DEITIES OF AGRICULTURE. 137 
goddess stands before him, and both are embowered in wheat. Besides the two 
we have the goddess Ishtar with weapons from her shoulders, a worshiper with 
a goat, a female figure with a spouting vase, an altar, and a rampant goat between 
the agricultural deities. ‘There is also the inscription giving the name of “ Ili-ugum, 
the Scribe.” ‘The lion’s robe is so extraordinary, indeed so like the robe of Hercules, 
that one is inclined to raise a question as to whether this cylinder has not been 
somewhat reworked. ‘The bow is unusual, but we see it on the Expedition cylinder, 
fig. 390; and the weapons of Ishtar and the inscription seem genuine. This cylinder 
is from the collection of the late Lord Southesk. 
A male deity with the same emblems would preferably be Ningirsu. Indeed 
Ningirsu, under the name of Shul-gur, “Heap of Corn,” was an agricultural deity 
and was also identified with Tammuz under one of the Protean forms of the latter 
god (Jastrow, “Religion,” p. 58; Sayce, “Religion,” p. 350), while Bau provides 
“abundance” for tillers of the soil. 
The sixth sign in the zodiac was designated, at least in the Seleucid times, 
by a word meaning “ear of wheat” (Jensen, “ Kosmologie,” pp. 311, 312); and 
Jensen says that doubtless the Greek ears of corn in the hand of Virgo go back to 
this designation of the sign as “ Ear of Wheat.”’ The representation of the goddess 
with the ear of wheat on the cylinders proves that the Greek design has its relation 
with a very early period in Babylonian religion. And yet it is far from certain that 
this goddess is not Nisabu, daughter of Anu and sister of Bel. She was much 
worshiped by Lugal-zaggisi at an extremely early period, and was especially a 
deity devoted to fertility and grain. In an inscription by Scheil in the Orientalische 
Literaturzeitung, July, 1904, p. 256, is given an inscription in honor of Nisabu, 
on a large terra-cotta vessel which may have been intended for grain. She is 
described as the gracious Lady beloved of Anu, who rules the fruitfulness of the 
land, who has innumerable wombs and nipples, and eighteen ears. She is the great 
Scribe of Anu and the great sister of Enlil. It is interesting to know that a goddess 
should be a scribe; but, as Scheil says, agriculture was the mother of letters, for 
it was the abundance of the grain and fruits that created property and trade and 
made letters and records necessary to protect property. It is not strange that a 
goddess of wheat should also be the goddess of letters and herself the scribe of the 
gods. We know in Babylonian times of a woman scribe, Amat-bawu. Barton in 
his “A Sketch of Semitic Origins,” p. 218, makes Nidaba a goddess and patron 
of agriculture. 
