Oriental Women

by Edward B. Pollard

THE BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN WOMEN

Archæology here puts on her apron, takes her pick and spade in hand to help us uncover the story of the woman of Babylonia and Assyria. Skulls, jewels, cylinders, tablets, monuments, mural decorations must be brought to light after their long sleep beneath the surface of the ground. As alive from the dead these come forth to tell, at least in broken story, of those women who helped to make the valley of the Tigris and Euphrates among the most noteworthy spots upon the face of the Eastern world.

What we may know concerning the women of this early Assyro-Babylonian civilization may be derived in part from the Greek annalists who taught the world to write history, but chiefly from the discoveries in modern excavations. And even with these sources at our command, we shall find that many things which we would like to know about Assyrian and Babylonian women are still obscure.

The Sumer-Accadian question shall not disturb us here. That there was a non-Semitic people living in the region of the Euphrates and the Tigris, and that they developed a civilization from which the Babylonian and Assyrians later borrowed, seems clearly established. What the Sumerian and Accadian women left to their Semitic sisters who came at length into the ancient heritage, it would now be impossible to say with any degree of certainty.

The ancient mythology and the epic poems of these people contain many female characters, which may throw some light upon woman's place in their civilization. A people's mythology is the dim daguerreotype of their childhood thinking. Fortunately for us, the last fifty years have brought to light a whole series of epic poems from early Babylonian life, some of them in fragmentary form, others more or less well preserved. In nearly all these the feminine character has its place.

It will be remembered that in the Hebrew account of the creation no female divinity plays a part. In the kindred Semitic accounts from Babylonia and Assyria, however, Tihâmat, or Mummu Tohâmat, becomes the primeval mother of all things. She was chaos--corresponding to the Hebrew Tehôm, or "abyss." And thus, from the womb of dark chaos, with the ocean as father, came the divinity, the sun, moon and stars, earth, man, everything. But, strangely enough, after the birth of the first gods from chaos, a strife arose between them and their mother Tihâmat. It is, however, the old story of light's struggle with darkness. Anu would decide the dispute, but Tihâmat declares that the war must go on. Marduk, the god of light, becomes the special champion of the forces arrayed against primeval darkness, and Tihâmat is vanquished and cut asunder. From one part he makes the firmament of the heaven, to which the gods of the heavenly lights, sun, moon, and stars, are assigned, and from the other half he fashions the earth.

So, also, in the story of the Deluge, the Babylonian Noah, called Sît-Napishti, takes his wife with him into the ark; and when the floods subside and the ship rests, stranded upon the land, Ishtar, the goddess of the rainbow, greatly rejoices as she smells the sweet incense that arises from the grateful altar of Sît-Napishti. The god Bel is persuaded never again to destroy the earth with a flood, and so takes Sît-Napishti and his faithful wife by the hand, blesses them, and at length translates them to paradise.

One of the most prominent heroines of early Babylonian epic is Ishtar. Indeed, there are many variant stories concerning her. Ishtar's descent into Hades is, in fact, one of the most important legends of Oriental mythology. She is the goddess of love, corresponding to the Canaanite and Phoenician divinities Ashtoreth and Astarte. She is the Aphrodite, the Venus of classic myth. Earlier she did not hold power over men's minds. She was a goddess of war, and the earlier warriors honored her as their patroness. It was Esarhaddon who enlarged the honors paid her; and he is said once to have interrupted his scribe, while reading of two important expeditions of arms, to send and fetch The Descent of Ishtar into Hades.

This romantic story of adventure on the part of the goddess is well set out in early Assyro-Babylonian literature. Tammuz, the young husband of Ishtar, has been cut off by the boar's tusk (of winter). Ishtar mourned incessantly for her lover, but in vain. She resolved to rescue him if possible from the realm of shade, the kingdom of Allat, whence he had gone; for, though god he was, he must keep company with all the rest whom death claimed. Only one method of restoring him to the realm of life was possible. There was a spring which issued from under the threshold of Allat's own palace. One who could bathe in and drink of these wonderful waters would live again. But, alas! they were zealously guarded; for a stone lay upon the fountain, and seven spirits of earth watched with assiduous care lest some might drink and live. Of these waters Ishtar resolved to go and fetch a draught. But no one, not even a goddess, can descend into this Hades alive. So we read: "To the land from whence no traveller returns, to the regions of darkness, Ishtar, the daughter of Sin, has directed her spirit to the house of darkness, the seat of the God Iskala, to the house which those who enter can never leave, by the road over which no one travels a second time, to the house the inhabitants of which never again see the light, the place where there is no bread, but only dust, no food, but wind. No one can see the light there, ... upon the gate and the lock on all sides the dust lies thick." But Ishtar, in her quest of love, is nothing daunted by the difficulties or the forbidding aspects of her task. She descends to the gates of Allat's abode and knocks upon them, calling commandingly to the doorkeeper to unlock the bolts: "Guardian of life's waters, open thy doors, open thy doors that I may go in. If thou do not open thy gate and let me in, I will sound the knocker, I will break the lock, I will strike the threshold and break through the portal. I will raise the dead to devour the living, the dead shall be more numerous than the living." The porter goes and tells his mistress, Allat, of the imperious demand of Ishtar. "O goddess, thy sister Ishtar has come in search of the living water; she has shaken the strong bolts, she threatens to break down the doors." Allat treats her with contempt, but finally commands her messenger: "Go, then, O guardian, open the gates to her, but unrobe her according to the ancient laws." Since men come naked into the world, they must go out unclad, and the older custom among the Babylonians was to bury the dead without clothing. Ishtar is stripped of her garments and jewels, and at each successive gate more of her ornaments were appropriated. First went her crown, for Allat alone was queen in that gloomy realm; then her earrings, her jewelled necklace; then her veil, her belt, her bracelets, and her anklets. When through the seventh gate she passed, all her garments were taken away; and Allat commanded her demon Namtar--the plague devil--to take her from the queen's presence and strike her down with disease of every sort. Meanwhile, in the upper world all are mourning because of her absence; for, as goddess of love and procreation, all nature was perishing, and there was no renewal. All the forces of the upper world, therefore, united to bring her back to light; for the world would be depopulated and barren, if some means were not found to restore her.

Here the supreme god Hea comes to the rescue, for he alone, as controller of the universe, can violate the laws which he himself has imposed thereon. Hea commands that Allat give life again to Ishtar by the application of the water of life to her. She was informed that power over the life of her consort Tammuz was given into her hands. The water of life was poured upon him, he was anointed with precious perfumes and clothed in purple. Thus "Nature revived with Tammuz: Ishtar had conquered death."