, , R.A., XIX (1922), pp. 158–159 Google Scholar.

page 120 note 7 Sargon, : K.B., II, 78, 168 Google Scholar; Nebuchadnezzar: N.B.K., 90, I, 19; 92, 29–30; 94, 13–14, 156; V, 11–13; Weidner, , M.A.O.G., IV, p. 235 Google Scholar, note 4.

page 120 note 8 N.B.K., 154, IV, 37, 40–41; 160, 9–11.

page 121 note 1 Legrain, , U.M., XIV, p. 330 Google Scholar, Plates XXXV, LI, No. 802, C.B.S., 12852; U.M., II, I, No. 144.

page 121 note 2 Alabaster vase, Heinrich, Kleinfunde, Plates III, XXXVIII; Akkadian cyl. seal, I.M. 14577, Ur Excav., II, Plate CCXV, No. 364; Basin of Gudea, Unger, , Sumer. u. akkad. Kunst, pp. 46–47, Fig. 47Google Scholar; Sippar relief. King, , Babyl. Boundary Stones, p. 20 Google Scholar, Plate C; Bronze Standard, Unger, , Forschungen u. Fortschritte, XII (1936), p. 154 Google Scholar, Fig. 3; Botta, Mon. de Ninive, II, Plate 158; Cyl. Seals, Lajard, Mithra, Plate XXXI, 7; V.A.R.S., Plate LXXVIII, No. 638.

page 121 note 3 That fish had a chthonic meaning is confirmed by a Cypriote amphora of the tenth to ninth centuries, decorated with panels painted in dull black on a white engobe ( Rutten, Maggie Dr., Mélanges Syriens, I, pp. 435–447 Google Scholar, Plate I). Face “A” shows two funerary vases, a lyre, and a bier. On Face “B” one side panel depicts a wild-goat, the other a water-bird and a big fish; from the raised hand of the person in the middle panel hangs a string of three fishes, one below the other.