Page 58 - The Art & Architecture of the Ancient Orient_Neat

THE EARLY DYNASTIC PERIOD

Dynastic Period and already existed in the Second.36 We also know that it was never
abandoned. .... , , r c
We have referred exclusively to figures of men in discussing style; the figures of
women arc, on the whole, of lesser quality and their stylistic character becomes blurred.
The contrast between the images of god and goddess in plate 13 is typical, not excep­
tional. Most of the surviving statues of women belong to the later style. This is probable
in plate 24A, a female figure from Mari, with a head-dress not, so far, found elsewhere. It
is certain for the figures of plates 24B and 25. The hair is generally shown as in plate 25,
with the long plait wound round the head, which gives, in front view, a good frame
to the face.
Non-human figures are known in both styles. Plate 26a shows the front part of the
arm-rest of a throne. It depicts one of the monstrous creatures which populated the fairy­
land of contemporary seal designs. The heavy mane of a bison surrounds an enigmatic
bearded face; the horns are broken off. It is the human-headed bull. His counterpart, the
bull-man, is known in sculpture in an offering-stand discussed on p. 27.
The cow of plate 26b is made of translucent serpentine. It has a beard, which is here
shown as a ritual appendage, bound round the muzzle. At the back of the head two
locks of human hair descend from between the horns as if one viewed from behind a
deity wearing a horned crown. It is likely that the cow represented the goddess Nintu,
‘ Lady of Births’, since it was not only found in her temple but would fit a pedestal built
on its altar. The meaning of the beard remains unknown; it recurs often when animals
embodying some superhuman power are represented (e.g. Plates 27B and 31). The small
green figure is oddly impressive, powerful out of all proportion to its size; the scheme
of the earlier stone vases (Plate 5), where animals passants turn their heads at right angles
to face the beholder, acquires a new meaning where the beast possesses this weird
numinous power and the beholder is a worshipper of the embodied deity.
The cow of Nintu and the arm-rest with the human-headed bull belong to the end
of the Second Early Dynastic Period, the period when the second, realistic style had
been established.37 This style in stone sculpture is contemporary with an extraordinary
efflorescence of statuary in copper and gold. Copper Hons served as guardians of the
temple of Ninhursag, ‘Lady of the Mountain’, at Al ‘Ubaid.38 It has not yet been de­
cided whether the heads were cast or hammered over a bitumen core. The bodies were
certainly made of hammered sheets of copper riveted together. The creatures show their
teeth, and a protruding tongue of red jasper adds to their fierce appearance; so do the
large inlaid eyes. Lions’ heads of the
same type, but carved in stone, come from Lagash,
and the device of guardian lions survived to the Hammurabi Period and re-emerged later
in Assyria.
The friezes of stone animals discovered in the Protoliterate temples of Warka (Plate 4)
find their counterpart in metal at Al ‘Ubaid. A series of standing bulls, and another of
ca ves kneeling down, turn their heads outwards in the old-established
manner.39 The
bodies of the calves are worked in relief, but the heads were cast separately and
are en-
tne y etachcd from the wall. We do not know where these friezes appeared
in the
uilding, since they were discovered buried in a
trench, thrown there, no doubt, on the
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