CHAPTER XXVIII. 
GOD WITH FOOT ON VICTIM. 
Among the cylinders of an early period, we considered in Chapter 1x those 
which show us a Sun-god, probably Nergal, assaulting an enemy and pushing him 
against a mountain. We recognized in him Nergal, as the hot sun driving away the 
clouds. Perhaps too closely connected with that mythologic design to be radically 
separated from it are the cylinders now to be considered. ‘They give us a god with 
his foot on a prostrate naked enemy lying on his back and lifting his hand in fear 
and petition. The god is bearded and wears a short garment, girded about his 
middle, which leaves his legs exposed. In one hand he carries a sheaf of weapons 
which radiate and end in some sort of protuberance. ‘They might be considered as 
clubs, or sometimes arrows, but more likely they were not meant for any particular 
sort of weapon, but rather to indicate the hundredfold weapon which gods some- 
times carried. ‘The other hand is raised to smite, and holds a weapon, such as a 
scimitar. The god does not wear the two-horned or several-horned turban, but 
a simpler turban with the band about the bottom. Unlike the god considered in 
Chapter 1x, who seemed to be an early form of such a god as Nergal, this god 
wears the short garment, such as we shall see worn by Ramman, or Adad. These 
cylinders belong to the Middle Babylonian Empire. 


— 







Je, & 
MME es 
——— 

A characteristic example is seen in fig. 446. Here the sheaf of weapons looks 
somewhat like clubs. Facing the god is a second god, perhaps, clad in precisely 
the same way, in the attitude of Ramman, except that the hand to his breast holds 
no rod or scepter, and the hand behind him holds downward the scimitar. ‘This 
figure is duplicated behind the filiary inscription, which seems to suggest that it is 
not a god. We remember that the god usually holding this attitude and weapon 
wears a long garment. The fact that he is accompanied by an attendant carrying 
a pail and vase also seems to support the conclusion that it is a human figure and 
not a god. But the attitude of dignity rather befits the god, and in the next figure 
we have what seems certainly Marduk occupying the same relative position. Why 
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