Sacred hunt

Why did Assyrian kings like lion hunt so much? According to the Assyrian reliefs, the favorite occupation of the Assyrian kings in peace was a lion hunt...The earliest depictions show the king hunting lions from a chariot using bow and arrows...

The later depictions show the king fighting lions on foot. On some of these depictions the king still used bow and arrows to kill the lion...

But on most of the reliefs, the king was depicted killing a lion with a spear...

Or killing a lion with a sword...

I wonder if this was just a sport or was there some religious reason for this lion hunt? This image depicts the Assyrian king pouring libation in a temple on 4 dead lions...Why? As a thanks to the gods for helping him kill the lions? Or are the lions an offering to the gods?

The climatic year in Mesopotamia is divided into hot, dry half (Apr/May - Oct/Nov) and cool, wet half (Oct/Nov - Apr/May)

You know how lion is the animal calendar marker which represents the hottest and driest part of the year in Mesopotamia and Levant...The time of death caused by drought...Because beginning of August, middle of Leo, is the beginning of the main mating season of Eurasian lions...

This is why we find lion depicted with the same heat rays radiating from his back also depicted radiating from the back of the sun god Utu/Shamash...I talked about this in my post "Lion radiating heat"

This is also why in the oldest Mesopotamian depictions, dragons, symbols of the Mesopotamian summer (Apr/May - Oct/Nov) and destructive sun's heat, have lion's bodies...I talked about this in my post "Seven headed dragon"...

This is why Nergal, the god of death, the Destructive Sun of the late summer, is depicted as a half man, half lion...I talked about this in my post "Winged superhuman hero"...

And you know how it is "the killing of the lion dragon by the thunder god", which signals the end of the hot dry half of the year...And the beginning of the cool wet part of the year, when rain and abundance return to Mesopotamia and Levant...

Was the Assyrian king slaying the lion a symbolic reenactment of the Sky, Rain, Thunder god, slaying the lion dragon? Did Assyrian kings actually have to kill lions to prove that they are indeed divinely ordained to rule?

Images are from "The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World Volume II" by George Rawlinson. English scholar, historian, and Christian theologian (1812-1902)"

PS: Well apparently I was right. 

The aspect of hunting in the Assyrian/Akkadian had a religious/monarchical importance. This is primarily due to the notion that the Great King, was instructed and obligated to mimic different aspects of the Great Gods; in the case of hunting this meant Ninurta...And Ninurta was the old Rain god...So Kings were enacting Ninurta killing Nergal...

Mario Liverani’s "Assyria: The Imperial Mission" has a chapter dedicated to this aspect of Assyrian kingship...

Winged superhuman hero

Impression from a cylinder seal from Babylonia, 8th century BC; currently in the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York City. 

Here is the official description of the scene depicted on the seal:

"A demonic lion faces a winged superhuman hero. The lion's threatening gesture and the tension of his sharp claws suggest his evil power. But the hero will prevail. Taller than the lion, he calmly dominates it, and the bull—the victim of the contest—remains in his power"...

🙂 What does this seal really depict?

Well, it depicts Nergal, the Mesopotamian god of death, war, and destruction, who was most often depicted holding a scimitar...

Example: Old Babylonian cylinder seal from Larsa, depicting the underworld (the god of death) Nergal, holding his distinctive scimitar and the double lion headed scepter. The Inscription is a dedication to Nergal by Abisare, perhaps the king of Larsa at that time...

Yeah right. How do we know that the winged dude on the original seal is Nergal? 

Because, in his earliest incarnation, in the Early Dynastic Period (c. 2900-2700 BC), this god of death "represented the high summer sun which scorched the earth...which hindered crop production"...

Sooo??? 

So, the climatic year in Mesopotamia is divided into two halves: cool, wet season (Oct/Nov-Apr/May) and hot, dry season (Apr/May-Oct/Nov)...

The hot dry season spans summer (symbolised by bull) and autumn (symbolised by lion). 

I talked about the animal symbols of the seasons in my article "Symbols of the seasons"...

And the hottest and driest part of the hot and dry season is the moment when lion catches bull. At the end of summer, beginning of autumn. This moment is "marked" by all those "lion killing bull" images, like this one from Persepolis...Lion (autumn) killing (ending) Bull (summer)...Well more like lion chewing on the bulls butt actually...

Which is why, on our original seal, we don't see hero defending the bull from the lion...We see Nergal, deadly sun, standing at the end of summer, symbolised by upside down bull whom he is holding by the hind leg, and the beginning of autumn, symbolised by the attacking lion...

This is the seat of Nergal, the god of death, the destructive sun of the hottest, driest part of the hot, dry season...Which marked by Leo... 

Which is why Nergal is depicted as a winged lion with a human face. 

Either with wings

Or without wings

And which is why Nergal, when depicted in his human form, holds double lion headed scepter...

Eeee, what? What about precession? Leo I am talking about has nothing to do with constellations. It is an ancient animal calendar marker, marking the beginning of the main mating season of the Eurasian lions. Which has nothing to do with stars and is not affected by precession...

Leo is also "the lair" of the fire breathing dragon... Usually in Mesopotamia depicted as a winged lion... The seat of the beast...Nergal...

I talked about this in my post "Is that you Gilgamesh"...

Nergal is also depicted as a true winged lion, without any human characteristics. Like on this "kuduru" boundary stone of the king Meli-shipak II, dated to the 15th c. BC and currently in Louvre.

Now the winged lion is the evolution of the "lion with sun rays coming out of his back", which is the symbol for the hot, dry half of the year in Mesopotamia, and particularly the hottest, driest part of the year, Leo... 

I talked about this in my posts "Nude winged hero dominating snakes", "Lion radiating heat" and "Butt chewing"...

Nergal, the Burning sun, the Dragon. This cylinder seal from Ur III, is dedicated to Meslamtaea, the earliest name of Nergal. Pic from: "Nergal alakja a sumer irodalomban"... 

It shows Meslamtaea/Nergal, holding his scimitar, and a "mythical beast", winged lion, both holding onto a scepter which looks very much like the two lion headed scepter of Nergal...

So is the scene depicting "Nergal and the dragon fighting over the scepter" a symbolic way of telling us: "Nergal is the winged lion, dragon"???

But this winged lion also has eagle talons...Which means that this "creature" is a mix of lion and eagle...Autumn which starts with Eurasian lions mating season ends with Eurasian vultures mating season...So this "creature" symbolises autumn, which starts when summer ends (dies)...

I talked about this in my post "Assyrian winged dragon"...

Why would Nergal be equated to autumn?

Guess who else is standing "between the lions" or "on a lion"? In Leo...The Old Utu/Shamash, the Old Sun of the end of summer...The destructive sun that dries the rivers and canals...And kills people...

I talked about this in my post "Canal".

In my posts "Shamash young and old" and "Butt chewing", I explained that the hot dry part of the year in Mesopotamia was divided into two parts. 

First part, Summer, Apr/May-Jul/Aug, symbolised by a bull, the part dominated by the "Young Utu/Shamash, the god of life"...He is the sun that fills the holy rivers and the irrigation canals...

Second part, Autumn, Jul/Aug-Oct/Nov, symbolised by a lion, the part dominated by the "Old Utu/Shamash, the god of death"...He is the sun that dries the holy rivers and the irrigation canals...Nergal. God of death...

Which is why on the above seal, Nergal is depicted as a winged dragon, half lion half eagle...Autumn....

So what do you think?

To read more about ancient animal and plant calendar markers, start here…then check the rest of the blog posts related to animal calendar markers I still didn't add to this page, and finally check my twitter threads I still didn't convert to blog post...I am 9 months behind now...

Assyrian winged dragon

Middle Assyrian seal from Morgan library. Official description: Lion-griffin attacking bull fallen on its forelegs -- Star and sun(?) in sky -- Behind bull, winged sun disk on stand or altar, kneeling worshiper below...

Basically no idea what all this is about...

The bull is the symbol of summer which starts in Taurus (Bull). Summer is symbolised by a bull because it starts with wild Eurasian cattle calving season (late April - early May) and ends with wild Eurasian cattle mating season (late Jul - early August)...

Autumn begins in Leo (lion) Autumn is symbolised by a lion because autumn is the time of the Eurasian lion mating season...

I talked about this in my post "Symbols of the seasons"...

Summer ends in Leo (Lion)...

So lion killing bull is the symbol for summer ending and autumn beginning...

But here we have a winged lion, which is in Mesopotamia one of the ways dragons are depicted...And dragon is a symbol of the destructive sun's heat. Which is most destructive in Leo, the hottest part of the year in the northern hemisphere...

So winged lion (dragon) killing bull is the symbol for summer ending and autumn beginning at the moment of maximum heat...

But this winged lion also has eagle talons...Which means that this "creature" is a mix of lion and eagle...Autumn which starts with Eurasian lions mating season ends with Eurasian vultures mating season...So this "creature" symbolises autumn, which starts when summer ends (dies)...

I talked about the origin of Griffin in this post about this Proto-Elamite seal, 3000 BC. 

During the Middle Assyrian period, the time when lion kills the bull was the time when both sun and Sirius were in the sky together...In Leo...Which is why we have the sun and "the star", Sirius, right above the scene of the tauromachy...

This is very important astronomical identification as "the star" is always interpreted as "the star of Inanna, Ishtar" which is never explicitly named but it is "believed" to be Venus (???) Hmmm...

The winged sun...Sun god? 

Link to the seal page

Scorpion man

Official description of this seal: "During Middle Assyrian period, seal carvers expanded their repertoire of fantastic and mythical creatures. On this seal, a bird-man with a scorpion tail aims a bow and arrow at a winged lion-griffin standing on a hillock". 1400-1200BC.

I have to say I love this description. It says that officially we have no idea what this all means...

So let's try to make some sense out of this scene...

Scorpion men appear in the Epic of Gilgamesh, where they stand guard outside the gates of the sun god Shamash at the mountains of Mashu. These give entrance to Kurnugi, the land of darkness...

Now when we talk about the sun god and the land of darkness that usually means winter. Which in Mesopotamia climatically starts at the beginning of November. In Scorpio...When the first rains arrive...And the temperature drops...

I talked about this in my post "Queen Puabi’s cylinder seal"... 

But before people start complaining about precession and constellations and such stuff, I am not talking about stars at all. Or stellar zodiac. I am talking about solar year markers...

The scorpio I am talking about marks the time when temperature in the northern hemisphere falls below what scorpions consider nice. And they decide to retire. Underground or inside people's houses. Where it's warm...

By the way I am not the first one to link these scorpion men to the zodiac sign of scorpio. I am just not sure if they understood why scorpio is where it is on the solar circle...I didn't until recently. Oh and this behaviour of scorpions is not affected by the precession...

BTW, we find the same thing in Egypt, where we also find The Scorpion King...

Who turned out to be just another version of the same animal calendar marker, marking the time when scorpions disappear...Which is also the time when plowing and sowing of grain takes place...I talked about this in my post "Scorpion king"...

BTW, the scorpion archer has a body and wings of a raptor...So this is an Eagle/Scorpion...Interestingly, Zodiac sign Scorpio, which marks Oct/Nov, is the only double sign...The other sign that marks the same period is Eagle...Cool...

I talked about this in my article "Four living creatures"...  

Ok. What about the other mythical creature? Lion. Well, have a look at this. This is zodiac, with the cross marking the signs in which the seasons start. Spring starts in Aquarius, Summer starts in Taurus, Autumn starts in Leo and winter starts in Scorpio. 

And because Scorpio is a double sign, Scorpio/Eagle...

Oh BTW, the eagle marks Oct/Nov, because this is when the mating season of Old World vultures starts. I talked about this in many of my posts...For instance "Eagle dance"...

In my other article "Symbols of the seasons", I talked about why these four animals were used as symbols of the four seasons: 

The Leo is where it is on the solar zodiac because this is when the mating season of the Eurasian lions started...

So for winter to start, autumn needs to end...So winter (symbolised by scorpion/eagle) kills (ends) autumn (symbolised by lion/eagle)...It's kind of obvious...Or not...

Oh...One other thing...Autumn in Mesopotamia is the time of droughts...Which start in Leo...Which is why a winged lion is the symbol of Nergal, the God of Death, the Destructive Sun...I talked about this in my post "Winged super human hero"... 

Wait!!!! If this is the case, shouldn't there be goat on the seal, to symbolise the end of summer, beginning of autumn?

Well glad you said it 🙂. Because actually, if you look at fine print, you can see a tiny Markhor goat standing right under the scorpion man's tail...

And as we all know, Markhor goat was with Ibex (Bezoar) goat symbol of rain season...The Goat of Rain...Before there was a God of Rain...You can read more about this in my article "Goat in a tree"...

The "stars" which frame the scene are actually just one "star" just impressed twice...It's a circular seal 🙂 Originally I thought it represented our sun, but now I know it represents Sirius. Which is at the time when Scorpion kills Lion, visible in the night sky...But which also in Leo (Jul/Aug) rises with the sun...

I talked about this in more detail in my article "7 stars of scorpio"

So there you have it...Neat right?

To read more about ancient animal and plant calendar markers, start here…then check the rest of the blog posts related to animal calendar markers I still didn't add to this page, and finally check my twitter threads I still didn't convert to blog post...I am 9 months behind now...