Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

‘Star Anu, Lord of Heaven’: The Influence of the Celestial Sciences on Temple Rituals in Hellenistic Uruk and Babylon

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Scholars and Scholarship in Late Babylonian Uruk

Part of the book series: Why the Sciences of the Ancient World Matter ((WSAWM,volume 2))

Abstract

The scholarly activities of the cuneiform-literate elite of Hellenistic Uruk ranged from astronomy, astrology , and medicine to theology and religious worship. Most scholars had priestly duties in the temples and many of Uruk’s leading minds were involved in the celestial sciences as well as in the city’s cultic reforms centred on the sky god Anu . The influence of these scholars’ intensive engagement with the stars on other disciplines, leading to new intellectual fields like birth horoscopy and astral medicine, is well-known. In this article, it is argued that the predominance of the celestial sciences in Hellenistic Babylonian scholarship also left its mark on local religious thought and ritual practice, both in Uruk and in Babylon . Stars and planets were included in daily offering cycles at the temples, cultic calendars were reinterpreted in astrological terms, and the astronomically significant events of the summer and winter solstice became occasions for religious festivals.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 119.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Hardcover Book
USD 159.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    Geller (2014).

  2. 2.

    Clancier (2009: 30–33, 47–73).

  3. 3.

    Robson (2007).

  4. 4.

    ACT 163 H.

  5. 5.

    Monerie (2013: 421–425).

  6. 6.

    BRM IV 7.

  7. 7.

    BRM IV 8.

  8. 8.

    W 18828 (UVB 15: 36–37).

  9. 9.

    SpTU 1, 2. This text probably dates to the Achaemenid or Hellenistic period; the content is anachronistic, since neither Marduk nor Anu were important deities during Šulgi’s time. It fits into a broader category of first-millennium BCE texts that describe Šulgi as an evil king who disturbed certain temples and ritual ordinances. However, it is unusual in its specific focus on the Anu cult, which suggest a terminus post quem of 484 BCE, the year of the intervention of Xerxes I into the organisation of many Babylonian city temples which led to the collapse of the Eanna and the revival of the Anu cult at Uruk (Waerzeggers 2003–2004; Kessler 2004).

  10. 10.

    K 3753; ed. McEwan (1981: 174–178).

  11. 11.

    Ibid. obv. 1–6; cf. KAV 218 II 16–21; ed. Reiner and Pingree (1981: 81–82).

  12. 12.

    MLC 1866 ; Beaulieu (2004: 315). See also Beaulieu in this volume and Beaulieu et al. (2018).

  13. 13.

    TU 12 + VAT 7847; Weidner (1967).

  14. 14.

    A new edition and analysis of all the microzodiac tablets had been prepared by Monroe (2016).

  15. 15.

    I intentionally exclude here the kalû material like the kettledrum and the building rituals, which were also occasional rituals and in terms of content not specific to Uruk, even though the latter were probably excerpted for the major temple renovations in the mid- and late third century BCE.

  16. 16.

    Oppert, Doc. Jur. 2 obv. 3 (245/244 BCE); ibid. 4 rev. 2′–3′ (223/222 BCE); OECT 9, 51 obv. 8–9 (undated).

  17. 17.

    TU 41 obv. 14–32. For a detailed analysis and interpretation of the ceremony described in TU 41, see Krul (2018).

  18. 18.

    Mul.Apin I 1 19.

  19. 19.

    It is also telling that no effort is made in any of the available sources to identify each planet with a specific deity; e.g. whether Mercury represented Ninurta, Nabû, or Marduk seems to have been irrelevant (unless, of course, the users of these texts simply took that knowledge for granted).

  20. 20.

    TU 41 rev. 28.

  21. 21.

    K 7067 (CT 13 31): 3; Horowitz (1998: 147–148); id. (2010: 79–80), Lambert (2013, 178) does not read zi-im bu-n[é-e], but zi-im bu-n[a-né-e], ‘the appearance of the forms…’.

  22. 22.

    Reiner (1995: 15–20, 86–88).

  23. 23.

    Koch-Westenholz (1995: 112); Ambos (2013).

  24. 24.

    Livingstone (2013: 107-150; 201-234).

  25. 25.

    BM 45749 obv. 1–35; Walker and Dick (2001: 70–72).

  26. 26.

    For the development of the Anu cult at Late Babylonian Uruk and its various political and theological aspects, see Krul (2018).

  27. 27.

    Neo- and Late Babylonian eššešu festivals probably spanned two consecutive days and took place monthly on days 1–2 (new moon ), 7–8 (half-moon ), 14–15 or 15–16 (full moon ), 19–20 (the ‘day of the sun ’) and 24–25 (waning moon ); Waerzeggers (2010: 140), Krul (2018).

  28. 28.

    Ibid. The ideal winter solstice , according to the early first millennium BCE system attested in MUL.APIN , fell on 15-X (MUL.APIN I iii 7–9). The outdated MUL.APIN system was still known and used at Seleucid Uruk (Steele forthcoming); furthermore, one astronomical text refers to ‘the equinox of month VII’ and ‘the solstice of month X’ to indicate the autumn equinox and winter solstice , even though the text as a whole refers to events occurring on the real calendar (SpTU 5, 269: rev. 11–12). In the more sophisticated Late Babylonian ‘Uruk scheme’, the actual date of the winter solstice fluctuated between 13-IX and 11-X (Neugebauer 1975: 362, Table 3; Britton 2002: 44, Fig. 7).

  29. 29.

    The only exception is the Great Festival of Nanna, held around the winter solstice at Ur during the Ur III period (Cohen 1996). Since that festival was nearly 2000 years earlier than the one at Uruk and restricted to a local mythological tradition at Ur, which involved a yearly battle for supremacy between the moon god Nanna and the sun god Utu, it seems of little relevance here.

  30. 30.

    BM 34035: 1–8 (Livingstone 1986: 255).

  31. 31.

    BM 34035: 33–35, 52–53 (Linvigstone 1986: 256–257).

  32. 32.

    SBH VIII rev. v 35–47 (Çağırgan 1976: 180–182).

  33. 33.

    There are a few references in Neo-Babylonian and Neo-Assyrian sources for special festivities on day 16-X (Uruk, Borsippa , Nineveh ; Robbins (1996: 69), Waerzeggers (2010: 134–137); SAA III 7: 10), but even though they seem to have focused on deities whose radiant light was a central aspect of their identity—a festival for Šamaš at Borsippa , Ištar ‘brightening’ the Emašmaš at Nineveh —it cannot be determined whether these were seen as connected to the winter solstice ; rather the contrary in the case of Borsippa , where the Šamaš festival was repeated in month VI, when one would expect month IV if it had been solstice -related.

  34. 34.

    RAcc 127-154 + BM 32485: 252–56 (Linssen 2004: 228).

  35. 35.

    RAcc 127-154 + BM 32485: 230–31, 240 (Linssen 2004: 227).

  36. 36.

    Rochberg (2009: 58–62).

  37. 37.

    RAcc 127-154 + BM 32485: 302–315, 325–332 (Linssen 2004: 229–230).

  38. 38.

    K 7353 obv. 7, 16–17 (McEwan 1981: 174–175).

  39. 39.

    SBH VIII obv. II 16–17 (Çağırgan 1976: 172).

  40. 40.

    Beaulieu (1992, 1995, 2004), Krul (2018).

References

  • Ambos, Claus. 2013. Der König im Gefängnis und das Neujahrsfest im Herbst. Mechanismen der Legitimation des babylonischen Herrschers im 1. Jahrtausend v. Chr. und ihre Geschichte. Dresden: Islet Verlag.

    Google Scholar 

  • Beaulieu, Paul-Alain. 1992. Antiquarian theology in Seleucid Uruk. Acta Sumerologica 14: 47–75.

    Google Scholar 

  • Beaulieu, Paul-Alain. 1995. Theological and philological speculations on the names of the Goddess Antu. Orientalia 64: 187–213.

    Google Scholar 

  • Beaulieu, Paul-Alain. 2004. New into old: religious reforms under Nabonidus and in Late Babylonian Uruk. In Mythen der Anderen – Mythopoetik und Interkulturalität, ed. M. Dietrich et al., 305–319. Mitteilungen für Anthropologie und Religionsgeschichte 16. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag.

    Google Scholar 

  • Beaulieu, Paul-Alain, Eckart Frahm, Wayne Horowitz, and John M. Steele. 2018. The Cuneiform Uranology texts: drawing the constellations. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society.

    Google Scholar 

  • Britton, John P. 2002. Treatment of annual phenomena in Cuneiform sources. In Under one sky. Astronomy and mathematics in the Ancient Near East, ed. John M. Steele, Annette Imhausen, 21–78. Alter Orient und Altes Testament 297. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag.

    Google Scholar 

  • Clancier, Philippe. 2009. Les bibliothèques en Babylonie dans la deuxième moitié du 1er millénaire av. J.-C. Alter Orient und Altes Testament 363. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cohen, Mark E. 1996. The sun, the moon, and the city of Ur. In Religion and politics in the Ancient Near East, ed. A. Berlin, 7–20. Bethesda, MD: CDL Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Geller, Mark J. 2014. Melothesia in Babylonia: Medicine, Magic, and Astrology in the Ancient Near East. De Gruyter, Berlin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Horowitz, Wayne. 1998. Mesopotamian cosmic geography. Mesopotamian Civilizations 8. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns.

    Google Scholar 

  • Horowitz, Wayne. 2010. Stars, cows, semicircles and domes: Astronomical creation myths and the mathematical universe. In A woman of valor: Jerusalem Ancient Near Eastern studies in honor of Joan Goodnick Westenholz, ed. W. Horowitz, U. Gabbay and F. Vukosavović, 73–87. Biblioteca del Proximo Oriente Antiguo 8. Madrid: CSIC Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kessler, Karlheinz. 2004. Urukäische Familien versus babylonische Familien: Die Namengebung in Uruk, die Degradierung der Kulte von Eanna und der Aufstieg des Gottes Anu. Altorientalische Forschungen 31: 237–262.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Koch-Westenholz, Ulla. 1995. Mesopotamian astrology. An introduction to Babylonian and Assyrian Celestial divination. Carsten Niebuhr Institute Publications 19. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum.

    Google Scholar 

  • Krul, Julia. 2018. The revival of the Anu cult and the nocturnal fire ceremony at Late Babylonian Uruk. Culture and History of the Ancient Near East 95. Leiden: Brill.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Lambert, Wilfred. G. 2013. Babylonian Creation Myths. Mesopotamian Civilizations 16. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns.

    Google Scholar 

  • Linssen, Marc J. H. 2004. The Cults of Uruk and Babylon. The temple ritual texts as evidence for Hellenistic cult practices. Cuneiform Monographs 25. Leiden: Brill-Styx.

    Google Scholar 

  • Livingstone, Alasdair. 1986. Mystical and mythological explanatory works of Assyrian and Babylonian Scholars. Oxford: Clarendon.

    Google Scholar 

  • Livingstone, Alasdair. 2013. Hemerologies of Assyrian and Babylonian Scholars. Cornell University Studies in Assyriology and Sumerology 25. Bethesda, MD: CDL Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • McEwan, Gilbert J. P. 1981. Priest and temple in Hellenistic Babylonia. Freiburger altorientalische Studien 4. Wiesbaden: Steiner.

    Google Scholar 

  • Monerie, Julien. 2013. ‘Aspects de l’économie de la Babylonie aux époques hellénistique et parthe.’ Ph.D. diss., Université Paris I – Panthéon-Sorbonne.

    Google Scholar 

  • Monroe, Willis. 2016. Advice from the stars: the micro-zodiac in Seleucid Babylonia. Ph.D. diss., Brown University.

    Google Scholar 

  • Neugebauer, Otto. 1975. A history of ancient mathematical astronomy. Berlin: Springer.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Ossendrijver, Mathieu. 2011. Science in action: networks in Babylonian astronomy. In Babylon: Wissenskultur in Orient und Okzident, ed. E. Cancik-Kirschbaum, M. Van Ess, and J. Marzahn, 213–221. Topoi 1. Berlin: De Gruyter.

    MATH  Google Scholar 

  • Reiner, Erica. 1995. Astral Magic in Babylonia. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Reiner, Erica, and David Pingree. 1981. Enūma Anu Enlil: Tablets 50–51. Bibliotheca Mesopotamica 2/2. Malibu: Undena Publications.

    Google Scholar 

  • Robbins, Ellen. 1996. Tabular sacrifice records and the cultic calendar of Neo-Babylonian Uruk. Journal of Cuneiform Studies 48: 61–87.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Robson, Eleanor. 2007. Secrets de famille: prêtres et astronomes à Uruk à l’époque hellénistique. In Lieux de savoir I: Espaces et communautés, ed. Christian M. Jacob, 440–461. Paris: Albin Michel.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rochberg, Francesca. 2009. ‘The stars their likenesses’: perspectives on the relation between celestial bodies and gods in Ancient Mesopotamia. In What is a god? Anthropomorphic and non-anthropomorphic aspects of deity in ancient Mesopotamia, ed. B. Nevling Porter, 41–91. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rochberg, Francesca. 2010. In the path of the moon. Babylonian celestial Divination and Its Legacy. Leiden: Brill.

    Google Scholar 

  • Steele, John M. Forthcoming. The continued relevance of MUL.APIN in Late Babylonian astronomy. In Scholars, priests, and temples: Babylonian and Egyptian science in context, ed. Mathieu Ossendrijver. Berlin: Edition Topoi.

    Google Scholar 

  • Waerzeggers, Caroline. 2003–2004. The Babylonian revolts against Xerxes and the ‘End of archives’. Archiv für Orientforschung 50/51: 150–173.

    Google Scholar 

  • Waerzeggers, Caroline. 2010. The Ezida Temple of Borsippa: priesthood, cult, archives. Achaemenid History 15. Leiden: Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten.

    Google Scholar 

  • Walker, Christopher and Michael Dick. 2001. The induction of the cult image in ancient Mesopotamia: The Mesopotamian Mīs Pî Ritual. Transliteration, Translation and Commentary. State Archives of Assyria Literary Texts 1. Helsinki: The Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project.

    Google Scholar 

  • Weidner, Ernst F. 1967. Gestirn-Darstellungen auf Babylonischen Tontafeln. Sitzungsberichte der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften 254/2. Vienna: Böhlaus.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Research Council under the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007–2013)/ERC Grant Agreement No. 269804 and from the Gerda Henkel Stiftung (project AZ 17/F/15).

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Durham University, Durham, UK

    Julia Krul

  2. Leiden University, Kort Galgewater 58, 2312 BR, Leiden, Netherlands

    Julia Krul

Authors
  1. Julia Krul
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Julia Krul .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratoire SPHERE UMR 7219, Université Paris Diderot—CNRS, Paris, France

    Christine Proust

  2. Department of Egyptology and Assyriology, Brown University, Providence, RI, USA

    John Steele

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2019 Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Krul, J. (2019). ‘Star Anu, Lord of Heaven’: The Influence of the Celestial Sciences on Temple Rituals in Hellenistic Uruk and Babylon. In: Proust, C., Steele, J. (eds) Scholars and Scholarship in Late Babylonian Uruk. Why the Sciences of the Ancient World Matter, vol 2. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-04176-2_7

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-04176-2_7

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-04175-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-04176-2

  • eBook Packages: HistoryHistory (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation