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oldeuropeanculture Profile picture
@serbiaireland
May 22, 2021 • 20 tweets • 7 min read • Read on X
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Thread: Impression from a cylinder seal from Babylonia, 8th century BC; in the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York City themorgan.org/seals-and-tabl… 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 divide 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 this article:

oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/2019/10/symbol…
And the hottest and driest part of the dry at the moment when bull meets lion. 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)...
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 middle of the hot, dry season...In Leo... Which is why Nergal 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...oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/2020/06/is-tha… The seat of the beast...Nergal...
Nergal, the Burning sun, the Dragon. This cylinder seal from Ur III, is dedicated to Meslamtaea, the earliest name of Nergal. docplayer.hu/47106522-Nerga…
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...
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... oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/2021/05/nude-w…
This is Ahriman of the Zoroastrians

So is the scene depicting "Nergal and the dragon fighting over the scepter" a symbolic way of telling us: "Nergal is the dragon"...
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...

oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/2021/04/canals…
oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/2021/05/shamas…
The Sumerian poem "Enki and the World Order" exclaims: Young Utu/Shamash (the sun), father of the Great City (the realm of the dead, underworld)...Equating Utu/Shamash with Nergal, the god of the Underworld...

How can sun be the Lord of the Underworld?

Sun, the god of death.

oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/2020/06/oldest…

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More from @serbiaireland

oldeuropeanculture Profile picture
Dec 17
Thread: Finnish illustrator Aleksander Lindeberg (1917-2015) Image
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Read 8 tweets
oldeuropeanculture Profile picture
Nov 22
Thread: Boreas (1903) by John William Waterhouse...

Boreas is the Greek god of the cold north wind, storms, and winter.

When I saw this picture first, I thought: Why did John William Waterhouse depict Boreas as a young woman wrapped in a black/grey veil? Image
I wondered if he did this because Romans depicted Winter as a woman covered with a black veil...

I talked about Winter here
The problem was that The Roman winter was an Ugly Old Hag...And the woman on John William Waterhouse's painting was young and beautiful. I was sure I was missing something important, but I didn't know what...
Read 9 tweets
oldeuropeanculture Profile picture
Oct 22
Thread: Buckle up, this is going to be quite a ride.

Meet Cetus, Poseidon's pet which he released on people that really pissed him off. Usually kings with beautiful daughters.

3rd c. BC mosaic depicting Cetus, from Ancient Kaulon, Calabria, Italy Image
Two most famous Cetuses 🙂 were so called Æthiopian (Levantine) Cetus and Trojan Cetus. This thread is about them, the two beautiful babes that were supposed to be sacrificed to them to appease them and the two heroes who strongly objected to such arrangements...

Here we go:
Queen Cassiopeia boasted that she and her daughter Andromeda were more beautiful than the Nereids. This angered Poseidon so much that he sent the sea monster Cetus to attack Æthiopia (Levant)...
Read 37 tweets
oldeuropeanculture Profile picture
Sep 27
Thread: Two days ago I wrote this analysis of this Early Mesopotamian bowl. But ever since I wrote it, I can't stop thinking about the "bundle of stylised reeds" and what does it actually look like...Here is why:
This is part of the full object description from the museum page: "...The animals are crouched before a bundle of stylised reeds (not shown), much like the reeds carved into a door at the base of the Ziggurat of Anu..."
Anyone seen this door? Is this what this "bundle of stylised reeds" looked like? Like these two "bundles of stylised reeds" depicted behind Inanna on the Uruk (Wakra) vase ? en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warka_VaseImage
Read 14 tweets
oldeuropeanculture Profile picture
Sep 25
Thread: A bowl from southern Mesopotamia c. 3300–2900 BC, Biblical Museum Jerusalem. Lions and calves are depicted lying down peacefully one after the other before a bundle of stylised reeds (not shown). Thanks to Muhammad Asghar for the pic and info.

Meaning? Check this out: Image
Reeds were an important crop in Mesopotamia, as important as grain. Reeds were used as building material for building irrigation canal dams, houses and boats, and for making baskets, mats and furniture...Reeds were also used as animal fodder... Image
You can read about reed 🙂 in Mesopotamian culture in oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/2022/03/scarle… oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/2021/04/canals…
Now: The best time to harvest reeds for animal fodder is between Apr/May, Taurus, and Jul/Aug, Leo...

Ha!!!
Read 6 tweets
oldeuropeanculture Profile picture
Sep 15
Thread:

1st article about the link between Nergal and Apollos:

About "Palil" a nickname of Nergal, the terrible, burning, destructive sun of Jul/Aug, Leo...And about the origin of the name Apollo and its meaning...

oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/2023/01/palil.…Image
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2nd article about the link between Nergal and Apollo:

About Nergal and Apollo as "The lords of the flies"...And about Jul/Aug, Leo, being the peak of the fly and fly born diseases season in Northern Hemisphere...

oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/2023/01/lord-o…Image
Image
3rd article about the link between Nergal and Apollo:

About the Lions of Delos, the burning destructive sun in Jul/Aug, Leo, and the fact that both Nergal and Apollo are linked to lions. oldeuropeanculture.blogspot.com/2024/02/lions-…Image
Read 10 tweets

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