Bēltu-ša-Rēš

Bēltu-ša-Rēš
Protective goddess of the Rēš temple
Member of the pentad of Uruk
Major cult centerUruk

Bēltu-ša-Rēš was a Mesopotamian goddess associated with a temple, or temples, bearing the name Rēš. She is only attested in sources from Uruk from the Neo-Babylonian and Seleucid periods. In the former, she belonged to the pentad of main deities of the city alongside Ishtar, Nanaya, Uṣur-amāssu and Urkayītu. In the latter, she served as the protective deity of a new temple complex dedicated to Anu and Antu.

Name and character

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The theonym Bēltu-ša-Rēš can be translated as "Lady-of-the-Rēš"[1] or "Mistress of the Rēš Temple."[2] Her identity remains uncertain, though according to Paul-Alain Beaulieu, her name might be related to the ceremonial name of a temple of Lugalbanda located in Kullab, É.SAG,[1] "foremost temple."[3] However, whether the É.SAG is related to a temple of Anu and Antu attested in documents from the Seleucid period, known as either as É.SAG, Rēš or Bīt Rēš, remains uncertain.[1] Julia Krul in a recent study concludes that the origin of the name remains a mystery, as no certain attestation of a temple referred to as Rēš predating first references to Bēltu-ša-Rēš is presently known.[4] She considers it possible that the Rēš in mention might have been the name of a structure built in Uruk in the Neo-Assyrian period which was later abandoned but whose name was preserved until the Seleucid period, when it was assigned to the new complex.[5]

Jeremiah Peterson suggested in a 2009 study of god lists that the theonym dLu2-saĝ-ĝa, found in the Nippur god list but otherwise entirely unknown, which according to him might represent a deity representing the divine counterpart of a "court eunuch" (lu2-saĝ), could be related to later Bēltu-ša-Rēš, as the Akkadian translation of the name of the corresponding office is ša reši(m).[6] However, he subsequently retracted this proposal in an errata published in the Assyriological periodical Nouvelles Assyriologiques Brèves et Utilitaires, as Bēltu-ša-Rēš's name is not etymologically related to ša reši(m).[7]

The most common spelling of the name in Neo-Babylonian sources is dGAŠAN šá SAG, though dGAŠAN šá re-e-šú and dGAŠAN šá reš-šú are also attested.[1] A further variant occurs in later Seleucid sources, dGAŠAN šá éSAG.[8]

Worship

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The only known references to Bēltu-ša-Rēš come from texts from Neo-Babylonian and Seleucid Uruk.[1] However, it has been proposed that she might have already been worshiped there in the preceding Neo-Assyrian period.[5]

According to Paul-Alain Beaulieu, Bēltu-ša-Rēš belonged to a pentad of main goddesses of Neo-Babylonian Uruk, with the other four members of this group being Ishtar, Nanaya, Uṣur-amāssu and Urkayītu.[9] Joan Goodnick Westenholz instead concluded that she, Ishtar and Nanaya formed a triad, though she considered the pentad proposal a possibility as well.[2] Like other members of Ishtar's entourage, Bēltu-ša-Rēš was worshiped in the Eanna temple complex.[8] Commodities offered to her included salt, dates, barley, emmer, flour, mersu (a type of cake), as well as meat of various animals, including oxen, sheep, geese, ducks and turtledoves.[10] Jewelry described as her property, including a crescent-shaped chest ornament, is also mentioned in the Eanna archive.[11]

In the Seleucid period, Bēltu-ša-Rēš occurs both in ritual and legal texts.[12] Like other deities from the entourage of Ishtar, she was relocated into a new temple, Irigal.[8] It is also presumed that she functioned as a protective goddess of the Rēš temple complex,[2][4] a new structure dedicated to Anu and Antu.[13] However, it cannot be presently established with certainty whether a separate shrine dedicated to her existed in its inner sanctum, as sometimes proposed.[5]

No theophoric names invoking Bēltu-ša-Rēš are known.[14] According to Julia Krul, her absence from them might be tied to her role as a protective deity of the Rēš, as the structure itself could be invoked in names instead, with the name Arad-Rēš appearing over a hundred times in Seleucid documents.[15]

References

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  1. ^ a b c d e Beaulieu 2003, p. 216.
  2. ^ a b c Asher-Greve & Westenholz 2013, p. 104.
  3. ^ George 1993, p. 138.
  4. ^ a b Krul 2018, p. 64.
  5. ^ a b c Krul 2018, p. 91.
  6. ^ Peterson 2009, pp. 89–90.
  7. ^ Peterson 2009a, p. 95.
  8. ^ a b c Krul 2018, p. 90.
  9. ^ Beaulieu 2003, p. 179.
  10. ^ Beaulieu 2003, pp. 221–224.
  11. ^ Beaulieu 2003, pp. 217–218.
  12. ^ Krul 2018, p. 71.
  13. ^ George 1993, p. 137.
  14. ^ Krul 2018, p. 70.
  15. ^ Krul 2018a, p. 353.

Bibliography

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  • Asher-Greve, Julia M.; Westenholz, Joan G. (2013). Goddesses in Context: On Divine Powers, Roles, Relationships and Gender in Mesopotamian Textual and Visual Sources (PDF). ISBN 978-3-7278-1738-0.
  • Beaulieu, Paul-Alain (2003). The pantheon of Uruk during the neo-Babylonian period. Leiden Boston: Brill STYX. ISBN 978-90-04-13024-1. OCLC 51944564.
  • George, Andrew R. (1993). House most high: the temples of ancient Mesopotamia. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns. ISBN 0-931464-80-3. OCLC 27813103.
  • Krul, Julia (2018). The Revival of the Anu Cult and the Nocturnal Fire Ceremony at Late Babylonian Uruk. Brill. doi:10.1163/9789004364943. ISBN 9789004364936.
  • Krul, Julia (2018a). "Some Observations on Late Urukean Theophoric Names". Grenzüberschreitungen Studien zur Kulturgeschichte des Alten Orients: Festschrift für Hans Neumann zum 65. Geburtstag am 9. Mai 2018. Münster: Zaphon. ISBN 3-96327-010-1. OCLC 1038056453.
  • Peterson, Jeremiah (2009). God lists from Old Babylonian Nippur in the University Museum, Philadelphia. Münster: Ugarit Verlag. ISBN 978-3-86835-019-7. OCLC 460044951.
  • Peterson, Jeremiah (2009a). "Additions and Corrections to AOAT 362, Godlists from Old Babylonian Nippur in the University Museum, Philadelphia" (PDF). Nouvelles Assyriologiques Brèves et Utilitaires (N.A.B.U.) (4). ISSN 0989-5671.
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