House Most High: The Temples of Ancient Mesopotamia

221 Pages·2004·4.658 MB·English

by  A. R. George (editor)

House Most High
The Temples of Ancient Mesopotamia
MLSOPOTAMIAN
QVILIZATIONS
General &litor
Jerrold S. Cooper, Johns Hopkins University
&litorial Board
Walter Farber, University of Chicago
Jean-Pierre Gregoire, C.N.RS.
Piotr Michalowski, University of Michigan
Simo Parpola, University of Helsinki
Marvin Powell, Northern Illinois University
Jack Sasson, University of North Carolina
Piotr Steinkeller, Haroard University
Marten Stol, Free University of Amsterdam
Irene Winter, Haroard University
l. The Lamentation over the Destruction of Sumer and Ur
Piotr Michalowski
2. Schlaf, Kindchen, Schlaf! MesopotamischeB aby-Beschworungenu nd
-Rituale
Walter Farber
3. Adoption in Old Babylonian Nippur and the Archive of
Mannum-mesu-li~~ur
Elizabeth C. Stone and David I. Owen
4. Third-Millennium Legal and Administrative Texts in the Iraq Museum,
Baghdad
Piotr Steinkeller and J. N. Postgate
5. House Most High: The Temples of Ancient Mesopotamia
A RGeorge
House Most High
The Temples of Ancient Mesopotamia
AR~orge
Eisenbrauns
Winona Lake, Indiana
1993
© Copyright 1993 by Eisenbrauns.
All rights reserved.
Printed in the United States of America
Libraryo f Congress Cataloging-in-PublicationD ata
House most high : the temples of ancient Mesopotamia/ [compiled and edited by)
ARGeorge.
p. cm. - (Mesopotamian civilizations ; 5)
Commentary in English; Sumerian texts in cuneiform and romanization.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-931464-80-3
L George, A R II. Series.
PJ4031.H68 1993
499'.95-dc20 93-15336
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American
National Standard for Information Sciences-Permanence of Paper for Printed Library
Materials, ANSI 239.48-1984.8 ™
To Professor William L Moran
List, list, 0, list!
Hamlet I. v. 22

Contents
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix
Abbreviations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . x1
Part One. The Temple Lists of Ancient Mesopotamia
Introduction................................................................ 1
Lexical Temple Lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Theological Temple Lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
The Canonical Temple List (no. 1) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
A Hierarchical Temple List
The Babylonian Temple List (no. 2) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
Geographical Temple Lists
The Khorsabad Temple List (no. 3) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
The Kuyunjik Ziqqurrat List (no. 4)................................. 4.5
The Neo-Babylonian Ziqqurrat List (no. . 5) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
An Explanatory Temple List, From Kisto Apak (no. 6)............ 49
Other Temple Lists (nos. 7-9) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
Part Two. The Temples of Ancient Mesopotamia: A Gazetteer
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ,59
Gazetteer of Ceremonial Names . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
Unnamed Temples, Listed by Divine Owner............................. 161
Ceremonial Names of Royal PalacPs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171
Indexes to the Gazetteer
Divine Names . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173
Geographical Names . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178
Royal and Personal Names . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
Lexieal Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18(-l
Index of CunPiform Tablets................................................. 191
Index of Previous P11bliC'ation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 192
Plat<:>1s -16 . .. . . . .. .. .. . .. .. .. . . . . . .. . . . .. . . .. . . .. . . . .. .. . . . . .. . . .. . . . . . . . . .. HJ:3
\°II

Preface
This work grew from what was originally envisaged as a collaboration
with Professor William L Moran The material for many of the texts presented
in the first part of the book was collected, studied and edited in first draft many
years ago by Prof. Moran A few other temple lists were discovered more
recently in the British Museum's Sippar collections by the author while work
ing on a previous volume, &bylonian Topographical Texts. After the comple
tion of that book it seemed desirable to put these out along with the remaining
temple lists. Prof. Moran, when approached with this proposal, with great gen
erosity put at my disposal an early draft of the Canonical Temple list and other
lists, but commitments elsewhere regrettably prevented him from taking an
active part in the preparation of the editions as they appear in the present book,
and in the compilation of the gazetteer of temple names which forms the sec
ond part of the book. Nevertheless I must acknowledge with pleasure the huge
debt the book owes to the initial groundwork done by Prof. Moran. I also record
with gratitude how his constant encouragement so eased the burden of writing
it, and thank him for his patient reading of my results, and for the warmth of
the hospitality extended to me during a few days' stay at his house in Belmont,
Mass., in the summer of 1989.I t must be hoped that the loss of the full benefit
of Prof. Moran's long immersion in the lists has not left us too much the poorer,
and the book is dedicated to him in the hope that he will find it worthy.
Thanks are also due to Prof. W. G. Lambert and Dr I. L Finkel, who iden
tified K 19475a nd K 20537r espectively as belonging to the Canonical Temple
List, and also to Prof. R Borger, whose own interest in the Canonical Temple
List produced the joining of K 12023,a nd who put his personal transliteration
at my disposal. New material from the British Museum is published by permis
sion of the Trustees. Prof. C. Wilcke generously sent his copy of a fragment
from lsin, IM 96881,a nd kindly allows its edition here in advance of its publi
cation in a forthcoming volume of copies. A tablet from Khorsabad, DS3 2-14,i s
published in Prof. Moran's provisional transliteration by permission of Prof.
J. A Brinkman of the Oriental Institute, University of Chicago.
A word must also be said about the transliteration of Sumerian in this
book. In Part One I have conformed to conservative Assyriological practice in
ignoring the distinction between the voiced consonant [g]a nd the nasal conso
nant [ng]. However in Part Two and its indexes, where there is both a wider
ix
Preface
X
intrusion of material from periods when Sumerian was still a spoken language
and a greater interest in the lexical aspect of the temple names themselves, the
nasal consonant is distinguished, according to convention, as [gt
London, 24th October 1992
ARG.