Enheduana and the geography of Sumer

[moksha]

I'm doing some research on Enheduana and Inanna and I just can't get my head round one point - something that will probably seem quite basic to a lot of people here.

It's generally understood that Enheduana lived in Ur. She is described as an Akkadian priestess. However, I thought that the Akkadian Empire spanned the middle of Mesopotamia though Ur is in the South where Sumer is. Maybe I should be thinking about this chronologically as well as geographically... but was Akkadia also in Sumer? Information on the internet seems conflicting on this.

[sheshki]

Well, as far as i know, Enheduanna was the daughter of Sargon the Great, founder of the first dynastie of Akkad. He usurped the throne of Kish and defeated Lugalzagesi of Uruk, who, a short time before that , united the sumerian citys by force.
Later during Sargons reign he made his daughter highpriestess of Nanna in Ur. Before that she was already priestess of An and Inanna in Uruk. Im not sure, but i think Sargon founded a tradition in mesopotamia with making his daughter highpriest in Ur because many kings who followed him did the same.

Btw, one of our boardmembers,balage, is a painter, check out his site
www.balage4art.com

Here is his version of Enheduanna. Wonderful picture



...and a link with some infos about sargon itself.
history-world.org/sargon_the_great.htm

[moksha]

Excellent picture, thank you. And the rest of the art on that site is fantastic.

Looking into it some more, it seems that I was indeed getting confused. She was a high priestess of Ur and a number of other cities as you said. However, she lived in Babylon [early period], not Ur. That would make sense as describing her as Akkadian. It also makes sense that she described Inanna as Inanna, rather than Ishtar [Assyrian] which would have been the name used slightly later on as the Akkadian empire collapsed.

There seemed to be a big difference in language and terminology over a few hundred years. The languages and traditions were quite dissimilar between the Akkadian and Assyrian empires.

[david]

I haven't looked through all of that site, but that art is amazing.

[sheshki]

Balage was so kind to give us some of his pictures for enenuru.net
so check www.enenuru.net ->> go to gallery->>balages reconstruction section

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uh, that was post 200...invisible drinks for everyone....except for naomi...you get your drink when certain things are done

[xuchilpaba]

Wasn't she also a priestess of Nanna?

[moksha]

Jan 10, 2009 22:16:18 GMT -5 @xuchilpaba said:

Wasn't she also a priestess of Nanna?

Yes, high priestess of Nanna. The famous [well, among those with such an interest] disc excavated at Ur shows her at the temple of Inanna.

Not sure about the rules on hotlinking here, so here's a link to that disc:

www.transoxiana.org/0108/Images/roberts_enheduanna-disc.jpg

[xuchilpaba]

That's what i thought. She's famous now because of her poems to Inanna. And I didn't think she was one of the prostitute priestesses if she was of Inanna, so it'd make more since she belonged to Nanna instead.

I believe she also believed herself to be a embodiment of some goddess related to Inanna, but i can't recall who atm.

(I think hot linking is ok. I do not recall any rule against it.)

[ummia-inim-gina]

Enheduana
en "a priest" + he2-du7 "ornament" + ana "heaven"

As already mentioned Enheduana was the en priestess of Nanna at Ur. The term "en priestess" is a bit of a misnomer though because the title of en priest was not gender related. The en of a deity was always the opposite gender of the deity (the station represented the deities consort here on earth, Ningal in Enheduana's case) So the gender implications that the translations into "priest" and "priestess" don't apply.
Enheduana was the first en priestess. This position was created for her by her father Sargon for her. It is often the view of modern scholars that this position was created as a political ploy to tie Sumer to the ruling Akkadian dynasty. She wrote politically motivated poetry in attempts to tie the cults of the various city-states into a single theological system. Perhaps her most note worthy composition was the compilation of 42 temple hymns.
She is credited to be the first author known by name however we do not actually know her real name. "Enheduana" was actually a title she took on when she became the en priestess at Ur. It mirrors other well known en priestesses such as:
enmenana, the daughter of Naram-sin
ennergalana, the daughter of Shulgi
enanatuma, the daughter of Ishme-Dagan of Isin
enanadu, the daughter of Kudur-Mabuk
These are just a few examples of the en priestess of Ur of which we know of about 15.
She must have been born late in her father's reign because she continued on through the reign of her brother brother Manishtushu and until the reign of her nephew Naram-Sin. Which means she must have lived for about 75 years total. Late in Narim-sin's reign a rebellion broke out with kings declaring independence in Kish, Uruk, and Ur. When Lugalanne declared himself king she refused to acknowledge his kingship.

(Out of time I will write more later...)

[xuchilpaba]

Thanks, Ummia. I thought the first author stuff was questionable. But you cleared it up.

75 years? That's a long time for someone back then! Life was harsh...

[us4-he2-gal2]

Hey everyone, Hey Moksha, nice thread here Well I just want to reinforce what Sheshki has explained about about Sargon, and that is while you may be most familiar with a divide between Sumer in the south and the Semitics (the Akkadians) in the north, and later Babylonians in the south and the Assyrians in the north (both Semitic), this divide should not be overly stressed - for one it`s true that there was always cross cultural fertilizations between the Semitics and the Sumerians - both borrow from one another and accepted influence from one another although this is most distinguishable when considering the influence the Sumerians had. And secondly, though the divide was more discernible in earlier times, around 2400 B.C., Sumer was definitively conquered that is physically, by the armies of Sargon the great, a Semitic hailing from originally Kish and then Agade (which he built. Though Semites had been in Mesopotamia all along, we refer to them by the accomplishments of this King. Agade = Akkad, in the Bible.)
According to S.N. Kramer`s "The Sumerians", Sargon erected stele`s in Enlil`s temple in Nippur that commemorated all of his victories and military exploits - though these are lost copies of the inscriptions were made in ancient times allowing us to see some of the story of a leader who became legend.

His influence made itself felt in one way or another "from Egypt to India" , his victories began however, with the attack on Southern Sumer: already mentioned is his victory over Lugalzaggesi, next, he would attack Ur, than Lagash down to the Persian gulf,than Umma. As his victories continued he appointed Semities to high positions through Sumer including in Religious officies, in order to maintain power and influence, including his daughter Enheduanna, who he elected to the office of En priestess at Ur.

From there he kept up the attack right out of Sumerian lands, attacking Mari, Ibla across the Taurus mountain lands, he subjected Elam and `carried off their possessions. ` But that was Sargon just getting started. He was by legend a great conquerer and these texts prove it. As Kramer reflects however, and on an unfortunate note, this campaign of Sargon`s began "the Semitization of Sumer that finally brought about the end of the Sumerian people, at least as an identifiable political and ethnic entity." Bear in mind though there was more than one factor to the end of the Sumerians, and this did`t come for another 400 years.

[us4-he2-gal2]

Wonderful addition Ummia, I hadn`t seen your post at the time I made mine slightly later - but together this should frame the social political context for Enheduanna in Ur.