The Early History of the Ancient Near East (9000-2000 BC)

by Hans J Nissen

  We have difficulties with the poem, because the statements made in it do not agree on several points with what we know about the situation. Thus in the course of the excavations of Enlil’s temple in Nippur it was not possible to find any levels from the period of Naram-Sin that had actually been destroyed. On the contrary, bricks stamped with Naram-Sin’s name show that he had clearly been as active as before in commissioning buildings there. In addition, the kingdom of Akkad and the city were not in any way destroyed during, or at the end of, Naram-Sin’s reign. It may well be that the Guti began their raids at this time. However, quite apart from the fact that their role in history has certainly always been exaggerated because they are mentioned in the Sumerian King List, they first actually played a role here under Naram-Sin’s successors. If we remove from the poem all the clear later accretions, what remains as the historical kernel is still the struggle between Naram-Sin and the gods, and especially the supreme god, Enlil.

  If we assemble everything said up till now and accept the changes connected with the deification as the actual kernel of the conflict, then, apart from anything else, we now have a solution to the strange fact that the only co-plaintiff beside Enlil—who represents the interests of all the gods—is the city goddess of Akkad. If our interpretation is correct, the interests of Naram-Sin’s city goddess would have been the first to have been affected by his actions. If we pursue this interpretation further, the deification would have been a clever move in Naram-Sin’s game, letting us know simultaneously that the city gods or their priests were the actual opponents of the central government. This poem would thus not be, as has been suggested, a document about the conflicts between Sumerians, represented by Enlil, and Akkadians, represented by the rulers of the Akkad Dynasty, but would bear witness to the permanent conflict between local and central power, represented here by the most important of the local gods and the ruler of the centralized state. As to the supposition that the contrast between two different religious concepts is behind this, all that need be said at the moment is that we are not here speaking of the contrast between “Sumerian” and “Akkadian” gods—a theory often put forward—but rather of a difference in man’s understanding of his own relationship to the gods. We shall have to return to this point.

  However, first we must pursue another train of thought and try to establish the characteristics of the art of the Akkad period by contrasting it with the art of the late Early Dynastic period. This may perhaps contribute to the solution of the overall problem. We want, here, to restrict ourselves to two from among the many possibilities for comparison, because these two are the ones that provide us with the most information—reliefs and cylinder seals.

  In the case of reliefs, we go back to the difference in interpretation that has long been observed between the so-called “Vulture Stele” of Eannatum of Lagash and the victory stele of Naram-Sin, most especially the completely different way in which the army is represented (figs. 61 and 65). Whereas on the older Vulture Stele the army is shown as a many-headed, many-armed, many-footed colossus made of shields, behind a ruler who is portrayed as being very much larger than they are, the soldiers on Naram-Sin’s stele are represented as individuals. If we include one more fragment from another stele, probably originating from Tello (fig. 64), on which a battle between two opposing armies is broken up into a series of single combats, the difference in conception is completely clear. This treatment of the figures on the pieces from the period of the Akkad Dynasty, with its novel emphasis on the individual, can also be found in the same way on other objects in the field of plastic art and among the things represented on cylinder seals.

  The fact that in Naram-Sin’s stele human forms are depicted with remarkable freedom of movement, and the landscape is not merely incorporated in the scene via a series of symbols, has been emphasized often enough, and is rightly seen as a significant innovation. Here, however, the attention of the reader must be drawn to one further aspect in which Naram-Sin’s stele reaches the limits of the representational potential of the ancient oriental artist as currently perceived. If we make a very rough comparison between the art of the ancient Orient and the works of Greek art, which came much later, all objects of ancient oriental art can easily be categorized as the juxtaposing of individual details to make a larger picture. The ideal typical representation of these details had, in consequence, hard lines between each individual detail. On the other side, there is the subordination of details to a total concept, and thus compositions containing details that are related to one another with natural transitions between them. The stele of Naram-Sin does not seem to fit into this clear antithesis. For, contrary to usual practice, where the individual figures, though they may have a substantive relationship to one another, are juxtaposed in an unconnected fashion, here the individual figures and parts of figures are related. This is evident in the row of fleeing forms lined up underneath each other on the right edge of the picture. They are turning round and holding out one or two beseeching hands to the ruler, who is shown in a victory pose. Whereas other works would have been satisfied with repeating the same figure of the enemy over and over again, here the way the enemies are standing is related to the way their position changes from the point of view of the ruler depending on where the figure is placed in the composition. Thus, according to the position of each enemy soldier, the face, and with it the line of sight, is turned increasingly upward. At the same time, the outstretched arm is held up in such a way that no matter what, the hand is always held out to the one they are appealing to so that it is in line with the mouth. In addition, the forces concentrated in the lines moving upward and downward in the work are so masterfully balanced that a completely harmonious picture was created. Only the figure of the ruler, because of its special position, still stands out, because it is hardly linked to the forces of the rest of the work. This clearly bears witness to a totally new independent concept of art. On the whole, we may say that this new way of seeing, this emergence of the individual, clearly reflects a change in consciousness, in which the independence and personal responsibility of the individual are for the first time given pictorial expression.

  This individualization and naturalistic representation is also found on the cylinder seals. A comparison between pictures of animal fights from cylinder seals of the Early Dynastic period (fig. 58a, b, d) and the period of the Akkad Dynasty (fig. 66a, b) gives an especially good example of this. The fear of having an empty—that is, unworked—surface, which, in the Early Dynastic period brought about artistic patterns in which figures are connected and overlap each other, gives way to a striving for uninhibited individualization of each figure. However, the freedom of composition we saw on the stele of Naram-Sin could not work on cylinder seals, because the parameters were quite different: the band was strictly limited as to the upper and lower edges but was, ideally, of limitless length. In addition to the themes of animal fights that continued to predominate, the cylinder seals now show a confusing number of new themes. These may often have been taken from popular myths, but we hardly ever succeed in identifying them. Therefore, what at first seems to be the sort of material that opens up the spiritual ideas of this period to us is, unfortunately, a closed book.

  Two themes should, however, be singled out. In both cases they are representations of gods, interpretation of which will perhaps make possible an important advance in our understanding. The two pictures in question are the so-called struggles of the gods (fig. 66d) and introduction or presentation scenes (fig. 66f).

  Figure 66. Seals of the Akkadian period. From R. M. Boehmer, Die Entwicklung der Glyptik während der Akkad-Zeit (Berlin, 1965), (a) fig. 53; (b) fig. 197; (c) fig. 611; (d) fig. 329; (e) fig. 399; (f) fig. 441.

  In the first case we are dealing with representations of figures fighting with each other who, because of their horned crowns, can be clearly defined as gods. This theme, which is first attested in the Akkad period, clearly contrasts not only with the earlier practice, which was either not to
represent gods at all or else only in noble poses, but also with the conception of the gods as we know it from texts of the earlier period. Depictions of this sort, as we now find them, seem inconceivable without a fundamental change in the conception of the gods. It is a new way of looking at the world of the gods: one that dissolves the earlier unity of the gods as all-embracing city gods—but who could also be given special characteristics—into gods with individual responsibilities, and into hierarchies.

  This line of thought receives further support from an examination of a second group of seals, the “introduction scenes.” During the period of the Akkad Dynasty a motif, very soon to become widespread, appeared characterizing the relationship between man and the gods in a particular way. In the “introduction scenes” a human supplicant is introduced to a higher divinity by another divinity who is interceding for him. From the way in which the figures of the gods are ordered, the rank of each god can be clearly seen. We do not only know of these ideas from a multiplicity of texts in which certain gods are portrayed as servants, messengers, or viziers of other gods, but, above all, from the idea that apparently personal tutelary gods were needed as well as the great gods. Clearly, the idea behind this was that a divine intercessor was needed if one was to be able to put one’s problems before the god one was really praying to. However, this can only have meant that the higher gods were seen as more abstract and inaccessible, whereas the lower-ranking gods were seen as more accessible, but also as gods who did not have any power of their own. What appears here is a concept of gods that is no longer dependent on the idea of the god as a land and property owner. The fact that this would have called into question the theoretical basis of local power would have been more of a threat to the latter than political striving toward centralism. But at the same time, we see here the theoretical basis upon which an attack such as that made by Naram-Sin could even be thinkable.

  In spite of all our attempts to explain and interpret individual phenomena, the question of why these innovations prevailed so forcefully at the beginning of the Akkad Dynasty remains unanswered. Any attempt to answer this question must include two premises. At the outset, it was proposed that even where there is apparent discontinuity, we should look for signs of continuity. In this sense, the thesis must be able to hold water that argues that just as the incorporeal, anonymous conception of man and the individualistic, naturalistic conception existed side by side as early as the Early Dynastic period, a concrete conception of the gods, largely related to a particular place, existed beside a more abstract one. It is also very difficult to imagine that the period of the Akkad Dynasty should not only have come forward with such completely new ideas, but was also able immediately to establish them so completely. The explanation for this could be that the period had merely given new priorities to older, already existing ideas.

  Figure 67. Cylinder seal and impression dating to the Akkadian period. Height 2.6 cm. Collection of the Seminar für Vorderasiatische Altertumskunde, Freie Universität, Berlin. Photo M. Nissen. (Cf. Moortgat-Correns, “Die ehem. Rollsiegel-Sammlung E. Oppenländer,” Baghd. Mitt. 4 [1968] no. 44.)

  The second premise also suggests a direction in which we might go to find a possible answer. For internal as well as external reasons, particulars of all kinds about the periods in question are known to us, in the main, only from, and about, the public sector of society. This is true for external reasons because there are hardly any areas apart from the public buildings in the settlements of that period that have been excavated. The internal reasons derive from the fact that we are dealing with written and artistic statements and with objects associated with the thin layer of upper-class citizens who were responsible for the form of government at any given moment, so that only the ideas of this class are reflected.

  A series of antitheses has repeatedly been presented above that can in no way merely be defined by labels such as “old” versus “new” or even “progressive” versus “reactionary.” Both have their own fair share of advantages and disadvantages, so that, in spite of their being absolute opposites, it is mostly a question of interchangeable options. From time to time we have observed connections between these pairs of opposites, not in the sense of causal dependences, but as conditions that converge in specific situations.

  If, while making a comparison of antitheses—such as local power as opposed to central power, anonymity as against individuality, gods tied to a specific place against abstract notions of the gods—we assemble all the terms mentioned on both sides, we shall probably arrive at the best characterization of the overall antitheses. These are linked to each other just as much in the Early Dynastic III period as in the period of the Akkad Dynasty. The political system of the period determined which of the two complexes predominated at any given point. And it had become especially clear, precisely for the political systems, that the options were almost interchangeable. Thus, the relatively rapid and comprehensive change in forms of cultural expression, perhaps best seen in art, can be explained by the close, if in no way genetic, connection between cultural life and forms of political organization. The exclusiveness with which the two complexes of artistic ideals appear before us is not one of actual ideals, but merely a consequence of the close connection between forms of artistic expression and each particular ruling class’s view of the world. Thus, for systematic reasons, we are bound to fail at any given time in our search for signs of the other complex.

  We have taken up a good deal of space here, in working out this basic conflict in Babylonian society because here it has once again been possible to show very strikingly how much the creation of the first regional state in the Near East was the answer to problems that could only arise in this form and to this extent given the specific conditions in Babylonia.

  The further we progress into the period from which thousands of texts allow us to draw up an ever more detailed picture of Babylonia, the more painful is our perception of the gaps in our information about many of the neighboring areas. While in the case of Babylonia we can already afford to argue about datings separated by only ten or twenty years, for most of the other areas we are still dependent on the use of terminology that bears witness to our total ignorance, such as “Early Bronze III period.”

  Happy to have any information at all about the relationships between different regions, we clutch at the statements by rulers about how they captured or conquered this or that city. Up to a short time ago, the silence of Babylonia’s opponents forced us not only to take the statements of Babylonian rulers at face value, but also allowed us to imagine military campaigns directed against areas that were more or less powerless and in every case underdeveloped.

  The texts from Ebla support a different view. Not only Ebla but a whole series of other places in the Syrian area prove to have been independent centers of political importance. However, there is absolutely no foundation for reading this to mean that Babylonia was even for a time subject to Ebla. Since during the excavations in Ebla unmistakable evidence was found that there had been two devastating destructions there, it is rather more realistic to believe the claims made in the inscriptions of Naram-Sin that he destroyed the city of Ebla. Further research on the texts from Ebla, and the possible discovery of texts from other places in Syria will, it is to be hoped, soon allow us to draw a more detailed picture of conditions in this area. Although they were doubtless similar in complexity to those in Babylonia, the forms of organization there were probably constructed on other basic patterns.

  Figure 68. Aerial photograph of Norşun Tepe (Turkey) and plan of the Early Bronze “mansion.” Courtesy, Dr. H. Hauptmann, Heidelberg University.

  In chapter 5 it was implied that we now, for the first time, find indications of greater changes in the Anatolian area bordering Mesopotamia to the north. Of course, we must start with the idea that here, too, changes had been in the offing for a long time before they become completely visible in the archaeological material. Finds from excavations at Norşun Tepe, near Elazig in the
Keban Dam area in eastern Turkey, and the uncovering of contemporary remains in other places, provide us with the visible arguments here. Within the sequence of levels from the Early Bronze III period at Norşun Tepe, a remarkable change takes place in the complexes of buildings from the usual division into small single units, such as were typical of rural settlements during the early part of this period, to a well-planned central structure on the same spot that took up a very large area in the late phase. The excavator is right in seeing in this signs of the construction of a mansion, a process that can also be seen at other excavation sites in the same region, for example at Tepecik.

  Thus it is probably no accident that we know of a whole sequence of burial sites in Anatolia from this period, such as the one at Alaca Hüyük, for example, whose individual graves were constructed at great expense and contained magnificent treasures either made out of precious metals or of high artistic merit as grave goods. These cemeteries undoubtedly contain the graves of members of a ruling class.

  Unfortunately, however, we cannot go any further than to confirm that the establishment of a political ruling class was obviously consolidated at this time, because the equivalent research at other sites is still lacking. Thus, for example, we should expect that the obviously widespread changes in leadership structures also had some effect on the mode of settlement. The example of the plain on which Norşun Tepe and Tepecik are situated along with other places, where a concentration of settlement activity actually can be shown to have taken place around the new seats of power, cannot, for the time being, be carried over to the areas that have not yet been investigated.