Mysterious Creature

Akkadian Cylinder Seal with a Mysterious Creature, Mesopotamia, 2300-2200 BC. Description: A carved white marble seal with two ibexes flanking a stylised tree and a bird-man figure...

What's all this about?

Well first, these are not ibexes. These are Goitered gazelles...See the horns? 

Gazelle. 

Ibex...

They are flanking a tree, which is usually indication that this is a depiction of the tree of life...

In Mesopotamia, the climatic year is divided into hot/dry half and cool/wet half...

It is this rain that supports (the tree of) life in Mesopotamia...And the arrival of the life giving rain, is announced by the beginning of the mating season of Ibex goats, which starts in Oct/Nov...

I talked about this in my post "Green pastures" about this votive plaque from Tell Asmar, Iraq...

Which is why Ibex goat is the most depicted animal in Mesopotamia and Iran...I talked about this in my posts 

"A vessel from Tepe Hissar" about the "Goat of rain"

"Goat petroglyphs from Iran" about the development of the "God of rain" from "Goat of rain"

 "Goat carrier" about sacrificing goats to gods...

But gazelles have the the same mating season as ibex goats. Which is why they are here used to represent the same idea as ibex goats: It is this rain that supports (the tree of) life in Mesopotamia...And the arrival of the life giving rain, is announced by the beginning of the mating season of Goitered gazelles, which starts in Oct/Nov...

This is why gazelles and ibexes are sometimes even used together to emphasise that they have the same meaning as animal calendar markers. Like this seal that I talk about in my post "Pissing gazelle"

 

It is that rain that turns desert into green pastures...Which is why gazelles are found on the base of the statue of the god Abu, also known as the "father of the pasture". I talked about this in my post "Abu"...

Interestingly, this guy could be just another incarnation of Ninurta, the god of rain, who was originally imagined as a huge storm bird, then as a bird man and then as god with a pet (monster) bird...I talked about this in my post "The judgement of the Birdman", about this amazing Babylonian seal...

The reason for this is that the rain season in Mesopotamia coincides with the mating season of vultures who at that time perform their synhronised flying routines...

So, gazelles, tree of life and a bird man with outstretched wings...The rains are coming...Rejoice...