Ishtar Gate

Ishtar Gate

ca. 575 BCE

1719

Single Built Works

Iraq (nation)

Babylon (deserted settlement)

Neo-Babylonian

city gates

View of the Ishtar Gate, reconstructed at the Pergamon Museum in Berlin, Germany. "The Ishtar Gate is named so, because it was dedicated to the Babylonian goddess Ishtar, although Nebuchadnezzar pays homage to other Babylonian deities through various animal representations. The animals represented on the gate are young bulls (aurochs), lions, and dragons (sirrush). These animals are symbolic representations of certain deities: lions are often associated with Ishtar, bulls with Adad, and dragons with Marduk. Respectively, Ishtar was a goddess of fertility, love, war, and sex, Adad was a weather god, and Marduk was the chief or national god of Babylon ... The front of the gate is adorned with glazed bricks with alternating rows of dragons and bulls. The beasts are furnished in yellow and brown tiles, while the bricks surrounding them are blue. The blue enameled tiles are thought to be of lapis lazuli, but there is some debate to this conjecture. The gates measured more than 38 feet (11.5 m) high with a vast antechamber on the southern side,"--Ancient History Encyclopedia.

ca. 38 feet high

jpeg

©2013 Lawrence Technological University. These images may be used for personal or educational purposes. They are not available for commercial purposes without the explicit permission of LTU.

A1BABAB1-2575BE26A1