Ama-arḫuš

Ama-arḫuš was a Mesopotamian goddess associated with compassion and healing or epithet of goddesses designating them as compassionate.

Name and character

Ama-arḫuš can be translated from Sumerian as "compassionate mother". The variant Nin-ama-arḫuššu, "lady compassionate mother", is also attested. Sporadic addition of the sign NIN to preexisting names of deities as a prefix is a well attested phenomenon in Mesopotamian sources, with other examples including Nin-Aya, Nin-Aruru and Nin-Azimua. An Akkadian phrase analogous to Ama-arḫuš is also known, ''ummu rēmi'' or ''rēmēnītu''. Dina Katz notes that the term ''arḫuš'' had a broad meaning, referring to emotions such as pity, empathy, and mercy, but that at the same time it occurs primarily in texts involving deities. In addition to its literal meaning, the name Ama-arḫuš was also meant to highlight a connection to healing and midwifery, Since ''arḫuš'' also had meaning "uterus", Irene Sibbing-Plantholt argues that it can be interpreted as an indication of "knowledge of the female body". Katz argues that the signs used to render it logographically, GA₂✕SAL, respectively "house" and "vulva", might indicate that the meaning "uterus" (or perhaps "placenta") was primary, and using it to designate an emotion was a secondary development.

As an epithet

Ama-arḫuš is attested as an epithet of Ninisina in the hymn ''Ninisina D'' from the second millennium BCE, and continued to be used to describe her in the first millennium BCE. In addition to her, Bau and in the first millennium BCE Gula and Ninkarrak as well, could be addressed with the same title. In the so-called ''Great Star List'', an astronomical compendium known from a number of Neo-Assyrian and Neo-Babylonian fragments, Ama-arḫuš is one of the "seven Gulas" alongside Bau, Ninšudda, Dukurgal, Gunura, Ninasag and Nin-umma-siga, and she is addressed as "Gula of the temple E-ešbar". In the god list ''An = Anum'', the poorly attested minor deity Enanun is described as the ''ama-arḫuš'' of Gula. The word ''arḫuš'' itself was used as an epithet or component of epithets of numerous other deities, both male and female, for example Azimua, Ninmah or Nanna, while the '' galla'' demons were characterized as lacking it.

Worship

Ama-arḫuš was worshiped in Uruk, where she is attested in texts from the Seleucid period as one of the newly introduced deities, alongside Amasagnudi, Šarrāḫītu and others. She is attested in the theophoric names Arad-Ama-arḫuš (masculine) and Amat-Ama-arḫuš (masculine), which occur n texts from between 211 and 149 BCE; four of the six known individuals bearing each of them belonged to local conservative aristocratic families. The name otherwise does not occur in the Mesopotamian onomasticon. Julia Krul suggests that since Gula is absent from late theophoric names from this city, despite being actively worshiped in it, it is possible that Ama-arḫuš was viewed as her manifestation or synonym, as she is not otherwise attested in Uruk. Identification with Gula is also considered a possibility by Irene Sibbing-Plantholt.

References

Bibliography

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*{{cite book, last=Sibbing-Plantholt, first=Irene, title=The Image of Mesopotamian Divine Healers. Healing Goddesses and the Legitimization of Professional Asûs in the Mesopotamian Medical Marketplace, publisher=Brill, publication-place=Boston, date=2022, isbn=978-90-04-51241-2, oclc=1312171937

External links

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A hymn to Ninisina (Ninisina D)
' in the Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature

Mesopotamian goddesses
Health goddesses