White Temple site plan

White Temple site plan

3200-3000 BCE

October 21, 2014

1230

orthographic projections (images)

Iraq (nation)

Warka (ruins)

Sumerian

temples (buildings)

ziggurats

site plans

Site plan for the White Temple and ziggurat at Warka in Iraq. "Like other early cities, Uruk was associated with a particular deity, in its case Anu, the chief deity of the Sumerians and god of the sky. Across Mesopotamia, temples dedicated to these divine guardians often formed the center of the urban landscape. Although access to the temples was generally restricted, mountainous, stepped platforms called ziggurats made them available for all to see ... Rising some forty feet above ground level, the ziggurat would have lifted the temple above the city’s fortification wall, supposedly constructed on the orders of Gilgamesh, the eponymous protagonist of the epic tale and legendary king of ancient Uruk (reigned ca. 2700 BCE). The grandeur of monuments like this one, as well as their ubiquity and centrality, suggests the profound role that religion played in the earliest urban experiences,"--Annenberg Foundation, Annenberg Learner website.
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