Enhedu enheduanna biography

Enheduanna, high priestess of Nanna c. Background [ edit ]. Rebellion of Lugal-Ane [ edit ]. Archaeological artifact [ edit ]. Attributed works [ edit ]. Temple hymns [ edit ]. Hymns dedicated to Inanna [ edit ]. The Exaltation of Inanna [ edit ]. Hymn to Inanna [ edit ]. Inanna and Ebih [ edit ]. Hymns dedicated to Nanna [ edit ]. Authorship debate [ edit ].

Influence and legacy [ edit ]. See also [ edit ]. Notes [ edit ]. ISBN References [ edit ]. Binkley, Roberta A. Rhetoric before and beyond the Greeks. Black, Jeremy Retrieved 10 December The Literature of Ancient Sumer. Oxford University Press. Civil, Miguel Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique. Ebeling, Erich, ed. Berlin: De Gruyter.

Retrieved 11 December Delnero, Paul 1 July Journal of Ancient Near Eastern History. S2CID Falkenstein, Adam ISSN JSTOR Frayne, Douglas Sargonic and Gutian Periods, BC. University of Toronto Press. Godotti, Alhena 12 August It depicts her in a religious procession, in which she is preceded by a male priest with two male attendants behind her.

Enheduanna wears a ruffled dress and a brimmed turban, a sign of her office. On the back of Enheduanna's disk is an inscription recording her as the "daughter of Sargon of Akkad ," the founder of the Dynasty of Akkad and the first ruler to unite northern and southern Mesopotamia, who reigned for 56 years, c. Scholars have debated whether to take this relationship literally or symbolically.

If literally true, it attests to Sargon's successful policy of appointing members of his family to key posts. Moreover, there followed after Enheduanna a long tradition whereby the king appointed his daughter to the post of high priestess of Nanna, leading many scholars to conclude that Enheduanna was indeed the first of such royal daughters to be appointed to this position.

This is not altogether surprising, since Ishtar is often portrayed as the daughter of Nanna. In this work Enheduanna calls on Sin and Inanna for help because she has been dislodged from her position by a rebelling Sumerian king, Lugal-Ane, who, she complains, did not show proper respect for the gods and has desecrated the Eanna temple at Uruk. Many scholars perceive political themes woven into Enheduanna's writings, motivated by her support of Sargon's imperial legacy.

Sin , tell An about Lugal-ane and my fate! To you, holy Inanna I shall give free vent to my tears like sweet beer! He has not stood in awe of the greatest deity. He has turned that temple, whose attractions were inexhaustible, whose beauty was endless, into a desolation Nin-me-sharra Her prayers to Inanna were answered with victories in battle, putting down the rebellion.

This allowed her royal nephew, Naram Sin, to successfully unite Sumer and Akkad for several years. As a result, Enheduanna was restored to her post as priestess of Nanna. Nanna, the moon god, was the firstborn of Enlil and Ninlil, the goddess of Earth, heaven, and air. Sargon's daughter, whose birth name is unknown, took Enheduanna as her en name.

Enheduanna means "chief priestess of the ornament of heaven. This linked the royal daughters with Nanna, which in turn linked the kingship with the pantheon. During digs conducted at Ur by English archaeologist Sir Leonard Wooley in and , a thin, see-through limestone disk was found. The disk bears a likeness of Enheduanna on one side and an inscription identifying her as the "wife" of Nanna and the daughter of King Sargon on the other.

Most likely a religious artifact from the temple, the disk shows the priestess performing a ritual. Most gods and goddesses in the Mesopotamian pantheon represented some element of nature. Inanna, or Ishtar in Akkadian, was one of the pantheon's most complex deities. She was the goddess of such unalike forces as love, fertility, and war. A pantheon is a group of gods and goddesses.

Inanna was described as cruel, vengeful, warlike, and destructive, but also as peaceful, tender, comforting, and mystical. She was seen as the protector of both Sargon and his daughter, Enheduanna.

Enhedu enheduanna biography

It was partly due to Enheduanna's focus on the goddess that Inanna became the most important deity in Mesopotamia for more than five hundred years. Inanna was the daughter of Nanna, the moon god, and the twin sister of Utu, the sun god. She was represented in the heavens by the planet Venus. In fact, astronomers scientists who study the planets and the stars named a continent on that planet after her.

When she first began to be worshipped by the Sumerians, Inanna symbolized the life force and was the goddess of both sexuality and fertility. When displeased, she could destroy crops and make women unable to bear children. Among the Assyrians and Akkadians to the north, she was worshipped as the goddess of war and the hunt and was often pictured in battle dress with bow and arrow.

Inanna is at the center of several powerful myths, including one that tells of her descent into the underworld to claim control of it. Her sister, Ereshkigal, who already ruled the underworld, was upset by this and sentenced Inanna to death. When Inanna died, however, the world dried up and crops would no longer grow. The water god, Ea, arranged to save Inanna, with the agreement that someone else would have to take her place in the underworld.

Inanna chose her lover, Dumuzi. Dumuzi then ruled from the underworld for half of each year and rejoined Inanna for the other half. The disk also serves as an introduction to the duties of a priestess, such as making daily offerings to the god or goddess honored by the temple. These offerings consisted of foods such as grain, honey, and dates that were carried in a basket called a gimasab , which is represented on the disk.

Other duties included conducting a ceremony to purify water and caring for the giparu , the building attached to the temple that contained the priestess's private residence. Enheduanna's position took her to the other major cities of Mesopotamia, where she promoted not only her deity, Nanna, but also the goddess Inanna, whom Enheduanna took as her personal deity and protector.

Priestesses were also responsible for composing hymns, songs, and poetry honoring the deities. Some of the historical knowledge of Enheduanna comes through the hymns she composed to Inanna. These hymns were later transcribed in cuneiform, wedge-shaped writing carved with a pointed stick on clay tablets. More than one hundred such tablets are believed to be the work of Enheduanna because they were written in Sumerian.

Her father, Sargon, typically wrote in Akkadian. February Sargon of Akkad father. Biography [ change change source ]. During the rebellion of Lugal-Ane [ change change source ]. Related pages [ change change source ]. Hidden categories: Articles lacking sources from February All articles lacking sources Articles with hCards No local image but image on Wikidata.

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