A small marble cylinder seal from the Akkadian period, roughly 2340 to 2200 BCE, engraved with an intercession scene: the god of the freshwater abyss, Enki, known in Akkadian as Ea, shown with streams of water and attended by a heroic figure. His two-faced vizier Usmu leads a personal protective goddess before the worshipper who commissioned the seal, a standard composition of the period in which a minor deity intercedes with a greater one on a mortal's behalf. The seal entered the Louvre's Department of Near Eastern Antiquities in 1880, inventory number MNB 1905, and is now held in Room 228. Enki is one of the oldest and most consistently attested deities of the Mesopotamian pantheon, god of wisdom, freshwater and crafts, and this seal is a characteristic example of how his cult was invoked in the personal devotional glyptic art of the period.
Facts
Subject Matter
Devotional FunctionA seal of this kind did religious work inside an entirely secular transaction: rolled across the wet clay of a contract, receipt or container closure to authenticate it, it embedded its owner's personal statement of devotion to Enki inside the routine economic and legal paperwork of daily Akkadian life, so that invoking the god's protection happened every time the seal was put to its ordinary administrative use. 1 Cross-Tradition Connections
Associated With
This source names Akkadian directly: "A small marble cylinder seal from the Akkadian period, roughly 2340 to 2200 BCE, engraved with an intercession scene: the god of the freshwater abyss, Enki, known in Akkadian as Ea, shown with..."
Belongs to Tradition
Depicts
Enki, Deities The seal's central deity, named directly in the Louvre's own catalogue description as the god of the waters (Ea/Enki) and confirmed by the object's Commons file title.
Sources
1. Cylinder Seal Intercession Scene MNB 1905, Museum Record (Musee du Louvre)
Cylinder Seal MNB 1905, Structured Record (Wikidata)
WikidataDepicts: EnkiQuote, Depicts: Enki
Cylinder seal, inventory MNB 1905, Akkad period, marble, Department of Near Eastern Antiquities, Musee du Louvre, Room 228, purchased 1880.
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