FIG. 20.
GROUND-PLAN OF E-MAKH.
A: Open Court. B: Ante-chamber to Shrine. C: Shrine. E: Entrance-chamber, or Vestibule, to temple, b: Service-room for Ante-chamber, c: Service-room for Shrine, d: Crude-brick altar, e: Well, s: Dais, or postament, for statue of Ninmakh. 1: Porters' room. 2-4: Priests' apartments or Store-rooms. 5, 6, 9, 10: Chambers giving access to narrow passages. 7, 8, 11, 12: Narrow passages, possibly containing stairways or ramps to roof.
(After Andrae.)
Passing through the entrance-chamber of E-makh, from which opens a service-room for the use of the temple-guardians, one enters a large open court,[135] surrounded on all sides by doorways leading to priests' apartments and store-chambers and to the shrine. The latter is on the south-east side, facing the entrance to the court, and, like the main gateway of the temple, the façade of the shrine and the flanking towers of its doorway were adorned with stepped grooves. The shrine itself is approached through an ante-chamber, and each has a small service-apartment opening out from it to the left. Against the back wall of the shrine, immediately opposite the doors, stood the cult image of the goddess, visible from the open court; this has disappeared, but the foundations of the low dais or postament, on which it stood, are still in place.
FIG. 21.
CONJECTURAL RESTORATION OF E-MAKH, THE TEMPLE OF THE GODDESS NINMAKH.
The view is taken from the north. The plain finish to the tops of walls and towers is in accordance with one theory of reconstruction. The connecting wall between the temple and the east wing of the Ishtar Gate is omitted to simplify the drawing.