2020_Women and Seals in the ancient Near East

Agnete Wisti Lassen

Klaus Wagensonner

2020, Women at the Dawn of History, edited by Agnete W. Lassen and Klaus Wagensonner

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25 pages

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AI-generated Abstract

This research explores the representation of women in art, particularly seals, from the ancient Near East. It focuses on the visibility and agency of women in relation to social roles throughout different historical periods, emphasizing that reduced depictions do not imply a lack of agency but rather a shift in the portrayal of power dynamics. Through examining various seal imagery, the study sheds light on the roles of elite women, working women, and significant cultural scenes like banquets, ultimately arguing for a nuanced understanding of women's contributions in these ancient societies.

Figures (26)

Fig. 3.2. Seal showing a woman giving birth (Oriental Institute Museum, Chicago, OIM A 27902), Early Dynastic period.

Fig. 3.3 Women engaged in pottery production (YPM BC 038221, NBC 12137), Jemdet Nasr period. ‘The end of the third and the first half of the second millennium BCE saw a substantial drop in the number of representations of women in art, and great significance about women’s agency and social roles has been inferred from this reduced visibility (Asher- Greve 2013; Otto 2016; Suter 2017). However, it must be noted that except for the ruler-with-mace motif, which may or may not represent a ruling king, mortal men also experienced reduced visibility in the second millennium, in favor of depictions of divine beings. Claudia Suter (2016, 2017) and Frauke Weiershauser (2008) therefore argue that the reduced visibility of women in art was not the product of a lack of agency in Old Babylonian society, but rather a reconfiguration of royal power. The scarcity of depictions of women on seals persists throughout the second and first millennium BCE, an exception being the portrayal of the queen in the Middle Assyrian and Neo-Assyrian periods. Recent in-depth analyses have explored

Fig. 3.5 Seal of queen Puabi of Ur (British Museum, London, 1928,1010.235).

Fig. 3.4 Seal with two registers. The top register shows a seated couple enjoying a drink (YPM BC 008968, NBC 5987).

Fig. 3.6 Divine and earthly banquet scenes (top: YPM BC 008993, NBC 6012; bottom: YPM BC 008998, NBC 6017).

Fig. 3.7 A seal divided in two registers showing a divine and earthly banquet (YPM BC 008972, NBC 5991). exclusively women. This seal is also divided into two registers, featuring a set of scenes that unfold in the mortal world. The upper register shows four women in long garbs each holding a ritual bucket in one hand while approaching a stalk of grain. The lower register shows three women, two grasping the date fruit of a palm tree. The date and the palm tree were associated with female fecundity and fertility and the goddess Ishtar in particular (Porter 2003: 18; Collins 2006). The association between women and fertility as evoked through the date palm was thus not restricted to the queen, but a trope that applied to women in general. aaa Sa” Date palms appear frequently alongside images of women. The female attendant in the lower register of the seal in Figure 3.7, for example, is shown holding a date fruit in her right hand, while another woman is picking dates from a date palm. A similar scene unfolds in the seal NBC 9345 in Figure 3.8, which shows

Fig. 3.9 Aseal showing the royal couple participating in the cult of the god Ea (YPM BC 037565, NCBS 668). The queen, frequently accompanied by the ruler, also appears engaging in rituals and acts of worship in Old Akkadian period art. The seal in Figure 3.9, for example, shows a couple being led by the two-faced god Usmu toward Ea, the god of wisdom. According to Mesopotamian mythology, Ea resides in the Apsii, the realm of the underground freshwater. In this seal, he is seated on a stylized temple facade with streams of water emanating from his body. A carp is placed above Ea’s raised right hand (No. 7). Carp bones were excavated in the temple dedicated to Ea in Eridu and carps were consumed as part of his cult. Both the man and the woman are carrying offering gifts: the man is holding a kid in his right arm and the woman a banduddi-bucket, presumably containing a liquid for a libation. While not explicitly labeled, they represent the royal couple and the scene shows them participating in the cult of Ea, the

patron god of the city Eridu. YBC 16396 (No. 22) also shows the royal couple, depicted in the same pose and with the same dress, hair style and offerings as in No. 7 (Figure 3.9). The only difference is that the king’s left hand, which in No. 7 was held by the god Usmu, is now raised in front of his face. A ritual practitioner, a priest wearing along, hemmed robe, pours a libation onto an altar. Represented by a series of dots, the liquid is spilling over the edge of the altar. This liquid offering is presented to a pair of male deities, each holding two staffs. The deities are depicted en face, facing the viewer of the seal imagery. The identity of the divine pair is unknown, but as they are shown here being worshipped by the royal couple, it seems that they were part of the official cult. A final example, the worn seal NBC 4953 (not shown) shows a royal couple approaching a god dispatching another god, possibly representing a smiting god or a reference to the god-killing-god motif—a well-established but poorly understood theme on Old Akkadian cylinder seals. The exact role of the ruling couple in this context is unknown.

Fig. 3.12 A tag carrying the impression of the seal of the scribe and majordomo of queen Tuta-shar-libbish (YPM BC 007117, NBC 4142). Representations of the king and the queen engaging in cultic activities are very consistent: they always wear the same clothing and hair styles, stand in the same pose, and carry the same offerings. Such seals, including those discussed here, clearly show the importance of the royal couple in the official cult in Old Akkadian society. There are examples of the king performing cultic activities on his own, however, the multitude of examples of the couple

Fig. 3.10 Seal showing three women in a worship scene (YPM BC 038123, NBC 12224).

Fig. 3.11. The royal family in worship (YPM BC 008997, NBC 6016).

Fig. 3.14. The queen receiving a woman in audience above a series of swans (YPM BC 037015, NCBS 118). Parallel to the earlier Akkadian representations of the queen and possibly other elite women (for instance, the seals in Figures 3.10 and 3.11), NCBS 118 (Figure 3.14) shows a seated woman, presumably the queen,

Fig. 3.13. The embracing ruling couple. Ur III period cylinder seal reused by a merchant in the Old Assyrian period (CS 106).

Fig. 3.145 The seal NBC 12254 (YPM BC 038329) showing a scene similar to NCBS 118.

in an introduction scene. Two female figures approach the seated queen, one introducing the other. Three horizontal lines separate this introduction scene from a lower register showing four waterfowl, possibly swans or geese, swimming in water, represented by wavy lines. The same configuration, including both the female introduction and the water birds, recurs on several other seals, such as NBC 12254 (Figure 3.15), and appears to be an established type. Though the exact significance of these scenes is unknown to us, this imagery would have carried meaning for an ancient viewer. The inclusion of the queen in the scene could suggest that anyone using such a seal would have been affliated with the queen’s household. Ur III queens, such as Shulgi-simti, the wife of Shulgi (reigned about 2094-2047 BCE), ran large estates and oversaw parts of the official cult (Sharlach 2017). The seal here, which is made of the prestigious Afghan material lapis lazuli, is inscribed in Sumerian cuneiform with the name “Kasa son of Lugalbi”—an otherwise unknown individual. Another unique seal from the Ur III period is NCBS 158 (Figure 3.17). This seal shows a contest scene, a very well-attested scene type in Mesopotamian glyptic, albeit here featuring a woman—rather than a male hero—battling two lions. The woman has long hair and is wearing a long robe. Her hands are clutched on her chest. A scorpion, a symbol of women Fig. 3.16 Seal with contest scene. Two erotic scenes were added to the seal after it was first carved (YPM BC 039029, YBC 12637).

Fig. 3.18 A seal showing a female ritual practitioner in front of a double-headed standard (YPM BC 037209, NCBS 312). While women may be rare in the glyptic art of the early second millennium BCE, the number of seals that were demonstrably used and owned by women is the highest of any period in Mesopotamian history. The ownership of these seals is attested by inscriptions on the seals with the name of the owner or by notations accompanying the seals on clay envelopes or tablets. Sometimes, nothing is known about these women except what is revealed by the seal inscriptions. What characterizes many of these seals is that they did not belong to royal or even elite women.

Fig. 3.17. A seal showing a woman in a contest scene (YPM BC 037055, NCBS 158). throughout Mesopotamian history, is placed next to her (Zernecke 2008). A standard topped by a bird, another symbol of womanhood, is placed next to the participants in the battle. The contest scene is usually interpreted as the battle between the forces of chaos (represented by rampant and dangerous animals) and good (represented by the hero and the heroic bull- man)—quintessentially male forces (Rakic 2014). This seal, however, clearly shows a woman in combat, whose female identity is supported by not just one, but two, emblems of womanhood. There can be no doubt as to the intentionality of this unique rendition of the contest scene. The seal is uninscribed and no attestations of its use on tablets or bullae are known, making it difficult to approach further an interpretation of the imagery.

Fig. 3.19 Seal belonging to Lamassi, daughter of Shalim-Assur and priestess in Assur (CS 1308), Old Assyrian period. Figure 3.21, a seal held in the British Museum, shows a female attendant in a long dress, holding a fringed cloth, in audience with a seated queen, who also wears a long dress as well as a mural crown. The queen holds a mirror in her right hand. Mirrors appear in Mesopotamian ritual texts and art as symbols of womanhood and fertility and are associated with elite women in particular (Albenda 1985). Clothing is also an important marker of status, and the cloth shown in the arms of the female attendant may represent the queen’s royal dress (Porada and Collon 2016: 128). The queen’s

Fig. 3.20 Seal belonging to an Anatolian woman (CS 1269), Old Assyrian period.

Fig. 3.21 Seal showing a person in a long robe, holding a piece of cloth, in audience with a queen wearing a mural crown (BM 132979; Porada and Collon 2016, MA 17), Middle Assyrian period.

Fig. 3.22 Carnelian seal with a gold cap from Grave ITI of the Queen’s Tombs at Nimrud (ND 1989.332; Hussein 2016, pl. 133).

Fig. 3.23 Gold stamp seal of Hama. above, Hama’s golden stamp seal is inscribed on the edge with her name and title (al-Rawi 2008; Hussein 2016: 28; Spurrier 2017). It shows a queen wearing a long dress and a diadem with a ribbon trailing down her back. With both hands raised, she approaches the goddess Ishtar/Mullissu, who is seated on a high- backed and star-studded throne, that is placed on top of a lion. Behind the goddess is a scorpion. The whole scene is encircled by a guilloche.

Fig. 3.24 Seal of a queen of Sennacherib. before Sennacherib was murdered and Esarhaddon became king (reigned about 681-669 BCE). The seal, therefore, belonged to one of Sennacherib’s wives, either Tashmetum-sharrat, as argued by Radner (2012), or Naqi’a, Sennacherib’s second (or third) wife and the mother of Esarhaddon, who, according to Frahm, may very well also have held the title of queen (Frahm 2014: 191-92). As was the case with Hama’s stamp seal, the imagery on this seal is encircled by a guilloche and includes a prominently featured scorpion. The ruling couple, the king shown taller than the queen, approaches a seated goddess. The queen is wearing a mural crown and a long, fringed dress with a shawl over it. A ribbon trails down her back. The king is wearing a tall conical hat with a point, and a ribbon hangs down his back. He is wearing a short-sleeved tunic, and a fringed shawl is wrapped around his body. The goddess, Ishtar/Mullissu, is sitting on a star- studded throne on top of a striding lion. The goddess is holding the lion on a leash. While the queen is worshipping along with her husband on this seal, her smaller size and position behind the king clearly mark her as secondary in relation to her consort.