The Concept of Authority in Ancient Iraqi Art: Assyria As a Model
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COMPETITIVE STRATEGY MODEL AND ITS IMPACT ON MICRO BUSINESS UNITOF LOCAL DEVELOPMENT BANKSIN JAWA PJAEE, 17 (7) (2020) The Concept of Authority in Ancient Iraqi Art: Assyria as a Model Al-Zahraa Hassan Omran1, Ali Hassein Al_khafagi2 1University of Babylon - College of Fine Arts 2University of Babylon - College of Fine Arts [email protected] Al-Zahraa Hassan Omran, Ali Hassein Al_khafagi.The Concept of Authority in Ancient Iraqi Art: Assyria as a Model-- Palarch’s Journal Of Archaeology Of Egypt/Egyptology 17(7), 3651-3661. ISSN 1567-214x Keywords: Micro Business Unit, Competitive Strategy, Performance ABSTRACT The current research consisted of four chapters that included the first chapter, of which the methodological framework for the research and the definition of the research problem, which was summarized by the question" Is there an impact of the concept of authority on ancient Iraqi art?" It also included the importance and need for research. The research goal is represented in knowing the concept of authority in ancient Iraqi art. The limits of the research were limited to dealing with the concept of authority in the Assyrian era in the time period between 1392 BC - 934 BC. While the second chapter (the theoretical framework) included representations of authority in ancient Iraqi art in all its eras and the data of those eras and their effects on the Assyrian society.As well as the indicators reached by the theoretical framework and previous studies. As for the third chapter (research procedures), it includesdemonstrating the concept of authority through the nature of power prevailing among the Assyrians with such scenes; and the artist was influenced by the structures of time and place and the extent of the spatial occupations of the place and has a relationship with the concept of the sovereignty of the image in terms of the king and the goddess.The study concluded that the ancient Iraqi artist searches for the truth of things despite the authority imposed on him and searches for the truth of art by glorifying the king and the gods, and the Assyrian artist must be aware of the dominance of the strong discourse of power. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 1. 1 The Research Problem Throughout history, power has dominated human thought through the existence of cosmic phenomena such as earthquakes, volcanoes, rain, thunderbolts and lightning, where primitive man has remained in the face of cosmic power, and authority has recorded a presence in the ancient Iraqi civilizations and the myths and epics it produced, as well as in the authority of the body in the Epic of Gilgamesh. Iraq, known in classical antiquity, 3651 COMPETITIVE STRATEGY MODEL AND ITS IMPACT ON MICRO BUSINESS UNITOF LOCAL DEVELOPMENT BANKSIN JAWA PJAEE, 17 (7) (2020) Mesopotamia was home to the oldest civilizations in the world. Its civilization history extends for more than 10,000 years, and its most famous civilizations are the civilizations of Sumer, Akkad, Babylon, Assyria, and Chaldeans. Artistic activity is as old as mankind, as the primitive man used to express himself through the arts. Power affected all aspects of political, social, cultural and religious life, as well as art. As the authority means the will of one party over the will of another, as the authority is based only on subordination, where the authority was the strongest influence on the artist to have the effect of the artwork conveyed, which will convey the image of the reality of the Assyrian community, that the conflict between the forces that dispersed the fate of people is nothing but an expression of the courage to which he aspires. Society and we find the recurrence of these conflicts in large areas of the relics of Assyrian art in the cylindrical seals and prominent stone tablets, Assyrian formulated in the form of documentation of the activities of the kings, the power of the king is only a reflection of the aspirations of the people and his ambition as a social symbol. In light of what has been mentioned, the research problem has been identified with the following question:Does the concept of authority have an effect on ancient Iraqi art? 1. 2 The Importance of Research This study provides an understanding of the concept of authority and its influential connotation. 1. 3 Research Goal The research aims at understanding the concept of authority in ancient Iraqi art. 1. 4 Research Limits Ii is limited to study the concept of authority in ancient Iraqi art, particularly, Assyria as a model in the area between 1392 BC to 934 BC in the ancient civilization of Iraq, the Assyrian era. 1. 5 Defining the Terms The authority in the Qur’an came in the verses "that my servants do not have authority over them over those who follow you from the tempters" Surah (Al- Hijr-42) and "But God directs his messengers over whom He wills, and God is Almighty over everything" Surah (Al-Hashr-6).Linguistically, authority is the authority, the proof, the proof, and the power related to worldly matters. As a government, officials in the state are a political force to which the citizen is subject.The French Raymond Aaron knew it: Authority is the ability to act or measure, and this concept takes its true dimension when individuals exercise their authority over others. Dr. Ahmad Zaki Badawi defines authority as the natural force or the legal right to act and issue orders in a specific society. This is linked to power with a social position that society members accept as legitimate and then submit to his directives, orders and decisions. The procedural definition of authority is the power, influence, and the ability to make decisions that govern the life and fate of others, individuals or societies, and the effects of this influence appear in the form of representations or manifestations of artistic productions in the Assyrian civilization. 3652 COMPETITIVE STRATEGY MODEL AND ITS IMPACT ON MICRO BUSINESS UNITOF LOCAL DEVELOPMENT BANKSIN JAWA PJAEE, 17 (7) (2020) THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK AND PREVIOUS STUDIES 2. 1 The Concept of Authority in Ancient Iraqi Art It originated in ancient Iraq and in the era of city-states that were separate small cities, each of which organized its own life and social affairs with a simple system and special norms that existed within the city limits. The Supreme and the so-called Sumerian (where) meaning (the master) is the first figure in that religious government, and he used to combine two authorities, the religious authority as the supreme priest who exercises his priestly role in conducting periodic religious rituals inside the temple and during holidays and official occasions, and at the same time he presides over the authority to administer events Life within the boundaries of his city and the organization of the life of its inhabitants, and Sumerian artists depicted priests in devotional situations that symbolized their religious and spiritual status (1) Figure 1(: A Sumerian priest statue, from the Louvre collection, on display in the UAE. In the midst of their struggle with nature, the Sumerians and Akkadians developed their productive forces and created large agricultural and industrial wealth resources, until they developed new production relations for material interests that laid the foundation of civilization. The human ability to bear it, but it generated another type of conflict, such as preserving and protecting crops, sharing water, and the threat of external aggression that the wealthy lands of Iraq are exposed to (2). This lifestyle based on agriculture and herding of livestock appears clear in the products of ancient Iraqi arts, where ancient artists depicted the marsh areas in southern Iraq, and herds of cattle and huts built from papyrus reeds appeared in the prints of old cylindrical seals (3). Figure2: Reed huts and cattle prints in seals 3653 COMPETITIVE STRATEGY MODEL AND ITS IMPACT ON MICRO BUSINESS UNITOF LOCAL DEVELOPMENT BANKSIN JAWA PJAEE, 17 (7) (2020) The emergence of this society in Iraq, the ancient society suffered from the problems of class conflict and the exploitation of man by man. In the ancient society, two classes were confronted: the dynastic feudalism that owned the agricultural lands, which was the keeper of the tribal dynastic system, and the class of defeated foreigners who found themselves in the position of loyalists and slaves whose ranks were constantly increasing with prisoners and intruders whose connections were interrupted (4).The concept of authority in society was one of the invention of the human mind that tries to regulate the conditions of society and ensure the rights of people and not to attack and spread injustice and chaos in the first human societies that created the first human civilizations, and in every time and place there must be an authority capable of imposing laws that regulate people's lives and guarantee their lives their rights and property, and in order to ensure the people's submission to this authority, the old Iraqi mentality invented the idea of authority in favor of divine right, which is rumored to take its legitimacy and right to rule directly from its affiliation to the ancient gods. So the king in the eyes of the people was the son of the gods or authorized by them to rule the country and control the fate of people (5). Kings are often depicted in fictional situations such as the struggle with predatory beasts, which are imaginary images inspired by myths such as the legend of Gilgamesh (6). Figure 3: Gilgamesh wrestling with the lions With the development of life and the multiplicity and ramification of the supreme priest's worldly responsibilities, it became difficult for him to abide by his duties, so a kind of separation occurred between his religious and political and administrative authorities within 2800 BC, so other priests took his place to carry out his religious duties, so that he devoted more time to the task of running the city and taking care of the affairs of Its inhabitants, but it still retained its supreme priestly capacity in religious celebrations, especially the feasts of the Sunnah, and this new character was called Sumerian (Ainsi), meaning (the Prince) in addition to the religious authority of the temple and the ruling prince.