6
Introduction
As discussed in the Introduction, the concept of reform has become integrated into notions of imprisonment in modern Western contexts. While in the “Hymn to Nungal” the prison served a purifying function for the guilty party, the concept, albeit striking, was dissimilar to modern examples. Yet points of comparison also exist, since modern imprisonment is intended to produce a religious effect in the life of the prisoner by touching the soul.1 The concept of religious reform is a very powerful, coercive tactic. This is particularly true when this notion is connected to imprisonment as a means of control.
As will be discussed in this chapter, the process of affecting this change occurred differently then and now. But the question remains whether imprisonment was or is capable of affecting positive change with any degree of consistency. Answering this question, however, remains an impossibility based on the limited data from early Mesopotamia. In particular, the nature of the evidence means that examples of rebellion among prisoners are more likely to be recorded, whereas those who conformed to society’s norms after imprisonment would likely fall out of the record or be unrecognizable in the record. Nevertheless, the few available data points will be discussed, but the limitations of the evidence should be kept in mind.
To grasp the connection between purification and imprisonment in the “Hymn to Nungal” and in later texts that use imprisonment as part of a purification ritual, it is necessary to consider briefly purity and purification in ancient Mesopotamia. While an exhaustive treatment is beyond the scope of this project, purity will be discussed to provide ideological context for understanding the relationship between imprisonment and purification. It will be evident that imprisonment, although not necessarily thought to entail the ability to purify in and of itself, figured into ritual purification. As purification was also a judicial act, imprisonment, when combined with laments and prayers before the gods, served as a fitting context where purification could occur. Although a longer view will be taken of purification, it should not be assumed that purity and purification were stagnant and unchanging throughout ancient Mesopotamia as the record clearly demonstrates changes and development over time.
Purity and Purification
Purity is an abstract concept that is never defined but pervades Mesopotamian thought and life.2 Prayers, rituals, divinations, letters, and literature attest to the significance of the topic of purity, but there is not a codified discussion of purity from ancient Mesopotamia.3 The extant sources, however, give the impression that questions of purity pervaded all of life.4 But our access to this information often relates more to concrete events, such as the causes of impurity and the steps to recover or preserve purity rather than defining the quality of the ideal itself, though some texts seem to point to the ideal, such as the “pure city of Dilmun” in “Enki and Ninḫursag” discussed below.
The more concrete act of purification deals with the removal of pollution and clears the way for the gods.5 This concept is captured in the parallelism from the Enuma Eliš:
6: 155–156: Asalluḫi Namru (…) / ilu ellu mullil alaktīni, “Asalluḫi the Radiant (i.e., the Sun) (…), the pure god who clears our path.”6
In this text, Marduk is associated with Asalluḫi, the radiant, and is described as the god who clears the way.
Impurity entailed a transgression, whether sin, what is normally called a taboo, or the result of being a victim of some external agent, such as sorcery.7 Impurity could be simple disruptions in daily life or more extensive problems. Disruptions to daily life were fairly simple to fix, but more extensive problems of purity required the work of specialists.8 Should the causes remain elusive, specialists could provide more generic rituals that were intended to alleviate the impurity without knowing its source. When considering the connection between imprisonment and purification, it is unlikely that imprisonment in and of itself had the ability to purify. Instead, when imprisonment was combined with the correct ritual actions, such as lamentation, the prisoner could be purified and, therefore, no longer offensive to the gods.
Purity and the Gods
All of life was lived in a careful balance before the gods, and the ebbs and flows of life were explained through this relationship with the divine. While the overall belief system was not static, as seen by Marduk’s ascendency in Enuma Eliš, or from syncretistic blending of gods and their functions,9 the belief system in Mesopotamia existed in a complex hierarchy that touched on life from top to bottom. Cities, for example, had key deities that resided there. Marduk was the main god of Babylon; while Šamaš’s principle shrines were in Sippar in Akkad and Larsa in southern Sumer.
Individuals had personal gods too. These protective deities were responsible for the care of these individuals. The function of these personal gods can be seen in blessing formulas in letters from the Old Babylonian period. Some letters, after wishing that the recipient receive long life from the gods, such as Šamaš and Marduk, will also refer to the personal god of the recipient.
AbB 6, 21510
Obverse:
1. a-na a-wi-lim
2. qi2-bi2-ma
3. um-ma gi-mil-damar.utu-ma
4. dutu u3 damar.utu li-ba-al-li-ṭu2-ka
5. lu ša-al-ma-ta lu ba-al-ṭa-ta
6. dingir na-ṣi-ir-ka re-eš-ka a-na da-mi-iq-tim
7. li-ki-il
8. a-na šu-ul-mi-ka aš-pu-ra-am
9. šu-lum-ka ma-ḫar dutu u3 damar.utu
10. lu da-ri…
Translation: (1–3) Speak to the Gentleman, thus (says) Gimil-Marduk. (4) May Šamaš and Marduk keep you in good health. (5) May you be well. May you be in good health. (6–7) May the god, your protector, provide you with good things. (8) I write to (inquire about) your well-being. (9–10) May your well-being endure before Šamaš and Marduk.…
Such blessings indicate both the role of the personal deity in protecting the individual but also the need for that personal god to be inclined favorably toward the person. As such, the relationship between a person and their god was important and fragile. Whether it was a city or a person, if they became impure, their god could become offended, leaving them vulnerable to attacks and other ill-effects of their impurity.
Within this system, certain gods were also known to relate to particular spheres of life, such as fertility, justice, or wisdom. When a person became impure, it was necessary to participate in purification rites, which could be rather simple or complex enough to require a specialist. These rites fell particularly under the purview of Enki.
Enki (Akkadian Ea) is considered the “god of purification par excellence.”11 He is described as the “lord of the washing bucket” and also “king of the Apsû” (lugal apsu). In Nanna E (lines 27–31),
Enki purifies the seat for you (Nanna!) and for you makes the residence sparkling clean; He consecrates the sky for you and makes the earth shine brightly for you. For you, he made the Ekišnug̃al, forest of cedars, reach the sky. Your proud seat, he makes it a sacred place for you, foundation of everything that belongs to the sky and to the earth. He accomplishes the rites and sublime lustrations with rectitude for you.12
As Guichard and Marti comment: “Enki creates and preserves not only the sacral integrity of the temple of Nanna’s throne but also, in a more general manner, the purity of the ground and of the atmosphere.”13
It is fitting that Enki is connected to the Apsû, the primordial body of water, which is the place of origin for purification rites. Preliminary purification for sacrificial animals was dependent on the Apsû. Purified water was connected to the Apsû and was kept in the sanctuary for purification rites.14 But even the gods were not free from the possibility of impurity. The sky and the Apsû, where Enki keeps his purification rites, could become defiled.15
Karel Van der Toorn argues that purity extends beyond ethics to etiquette.16 Something unethical, such as a sinful act, can make one impure. However, other causes of impurity relate less to sin and more to appropriate behavior or etiquette. In contrast to sinful acts, breaches of etiquette, did not result in immediate punishment, provided the affected person did not seek to approach the divine in the impure state.17 While helpful in understanding that impurity extends beyond that which is sinful, more may be said about purity and impurity.
The Sumerian evidence, such as the abomination or taboo (niĝ2-gig) in Sumerian Proverbs, demonstrates that terminology extends beyond the cultic and ethical to describe “judicial or social failure.”18 The judicial aspect of purity and impurity is seen through the role of Utu/Šamaš, who is the god of justice. For example, divination is part of the process for selecting the appropriate bricks to build the temple in Gudea (ca. 2200–2100 BC). Gudea determined where the clay for the bricks was to be taken from by performing extispicy and that the clay was to be cleansed by rites of purification. Extispicy was a judicial act (dīnu) of the Sun-god, Utu/Šamaš, connecting notions of purity and impurity with judicial acts.19
The judicial aspect of divination is confirmed further with Enlil. In the context of building the temple E-kur, “Enlil made up his mind, filled with pure and useful thoughts, to make them shine like the sun in the E-kur” (“Ur-Namma B”).20 Enlil is also the god of broad wisdom in “Ur-Namma B,” who “knows the judgment (rendered by the performance of extispicy), who is the lord of broad wisdom, prepared (lit. set in order) the brick mold.”21
Further evidence reveals judicial aspects of purity and purification. The Apsû is not just connected to Enki. The door of the Ekišnug̃al-chapel bears the solar emblem, associated with Utu.22 In “Enki and Ninḫursag̃a,” Enki and Utu cooperate, demonstrating that Utu, as the god of justice, was a participant in purification.23 As such when the Sumerian evidence is taken into consideration, purity extends beyond ethics and etiquette to the judicial as well.24 This judicial aspect helps to provide a conceptual relationship between purification and imprisonment.25
Control Through Imprisonment
While the cause of impurity might be a transgression of ethics or etiquette of the infected individual, sometimes the person was a victim of sorcery, a ghost, or a malevolent deity. And it is here that a further connection to imprisonment may be seen.
Exorcists trained in and copied the Exorcist Manual (āšipūtu). These texts were copied extensively as part of the exorcist training in the first millennium, with examples being discovered in Assur, Nineveh, Sippar, Babylon, and Uruk, demonstrating the ubiquitous concern with matters of purity and attempts to control malevolent forces.26
The so-called Exorcist Manual references compositions that deal with rituals for temple foundations, mouth washing for cultic object initiation, the installation of priest, prayers, rituals for appeasing angry deities, and purification (wiping) rites and related incantations against sickness, evil, and demons.27 These are just a few of the texts to be drawn upon by exorcists as part of their training.
Among these threats, sorcery could take a variety of forms. One example would be getting someone to ingest saliva unwittingly. This hidden defilement could bring ill effects on the person. One text provides a number of ways sorcery could occur.
The witch did an evil sorcery against me. She nourished me with bad drugs; she made me drink her drink, which took my life, she made me take a dirty bath, which provoked my death; she anointed me with her evil ointment which caused my destruction, she made me be overtaken by her evil sickness which is “capture by the māmītu…”28
Through sorcery, the infected became impure, which resulted in their personal god being offended and removing protection from the individual. In response to sorcery of an unknown cause, the maqlû (combustion) was a general ritual to remove the ill effects. The ritual, which bore similarities to the washings of the bīt rimki, involved “listing all possible forms of sorcery and then transferring the evil of the patient onto a figurine representing the person who cast the spell; the figurine was then burned in order to undo the evil curse.”29 The representations of the sorcerers were to be raised before Šamaš, as the god of divination and justice, and placed in a fire. The attacked person requests that Šamaš judge the sorcerer, again attaching the judicial to issues of purity. The entire ritual uses water, fire, and fumigation to remove the ill effects of the curse.
There were spells and rituals to protect a person against the threat of the well-known demon Lamaštu, who would often attack pregnant women and babies.30 Such rituals often involved various actions related to a figurine of the demon, including the imprisonment of such a figurine.
Lamaštu Series I: Line 2331
du3.du3.bi Lamaštu kīma ša bīt ṣibitti teppuš
“Its Ritual: You make (a figurine of) Lamaštu as a prisoner…”
This connection of imprisonment does not relate to purification as much as it does control. Much like the troublesome rays in Bilgameš discussed above, the prison was being used to control the demon Lamaštu through ritual binding.
The Netherworld and even the mountains, served as places where demons could hold people captive.32 From their perspective, the Netherworld also had judicial and imprisoning functions that served to control malevolent beings. The judicial process is indicated by instances where Gilgameš, for example, sits on his throne passing judgment;33 and when kings pass through the Netherworld, their journey is likened to the River Ordeal.34 The imprisonment was also accomplished by Ningišzida, who guarded evildoers in this prison.35 While the combination of judicial process and imprisonment may be associated with imprisonment as part of a trial, there is also attestation of the idea that malevolent spirits be imprisoned permanently by Gilgameš.36 As such, the imprisonment was deemed a means of control.
Ritual Purification Through Imprisonment
The king also had to maintain purity ideals. It is in this context that we see a later example of imprisonment being involved in ritual purification. The bīt sala’ mê, house of water sprinkling, was an Assyrian New Year ritual from the fourth to the eighth day of the month Tašrītu, but was also performed on an ad hoc basis when an evil portent occurred, such as a solar or lunar eclipse.37 On the eighth day, the king, without his insignia, would spend the night in a reed-prison in the steppe. The focus appears not to have been on the king’s role as a representative, the opposite of what we see in the Babylonian akītu festival.38 Instead, the bīt sala’ mê deals with the king as an individual. This individual needed to be made right with his personal god. The night šu-il2-la2 prayer to the stars and gods of Nippur and Babylon as well as the dingir-ša3-dib-ba prayers offered in the morning to personal gods may be classified as individual prayers.39 Unlike investiture rituals, the prayers that the king offered were not directed toward the future of the kingdom. Rather these prayers concern offenses against personal gods. The king’s time in the reed-prison encapsulates this idea, since, according to Claus Ambos, the prison was code for social isolation, exclusion, illness, misery, poverty, and the distress of a person abandoned by his gods.40
The Old Babylonian hymn to the prison goddess, Nungal, deals with similar notions of purification achieved through imprisonment. The text begins by depicting the prison as a dark and sombre place. After expounding on the nature of the prison and the greatness of the prison goddess Nungal, the text describes prisoners being led naked into her presence. At the appointed time, a festival was held during which the River Ordeal was used to separate the innocent from the guilty.41 After the ordeal, the innocent person was released, but the guilty returned into the prison. This was achieved by the prison’s chief prosecutor reaching out their hands and snatching the person from death. As stated in chapter four, this is likely in reference to the guilty person being rescued from the River Ordeal and returned to the prison.42
The horrors of the prison were not isolated to the ordeal portions of the judicial process.
“Hymn to Nungal” (lines 55–57):43
The interior of the temple returns weeping, laments, and cries. Its brick walls crush evil men and give rebirth to just men. Its angry heart causes one to pass the days in weeping and lamentation.
The mention of tears and lamentations in connection with the later purification of the offender and the restoration of their relationship with their personal god indicates that this imprisonment may be securely connected to a ritual process. The terror of the prison was not meant to induce mere sorrow and lament; the goal was purification. Once a guilty person was imprisoned, that person recited lamentations that were designed ritualistically to transform them and in particular their relationship to the gods. Through the pain and suffering of the prison and the process of lamentation, the prisoner was to be changed for the better.44 The prison snatched the prisoner from a greater punishment, perhaps death,45 and refined the prisoner through laments, suffering, and rituals, only to give birth to a purified person. In short, the suffering and terror are presented as good for the prisoner in the end, a process that happens through lament.46
“Hymn to Nungal” (Lines 105–9):47
When it pacifies the heart of his god, when it has polished him like silver of good quality, when it has made him shine forth through the dust; when it has cleansed him of dirt, like silver of best quality, he will be returned to the good hands of his god.
The prison refined the offender like silver of finest quality. The result was that the reformed prisoner’s personal god and Nungal may be praised.
When individuals became impure, they could experience abandonment by their personal god, leaving them vulnerable to attack. The restoration of the purity ideal and, therefore, the reparation of the integral relationship between a person and their god could be achieved through lamentation, prayers, and ritual acts.
Imprisonment and Positive Change
All of this demonstrates the fragility of life before and with the gods, and the judicial nature of purification and purity. Imprisonment became a fitting mechanism or context for control and purification through ritual lament. So, it is appropriate to consider the effectiveness of imprisonment for producing positive change in the person of the prisoner. Did this translate to reality in any visible way in the record?
While not to be considered representative for the whole, the “Hymn to Nungal” provides at least one perspective about the goal of imprisonment in early Mesopotamia. The character of the guilty person was to be changed or reformed. Once this process had taken place, the prisoner could be returned to normal life outside of the prison. The merciful and healing actions of imprisonment are also captured in the Assyrian recension of the Marduk Ordeal, where in assertion of Assyrian superiority over Babylon, Ištar is said to show Marduk compassion by sending him to prison (SAA 3 35: 39). Annus describes this as follows: “This ‘prison’ is a form of a hospital where Marduk is cured of his illness and political sin.”48 Annus rightly connects this notion to the viewpoint found in the “Hymn to Nungal.”
Perhaps this ideal is reflected in part in the following text.
AbB 14, 29:49
28. ma-ḫar gal.ukkin ki-a-am ad-bu-ub-šum-ma
29. u4 4(diš).kam i-na e2 gal.ukkin.na ak-la-šu
30. na-pi2-iš-tum i-ṭi-ib-šum-ma
31. um-ma šu-u2-ma na-pi2-iš-tum
32. qi2-in-ni la is-sa3-ap-pa-aḫ
33. ki-a-am iq-bi-a-am-ma
34. li-ib-bi i-re-em-šu-ma
35. uš-te-˹ṣi˺-šu
Translation: That I told him in the presence of the director, and I had detained him for four days in the house of the director. He then came to value his life and said: “(My) life (is at stake), my family shall not be scattered!” When he said so, I felt pity for him and had him released.
According to this text, detention caused a person to have a change of mind that resulted in his release. Perhaps, this in some measure aligns with the goal of positive change that is claimed in the “Hymn to Nungal.”
Of course, such an ideal was not always achieved. The most remarkable example of this is the much later first millennium text, PTS 2185, edited by Kleber and Frahm.50 In PTS 2185, a thief becomes a murderer in prison, a remarkable trajectory when juxtaposed to the perspective set forth in the “Hymn to Nungal.”
For the Ur III period, an escape is attested in the following Ur III text.
ASJ 9, 315, 451
Obverse:
1. 1(diš) 52šara2-i3-sa6
2. dumu me:te-a-ni geme2 kikken
3. ki ur-e11-e gala-ta
4. lu2-dšara2 gu-za-la2
5. en-nun-ta ba-an-da-zaḫ3
6. mu-bi-še3
Reverse:
1. lu2-dšara2 gu-za-la2
2. a2 ug3-IL2-še3
3. lu2-ĝiri17-zal i3-dab5
Blank
5. iti šu-numun-ta x
6. mu en-maḫ-gal-an-na en dnanna ba-ḫun
Translation: Šara-isa, son of Meteani, the miller-girl, fled from the place of Ur-Ee, the eunuch, from the custody of Lu-Šara, the throne-bearer. Because of it, Lu-Šara, the throne-bearer, was taken by Lu-ĝirizal for corvée labor. From the month of “seeding.” Year: When Enmaḫgal-anna, the En-priestess of Nanna, was installed
The escape of Šara-iša resulted in Lu-Šara being taken for corvée labor. While the text lacks key details of context, it can be compared to an escape attempt from Mari (ARM 10, 150 = LAPO 18 1112) that records Zimri-lim’s response to the escape and subsequent capture of some men from jail. Zimri-Lim writes to Addu-duri:
ARM 10, 150: 4–11 = LAPO 18, 111251
4. ṭup-pa-ki ša tu-ša-bi-lim eš-me
5. ki-ma lu253 ki-na-tu-u2 ne-pa-ar
6. ṣu2-up-ri-imki ip-lu-šu-ma
7. in-na-bi-tu-ma u3 lu2meš šu-nu-ti iṣ-ba-tu-nim
8. ta-aš-pu-ri-im ki-ma ša te-el2-tim
9. ša šu-up-pa-ta-am i-ša-tum
10. i-ka-al-ma u3 ta-ap-pa-ta-ša
11. i-qu2-ul-la…
Translation: “I have listened to the letter that you conveyed. You wrote about men, domestics, who broke through the jail in Ṣuprum (nepār ṣ.) and escaped, but that these men were caught. This is like the folk wisdom that has it, ‘When a fire consumes a (single) reed, its companions are on the alert’.…”
This may not be the only example of rebellion occurring in Mari. After discussing fugitives, the letter ARM 26, 524 states:
18. ša-ni-tam lu2mu-un-na-ab-tu šu-nu
19. a-na aš-kur-diškur
Reverse:
20. ki-a-˹am iq-bu˺-u2 um-ma-a-mi
21. i-nu-ma dumu ˹ši˺-[ip]-˹ri˺-im lu2 eš3.nun.naki ra-ki-ib anšeḫi.a
22. ša it-ti dumu [iš-me-]dda-gan a-na pa-ṭa3-ar
23. lu2 eš3.nun.naki i-le-em a-na ra-za-ma-aki
24. ik-šu-dam-ma i-na ra-za-ma-aki i-mu-ru-šu-ma
25. ṣi2-bi-it-tum i-na a-lim ša-a-ti it-be2
26. u3 iš-me-dda-gan dumu ši-ip-ri-im ša-a-tu
27. i-na a-wa-tim ki-a-am iṣ-ba-as-su2 um-ma-a-mi
28. 5(diš) me ṣa-ba-am lu2 eš3.nun.naki a-na na-ṣa-ri-ia
29. i-de-em u2-la-šu-ma wa-ar-ki-ka-ma
30. ma-ti i-du-uk-ka-an-ni u2-ul u2-ba-la-ṭu2-ni-in-/ni5
Translation: Further: those fugitives spoke to Aškur-Addu as follows: “When the Ešnunakean messenger, a rider of donkeys, who came up with the son of Išme-Dagan to dismiss the Ešnunakeans, arrived in Razama, they (the people) saw him in Razama, and the ṣibittum rose up in that city. And Išme-Dagan addressed that messenger as follows: ‘The 500 Ešnunakean troops must stay behind to guard me! If not, my land will kill me after you (depart). They will not let me live.’ ”52
Lafont, the editor of the text, translates the term ṣibittum as “vive discussion” or a lively dispute.54 Lafont conveys a personal note from Durand that the prison did not fit the context of this passage. Lafont notes that term might be related to another well-known expression that indicates taking someone to task. Unlike Heimpel’s reading which would mean that a prison rose up, Lafont understands it as a lively dispute or taking others to task.55 While the meaning of the term ṣibittum, which Heimpel reads as prison in his edition of this text, remains somewhat unclear, an Old Babylonian omen text (YOS 10, 47; Figure 8) indicates that there was a concern that the prison could revolt. The following occurs in the Old Babylonian Omen, YOS 10, 47 Reverse line 7 reads as follows:
Figure 8. Omens of Sacrificial Lambs. Old Babylonian tablet, YOS 10, 47. Courtesy of the Yale Babylonian Collection. Photography by Klaus Wagensonner.
Reverse
Line 7: šumma [qa]-˹ra˺-an na-ag-la-bi-im ša i-mi-tim a-na 2(diš) pa-ṭi-ir
ṣi-bi-it-˹tim˺ ib-ba-la-ka-at
Translation: “If the ridge of the shoulder blade opens on two sides, the prison will revolt.”56
Although the evidence is limited, the documents of practice that record examples of rebellion indicate that the ideals of personal reformation and correction envisioned in the “Hymn to Nungal” were not always achieved. Historically, this is exactly what one expects to find with imprisonment.
Conclusion
In conclusion, all of life was fraught with the possibility of impurity and Enki was the god of purity par excellence.57 Since imprisonment was an available mechanism to control and detain, it is very understandable how the practice of imprisonment could become attached to the notion of purification, especially when the judicial nature of purification is taken into consideration. Imprisonment was integral to the entire judicial process, even though imprisonment was rarely if ever used for punishment. Prison was a miserable place that produced weeping and lament. Through this, the hearts of the gods could become pacified and a right relationship with the gods re-established, and in particular one’s relationship with their personal god could be restored. After restoration with one’s protective deity, the prisoner was better equipped to face the dangers of a world that could become impure before the gods and so suffer their wrath or abandonment.
Imprisonment, as a means of control and a context where a person could be purified through ritual lament, was conceptually good for both society and the person of the prisoner. Impurity was dangerous for the person and the community, and so a conceptually positive function of imprisonment was born through the integral relationship between the religious and judicial in ancient Mesopotamia. But of course, this did not always work. While little is known about the lives of prisoners beyond glimpses into their time served, there are a handful of examples that show prisoners engaging in further criminal activity.
Prisons in Ancient Mesopotamia: Confinement and Control until the First Fall of Babylon. J. Nicholas Reid, Oxford University Press. © J. Nicholas Reid 2022. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192849618.003.0007
1 See Foucault 1995 and in particular Throness 2008.
2 Guichard and Marti 2013: 48.
3 See such observations in Guichard and Marti 2013: 47, and Sallaberger 2007b: 295–6.
4 Sallaberger 2007b: 296.
5 Lexical lists and bilingual texts do not clearly distinguish between the Sumerian terminology related to holiness and purity (i.e. kug, sikil, dadag, and other terms such as šu-luḫ). For discussions of the lexical data, see Pongratz-Leisten 2009; Sallaberger 2007: 295; Wilson 1994; Guichard and Marti 2013: 51–52, 61–62. See further Feder 2014: 87–113; Geller 1990: 105–17. Much of the development of the key terminology relates the abstract concept of purity to shining qualities. This shining quality was adapted to describe the concept of being free from pollution; claims; and guilt (Feder 2014).
6 Cited after Stadhouders and Panayotov 2018: 649 n. 39.
7 See discussions in van der Toorn 1985; Geller 1990; Pongratz-Leisten 2009.
8 Frevel and Nihan 2013: 22; Guichard and Marti 2013: 80–82.
9 While there are plenty of examples, again Enuma Eliš demonstrates this, as the attributes of other gods are attributed to Marduk and he is given fifty names.
10 Frankena 1974: 144–45. See transliteration and translation in Ungnad 1914: text 254. Handcopy in Delitzsch 1909: text 198.
11 Guichard and Marti 2013: 56.
12 Cited in Guichard and Marti 2013: 68.
13 Guichard and Marti 2013: 68.
14 Guichard and Marti 2013: 69–70.
15 Guichard and Marti 2013: 73.
16 van der Toorn 1985: 21–23.
17 See Geller 1990: 112 and Guichard and Marti 2013: 84.
18 Pongratz-Leisten 2009: 414. See Geller 1990 on niĝ2-gig = ikkibu = toevah, abomination or taboo according to Hallo 1985: 39–40.
19 Pongratz-Leisten 2009: 422.
20 After ETCSL – http://etcsl.orinst.ox.ac.uk/section2/tr2412.htm.
21 Pongratz-Leisten 2009: 422.
22 Guichard and Marti 2013: 70. On the connection with the Ekišnug̃al, purity, and justice, see Guichard and Marti 2013: 66–69 and Charpin 2017: 73–76.
23 Guichard and Marti 2013: 70.
24 Pongratz-Leisten 2009: 413–27.
25 The judicial nature of purity is seen further in the first millennium with the installation and maintenance of priests. Priests in the first millennium were shaven (gullubu) as part of an initiation rite to enter the temple. There were three areas of the temple (Waerzeggers and Jursa 2008). The outer courts did not require the gullubu initiation, while the courtyard was restricted to the initiated. In this courtyard, various tasks were performed and the group of initiated included “fishermen, bakers, brewers, oxherds, artisans, and likely slaughters, among others still” (Waerzeggers and Jursa 2008: 14–15). Initiation was also required for entrance to the cella, the innermost section and most sacred portion of the temple, where the statue of the god was housed. Access to this portion was restricted to the ērib bīti, “temple enterers,” which despite the name was an honorific title reserved for those who entered the most sacred place of the temple (Waerzeggers and Jursa 2008: 14. On earlier terminology for those who are able to enter the shrine, see Steinkeller 2019: 117–18). Purity was central to the rite of initiation but also ongoing service. Purity was assessed at the level of body, mind, and lineage (Waerzeggers and Jursa 2008: 4–5). Prior to the gullubu initiation, the person was stripped and investigated for defects. The person could not have committed any blood “crimes” or be guilty of theft. Further, witnesses were called to attest to the purity of the individual’s lineage. The lineage was traced through the father, but the mother was also significant. One such inquiry involves testimony that the prospective initiate’s mother was a virgin when she married. This is likely required to demonstrate that the child was not illegitimate. As Löhnert states, “According to these documents especially the physical descent of the initiate was of judicial concern” (Löhnert 2010: 184 n. 10).
26 See Schwemer 2011: 421. See further Geller 2000: 242–54; Jean 2006: 62–72.
27 Schwemer 2011: 421.
28 Guichard and Marti 2013: 90.
29 Guichard and Marti 2013: 100.
30 Farber 2014: 3.
31 Cited after, Farber 2014: 146–47.
32 Annus 2016: 39–40.
33 George 2003: 127–28; Annus 2016: 44–46. See too from Lamaštu: “You are conjured! May you be bound by the spell! I have conjured you by ordeal river, city gate, justice and main square. I have conjured you by the Šar’ur, the powerful weapon, the attendant of the Lord-of-the-Lands. I have conjured you–may you be bound by the spell. Do not approach the door whose bolt is Justice, whose door post is Anu, whose gate guard is Papsukkal, of whom (it is known that) one bound by his spell will not return” (Farber 2014: 168–69).
34 Annus 2016: 43.
35 Annus 2016: 46.
36 Annus 2016: 46–47.
37 Oshima 2014: 172.
38 Ambos 2013: 101.
39 Ambos 2013: 101. For further discussion of these prayers, see Löhnert 2011: 404–05.
40 Ambos writes: “Das Gefängnis wird hier zur Chiffre für soziale Isolation, Ausgrenzung, Krankheit, Elend und Not des von seinen Göttern verlassenen Menschen” (Ambos 2013: 108). Compare the Akkadian poem “Ludlul Bēl Nēmeqi.” Ludlul says, “I took to a bed, confined, going out was exhaustion, / My house turned into my prison (kišukkīya) / My flesh was a shackle, my arms being useless, / My person was a fetter, my feet having given way” (Tablet II lines 95–98). Cited after Foster 2005: 401. See further Lambert 1996 (reprint of 1963): 45. Beyond the key work Ambos 2013, for further discussion of the rituals that involved imprisoning the king, see the concise discussion in Annus 2016: 65–69.
41 On the River Ordeal, see Frymer-Kensky 1977. Gurney 1983: 10–12.
42 Ambos 2013: 107.
43 After Black, Cunningham, Robson, and Zólyomi 2004. See Chapter 1 n. 50 on editions and studies.
44 Charpin 2017: 82.
45 On the meaning of šer7-da, see Civil 1993: 76–78. Civil contends the term refers to a “capital crime,” by considering it alongside other occurrences (Gudea A xii 24ff.; NATN 366: line 3ff.; JCS 12, 106; etc.). Contra Attinger (2003: 27), who argues that “capital crime” is not required in those texts and other occurrences of the terminology remains unexplained by Civil. See similar note in Reid 2016: 98 n. 59.
46 Charpin rightly warns that we should not connect this idea to prisoners in modern contexts playing music; this is ritual. Charpin 2017: 82.
47 Black, Cunningham, Robson, and Zólyomi 2004.
48 Annus 2016: 63.
49 Veenhof 2005: 24–25 (AO 4658; Ungnad 1914: BB 143).
50 Kleber and Frahm 2006: 109–22.
51 Umma; Amar-Suen Year 4 Month 6; Hirose n. Yoshikawa 1987: 303–19.
52 Translation after Sasson 2015: 224 n. 22. Sasson offers the following interpretation of the letter: “The king is urging his correspondent not to wait for such outbreaks to be attentive.” See Dossin and Finet 1978 and Durand 2000 no. 1112 (LAPO 18).
53 After Heimpel 2003: 402–3. See edition in Lafont 1988: 500–502.
54 Lafont 1988: 501.
55 Lafont 1988: 501 n. h: “J.-M. Durand me fait les remarques suivantes: ṣibittum, ‘prison’, n’est pas bon dans ce contexte. Il est possible que ce mot ait ici le sens de ‘fait de prendre à partie’, comme dans l’expression bien connue: NP aṣbat.”
56 Goetze 1947 plate XCIX. See also YOS 10, 11 ii: 30 (Goetze 1947 plate VIII).
57 Guichard and Marti 2013: 56.