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Yam Three Iconographic Studies Have Been Devoted to Y Iconography of Deities and Demons: Electronic Pre-Publication 1/3 Last Revision: 9 June 2008 Yam Three iconographic studies have been devoted to Y. E. WILLIAMS–FORTE (1983: I. Introduction. Levantine god. In 32–38) attempted to prove that the serpent Ugaritic texts Y. is referred to as a personi- which Baal is fighting should be identified fied deity (→DDD 739f). Y.’s hydro affin- with →Mot instead of Y. However, her ity is not only indicated by his name, ym suggestion did not find general support “sea” (as personal name already attested in (LAMBERT 1985: 444; KEEL 1986: 308– Mari; DURAND 1993: 57f), but also by his 310). epithet ṯpṭ nhr “Judge River (Nahar).” The P. MATTHIAE argued that a particular impersonal sea as mythological chaos power winged god on Old Syrian cylinder seals is first mentioned in the 18th cent. Amorite should be equated with Y. However, the text A.1968, in the “proto–Ugaritic” theme tendency to read the Ugaritic mythical texts of the conflict of the →storm god against into iconographic representations is prob- the sea, referring to the former as →Hadad lematic (e.g., MATTHIAE detects Y.’s arro- of Aleppo and the latter by the Akk. term gance toward →El in a turned shoulder, têmtum “vast expansion of water” (DURAND depicted on a particular cylinder seal [MAT- 1993: 43–45, 58; see also KTU 1.2 iv:3 THIAE 1992: 176]). The argument that the [bym]). tilted style of a particular seal (DELAPORTE Ugaritic texts suggest the ophidian na- 1910: pl. 32:490) indicates the “situation of ture of Y., which is not only identified with conflict” (MATTHIAE 1992: 173) between the sea (KTU 1.6 iv:51; see also Isa 27:1) Baal and Y. is also questionable. According but also with the sea monster Tunnanu (tnn; to MATTHIAE, “one of the apparently less →Tannin; KTU 1.83:4–12; PITARD 1998: comprehensible figurative aspects of Y.’s 279; see also Ps 74:13). The close relation- iconography in the cylinder seals is his ship between Y. and Tunnanu is most likely winged nature” (1992: 176). In fact, the also indicated in KTU 1.3 iii:39–42, where wings are a major obstacle to the identifica- →Anat claims to have killed Y.=Na- tion with Y. har=Tunnanu (see PITARD 1998: 280) and An essay on representations of serpents the “twisting serpent, šlyṭ/the Mighty One from Palestine/Syria by O. KEEL provides a (?) with the seven heads.” Whether the latter helpful overview of the serpent motif from should also be identified with Y. or re- an ancient Near Eastern background; of garded as a separate being is unclear. In particular interest is the section on the storm KTU 1.5 i:1–3 (see also Isa 27:1) the “twist- god and the serpent on Old Syrian cylinder ing serpent” has lost any distinct nature and seals (1992: 212–215). has become the epithet of ltn (lītānu > II. Typology liwyātān →Leviathan; see also Ps 74:14), II.1. Phenotypes the monster killed by →Baal. Although ltn A. THERIOMORPHIC 1. SERPENT 1.1. Killed with a is not directly equated with Y., Baal’s con- long spear (1–2, →Baal 16–17) 1.2. Killed with a sword (→Baal 6–7) B. NATURAL PHENOMENON flict with serpentine ltn parallels his struggle POSSIBLE with Tunnanu (see KTU 1.82:1). Since A. Theriomorphic Tunnanu can be directly associated with Y., 1. Serpent both conflicts seem to reflect Baal’s fight 1.1. Killed with a long spear. The with his main opponent at Ugarit, the god winged Levantine →storm god →Baal is Y. (KTU 1.2 iv:8–27; Anat’s claim in KTU depicted on a scarab from Tell el–Far˓ah 1.3 to have killed Y.=Nahar=Tannin is (South) (→Baal 16*–17) as spearing the generally interpreted as support of Baal in body of the Asiatic horned serpent in Egyp- his battle against Y. [contra BINGER 1992]). tian style (KEEL 1990: figs. 89, 94, 95; LEI- The serpentlike nature of Y. is also indi- BOVITCH 1944: fig. 11), holding its neck rectly attested by the fact that in a Ugaritic with the other hand and stepping on its polyglot vocabulary (NOUGAYROL et al. tail/body. Thee features are also seen in the 1968: 240f)Tunnanu corresponds with the combat of the Syrian storm god with the Sumerian ideogram MUŠ “serpent” and the →serpent, although with some differences. Akkadian bašmu (→Bashmu) or ṣēru. This The close identity of Baal with →Seth is corresponds with the Hittite myth of Illuy- indicated when the latter likewise kills the anka, in which the sea is equated with the horned serpent in the same manner and not serpent battling the storm god (ConScr 1.56 →Apophis, as would be expected (1*–2). A iii 20’–24’). 1.2. Killed with a sword. In From an iconographic perspective the Egypto–Palestinian Seth–Baal tradition, as struggling of the Levantine storm god with on a scarab from Lachish (→Baal 6*–7), the serpent therefore serves as a starting Y. is depicted as a horned serpent being point for the visual identification of Y. IDD website: http://www.religionswissenschaft.unizh.ch/idd Iconography of Deities and Demons: Electronic Pre-Publication 2/3 Last Revision: 9 June 2008 killed with a sword by the Levantine storm II.2. Standard associations god. 1. Associated with deities/demons B. Natural phenomenon: Possible. 1.2. Baal. Representations of Y. with The wavy band in the upper pedestal and the Levantine storm god →Baal are few. the wavy line in the lower pedestal of the Only Egyptianized Sethian Baal is depicted so–called Baal stela (→Baal 1*) are com- as spearing the horned serpent (→Baal monly interpreted as stylized →mountains 16*–17) or killing it with a sword (→Baal (see SCHAEFFER 1949: 129; CORNELIUS 6*–7). 1994: 136 n. 1). However, BÖRKER–KLÄHN 1.3. Seth. In identical pose as Sethian (1982: 239) and FENTON (1996: 52) pointed Baal, →Seth is spearing Y. as indicated by out that these wavy features have nothing in the horns on the animal’s head (3*–4). common with the scaly depictions of moun- III. Sources tains in the ancient Near East. KAISER Representations of Y. as serpent are re- (1962: 73 with n. 296) noted that the undu- stricted to seals from the Southern Levant lation on the lower part of the wavy band of (Tell el–Far˓ah [South]: →Baal 16*; Tell the upper pedestal rules out an interpretation eṣ–Ṣafi: 2; Lachish: →Baal 6*; Tell Deir of mountains. YON (1991: 298) identified ˓Alla: →Baal 7) dating to the 13th–11th the wavy band as mountains and the wavy cent. line as water, while WILLIAMS–FORTE IV. Conclusion. The Ugaritic texts 1983: 30 suggested that the two wavy sym- and the related iconographic tradition sug- bols could also be serpents. For FENTON a gest that Y. was visualized as a serpent. serpentine interpretation of the upper wavy Indications that Y. could also have been band is unconvincing, citing the “most un- represented symbolically as water are in- serpentine” (1996: 57) head and dismissing conclusive (see § II.1.B). Against the back- the proposed serpent as a product of the ground of the well–known struggle between imagination. Y. and Baal of the Ugaritic texts, it is Most likely the wavy symbols are to be somewhat surprising that this mythonem is interpreted as water. Their role on the Baal only known iconographically from Egyp- stela cannot be interpreted clearly due to the tian-influenced scarabs of the mid–13th– lack of unique functional markers (see DU- 11th cent. from the Southern Levant RAND 1993: 56). PARROT (1957: 54f) sug- (→Baal 6*–7, 16*–17). Not surprisingly, gested a literal identification with the Oron- Seth can therefore also be represented as tes and Litani rivers. YON (1991: 298) asso- killing the Asiatic horned serpent instead of ciated the wavy symbols with Baal as god the Egyptian Apophis serpent (1*–2), since of fertility by referring to KTU 1.101:1–2 there is considerable overlap between the (see PARDEE 1988: 132–134), as did HILL- two in this period. The dependency of the MANN (1965: 49) in interpreting them as Ugaritic conflict between the storm god and “Baalistic water,” which promises fertility. the sea on older Syrian traditions is evi- Other options include a reference to the denced by literary hints, but also by icono- subdued god Y. (see CASSUTO 1954: col. graphic representations of the Syrian storm 284; BORDREUIL/PARDEE 1993: 68) or, god Hadad fighting a serpent, although there more generally, the chaotic powers of water is variation in the killing of the serpent. (see also in this connection the undulating serpent in UEHLINGER 1990: 516, fig. 1). V. Catalogue A large decorated lapis lazuli cylinder 1* Scarab, enstatite, 20.4 x 15.2 x 8.8 mm, 1250–1000, Brussels, Musées Royaux, E 7036b. KEEL 1990: 309f, pl. 17:4 (kunukku) from the treasury find at the 2 Cylinder seal, steatite, 25 x 5 mm, Tell eṣ–Ṣafi, c. 1300– Esagil, →Marduk’s temple at Babylon, 1100. GIVEON 1978: 97f with fig. 49; KEEL 1990: 310f with fig. dating to the mid–9th cent. (WETZEL et al. 82 1957: 37, pl. 43f) represents a counterpart to Jürg Eggler the iconographic topic under discussion here. LAMBERT (1985a: 90) suggested that the wavy lines below the →mushhushshu and standing Marduk (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marduk) al- lude to “his [Marduk’s] victory over the Sea (Tiāmat).” By referring to the victory over the sea, LAMBERT avoided an outright per- sonification of the wavy lines with →Tiamat since their semantic field cannot be narrowed down only to the deity.
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