Etemenanki

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Etemenanki, "The temple of the creation of heaven and earth", was the name of a ziggurat to Marduk in the city of Babylon of the 6th century BC Chaldean (Neo-Babylonian) dynasty. Originally seven stories in height, little remains of it now save ruins. Etemenanki was later popularly identified with the Tower of Babel.

Construction

It is unclear exactly when the Etemenanki was first built, but it was probably in existence before the reign of Hammurabi (1792-1750 BC middle chronology). It is thought that the Babylonian creation poem Enûma Elish was written during or shortly after Hammurabi's reign; since the poem mentions Esaggila, the Temple of Marduk, being created immediately after the creation of the world, and implies the existence of the Etemenanki, both structures are presumed to have existed for at least 100 years by the time the poem was written, so as to have been around long enough for the authors of the poem to have been unaware of when they were actually built.

The city of Babylon had been destroyed in 689 BC by Sennacherib, who claims to have destroyed the Etemenanki. The city was restored by Nabopolassar and his son Nebuchadnezzar II. It took 88 years to rebuild. Its central feature was the temple of Marduk (Esagila), to which the Etemenanki ziggurat was associated. The ziggurat was rebuilt by Nebuchadnezzar II. The seven stories of the ziggurat reached a height of 91 meters, and contained a temple shrine at the top.

Descriptions

The Etemenanki is described in a cuneiform tablet from Uruk from 229 BC, a copy of an older text (now in the Louvre in Paris). It gives the height of the tower as seven stocks (91 meters) with a base of 91 meters square. This mud brick structure was confirmed by excavations conducted by Robert Koldewey after 1913. Large stairs were discovered at the south side of the building, where a triple gate connected it with the Esagila. A larger gate to the east connected the Etemenanki with the sacred procession road (now reconstructed in the Pergamon museum in Berlin).

External links

[Etemenanki (The tower of Babel)] by Jona Lendering
[Goro Adachi's Etemenanki] Where Imagination And Reality Unite

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