The Sumerian World (Routledge Worlds)

Mar lies Heinz

Figure 9.1 City map of Uruk (source: M. Heinz)

The Eanna: its functions

There is no contemporary written evidence at hand when it comes to the consideration
of what functions the Eanna and its buildings had. It is the size of the buildings, the
material and human resources necessary to build the ensemble, the overall planning,
the spacious design of the precinct and the central and visible location of Eanna in the
middle of the urban area of Uruk that makes the function of the structures as public
buildings more than likely and their creation on behalf of a powerful elite plausible.
The more specific functional allocation, the designation of the precinct as a cultic
district follows more or less descriptions in later Sumerian texts. These denote Eanna
as the holy realm of the city goddess of Uruk, Inanna (Mittermayer 2009; Sallaberger
1999). A symbol showing the so-called ‘Schilfringbundel’, is also thought to represent
the goddess Inanna. Appropriate representations have been found on the seal impres­
sions discovered in the context of the Uruk VI—IV buildings (Boehmer 1999). The
designation then of the largest buildings in this cultic district, the standardised
tripartite buildings, as temples’ was the next 'logical’ step in the analysis, that allocates
the most important function, that of the temple, to those buildings that had required
the highest building effort and costs.

The Eanna and its builders - or, who needed the public architecture of the Eanna?

The interpretation of the architectural record, the texts and the representations thus
implicitly assumes a certain functional, socio-political and cultural order in Uruk:
namely, the creation of Eanna for mainly religious reasons, the dominance of the

Level M)

Level iva

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