Near Eastern Alabaster Plaque with an image of ritual worship

Culture : CultureDimensions : H: 39.5 cm

Price : POR
Provenance :

Ex Elie Bustros Collection, Beirut, 1950s-1960s.

Conditions : Complete and virtually intact plaque, except for minor chips on the edges (three
corners). Back surface roughly flattened and very slightly rounded. The plaque is a few
centimeters thick, with straight edges, as if it was designed to be inserted in a wall, although
there are no traces of tenons. Trunconical in shape, it tapers towards the upper part.

Description

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The plaque is a few centimeters thick, with straight edges, as if it was designed to be inserted in
a wall,although there are no traces of tenons. Trunconical in shape, it tapers towards the upper
part. The front is largely covered with incisions representing a series of geometric, architectural
and figural patterns that are also attested in other contemporary Near Eastern monuments.

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Near Eastern Alabaster Plaque with an image of ritual worship

The decoration is composed thus: a) framing the plaque at the top and bottom are friezes of
linear motifs (zigzags, hatched triangles, net patterns); b) the central part is occupied by what
looks like a simplified human face (which would be female, considering the presence of the
incised pubic triangle between the netting and the hatched triangles), with the eyes represented
by five concentric circles and surmounted by brows, a vertical line and two concentric circles
respectively representing the nose and the mouth (one could also suggest that the eye circles
represent the breasts and the mouth circles the navel, so the panel would depict a female body
with a strongly accentuated sexual nature); c) there are three elements pertaining to ritual
worship, namely the three-floored symmetrical rectangular buildings with ornate doors and
lintels, the frieze of nine eye idols of a type well documented throughout the Near East (their
shape recalls the figurines first discovered at Tell Brak, in the so-called Eye Temple) and the
four simplified plant branches (vertical stems with herringbone motifs) placed around the pubic
area and on the first floor of the buildings. It is currently not possible to determine the exact
iconographic meaning of the stele, although it is no doubt closely linked to the religious and
ritualistic sphere. This work has a close parallel in a plaque of the same type and shape,
excavated at Mari, decorated with incisions similar not only in their structure, but also in their
general theme; there are the same geometric decorations framing the scene, the same type of
face and female body, the presence of a central image linked to ritual worship (plant stems,
deer whose presence near the female pubis would represent the masculine principle).

The stele from Mari, uncovered in 1997 beneath an altar dedicated to the Sumerian mother
goddess Ninhursag (ca. 2300 B.C.), was in a grave (called favissa) in which were deposited
ritualistic objects from an ancient shrine to the goddess; it would certainly be dated earlier than
the altar, at the beginning of the 3rd millennium B.C., like our example. It is noteworthy,
however, that our stele features a more rigid and symmetrical decorative structure, with a larger
number of incised motifs and fewer empty areas.

The evocation of the stylized female body, with the obvious emphasis on its sexual nature
(according to a typology that refers to the iconography of Aegean, Anatolian and Levantine
sculpture of the Early Bronze Age, rather than to the Mesopotamian models), is very probably
connected to beliefs regarding fertility; the plant branches would have to be interpreted in the
same context. The image of the eye was an important symbol in the ancient Near East.
Although their exact significance is still debatable, eye idols like those carved on this stele -
schematic figures formed of a simple trapezoidal plaque imitating a human body, with the highly
stylized head reduced to a large pair of flat wide eyes above a thick neck - were supposed to
have a religious function; it is thought that their huge eyes echoed the wonder of the faithful at
all things sacred or at the apparition of the deity, or even that they might embody supernatural
beings appearing through the eyes. The two constructions that frame the face/female body are
placed on a flat ground which, reinforced by a frieze of zigzags, clearly divides the upper and
lower parts of the plaque; the appearance of each floor of these buildings recalls the facades of

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Near Eastern Alabaster Plaque with an image of ritual worship

temples in scenes engraved on contemporary cylinder seals. One may therefore conclude that
they were religious rather than civilian buildings. No detail differentiates one fl oor from another,
except their size; there is no trace of a shrine, of a cult statue or of an altar (the only remarkable
elements are the plant branches located on the roofs of the first level). The presence of three
stacked levels is certainly the most important element of this panel, given that practically no
multi-fl oored religious building is documented in the architectural iconography of glyptics
(whereas multi-floored constructions are attested by some models in the 3rd millennium B.C.);
here, one would imagine that the size and proportions of the support influenced the choice of
the sculptor.

The fact that two identical buildings are visible on the left and right is also enigmatic, since it is
not clear whether they are two separate buildings or a simple iconographic convention meant to
respect the symmetry of the scene. The association of religious architecture with a large-eyed
mask is also attested in glyptics through a Predynastic cylinder seal from Khafajah (Temple of
Shara), on which, below a curved line, can be seen the facade of a temple (or altar?); above the
line, there are plant elements (three rosettes) and, symmetrical to the building, a face with two
wide open eyes, brows, nose and small mouth. Like its parallel from Mari, this stele has a very
elaborate iconography, which combines on a reduced surface several symbols related to the
Near Eastern religious beliefs of the late Neolithic and early Bronze Age. It can therefore be
imagined that this object was intended for a cult use, the functioning of which is currently
unknown.

Bibliography

On the stele from Mari, see:

ARUZ J. (ed.), Art of the First Cities: The Third Millennium B.C. from the Mediterranean to the
Indus, New York, 2003, p. 163, no. 106.
FORTIN M., Syrie: Terre de civilisations, Montreal, 1999, p. 284, no. 295.

On "eye idols" and their meanings, see:

BRENIQUET C., Du fi l retordre: Rflexions sur les "idoles aux yeux" et les fileuses de
l'poque d'Uruk, in GASCHE H. and HROUDA
B., Collectanea orientalia: Histoire, arts de l'espace et industrie de la terre, Neuchtel-Paris,
1996, pp. 31-53.
CAUBET A., Des idoles et des lunettes, in Syria, 83, 2006, pp. 177-181.

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Near Eastern Alabaster Plaque with an image of ritual worship

On architectural iconography, see:

AMIET P., La glyptique msopotamienne archaque, Paris, 1980, pp. 89-92; pp. 99-100, no.
681, pl. 48 (cylinder seal from Khafajah).
HEINRICH E., Bauwerke in der altsumerischen Bildkunst, Wiesbaden, 1957, pp. 69 ff.
MARGUERON J., Iconographie et architecture dans la Msopotamie du IIIe millnaire av. J.-C.,
in SIEBERT G. (ed.), Mthodologie iconographique: Actes du colloque de Strasbourg, 27-28
avril 1979, Strasbourg, 1981, pp. 11-30.

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