Utu

Utu,[a] later worshipped by East Semitic peoples as Shamash,[b] was the ancient
Utu (Shamash)
Mesopotamian Sun god - god of justice, morality, and truth, and the twin of the goddess
Inanna, the Queen of Heaven. His main temples were in the cities of Sippar and Larsa. He Sun god - god of justice, morality,
was believed to ride through the heavens in his sun chariot and see all things that happened and truth
in the day. He was the enforcer of divine justice and was thought to aid those in distress.
According to Sumerian mythology, he helped protect Dumuzid when the galla demons tried
to drag him to the Underworld and he appeared to the hero Ziusudra after the Great Flood.
In the Epic of Gilgamesh, he helps Gilgamesh defeat the ogre Humbaba.

Contents
Family
Worship
Iconography
Mythology
Later influence
Family tree
See also
Notes Representation of Shamash from
References the Tablet of Shamash (c. 888 – 855
Bibliography BC), showing him sitting on his
throne dispensing justice while
External links
clutching a rod-and-ring symbol
Abode Heavens
Family Planet Sun
Symbol Mace, Saw, Sun rays
Utu was the twin brother of Inanna,[4][5] the Queen from shoulders, Sun Disk
of Heaven, whose domain encompassed a broad
Mount Sun chariot
variety of different powers.[6][5] In Sumerian texts,
Inanna and Utu are shown as extremely close;[7] in Personal information
fact, their relationship frequently borders on Parents usually Nanna and
incestuous.[7][8] Utu is usually the son of Nanna, the Ningal, but sometimes
god of the moon, and his wife, Ningal,[9][10] but is the son of An or Enlil
sometimes also described as the son of An or
Enlil.[9][10] His wife was the goddess Sherida, later Siblings Ereshkigal (older sister)
known in Akkadian as Aya.[11][12][10] and Inanna (twin sister),
Ishkur/ Hadad (in some
Sherida was a goddess of beauty, fertility, and sexual sources)
love,[12] possibly because light was seen as
Consort Sherida
inherently beautiful, or because of the sun's role in
promoting agricultural fertility.[12] They were Children Kittu ("Truth") and
believed to have two offspring: the goddess Kittu, Misharu ("Justice")
Goddess Ishtar stands on a lion and
holds a bow, god Shamash symbol at whose name means "Truth", and the god Misharu,
the upper right corner, from Southern whose name means "Justice".[12] By the time of the Old Babylonian Period (c. 1830 – c.
Mesopotamia, Iraq 1531 BC), Sherida, and consequently Utu, was associated with nadītu, an order of cloistered
women who devoted their lives to the gods.[10] Utu's charioteer Bunene is sometimes
described as his son.[11][10] Bunene was worshipped independently from Utu as a god of
justice in Sippar and Uruk during the Old Babylonian Period[11][10] and, in later times, he was also worshipped at Assur.[11][10]

Worship
Utu was worshipped in Sumer from the very earliest times.[11] The oldest documents mentioning him date to around 3500 BC,
during the first stages of Sumerian writing.[10] His main temples, which were both known as E-babbar ("White House"), were
located in Sippar and in Larsa.[11] Utu continued to be venerated until the end of Mesopotamian culture[10] and was worshipped for
well over 3,000 years.[10] Utu's main personality characteristics are his kindness and generosity,[10] but, like all other Mesopotamian
deities, he was not above refusing a request which inconvenienced him.[10] In the Hurro-Akkadian bilingual Weidner god list, Utu is
equated with the Hurrian sun-god Šimigi.[13] In the Ugaritic trilingual version of the Weidner god list, Šimigi and Utu are both
equated with Lugalbanda.[14]

Iconography
In Sumerian texts, Utu is described as "bearded" and "long-armed".[11] In art, he is shown as an old man with a long beard.[10] He
was believed to emerge from the doors of Heaven every day at dawn and ride across the sky in his chariot before returning to the
"interior of heaven" through a set of doors in the far west every evening.[11] Utu's charioteer was named Bunene.[15] Cylinder seals
often show two gods holding the doors open for him as he wields his weapon, the pruning-saw,[11] a double-edged arch-shaped saw
with large, jagged teeth, representing his role as the god of justice.[11] Utu's main symbol was the solar disc,[10] a circle with four
points in each of the cardinal directions and four wavy, diagonal lines emanating from the circle between each point.[10] This
symbol represented the light, warmth, and power of the sun.[10]

Detail of a cylinder seal from Sippar (2300 Old Babylonian cylinder seal impression depicting
BC) depicting Shamash with rays rising Shamash surrounded by worshippers (c. 1850-
from his shoulders and holding a saw- 1598 BC)
toothed knife with which he cuts his way
through the mountains of the east at dawn
(British Museum)

Mesopotamian limestone cylinder seal and Version of the ancient

impression showing people worshipping star/Sun symbol of
Shamash (Louvre) Shamash[16]
 Male figure in an Assyrian winged sun emblem Shamash depicted on bronze coin struck in Hatra (c.
(Northwest Palace of Nimrud, 9th century BCE; 117-138 AD)
British Museum room B, panel 23). This
iconography later gave rise to the Faravahar
symbol of Zoroastrianism.

Mythology
The Sumerians believed that, as he rode through heaven, Utu saw everything that happened in the world.[11][12] Alongside his sister
Inanna, Utu was the enforcer of divine justice.[7] At night, Utu was believed to travel through the Underworld as he journeyed to the
east in preparation for the sunrise.[12] One Sumerian literary work refers to Utu illuminating the Underworld and dispensing
judgement there[17] and Shamash Hymn 31 (BWL 126) states that Utu serves as a judge of the dead in the Underworld alongside the
malku, kusu, and the Anunnaki.[17] On his way through the Underworld, Utu was believed to pass through the garden of the sun-
god,[12] which contained trees that bore precious gems as fruit.[12]

Utu was believed to take an active role in human affairs,[11] and was thought to aid those in distress.[11] In one of his earliest
appearances in literature, in the Myth of Etana, written before the conquest of Sargon of Akkad (c. 2334–2284 BC), the hero Etana
invokes Utu to help his wife conceive a child.[10] In the Sumerian poem The Dream of Dumuzid, Utu intervenes to rescue Inanna's
husband Dumuzid from the galla demons who are hunting him.[11] In the Sumerian flood myth, Utu emerges after the flood waters
begin to subside,[18][19] causing Ziusudra, the hero of the story, to throw open a window on his boat and fall down prostrate before
him.[18][19] Ziusudra sacrifices a sheep and an ox to Utu for delivering him to salvation.[18][19]

In the Sumerian King List, one of the early kings of Uruk is described as "the son of Utu"[11] and Utu seems to have served as a
special protector to several of that city's later kings.[11] In the Sumerian poem of Gilgamesh and Huwawa, the hero Gilgamesh asks
Utu to assist him in his journey to the Cedar Mountain.[20] In this version, Gilgamesh asks Utu's help because Utu is associated with
the Cedar Mountain, which is implied to be located in the far east, the land where the sun rises.[21] Utu is initially reluctant to
help,[22] but, after Gilgamesh explains that he is doing this because he intends to establish his name, because he knows he will
eventually die, Utu agrees.[21] Once Gilgamesh reaches the Cedar Mountain, Utu helps him defeat the ogre Huwawa, who lives
there.[22]

In the standard Babylonian Epic of Gilgamesh, Gilgamesh's plan to visit the Cedar Mountain is still his own idea and he goes to
Shamash for aid.[23] In this version, however, the Cedar Mountain is explicitly stated to be located in the northwest, in Lebanon.[24]
Shamash helps Gilgamesh defeat Humbaba (the East Semitic name for Huwawa).[11][25] Jeffrey H. Tigay suggests that
Lugalbanda's association with the sun-god in the Old Babylonian version of the epic strengthened "the impression that at one point
in the history of the tradition the sun-god was also invoked as an ancestor".[26] In the Sumerian version, Gilgamesh's initial quest is
to visit the Cedar Mountain and Humbaba is merely an obstacle that Gilgamesh and Enkidu encounter once they have already
arrived there,[27] but, in the Babylonian version, defeating Humbaba is the initial quest on which the heroes embark.[28] In a late
version of the Gilgamesh story, Shamash becomes the instigator of the quest, the one who instructs Gilgamesh to go slay Humbaba
to begin with.[28] Tigay describes this as the "final and logical development of [Shamash's] role."[28]

Later influence
The authors of the Hebrew Bible generally attempt to portray the sun in a non-anthropomorphic manner, sometimes using it as a
symbol of Yahweh's power.[29] The Hebrew word for "sun", šapaš or šemeš, is often substituted for euphemisms, such as the word
or, meaning "light".[29] These authors appear to have made a conscious effort to avoid implications of sun worship, even of a
Yahwistic variety, at all costs.[29] Specifically, God creates the "greater light," the "lesser light," and the stars.
According to Victor Hamilton, most scholars agree that the choice of "greater light" and "lesser light", rather than the more explicit
"Sun" and "Moon", is anti-mythological rhetoric intended to contradict widespread contemporary beliefs that the Sun and the Moon
were deities themselves.[30] However, the Woman of the Apocalypse in the Book of Revelation, may directly allude to ancient Near
Eastern sun goddesses.[29]

Family tree
An

Enki Ninkikurga
Nisaba
Ninḫursaĝ born to born to Ḫaya
born to Uraš
Namma Namma

Ninsar Ninlil Enlil

Ningal Ninurta Baba

Nergal
maybe maybe born born
Ninkurra Nanna maybe son
daughter to to
of Enki
of Enlil Ninḫursaĝ Uraš

Inanna
possibly
also the Dumuzid Ninkigal
Uttu daughter maybe son Utu married
of Enki, of of Enki Nergal
Enlil, or of
An

Meškiaĝĝašer Lugalbanda Ninsumun

Enmerkar Gilgāmeš

Urnungal

See also
Code of Hammurabi
Shapash
Utukku
List of solar deities

Notes
a. Akkadian rendition[1][2] of Sumerian dUD 𒀭𒌓 "Sun",[3]
b. Akkadian šamaš "Sun" was cognate to Phoenician: 𐤔𐤌𐤔 šmš, Classical Syriac: šemša, Hebrew: ׁ‫מש‬
ֶ ֶׁ‫ ש‬šemeš
and Arabic: ‫ ﺷﻤﺲ‬šams.

References
1. http://www.sumerian.org/sumlogo.htm s.v. "babbar(2)" 9. Black & Green 1992, pp. 182–184.
2. Frederick Augustus Vanderbergh : Sumerian Hymns 10. Mark 2017.
from Cuneiform Texts in the British Museum. Columbia 11. Black & Green 1992, p. 184.
University Press, 1908. p. 53 (https://books.google.co 12. Holland 2009, p. 115.
m/books?id=lk0YAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA53&lpg=PA53&dq
=Sumerian+UD+sun&source=bl&ots=ew7v7u-uGk&sig 13. Simons 2017, p. 83.
=ZZ9xA87ULWnNIWlwlpk8ssRn6bY&hl=en&ei=NbXh 14. Simons 2017, p. 86.
Sq6ALsHj8QaO6ejyAQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=res 15. Black & Green 1992, p. 52.
ult&resnum=2&ved=0CA0Q6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=S 16. Black & Green 1992, p. 68.
umerian%20UD%20sun&f=false).
17. Horowitz 1998, p. 352.
3. Kasak, Enn; Veede, Raul (2001). Mare Kõiva; Andres
Kuperjanov (eds.). "Understanding Planets in Ancient 18. Kramer 1961, p. 98.
Mesopotamia (PDF)" (http://www.folklore.ee/Folklore/v 19. Hämmerly-Dupuy 1988, p. 56.
ol16/planets.pdf) (PDF). Electronic Journal of Folklore. 20. Tigay 2002, p. 76.
Estonian Literary Museum. 16: 7–35. 21. Tigay 2002, pp. 76–77.
doi:10.7592/fejf2001.16.planets (https://doi.org/10.759 22. Tigay 2002, p. 77.
2%2Ffejf2001.16.planets). ISSN 1406-0957 (https://ww
w.worldcat.org/issn/1406-0957). The Sumerian 23. Tigay 2002, pp. 77–78.
cuneiform character is encoded in Unicode at U+12313 24. Tigay 2002, p. 78.
𒌓 (Borger nr. 381). Borger's 381 is U4. 25. Tigay 2002, pp. 77–81.
http://www.sron.nl/~jheise/signlists/top20.html 26. Tigay 2002, pp. 76–81.
4. Black & Green 1992, p. 182. 27. Tigay 2002, pp. 77, 79.
5. Pryke 2017, p. 36. 28. Tigay 2002, p. 79.
6. Black & Green 1992, pp. 108–109. 29. van der Toorn, Becking & van der Horst 1999, p. 960.
7. Pryke 2017, pp. 36–37. 30. Hamilton 1990, p. 127.
8. Black & Green 1992, p. 183.

Bibliography
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ISBN 0-7141-1705-6
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=PR3#v=onepage&q&f=false). New International Commentary on the Old Testament (NICOT). Grand Rapids:
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v=onepage&q=Utu%20sun%20god&f=false), Berkeley, California, Los Angeles, California, and London, England:
University of California Press, pp. 49–60, ISBN 0-520-05973-5
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Mark, Joshua (31 January 2017), "Utu-Shamash" (https://www.ancient.eu/Utu-Shamash/), Ancient History
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 van der Toorn, Karel; Becking, Bob; van der Horst, Pieter Willem (1999), Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the
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ISBN 0-8028-2491-9

External links
Ancient Mesopotamian Gods and Goddesses: Utu/Šamaš (god) (http://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/amgg/listofdeities/
utu/)

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