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The Ur III Temple of Inanna at Nippur: The Operation and Organization of Urban Religious Institutions in Mesopotamia in the Late Third Millennium B. C.
... Peters 1897. Zettler 1992. This should rather be seen as an approximation, but with a history of more than 5000 years of both mounds a generalization is more trustworthy than at a mound with just a few periods of occupation. ...
... The greater bulk of the two main parts of Nippur, with about two thirds to the southwest and approximately one third towards the northeast, separated by the current Zettler 1992 Nippur: City of Enlil and Ninurta wadi of the Shatt en-Nil, the ancient Canal in the heart of the city from the Kassite city map, seems to have been settled around the two main sanctuaries of the city: the Enlil Temple towards the northeast and the so-far unlocated temple of Ninurta, Enlil's son, 62 which seems to lie buried in the mounds towards the southwest. ...
... Discussion has centered on studies that draw on a direct contextual relationship between texts and archaeology, focusing on cuneiform tablets whose contents shed direct light on the very building in which they were excavated (e.g., Matthews 2003, pp. 60-64), especially Stone's (1981Stone's ( , 1987 work on Nippur neighborhoods, and Zettler's (1992) work on the Ur III period Inanna Temple at Nippur. Stone (1981) correlated physical modifications to an excavated Nippur house with adjustments in ownership following its inheritance by four brothers, while Zettler's (1992) study of the Inanna Temple examined the role of a family of temple administrators during the Ur III period. ...
... 60-64), especially Stone's (1981Stone's ( , 1987 work on Nippur neighborhoods, and Zettler's (1992) work on the Ur III period Inanna Temple at Nippur. Stone (1981) correlated physical modifications to an excavated Nippur house with adjustments in ownership following its inheritance by four brothers, while Zettler's (1992) study of the Inanna Temple examined the role of a family of temple administrators during the Ur III period. Possibilities for applying this approach in other contexts are limited because few Babylonian cuneiform tablets have been found in situ in a primary context. ...
Although considerable attention has been devoted to early urbanism in southern Mesopotamia, the later development of cities in the region has been neglected. By studying the Babylonian cities of the second and first millennia BC, it is possible to trace continuity and change in urbanism over some 3000 years of recorded history, from city-state to empire. The ideal of the southern Mesopotamian city comprised a standardized inventory of architectural elements that was remarkably persistent but also flexible, since it did not dictate the details of their plan or construction, nor their spatial relationship with one another. The salient characteristic of the city was its role as religious center: each city’s identity was bound up with its main temple, which housed its patron deity and dominated the social and economic life of the city and its hinterland.
... Contrary to the expected generalized inequality, some men and women in southern Mesopotamia prospered based upon their kinship affiliations (e.g., Zettler 1992;Wright 2008). Their appointment to high offices was a strat egy that enabled leaders to establish a loyal following and control certain institutions. ...
... There are three references to women at a "middle rank" involved in textile production. Ummi-Tabat was responsible for disbursing wool, monitoring the quality of goods, and redistributing cloth to other offices in an administrative capac ity that was on par with her male counterpart (Hattori 2002;Wright 2008;Zettler 1992). High-ranking women also exchanged craft goods with women of equal rank outside of Mesopotamia. ...
... 30 Goetze 1970. 31 Asher-Greve 1985Zettler 1992, fig. 6. ...
... 21 Ellis 1968. 22 For the foundation deposits at Ur see Woolley 1926, 1939and 1974as well as Zettler 1986and Ellis 1968 For the foundation deposits at Nippur see Haines 1956, Haines 1958and Zettler 1992. Nimin-tabba temple is recorded completely, with excavation number, reference to similar foundation deposits and its museum number.26 ...
... Once these barriers are removed, his model is falsified in several ways. Although the major Mesopotamian institutions were responsible for much of the urban infrastructure, there are numerous examples of women and men at many social and economic levels who held official positions and property (Hattori 2002 ;Maekawa 1973Maekawa-1974Zettler 1992 ). In certain instances access to land was much like some lands described at Ebla that are referred in the Mesopotamian literature as "prebend." ...
Introduction Gender in Hunter-Gatherer and Early Farming Societies From Prehistory to Protohistory: Gender, Complexity, and Social Status Conclusion References
... The temple of Inanna during Ur III owned lands, gardens, and orchards as well as potters, reed workers, carpenters, and leather workers. It also owned animal herds of sheep, goats (Zettler 1992), and possibly cattle. Wool from the herds was woven into cloth by women and children working in teams in the weaving workshop using similar standards to those applied elsewhere. ...
This article offers a detailed study of the organization of livestock management at Irisaĝrig in post-Ur III times. Three clusters of texts will be discussed, which focus on the activities of a small group of officials who oversaw the collection and disbursement of small cattle for religious and secular purposes. It is argued that the central urban organization on whose behalf these administrators operated was the local palace. The analysis of the archival records reveals a strong royal presence in the city and suggests that Irisaĝrig was an important center of the newly established kingdom of Malgûm Text abbreviations follow those of BDTNS = Database of Neo-Sumerian Texts ( http://bdtns.filol.csic.es ) and/or CDLI = Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative ( http://cdli.ucla.edu ); other abbreviations after RlA.
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The common meal with deities comprises one of the most popular religious rituals. Itresults from the popularity of offerings composed with such alimentary items like meat, bread,fruits, wine, oil, etc. This paper deals with the sacred dimension of the cultic banquets on theexample of epigraphical and archaeological evidence. As case-studies are presented two cities:the Northern Mesopotamian city of Hatra (ca. 290 km northwest of Baghdad) and the SouthernMesopotamian city of Nippur (ca. 150 km southeast of Baghdad). The case of Hatrene sacralarchitecture together with written material in the local dialect of Aramaic defines very similarstructures in Nippur as sacred space for cultic meals and helps to reconstruct the practices in theperiod from 1st c. to the mid-3rd century CE.
'Los negocios de Plutón. La economía de los santuarios y templos en la antigüedad' es una monografía colectiva que trata de las riquezas de los santuarios y templos antiguos y se interesa por cómo se gestionaron esos recursos y bienes, así como por qué y cómo se acumularon los tesoros, amén de por cuándo y por quiénes fueron expoliados. La obra, que contiene siete contribuciones de autoría individual, en inglés, español e italiano, propone un recorrido que empieza en Sumeria y finaliza en el Imperio romano, cuando las primeras comunidades cristianas utilizaron un sistema por entonces revolucionario de gestión de los bienes comunes.
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the operation of the še u r ₅-ra system of institutional loans of barley in late third millennium BCE Babylonia. In particular, it focuses on the še u r ₅ -ra -loans stemming from the Ĝirsu-Lagaš province, one of the most important areas for cereal production of the entire Ur III kingdom. The article argues that the še u r ₅-ra system, which was based on the availability of large quantities of barley in the provincial network of rural storage facilities, was designed and implemented to (1) reduce food losses, (2) provide state dependents with economic support in times of need, and (3) counteract and mitigate the impact of local crop failures on the institutional workforce at large.
(Akkadica 142/2, pp. 113-142). This paper aims to do a prosopographical study of individuals delivering animals to the Puzriš- Dagan organization during the Third Dynasty of Ur (ca. 2112-2004 BC). Who are they? What kind of ani- mals did they deliver? And how did the family-based individuals deliver animals to Puzriš-Dagan? Build- ing on previous scholarship, a comprehensive analysis of all of the Puzriš-Dagan cuneiform texts recording individual deliveries of animals (mu-DU), spanning the period between Š43 and IS2, might suffice to bring about a conclusive answer to these questions. Four issues will be quantitively discussed: individuals ap- pearing as delivering animals to Puzriš-Dagan; the types of animals delivered to Puzriš-Dagan; delivering animals disbursed for different purposes or final destinations; and family members delivering animals to Puzriš-Dagan.
The First Sealand period in Babylonia has long been obscure, despite the major changes that occurred in the area at that time. The defining characteristics of its ceramics are almost unknown, making identification of its sites through surface survey almost impossible. However, recent excavations at Tell Khaiber near Ur have uncovered a large fortified building of the period, with a dated administrative archive. The pottery from it represents the first substantial strati ed corpus of Sealand period ceramics, providing a solid chronological sequence for the middle centuries of the 2nd millennium in southern Iraq. Using the latest methods and approaches, this volume not only establishes a typology and relative chronology, but also addresses the chaîne opératoire underpinning Sealand period pottery, from clay collection through to vessel use and discard.
Despite the relevance of strong political and property rights, we still lack a unified framework identifying their origins and interaction. In our model, the elite can elicit the citizens' cooperation in investment by granting a more inclusive political process, which allows them to select the tax rate and organize public good provision, and by punishing suspected shirking through the restriction of private rights. When the investment return is small, cooperation can only be attained under strong political and property rights and full taxation. When, instead, it is intermediate, the elite keeps control over fiscal policies and can implement partial taxation. When, finally, the investment return is large, the elite can also weaken the protection of private rights. Embracing the stick, however, is optimal only when production is sufficiently transparent, and, thus, punishment effectively disciplines a shirking citizen. These predictions are consistent with novel data on the division of the decision-making power, the strength of the private rights on land, the provision of public goods and the geographic conditions determining the expected return on farming and its opacity in a panel of 44 major Mesopotamian polities spanning each half-century between 3050 and 1750 BCE. Crucially, our estimates are quite similar when we also control for the trade potential, the severity of external and internal conflicts and the degree of urbanization.
This chapter considers some of the debates surrounding the study of ancient Near Eastern temple architecture, proceeding chronologically. It examines the shifting criteria in modern scholarship for identifying temples from the Late Uruk through the Early Dynastic periods. The chapter then considers the significance scholars assign to the shift from the bent‐axis to the straight‐axis approach in the late third millennium BCE. The bent‐axis and straight‐axis approaches to the cella and its altar have always received special consideration because they are thought to reveal something about cult. Another fundamental distinction in temple architecture, between the broad‐room and long‐room plans, beginning in the early second millennium BCE, offers a counterpoint. Finally, the chapter discusses the great traditions of continuity in Mesopotamian temple building in order to suggest that, when considering aspects of the Mesopotamian temple, a balance must be maintained between the particular and the collective.
RTC 145, a tablet from Tello in southern Iraq dating to the third millennium BC, bears a building plan in which the names and the dimensions of the rooms were written. The drawing and the dimensions are not in agreement: this article discusses the nature of the building shown on the tablet and suggests possible ways to resolve the inconsistency between the building plan and the measurements of the rooms recorded on it. © Presses Universitaires de France. Tous droits réservés pour tous pays.
Prevailing theories of the evolution of early complex societies in southern Mesopotamia presume a uniform, arid landscape transited by Tigris and Euphrates distributaries. These theories hold that it was the seventh millennium BCE introduction of irrigation technologies from the northern alluvium to the south that began the punctuated evolution of Mesopotamian irrigation schemes. In this view, irrigation-dependent agro-pastoral production was the primary stimulus to urbanization and, millennia later, the emergence of city-states. In this dissertation, I cast serious doubt on the landscape characterization underlying this model. I argue that much of the archaic alluvial landscape of southern Iraq consisted in large part, not of desert or steppe, but of wetlands, and that this finding requires a comprehensive reassessment of southern Mesopotamian resource management strategies and their role in emergent complex polities.
While there was in general no negative attitude towards interest on loans in the ancient Near Eastern civilizations it was the moral commands of the Hebrew Bible that viewed the concept of interest taking on loans - at least to any member of the community of Israel -- as a morally questionable practice. All of the three legal codes of the Old Testament, the "Code of the Covenant," the "Law of Holiness," and the "Deuteronomic Code," contain a law prohibiting the lending on interest whereby the prohibition in the "Code of the Covenant" in the book of Exodus is generally agreed to be the oldest. This thrice repeated prohibition against lending for interest in the Pentateuch is therefore often regarded as the result of a primitive economic standard and the specific "kinship morality of a tribal society." A closer look at the subject seems to prove this general opinion of most scholars to be a historical myth. In the light of recent historical research the Hebrew condemnation of lending at interest is neither in striking contrast with the traditions of Israel's ancient neighbors nor rested on very different grounds to the ideas of Plato. The Biblical prohibition against lending at interest was formulated by the "Deuteronomic school" as part of an ideal law for a new post-exile "Israel." It was the utopian response to the ethical demands of the prophetic thematization of justice after Israel's economy had entered the stage of early capitalism. Therefore it was not the authors of Deuteronomy, who formulated the prohibition in a stricter way than the traditional "Covenant." It was the authors of Deuteronomy, who were the first to formulate the prohibition, and it was the "Deuteronomistic school," which extended the other codes with a prohibition against lending at interest based on the Deuteronomic Code. The Old Testament anti usury laws are but one of the many utopian ethical demands that had a profound influence on the life and thought of the Western World.
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