A City Lament is a poetic elegy for a lost or fallen city. This literary genre, from around 2000 BCE onwards, was particularly prevalent in the
Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia ''Mesopotamíā''; ar, بِلَاد ٱلرَّافِدَيْن or ; syc, ܐܪܡ ܢܗܪ̈ܝܢ, or , ) is a historical region of Western Asia situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system, in the northern part of the ...
n region of the
Ancient Near East
The ancient Near East was the home of early civilizations within a region roughly corresponding to the modern Middle East: Mesopotamia (modern Iraq, southeast Turkey, southwest Iran and northeastern Syria), ancient Egypt, ancient Iran ( Elam, ...
.
The Bible's
Book of Lamentations
The Book of Lamentations ( he, אֵיכָה, , from its incipit meaning "how") is a collection of poetic laments for the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BCE. In the Hebrew Bible it appears in the Ketuvim ("Writings") as one of the Five Megill ...
concerning
Jerusalem
Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...
around 586 BCE, contains some elements of a city lament.
Features
In the five known Mesopotamian City Laments, the lament is written in voice of the city's
tutelary goddess
A tutelary () (also tutelar) is a deity or a spirit who is a guardian, patron, or protector of a particular place, geographic feature, person, lineage, nation, culture, or occupation. The etymology of "tutelary" expresses the concept of safety and ...
.
The destruction of the city, the mass killing of its inhabitants, and the loss of its central temple are vividly described. Special attention is given to the divine sphere, where the gods order the destruction of the city, the city patron gods implore against this, but in vain. The patron gods are exiled to live as deportees in foreign cites, lamenting their devastated shrine. Subsequently they return from exile and renew their former existence.
Mesopotamia
The
Lament for Ur
The Lament for Ur, or Lamentation over the city of Ur is a Sumerian lament composed around the time of the fall of Ur to the Elamites and the end of the city's third dynasty (c. 2000 BC).
Laments
It contains one of five known Mesopotamian ...
, or Lamentation over the city of Ur is a
Sumerian lament
A lament or lamentation is a passionate expression of grief, often in music, poetry, or song form. The grief is most often born of regret, or mourning. Laments can also be expressed in a verbal manner in which participants lament about something ...
composed around the time of the fall of
Ur to the
Elamites and the end of the city's
third dynasty
The Third Dynasty of ancient Egypt (Dynasty III) is the first dynasty of the Old Kingdom. Other dynasties of the Old Kingdom include the Fourth, Fifth and Sixth. The capital during the period of the Old Kingdom was at Memphis.
Overview
Af ...
around 2000 BCE.
The
Lament for Sumer and Ur
The lament for Sumer and Urim or the lament for Sumer and Ur is a poem and one of five known Mesopotamian "city laments"—dirges for ruined cities in the voice of the city's tutelary goddess.
The other city laments are:
*The Lament for Ur
*T ...
concerns the events of 2004 BCE, during the last year of
King Ibbi-Sin's reign, when Ur fell to an army from the east. The Sumerians decided that such a catastrophic event could only be explained through divine intervention and wrote in the lament that the gods, "An, Enlil, Enki and Ninmah decided
r'sfate".
The
Lament for Eridu
Eridu (Sumerian language, Sumerian: , NUN.KI/eridugki; Akkadian language, Akkadian: ''irîtu''; modern Arabic language, Arabic: Tell Abu Shahrain) is an archaeological site in southern Mesopotamia (modern Dhi Qar Governorate, Iraq). Eridu was l ...
. Unlike Ur or Akkad we don't have a good idea of how Eridu actually fell, or when other than in the Early Dynastic period. The
Sumerian King List simply says "Then Eridug fell and the kingship was taken to Bad-tibira". This lament also describes how the loss of favor with the gods led to its fall.
There was also a
Lament for Uruk and a
Lament for Nippur.
The literary works of the Sumerians were widely translated by, for example, the
Hittites
The Hittites () were an Anatolian people who played an important role in establishing first a kingdom in Kussara (before 1750 BC), then the Kanesh or Nesha kingdom (c. 1750–1650 BC), and next an empire centered on Hattusa in north-centra ...
,
Hurrians and
Canaanites.
Samuel Noah Kramer suggests that subsequent
Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
as well as
Hebrew
Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...
texts "were profoundly influenced by them." Contemporary scholars have drawn parallels between the lament and passages from the Bible (e.g. "the Lord departed from his temple and stood on the mountain east of Jerusalem (Ezekiel 10:18-19)."
Hebrew Bible
In the Jewish tradition, this genre also appears over a millennium later in the
Hebrew Bible
The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;["Tanach"](_blank)
'' destruction of Jerusalem
The siege of Jerusalem of 70 CE was the decisive event of the First Jewish–Roman War (66–73 CE), in which the Roman army led by future emperor Titus besieged Jerusalem, the center of Jewish rebel resistance in the Roman province of Jud ...
by
Nebuchadnezzar II of
Babylon in the sixth century BCE.
The similarities are, however, of motif rather than of form; in other respects, the Hebrew genre is quite different from its Sumerian predecessors.
Lamentations
The
Book of Lamentations
The Book of Lamentations ( he, אֵיכָה, , from its incipit meaning "how") is a collection of poetic laments for the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BCE. In the Hebrew Bible it appears in the Ketuvim ("Writings") as one of the Five Megill ...
shares some motifs with earlier
Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia ''Mesopotamíā''; ar, بِلَاد ٱلرَّافِدَيْن or ; syc, ܐܪܡ ܢܗܪ̈ܝܢ, or , ) is a historical region of Western Asia situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system, in the northern part of the ...
n laments. Whereas the Mesopotamian laments are in the voice of the city's tutelary goddess, Lamentations, with its monotheistic background, is instead tenderly addressed as "Daughter Jerusalem" and "Daughter Zion".
Like its Mesopotamian predecessors, it personifies the city, grieves over its destruction by God, and prays that calamity will overtake its destroyers. Unlike them, God does not weep over the destroyed sanctuary, nor does it portray a rebuilding, nor give praise for such a prospect.
Other occurrences
Much of the postexilic scroll of Isaiah concerns the destroyed and restored city of Jerusalem.
Laments can also be found in the
Book of Jeremiah, the
Book of Ezekiel
The Book of Ezekiel is the third of the Latter Prophets in the Tanakh and one of the major prophetic books, following Isaiah and Jeremiah. According to the book itself, it records six visions of the prophet Ezekiel, exiled in Babylon, during ...
and the
Book of Psalms,
Psalm 137
Psalm 137 is the 137th psalm of the Book of Psalms in the Tanakh. In English it is generally known as "By the rivers of Babylon", which is how its first words are translated in the King James Version of the Bible. Its Latin title is "Super flum ...
.
References
Bibliography
*
{{Bible-stub
Book of Lamentations
Laments
Poetic forms