The Divine/Demonic Seven and the Place of Demons in Mesopotamia

Gina Konstantopoulos (Autor)

Buch | Hardcover

356 Seiten

2023
Brill (Verlag)
978-90-04-54614-1 (ISBN)

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The Divine/Demonic Seven and the Place of Demons in Mesopotamia investigates and contextualizes the Mesopotamian figures known as the Sebettu, highlighting their political and religious importance across textual and artistic sources from the late third to first millennium BCE.

In The Divine/Demonic Seven and the Place of Demons in Mesopotamia, Gina Konstantopoulos analyses the Sebettu, a group of seven divine/demonic figures found across a wide range of textual and artistic sources in Mesopotamia from the late third to first millennium BCE.

The Sebettu appeared both as fierce, threatening demons and as divine, protective, figures. These seemingly contradictory qualities worked together, as their martial ferocity facilitated their religious and political role. When used in royal inscriptions, they became fierce warriors attacking the king’s enemies, retaining that demonic nature. This flexibility was not unique to the Sebettu, and this study thus provides a lens through which to examine the place of demons in Mesopotamia as a whole.

Gina Konstantopoulos, Ph.D. (2015), University of Michigan, is an Assistant Professor in Assyriology and Cuneiform Studies at the University of California Los Angeles. She has published on magic, religion, and literature in Mesopotamia.

Acknowledgments

List of Figures and Tables

Abbreviations

List of Appendices

Frequently Cited Texts and Their Editions

Introduction

Terminology and Defining the Demonic

Previous Studies and Writing the Sebettu

Seven as a Number of Significance

Overview of the Book

1 The Variable Nature of Demons

1 The Mostly Malevolent Udug

2 The Ambiguous Alad

3 The Benevolent Lamma

2 Early Foundations of Literary Evidence and Cultic Use

1 Third Millennium References

2 The Sumerian Narrative of Gilgameš and Huwawa

3 Lugalbanda in the Wilderness: The Torches of Inana

4 The Malevolent Sebettu in Old Babylonian Incantations

5 The Hymn to Hendursaĝa

6 Literary Tropes and the Subservience of Demons

7 Second Millennium Cultic Evidence

3 The Escalated Use of the Sebettu in the First Millennium

1 First Millennium Literary Texts

2 Expansionist Politics: The Initial Stages of the Assyrian Empire

3 Initial Decline

4 Returning to Strength

5 The Last Great Kings of Assyria

6 Ritual and Cultic Connections

4 The Sebettu in Incantations and Household Use

1 The Sebettu in Incantations

2 The Sebettu and the Udug Hul Incantation Series

3 Malevolence and Benevolence: A Survey of the Incantations as a Whole

5 Iconography and the Pleiades

1 The Behavior of the Pleiades

2 Astral Imagery and the Pleiades

3 Iconography and Representations of the Sebettu

4 Seals and the Pleiades

Conclusion: Concerning Demons

Appendix A: Comparative Epithets of the Sebettu

Appendix B: Birds, Deities, and Cries in the Birdcall Text

Appendix C: Textual Attestations to the Sebettu

Appendix D: Star Maps

Appendix E: Catalogue of Cylinder Seals

Works Cited

Index

Erscheinungsdatum	10.07.2023
Reihe/Serie	Ancient Magic and Divination ; 20
Verlagsort	Leiden
Sprache	englisch
Maße	155 x 235 mm
Gewicht	742 g
Themenwelt	Geisteswissenschaften ► Religion / Theologie ► Weitere Religionen
ISBN-10	90-04-54614-6 / 9004546146
ISBN-13	978-90-04-54614-1 / 9789004546141
Zustand	Neuware