Page 85 - The Art & Architecture of the Ancient Orient_Neat

VAllT ONE: MESOPOTAMIA
majority of craftsmen working for private
persons were unable to realize. It represents the
goddess Ningal, spouse of the moon-god Nan-
nar, who was the tutelary deity of Ur, and it
was dedicated by the High Priestess of the god­
dess who was a daughter of king Ishme-Dagan
of Isin. Yet the modelling even of this excellent
figure seems a little hard and insensitive in com­
parison with similar works of an earlier age
(Plates 50B and 5413).
In small shrines reliefs of baked clay could re­
place the cult-statue; but the profile, used ex­
clusively in narrative reliefs, was unsuited to a
plaque representing the deity in the actual rites,
and reliefs placed over the altars of shrines show
the gods in full front view, which establishes a
relation with all who approach. In plate 56 a
fine example of such a relief is preserved.25 It is
in keeping with the sombre mood of Meso­
potamian religion that so sinister a figure should
receive a cult. The goddess is winged, and the
legs, between knee and talon, are feathered. She
10 METRES
' is a bringer of death. Moving soundlessly and at
IO 20 30 FEET
bzH .-j H H I / night, men sometimes catch sight of her in the
N guise of an owl, but her irresistible power, her
Figure 21. Plan and section of a private truly terrifying nature, is leonine rather than
house at Ur
bird-like. We know of a goddess Lilith whose
name is rendered in the Authorized Version as ‘screech owl’ (Isaiah xxxiv, 14), and
who is mentioned in an early fragment of the Gilgamesh Epic as having built her
house in the middle of a hollow tree, as owls do. In later times she was known as a succu-
bus who destroyed her lovers, but the existence of the relief shows that she represented a
power susceptible of worship. The symbols which she holds in her hands and displays so
emphatically seem to be measuring rope, which we discussed in connexion with the
stele of Umammu (see p. 51). They may indicate the limited span of man s life or his
judgement at death. The whole apparition is set on a ledge covered with a scale pattern,
the conventional rendering of ‘ the mountain’. This, as we have seen (p. 6), is in Meso­
potamia the ‘religious landscape’ par excellence, as the reed marsh is of Egypt and the
mound of Golgotha in Christianity, and therefore the normal setting for the epiphany
of a god. The relief was coloured, and traces of paint still adhere to it; the body of the
goddess was red, the feathers of her wings and those of the owls are black and red alter-
nately, and the manes of the lions black.
Reliefs of this type, and also cult statues, were copied on a small scale and were distri- ,
.
buted in large numbers as clay reliefs pressed from moulds. These turn up in temples and
5<>