Scientific Superstitions

The ancient Mesopotamian culture, especially in the Assyrian Empire, as illustrated by Zainab Bahrani in Rituals of War, appeared to have placed high values in interpretations of signs from gods. The first chapter introduces the reader to the meaning of the king’s head in wall inscriptions. Later in the book we see many more examples of how Assyrians interpreted signs from bodies (human or animal), dreams, body organs, or any empirical occurrences. Extispicy and hepatoscopy were two ways that the Assyrians employed to read these omens.

What was quite fascinating in reading this book, especially Chapter 3 of it, was when Bahrani points out that these “superstitions” were, to the people during that time, their facts. Bahrani suggests that the popular paradigm that people followed was that of a cause and effect. That is, any observation made would imply a consequence. The omens that were followed in this period at first appear to be quite amusing to read most probably because some of them were overly absurd. For instance, there was a condition when “entrails resemble the head of Humbaba.” They also interpreted dreams in a rather arbitrary way, as it does not seem logical to correlate someone eating dog’s meat with a city’s rebellion, for example.

However, reading through the chapter, I found these relations to be quite interesting because without the presence of physical sciences that have accumulated over the centuries (or even millennia) as we do today, those observations and relations that they made were technically their “sciences.” In fact, Bahrani also quotes some results from a veterinarian that could support the correlations of these “causes” and “effects” as it is easily comprehensible that livers or entrails of animals would reveal the characteristics of the environment. Moreover, these omens probably came from repetitions of certain situations, and the people recorded the number of occurrences and summarized the data. This technique of observation is the fundamental of science today.

War for an omen? A statue?

Chapter 3 of the Rituals of War examined the role of body parts in Babyloniam divination. Those who can read the signs on a body, such as in hepatoscopy or extispicy, held much power in society. The Babylonian baru priests were often consulted in military decitions. The way Bahrani depicted how much ancient Mesopotamians believed in omens was almost too fantastic though. Did the government often take heed of the omens or make political decisions based on the omens? Or were omens a form of ideological power the government used to justify their actions? In other words, did the government listen to the priests or did the priests say what the government wanted them to say? The priests also held government positions, so the government may have been using the omens for their own gain.

Chapter 6 of the Rituals of War examined the destruction and removal of the enemy’s public monuments. According to Bahrani, “war was fought at the level of monuments as much as land and natural and economic”. She claims that some wars were fought specifically for images and acquiring public monuments. This statement is somewhat too bold. Although public monuments do indeed hold great meaning for its residents, it is hard to believe that a war can be launched for the sole purpose of the monument. It is like the Trojan War, launched for the sole purpose of a female. Perhaps, the morale of the people would be diminished by the loss the statue, and thus the leaders of the state decide that the only a war can boost morale. A even more likely explanation is that by the time the enemy has taken the gods’ statue, the ultimate insult, the relation between the two states had already become very hostile.

Bahrani also parallels the removal of public monuments with the deportation and relocation of conquered peoples. It is questionable whether or not these two practices can be connected together. However, it is understandable that the effect of these two practices is punishing and marginalizing specific groups of people.

Divine signs and Scientific Relevance

Ronak Patel

Near Eastern Studies R1B

Response Paper; Rituals of War (Ch.3 and Ch.6)

Chapter 3 of Zainab Bahrani’s book, Rituals of War, dealt with the relationship between the body and divination, while chapter 6 of the book dealt with the different types of art forms and statues that were relevant to war. Something I found very interesting was the claim that there is a possibility that divinatory signs characterized by exticipacy were somehow scientifically relevant (Bahrani 85). I believe the scientific relevance of divinatory signs was an unintended consequence of the practice instead of being its purpose.

Bahrani mentions that “historical omens read conditions that had been previously observed” and considered significant (86). This means that any initial observations of the slaughtered animal made by oracles would be considered accurate without question. There is no reason to believe that these initial observations were based on any scientific inquiries, but instead could have been a mere coincidence.

Bahrani also goes on to say that “omen’s logic seems to derive from homonyms or synonyms” (87). This means odd relations made by individual oracles’ imaginations played a role in deciphering the meaning of different signs. There is no scientific premise on which these logical homonyms or synonyms are derived from so placing it in the context of scientific relevance would be a mistake.

At the same time the specificity of some of the earlier omens (Bahrani 86), make it seem very unlikely that the deciphering of the signs had a scientific basis. For example, “If the entire liver is anomalous: omen of the king of Akkad regarding catastrophe” (Bahrani 86). This situation is very specific to the king of Akkad, but there is no evidence of what this phenomenon would mean if it dealt with the king of another state. There is no reason to believe this much specificity could be scientifically based.

The basis of deciphering the omens is not known, but there is not very much evidence to prove that it is scientifically based. The entire system could have been based by spontaneous events that led to the need to justify the reasoning for the greater understanding of the population.

The Importance of Monuments in Mesopotamian Warfare

According to Bahrani, many wars in Mesopotamia were "fought at the level of monuments as much as land and natural and economic resources." This motivation for war has not been looked at by any of the other historians we have looked at all semester; resources and power were the motivations that they cited. In chapter 6, Bahrani talks about how the capture, mutilation, and public display of monuments in Mesopotamian wars displayed one Kingdom's victory over another. One example of this was how some armies would destroy a cities' records. In ancient Mesopotamia, much weight was kept on record keeping, and it would be a huge blow for a city for their records to be destroyed.

However, I do not see how the capture of another city's records and monuments can be separated from the other motivations. By capturing them, isn't the king still showing off his power and strength to his people as well as his enemies? For example, with the code of Hammurabi, the Elamite army took the stela to show off the kings wisdom and valor. The same can be argued with the capture of deities and cult statues. The deities were not "harmed" when they were taken from enemy cities, but they were kept by the enemy. The city who had lost the deity would then be left helpless and powerless. The deities were like prisoners of war, and by taking them, it would seem as a way that a kingdom could assert their superiority over others.

Different Motivations

In the “Rituals of War,” Bahrani talks about how there are certain way things were carried out in Ancient Mesopotamian warfare. From the ways the of starting warfare through divine signs in animals and in nature to the ways war were fought. The reasons why the wars were fought in such manner, according to Bahrani, were for cultural assimilation rather than for land or resource reasons. Therefore wars were not out of desperation or for a strong intent as a war for resources would carry more weight than say an acquisition of a monument. It is an interesting perception of warfare since the later empires would utilize warfare for resources and land. The Mesopotamians didn't need to expand their territories, so warfare was more of an act of stealing than a display of power. What was the point of warfare and why was it such a big deal to look for signs and use deportation as a tactical means?
If Bahrani says that warfare was for the sole purpose of gaining monuments and temples, and yet they performed rituals of finding signs and deporting the enemies, then it shows the importance the Mesopotamians placed on warfare and the need to assimilate their culture. Hence the value placed on taking enemy monuments brings the question of how important it is to do such things. It implies that abducting other kingdom's monuments and sort was more important than to increase land size or take over resources, which would make more sense considering that kings would want to expand their territories to obtain more resources. However, the impact of religion and divinity overrules any earthly gains, which would explain the shift from resources to culture.
The impact that deities had on the Mesopotamian altered the modern view of conquest in seeking resources. But rather it has become so that the attaining of monuments was more dominant. They went all out in warfare from the prewar rituals and then the scattering of populations so that they can be known, not for their desires for resources and land, but for their monuments and culture. Bahrani claims that the Mesopotamian sought after monuments shows the kind of emphasis they placed in warfare for cultural assimilation.

Some Costs to Human Booty

In the sixth chapter of Zainab Bahrani’s book entitled Rituals of War, she points out that one of the war tactics that Mesopotamian empires utilized, especially the Assyrians, was the collection of human beings. Not only did victorious kings proudly display severed heads at the gates of conquered cities, but they also acquired people and incorporated them into their inventories of booty. These acquired “citizens” were essentially in the same boat as inanimate objects of material wealth. By deporting these people from their homelands, Assyrian kings were able to terrorize these people into subjugation, as well as to expand the empire’s control territorially. Although Bahrani claims that having this mass of newly acquired people was beneficial for the kingdom, there might be some reason to believe that this practice wasn’t as safe-proof as she makes it out to be.

Firstly, although it is true that the empire gained a “means of increasing the army’s numbers [and] laborers … for construction” (180), I can’t help but think of the extra funds that the empire needed to put in to not only transport this bulk of people to a new country, but also to keep them “healthy and well fed” (179). After all, these people were not regarded as slaves, for they didn’t “march [around] in shackles as prisoners” (179), but were pretty much deemed citizens who were “treated in the same way as the local population” (180). The cost of maintaining this new populace must have been some burden to the kingdom. Also, keeping in mind that the power of Mesopotamia was constantly shifting hands, I wonder whether sometimes this practice was pointless due to the need to transport these people once again.

On a side note, I question the practice of making some of these new citizens into “the king’s personal bodyguards” (180). Even though there might not have been a documented case of betrayal, I’m alarmed at the notion that a king would entrust a deportee of a conquered nation to serve as one of his protectors. If anything, I would think that having a deportee in a king’s trusted circle would grant opportunity for him to strike the king when he least expects it.

Representation of the Human Body

The human body is presented as something sacred and significant throughout Chapter 3. The Mesopotamians believed that the body was covered in signs and symbols that could be read and interpreted for mysticism. The interesting thing is that every single person's body was covered in symbolism and could be analyzed for signs. “The total organic body was seen as a text” that could be read (76). Mysticism as a whole was huge for the Mesopotamian people, and there were a lot of prophecies that revolved around the body and dreams etc. For example, there is a prophecy that said if a man dreams about a friend eating his face, he will “enjoy a large share” (93). There were many more about dreaming of eating flesh belonging to different acquaintances etc, which begs the question: did people dream about eating each other a lot? Did they actually eat each other? It seems quite strange to have so many predictions revolving around that if it wasn’t even significant to them.

To read about how important the physical body was to the Mesopotamians makes it seem like everyone had value in the culture. This including the servants and the peasants in addition to the royalty and wealthy people. However, in Chapter 6 the book discusses the practices of war. Battle and conflict revolved mainly on trying to capture and steal another region’s god in order to defeat them. This tactic made sense because of the value and life that the statues and images were believed to have. However, when a region was defeated and a god was stolen, the people were deported by the Assyrians and counted in the “booty”. They were counted as inanimate objects and treated as if they were just things. Compared to the view of the times in regards to the significance of the human body, this surprised me. They weren’t treated as significant human beings and bodies that were important for divination, but were treated as cattle or coin. Therefore, it is surprising that they were treated this way as it does not respect the traditions and divinatory beliefs.