Mapping the Mythical Time in Rituals

The construction of time in antiquity, Durham 3-4/03/2013

Lorenzo Verderame
Istituto Italiano di Studi Orientali
“Sapienza” Università di Roma
The Mesopotamian calendrical system
General considerations

• 12 lunar months
• intercalation of a 13 month
• beginning of the year: mid-March = equinox,
harvest
• New Year festival

• intercalation
• no fixed scheme
• king’s decision
• association moon and kingship

Mapping the Mythical Time in Rituals 03/03/13

The creation of time
The cosmogony

• The Poem of Creation

• Enūma eliš “When above” (incipit)

• composed around the mid 2nd Millennium

• contemporary to the adoption of the
“standard” calendar

• recited during the New Year festival (4th

day)

• celebration of Marduk’s victory over

Tiamat and creation of the world

Mapping the Mythical Time in Rituals 03/03/13

The creation of time
The stars and the year

He fashioned heavenly stations for the great gods,

And set up constellations, the patterns of the stars.
He appointed the year, marked off divisions,
And set up three stars each for the twelve months.
After he had organized the year,
He established the heavenly station of Neberu to
fix the stars' intervals.
That none should transgress or be slothful
He fixed the heavenly stations of Enlil and Ea with
it.
(Poem of Creation V 1-11)
Mapping the Mythical Time in Rituals 03/03/13
The creation of time
The stars movement: IIIrd. mill. references
The farmer instructions: 38-40
When the constellations in the sky are right, do
not be reluctant to take the oxen force to the
field many times. The hoe should work
everything.

Gudea, Cylinder A: IV 19-23 and V 19-26:

"Then there was a woman -- whoever she was.
She …… sheaves. She held a stylus of
refined silver in her hand, and placed it on a
tablet with propitious stars, and was
consulting it.”
...
“(The young woman ...) was in fact my sister
Nisaba. She announced to you the holy
stars auguring the building of the house."

Mapping the Mythical Time in Rituals 03/03/13

The creation of time
The moon and the day/month cycle

Gates he opened on both sides, and put strong bolts at the left and
the right.
He placed the heights (of heaven) in her (Tiamat's) belly,
He created Nannar, entrusting to him the night.
He appointed him as the jewel of the night to fix the days,
And month by month without ceasing he elevated him with a crown,
(Saying,) "Shine over the land at the beginning of the month,
Resplendent with horns to fix six days.
On the seventh day the crown will be half size,
On the fifteenth day, halfway through each month, stand in
opposition.
When Šamaš [sees] you on the horizon,
Diminish in the proper stages and shine backwards.
On the 29th day, draw near to the path of Šamaš,
[ . . ] the 30th day, stand in conjunction and rival Šamaš.
(Poem of Creation V 9-22)

Mapping the Mythical Time in Rituals 03/03/13

The creation of time
The role of the sun

I have ( . . . . ] . the sign, follow its track, Draw

near . . ( . . . . . ) give judgment. [ . . . . ] . Šamaš,
constrain [murder] and violence [. . . ] . me. At the
end [ . . .] Let there [be] the 29th day [ . . .] After
[he had . . . . ] the decrees [ . . .] The organization
of front and . [ . . .] He made the day [ . . .] Let the
year be equally [ . . .] At the new year [ . . .] The
year . . . . . [ . . .] Let there be regularly [ . . .] The
projecting bolt [ . . .] After he had [ . . .] The
watches of night and day [ . . .]
(Poem of Creation V 23-46)

Mapping the Mythical Time in Rituals 03/03/13

Time in Mesopotamian cosmogonies
General considerations

1. Time, or time reckoning, is created in the

beginning as one, or the first, of the creative
actions of the cosmogonies.
2. Time and heavenly bodies are strictly related:
the latter are created in order to time reckoning
(stars for yearly cycle, moon for day/month
cycle).
3. While created before the humanity, time (and its
reckoners) are created for the humanity.
4. Time is then only a human dimension.

Mapping the Mythical Time in Rituals 03/03/13

Time aspects
Dychotomies

• Mythical vs. historical

• Historical time: sacred/profane,

qualitative/quantitative, repetition/growth,
circular/linear

• qualitative:
• periodicity and repetition
• normal activity (or routine) and sacred time
• crisis / festivals
Mapping the Mythical Time in Rituals 03/03/13
Time aspects
Crisis and festival

The “sacred” time revived by the festivals intervenes to

face the «disintegration - or the risk of disintegration - of
an order and implies the need to restore the
compromised order ... or to establish a new one ... the
“new” order must rely on pre-existing and permanent
models (archetypes) which are fixed in the stable forms
of the myth and ritual. The need to link up to a
permanent order explains the recourse to festival
celebrations, that is to say to the contact with the
“sacred time” which is external to the tottering human
world» (Brelich 1954)
Mapping the Mythical Time in Rituals 03/03/13
The New Year festival
General

• akītu (Sum. á-ki-ti)

• twice a year:
• equinoxes
• sowing and harvest

• Third Millennium:
• oldest reference: Fara (ca. 2600 BCE)
• various akītus, most famous: Nanna (moon)

• “standard” calendar

• akītu in the 1st month (Nisannnu) = mid-March

• Marduk and the recitation of The Poem of Creation
(4th day)

Mapping the Mythical Time in Rituals 03/03/13

The New Year festival
The cultic commentaries

It is said in Enūma Eliš: When

heaven and earth were not created,
Aššur came i[nto being]
(SAA III 34: 54ff.)

[The brazie]r which is lighted in front of Mullissu,

and the sheep which they throw on the brazier and
which the fire burns, is Qingu, when he burns in the
fire
(SAA III 37: 9ff.)

Mapping the Mythical Time in Rituals 03/03/13

The New Year festival
The cultic commentaries

[The Akitu House where] he goes, is the house

at the edge of (the place of) the ordeal; they
question him there.
[Nabû, who] comes [from] Borsippa, comes to greet his father, who has
been taken prisoner.
[Belet-il]i, who roams the streets, is looking for Marduk: "Where is he kept
prisoner?"
[Zarpanitu], whose hands are stretched out, prays to Sin and Šamaš: "Let
Bel live!"
[Belet-ili] who goes away, is going to the graveyard and looking for him.
[The ath]letes who stand at the gate of Esaggil are his guards; they are
appointed over him, and guard [him].
...
Enuma Eliš, which is recited and chanted in front of Bel in Nisan, concerns
his imprisonment.
(SAA III 34: 7ff., 54ff.)

Mapping the Mythical Time in Rituals 03/03/13

 The New Year festival
Passages

Time Ritual Cult

end of the old separation Marduk’s
cycle absence

suspension liminality M.’s captivity or

death

beginning of the post-liminality M.’s return

new c. reintegration

Mapping the Mythical Time in Rituals 03/03/13

The New Year festival
The cultic commentaries

The king, who wears his jewelry and roasts young virgin goats, is
Marduk, who wearing his armour bur[ned] the sons of Illil and Ea in
fire.
The king, who stands on the podium with a [heart] in his hand, while
the singer chants To the Western Goddess, is Marduk, [who] with
his bow in his hand cast down Ea, while Venus was ascendant in
front of him.
The king, who opens the vat in the race, is Marduk, who [defeat]ed
Tiamat with his penis.
[The ki]ng, who with the high priest tosses the cake, is Marduk
(with) Nabû, [who ...] vanquished and crushed Anu.
(SAA III 37: 16ff.)
Mapping the Mythical Time in Rituals 03/03/13
Moon and kingship
Astrolabes

Astrolabe B
• Akk. “three stars for each (month)”
• almanac

First part, bilingual (Sumerian/Akkadian):

• name of the month
• a constellation
• cultic and theological commentary
• association with a god

Second part:
• star catalogue

Mapping the Mythical Time in Rituals 03/03/13

 Moon and kingship
Astrolabe B: Nisan (1st month)

Sum. Akk.
Month “Podium of the sanctuary/ies”*, Month Nisannu,
Field constellation**, Field constellation**,
podium of An throne/seat of An

the podium is lifted, the king is lifted,

the podium is established the king is established

propitious beginning of the year of An star of An, propitious beginning of the

and Enlil year of An and Enlil
Month of Nanna, the first born of Enlil Month of Sîn, the first born of Enlil/An

*Sum.: bára.zag.ĝar, bára = podium, altar

**The Field = α, β, γ Pegasi and α Andromedae

Mapping the Mythical Time in Rituals 03/03/13

Moon and kingship
Foundation of the royal power and of the calendrical
system
If it [is acceptable] to the king, my lord, the
large royal statues should be erected on the
right and the left side of the [Moon] god. The
statuettes of the king's sons should be s[et up
behind] and in front of the Moon god. The
Moon, lord of the cr[own], will (then) every
month without fa[il], in rising and [setting],
unceasingly send h[appy] signs of long-
lasting days, steady reign and increase in
power to the king, my lord
(SAA X 13: r. 2ff.)
Esarhaddon stele (Zinçirli)

Mapping the Mythical Time in Rituals 03/03/13