Ashur, Ashshur, also spelled Ašur, Aššur (
Sumerian: AN.ŠAR₂,
Assyrian cuneiform
Cuneiform is a Logogram, logo-Syllabary, syllabic writing system, script that was used to write several languages of the Ancient Near East, Ancient Middle East. The script was in active use from the early Bronze Age until the beginning of the ...
: , also phonetically ) is a god of the ancient
Assyrians and
Akkadians
The Akkadian Empire () was the first ancient empire of Mesopotamia after the long-lived civilization of Sumer. It was centered in the city of Akkad () and its surrounding region. The empire united Akkadian and Sumerian speakers under one rul ...
, and the head of the
Assyria
Assyria (Neo-Assyrian cuneiform: , romanized: ''māt Aššur''; syc, ܐܬܘܪ, ʾāthor) was a major ancient Mesopotamian civilization which existed as a city-state at times controlling regional territories in the indigenous lands of the A ...
n pantheon in
Mesopotamian religion
Mesopotamian religion refers to the religious beliefs and practices of the civilizations of ancient Mesopotamia, particularly Sumer, Akkad, Assyria and Babylonia between circa 6000 BC and 400 AD, after which they largely gave way to Syriac C ...
, who was worshipped mainly in
northern Mesopotamia
Upper Mesopotamia is the name used for the uplands and great outwash plain of northwestern Iraq, northeastern Syria and southeastern Turkey, in the northern Middle East. Since the early Muslim conquests of the mid-7th century, the region has been ...
, and parts of north-east
Syria
Syria ( ar, سُورِيَا or سُورِيَة, translit=Sūriyā), officially the Syrian Arab Republic ( ar, الجمهورية العربية السورية, al-Jumhūrīyah al-ʻArabīyah as-Sūrīyah), is a Western Asian country loc ...
and south-east
Asia Minor
Anatolia, tr, Anadolu Yarımadası), and the Anatolian plateau, also known as Asia Minor, is a large peninsula in Western Asia and the westernmost protrusion of the Asian continent. It constitutes the major part of modern-day Turkey. The re ...
which constituted old Assyria. He may have had a solar iconography.
Legend
Aššur was a deified form of the city of
Assur
Aššur (; Sumerian: AN.ŠAR2KI, Assyrian cuneiform: ''Aš-šurKI'', "City of God Aššur"; syr, ܐܫܘܪ ''Āšūr''; Old Persian ''Aθur'', fa, آشور: ''Āšūr''; he, אַשּׁוּר, ', ar, اشور), also known as Ashur and Qal'a ...
, which dates from the mid 3rd millennium BC and was the capital of the
Old Assyrian kingdom.
As such, Ashur did not originally have a family, but as the cult came under southern Mesopotamian influence, he later came to be regarded as the Assyrian equivalent of
Enlil
Enlil, , "Lord f theWind" later known as Elil, is an ancient Mesopotamian god associated with wind, air, earth, and storms. He is first attested as the chief deity of the Sumerian pantheon, but he was later worshipped by the Akkadians, Bab ...
, the chief god of
Nippur
Nippur (Sumerian language, Sumerian: ''Nibru'', often logogram, logographically recorded as , EN.LÍLKI, "Enlil City;"The Cambridge Ancient History: Prolegomena & Prehistory': Vol. 1, Part 1. Accessed 15 Dec 2010. Akkadian language, Akkadian: '' ...
. Enlil was the most important god of the southern pantheon from the early 3rd millennium BC until
Hammurabi
Hammurabi (Akkadian: ; ) was the sixth Amorite king of the Old Babylonian Empire, reigning from to BC. He was preceded by his father, Sin-Muballit, who abdicated due to failing health. During his reign, he conquered Elam and the city-states ...
founded an empire based in
Babylon
''Bābili(m)''
* sux, 𒆍𒀭𒊏𒆠
* arc, 𐡁𐡁𐡋 ''Bāḇel''
* syc, ܒܒܠ ''Bāḇel''
* grc-gre, Βαβυλών ''Babylṓn''
* he, בָּבֶל ''Bāvel''
* peo, 𐎲𐎠𐎲𐎡𐎽𐎢 ''Bābiru''
* elx, 𒀸𒁀𒉿𒇷 ''Babi ...
in the mid-18th century BC, after which
Marduk
Marduk (Cuneiform: dAMAR.UTU; Sumerian: ''amar utu.k'' "calf of the sun; solar calf"; ) was a god from ancient Mesopotamia and patron deity of the city of Babylon. When Babylon became the political center of the Euphrates valley in the time of ...
replaced Enlil as the chief god in the south. In the north, Ashur absorbed Enlil's wife
Ninlil
Ninlil ( D NIN.LÍL; meaning uncertain) was a Mesopotamian goddess regarded as the wife of Enlil. She shared many of his functions, especially the responsibility for declaring destinies, and like him was regarded as a senior deity and head of the ...
(as the Assyrian goddess
Mullissu
Mullissu is a goddess who is the consort of the Assyrian god Asshur. Mullissu may be identical with the Sumerian goddess Ninlil, wife of the god Enlil, which would parallel the fact that Asshur himself was modeled on Enlil. Mullissu's name was w ...
) and his sons
Ninurta
, image= Cropped Image of Carving Showing the Mesopotamian God Ninurta.png
, caption= Assyrian stone relief from the temple of Ninurta at Kalhu, showing the god with his thunderbolts pursuing Anzû, who has stolen the Tablet of Destinies from En ...
and
Zababa
Zababa (Sumerian: 𒀭𒍝𒂷𒂷 dza-ba4-ba4) was the tutelary deity of the city of Kish in ancient Mesopotamia. He was a war god. While he was regarded as similar to Ninurta and Nergal, he was never fully conflated with them. His worship is at ...
—this process began around the 14th century BC and continued down to the 7th century.
[
During the various periods of Assyrian conquest, such as the ]Old Assyrian Empire
The Old Assyrian period was the second stage of Assyrian history, covering the history of the city of Assur from its rise as an independent city-state under Puzur-Ashur I 2025 BC to the foundation of a larger Assyrian territorial state after the ...
of Shamshi-Adad I
Shamshi-Adad ( akk, Šamši-Adad; Amorite: ''Shamshi-Addu''), ruled 1808–1776 BC, was an Amorite warlord and conqueror who had conquered lands across much of Syria, Anatolia, and Upper Mesopotamia.Some of the Mari letters addressed to Shamsi-Ada ...
(1813–1750 BC), Middle Assyrian Empire
The Middle Assyrian Empire was the third stage of Assyrian history, covering the history of Assyria from the accession of Ashur-uballit I 1363 BC and the rise of Assyria as a territorial kingdom to the death of Ashur-dan II in 912 BC. ...
(1391–1056 BC) and Neo-Assyrian Empire
The Neo-Assyrian Empire was the fourth and penultimate stage of ancient Assyrian history and the final and greatest phase of Assyria as an independent state. Beginning with the accession of Adad-nirari II in 911 BC, the Neo-Assyrian Empire grew t ...
(911–605 BC), Assyrian imperial propaganda proclaimed the supremacy of Ashur and declared that the conquered peoples had been abandoned by their own gods.
When Assyria conquered Babylon in the Sargonid period (8th–7th centuries BC), Assyrian scribes began to write the name of Ashur with the cuneiform signs AN.ŠAR2, the ideograms for "whole heaven" in Sumerian, simplified into
AN.ŠAR2 in Assyrian cuneiform
Cuneiform is a Logogram, logo-Syllabary, syllabic writing system, script that was used to write several languages of the Ancient Near East, Ancient Middle East. The script was in active use from the early Bronze Age until the beginning of the ...
, which came to be pronounced ''Aššur'' in the Assyrian dialect of Akkadian Akkadian or Accadian may refer to:
* Akkadians, inhabitants of the Akkadian Empire
* Akkadian language, an extinct Eastern Semitic language
* Akkadian literature, literature in this language
* Akkadian cuneiform
Cuneiform is a logo- syllabi ...
, the language of Assyria and Babylonia
Babylonia (; Akkadian: , ''māt Akkadī'') was an ancient Akkadian-speaking state and cultural area based in the city of Babylon in central-southern Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq and parts of Syria). It emerged as an Amorite-ruled state c. ...
. The intention seems to have been to put Aššur at the head of the Babylonian pantheon, where Anshar
Anshar, also spelled Anšar ( Sumerian: , Neo-Assyrian: , meaning "whole heaven"), was a primordial god in the Babylonian creation myth Enuma Elish. His consort is Kishar which means "Whole Earth". They were the children of Lahamu and Lahmu an ...
and his counterpart Kishar
In the Babylonian epic Enuma Elish, Kishar ( akk, 𒆠𒊹, Kišar) is the daughter of Lahamu and Lahmu, the first children of Tiamat and Abzu. She is the female principle, sister and wife of Anshar, the male principle, and the mother of Anu. K ...
("whole earth") preceded even Enlil and Ninlil. Thus in the Sargonid version of the Enuma Elish, the Babylonian national creation myth, Marduk
Marduk (Cuneiform: dAMAR.UTU; Sumerian: ''amar utu.k'' "calf of the sun; solar calf"; ) was a god from ancient Mesopotamia and patron deity of the city of Babylon. When Babylon became the political center of the Euphrates valley in the time of ...
, the chief god of Babylon, does not appear, and instead it is Ashur, as Anshar, who slays Tiamat
In Mesopotamian religion, Tiamat ( akk, or , grc, Θαλάττη, Thaláttē) is a primordial goddess of the sea, mating with Abzû, the god of the groundwater, to produce younger gods. She is the symbol of the chaos of primordial creati ...
the chaos-monster and creates the world of humankind.[Donald A. Mackenzie ''Myths of Babylonia and Assyria'' (1915)]
chapter 15: "Ashur the National God of Assyria"
/ref>
Representation and symbolism
Ashur was represented as the winged sun
The winged sun is a solar symbol associated with divinity, royalty, and power in the Ancient Near East (Egypt, Mesopotamia, Anatolia, and Persia).
Ancient Egypt
In ancient Egypt, the symbol is attested from the Old Kingdom (Sneferu, 26th cen ...
disc that appears frequently in Assyrian iconography
Iconography, as a branch of art history, studies the identification, description and interpretation of the content of images: the subjects depicted, the particular compositions and details used to do so, and other elements that are distinct fro ...
. Many Assyrian kings had names that included the name Ashur, including, above all, Ashur-uballit I
Ashur-uballit I ''(Aššur-uballiṭ I)'', who reigned between 1363 and 1328 BC, was the first king of the Middle Assyrian Empire. After his father Eriba-Adad I had broken Mitanni influence over Assyria, Ashur-uballit I's defeat of the Mitanni ...
, Ashurnasirpal, Esarhaddon
Esarhaddon, also spelled Essarhaddon, Assarhaddon and Ashurhaddon (Neo-Assyrian cuneiform: , also , meaning " Ashur has given me a brother"; Biblical Hebrew: ''ʾĒsar-Ḥaddōn'') was the king of the Neo-Assyrian Empire from the death of his ...
(Ashur-aha-iddina), and Ashurbanipal
Ashurbanipal (Neo-Assyrian language, Neo-Assyrian cuneiform: , meaning "Ashur (god), Ashur is the creator of the heir") was the king of the Neo-Assyrian Empire from 669 BCE to his death in 631. He is generally remembered as the last great king o ...
. Epithets include ''bêlu rabû'' "great lord", ''ab ilâni'' "father of gods", ''šadû rabû'' "great mountain", and ''il aššurî'' "god of Ashur". The symbols of Ashur include:
# a winged disc with horns, enclosing four circles revolving round a middle circle; rippling rays fall down from either side of the disc;
# a circle or wheel, suspended from wings, and enclosing a warrior drawing his bow to discharge an arrow;
# the same circle; the warrior's bow, however, is carried in his left hand, while the right hand is uplifted as if to bless his worshipers (see picture).
An Assyrian standard, which probably represented the world column
In astronomy, axis mundi is the Latin term for the Axial tilt, axis of Earth between the celestial poles.
In a geocentric coordinate system, this is the axis of rotation of the celestial sphere.
Consequently, in ancient Greco-Roman astronom ...
, has the disc mounted on a bull's head with horns. The upper part of the disc is occupied by a warrior, whose head, part of his bow, and the point of his arrow protrude from the circle. The rippling water rays are V-shaped, and two bulls, treading river-like rays, occupy the divisions thus formed. There are also two heads—a lion's and a man's—with gaping mouths, which may symbolize tempests, the destroying power of the sun, or the sources of the Tigris and Euphrates. Jastrow regards the winged disc as "the purer and more genuine symbol of Ashur as a solar deity". He calls it "a sun disc with protruding rays", and says: "To this symbol the warrior with the bow and arrow was added—a despiritualization that reflects the martial spirit of the Assyrian empire".[
]
The Assyrian Tree of Life
Simo Parpola Simo Kaarlo Antero Parpola (born 4 July 1943) is a Finnish Assyriologist specializing in the Neo-Assyrian Empire and Professor emeritus of Assyriology at the University of Helsinki (retired fall 2009).
Career
Simo Parpola studied Assyriology, C ...
explored the use of the 'Tree of life
The tree of life is a fundamental archetype in many of the world's mythological, religious, and philosophical traditions. It is closely related to the concept of the sacred tree.Giovino, Mariana (2007). ''The Assyrian Sacred Tree: A History ...
' motif when Ashur is depicted in reliefs.[http://www.atour.com/education/pdf/SimoParpola-TheAssyrianTreeOfLife.pdf The Assyrian Tree of Life: Tracing the Origins of Jewish Monotheism and Greek Philosophy] Often, Ashur is depicted in a winged disk hovering on top of a tree, for instance, in Ashurnasirpal's throne room in Calah
Nimrud (; syr, ܢܢܡܪܕ ar, النمرود) is an ancient Assyrian city located in Iraq, south of the city of Mosul, and south of the village of Selamiyah ( ar, السلامية), in the Nineveh Plains in Upper Mesopotamia. It was a majo ...
which was inscribed with "vice-regent of Ashur".
Parpola continues by drawing on parallels between the Ein Sof
Ein Sof, or Eyn Sof (, he, '; meaning "infinite", ), in Kabbalah, is understood as God prior to any self-manifestation in the production of any spiritual realm, probably derived from Solomon ibn Gabirol's ( 1021 – 1070) term, "the Endless O ...
in the Kabbalah
Kabbalah ( he, קַבָּלָה ''Qabbālā'', literally "reception, tradition") is an esoteric method, discipline and Jewish theology, school of thought in Jewish mysticism. A traditional Kabbalist is called a Mekubbal ( ''Məqūbbāl'' "rece ...
and the symbolism of Ashur with the Tree of life
The tree of life is a fundamental archetype in many of the world's mythological, religious, and philosophical traditions. It is closely related to the concept of the sacred tree.Giovino, Mariana (2007). ''The Assyrian Sacred Tree: A History ...
. The depiction of Ashur, the universal God, behind a solar disk, representing light as his essential nature, just as in Kabbalah, is just one instance of Parpola's comparison.
See also
* Anshar
Anshar, also spelled Anšar ( Sumerian: , Neo-Assyrian: , meaning "whole heaven"), was a primordial god in the Babylonian creation myth Enuma Elish. His consort is Kishar which means "Whole Earth". They were the children of Lahamu and Lahmu an ...
* Ahura Mazda
Ahura Mazda (; ae, , translit=Ahura Mazdā; ), also known as Oromasdes, Ohrmazd, Ahuramazda, Hoormazd, Hormazd, Hormaz and Hurmuz, is the creator deity in Zoroastrianism. He is the first and most frequently invoked spirit in the ''Yasna''. ...
* Asura
Asuras (Sanskrit: असुर) are a class of beings in Indian religions, Indic religions. They are described as power-seeking clans related to the more benevolent Deva (Hinduism), Devas (also known as Suras) in Hinduism. In its Buddhism, Buddhi ...
* Farr-e Kiyani (Faravahar)
The Faravahar ( fa, فروهر), also known as the Foruhar () or the Farre Kiyâni ( fa, فر کیانی, label=none), is one of the best-known symbols of Zoroastrianism, an Iranian religions, Iranian religion. There are various interpretatio ...
* Ashur (Bible)
Ashur ( ''ʾAššūr'') was the second son of Shem, the son of Noah. Ashur's brothers were Elam, Arphaxad, Lud, and Aram.
Prior to the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, there was contention in academic circles regarding whether Ashur or Nimrod b ...
* Yahweh
Yahweh *''Yahwe'', was the national god of ancient Israel and Judah. The origins of his worship reach at least to the early Iron Age, and likely to the Late Bronze Age if not somewhat earlier, and in the oldest biblical literature he posse ...
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ashur (God)
Early Period (Assyria)
Mesopotamian gods
Solar gods
Jovian deities