Bêl (; from akk, bēlu) is a title signifying "lord" or "master" applied to various gods in the Mesopotamian religion of

Akkad Akkad may refer to: *Akkad (city), the capital of the Akkadian Empire *Akkadian Empire, the first ancient empire of Mesopotamia *Akkad SC, Iraqi football club People with the name *Abbas el-Akkad, Egyptian writer *Abdulrahman Akkad, Syrian LGBT act ...

, 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 feminine form is ''Bêlit'' ('Lady, Mistress') in Akkadian. ''Bel'' is represented in Greek as Belos and in Latin as Belus. ''Belit'' appears in Greek form as Beltis (Βελτις). Linguistically, ''Bel'' is an East Semitic form

cognate In historical linguistics, cognates or lexical cognates are sets of words in different languages that have been inherited in direct descent from an etymology, etymological ancestor in a proto-language, common parent language. Because language c ...

with the Northwest Semitic Baal with the same meaning. ''Bel'' was especially used for the Babylonian god

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 ...

in Assyrian and neo-Babylonian personal names or mentioned in inscriptions in a Mesopotamian context. Similarly, ''Bêlit'' mostly refers to

's spouse Sarpanit. Marduk's mother, the

Sumerian Sumerian or Sumerians may refer to: *Sumer, an ancient civilization **Sumerian language **Sumerian art **Sumerian architecture **Sumerian literature **Cuneiform script, used in Sumerian writing *Sumerian Records, an American record label based in ...

goddess often referred to in the

Sumerian language Sumerian is the language of ancient Sumer. It is one of the oldest attested languages, dating back to at least 3000 BC. It is accepted to be a local language isolate and to have been spoken in ancient Mesopotamia, in the area that is modern-day ...

as Ninhursag, Damkina, and Ninmah, was often known as ''Belit-ili'' ("Lady of the Gods") in Akkadian. Other gods called "Lord" were sometimes identified totally or in part with Bel Marduk. The god

Malak-bel Malakbel (Arabic: ملاك بعل) was a sun god worshiped in the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra, frequently associated and worshiped with the moon god Aglibol as a party of a trinity involving the sky god Baalshamin. Etymology Malakbel's nam ...

of Palmyra is an example, attested as a messenger of Bel but existing as a deity separate to Bel/

. Similarly, Zeus Belus mentioned by

Sanchuniathon Sanchuniathon (; Ancient Greek: ; probably from Phoenician: , "Sakon has given"), also known as Sanchoniatho the Berytian, was a Phoenician author. His three works, originally written in the Phoenician language, survive only in partial paraphras ...

as born to

Cronus In Ancient Greek religion and mythology, Cronus, Cronos, or Kronos ( or , from el, Κρόνος, ''Krónos'') was the leader and youngest of the first generation of Titans, the divine descendants of the primordial Gaia (Mother Earth) and ...

/ El in Peraea is unlikely to be Marduk. Early translators of Akkadian believed that the ideogram for the god called ''

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 ...

'' in

was to be read as ''Bel'' in Akkadian. Current scholarship holds this as incorrect, but ''Bel'' is used in referring to Enlil in older translations and discussions. In Mandaean cosmology, the name for Jupiter is '' Bil'' (), which is derived from the name Bel.

Bel of Palmyra, Syria

A god named Bel was the chief-god of Palmyra,

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 ...

in pre-

Hellenistic In Classical antiquity, the Hellenistic period covers the time in Mediterranean history after Classical Greece, between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and the emergence of the Roman Empire, as signified by the Battle of Actium in ...

times, being worshipped alongside the gods Aglibol and Yarhibol. Originally, he was known as Bol, after the Northwestern Semitic word Ba'al (usually used to refer to the god

Hadad Hadad ( uga, ), Haddad, Adad (Akkadian: 𒀭𒅎 '' DIM'', pronounced as ''Adād''), or Iškur ( Sumerian) was the storm and rain god in the Canaanite and ancient Mesopotamian religions. He was attested in Ebla as "Hadda" in c. 2500 BCE. ...

), until the cult of Bel-

spread to Palmyra and by 213 BC, Bol was renamed to Bel. The Temple of Bel in Palmrya,

was dedicated to this god. The temple has since been destroyed by ISIS.

References

External links

Bartleby: American Heritage Dictionary: Semitic Roots: b^cl
(Dead link. ) {{DEFAULTSORT:Bel (Mythology) Titles Deities in the Hebrew Bible Mesopotamian mythology Baal

Bel of Palmyra, Syria

See also

References

External links