meant to accompany kings and queens to the aft erlife: jewelry
in gold, lapis lazuli, carnelian, and other semiprecious stones;
gold and silver crowns and other personal adornments; bowls
of alabaster and silver; and thousands of cylinder seals. Th e
fabulous Great Lyre found at Ur is made of bitumen and lapis
lazuli, and it displays the head of a bearded bull cast from a
large mass of solid gold.
Th e cylinder seal emerged during this time as a practi-
cal tool as well as an important artistic medium. A seal was
a small, carved cylinder that could be rolled across a wet clay
tablet or sheet of papyrus to show possession or to record a
document or transaction. A seal was made of stone, fi red clay,
bone, or ivory; when rolled across a document, it left a long
rectangular impression showing a simple geometric design,
banqueting scene, religious symbols, or a god or gods in a
variety of aspects and poses.
Artists of the Early Dynastic Period that followed Uruk
worked in a familiar style in their statuary, paintings, and
cylinder seals. Statuettes from a temple site at Tell Asmar
were given very large eyes, which were originally inlaid with
semiprecious stones; the eyes symbolized fervent devotion of
ordinary worshippers to the god of the temple. Square stone
plaques attached to the temple walls showed banquet scenes
in bas-relief. Historical scenes of battle and victory were
carved into stelae, freestanding blocks of stone that carried
inscriptions, proclamations, or human fi gures. Sculptors also
carved portraits in stone of kings, scribes, and administra-
tors, each with individual expressions and features.
King Gilgamesh of Uruk, who reigned in Sumer around
2500 b.c.e., became the central hero of the Epic of Gilgamesh,
a poem of 3,000 lines that survives as one of the world’s
oldest works of literature. For the next two millennia the
Gilgamesh epic provided artists of the region abundant sub-
ject matter in their sculpture, paintings, and cylinder seals.
AKKAD AND BABYLON
The conquest of Mesopotamia by King Sargon in 2340
b.c.e. established the Akkadian Dynasty. Sumerian cities
declined in importance as Sargon united the northern and
southern regions of Mesopotamia for the first time. The art
of Mesopotamia also underwent important changes. Hu-
mans and animals gained prominence by being set against
plain backgrounds, rather than serving as simply another
useful motif in a repeating pattern. Seal and jewelry en-
gravers showed much greater skill in bringing out realistic
features of the head, face, and body and in depicting life-
like emotions. The stelae and bas-reliefs of the Akkadian
Dynasty honored the achievements of their kings, who are
shown engaging in battle, taking prisoners, and driving
their enemies from the field. Artists began using diorite,
an extremely hard gray stone that could be polished to a
glossy sheen, for their monumental sculptures. Akkadian
metalsmiths skillfully cast sculpture and vases in silver,
copper, and gold, and they created ceremonial weapons
and tools that carried symbols of the ruler and the gods.
Human-headed winged bull from the palace of King Sargon II
(721–705 b.c.e.) at the Assyrian capital Dur-Sharrukin (modern-day
Khorsabad, Iraq) (Courtesy of the Oriental Institute of the University
of Chicago)art: The Middle East 99The Kassite Dynasty that rose in the 16th century b.c.e. is
best known for a series of kudurrus, or boundary stones,
which became an important medium for commemorative
inscriptions and in which the figures of the gods were re-
placed by familiar emblems.
Th e fall of Akkad ushered in a period of weak political
control but important artistic advances in Mesopotamia.
Artists mastered the human form, rendering movement
with great realism and decorating the body with elaborately
designed and draped clothing. Th e reign of Hammurabi of
Babylon, which lasted from 1792 to 1750 b.c.e., left as its
most enduring monument a code of laws carved into a tall,
diorite stele, which as both a social and artistic artifact has
become the most famous single work of ancient Mesopota-
mian art. In the Stele of Hammurabi, the king stands before
the sun god, who presents a ring and staff to the king as
symbols of his sovereignty. French archaeologists unearthed
the stele at Susa, in what is now Persia, where the ancient
Elamites had taken it aft er the conquest of Babylon in the
12th century b.c.e.ASSYRIA
As Babylon grew weaker, the realm of Assyria rose in
northern Mesopotamia and spread its authority over the
mountains of Asia Minor and the valleys of the Tigris and
Euphrates. Th e kings of Assyria ordered the carving of enor-
mous bas-reliefs to celebrate their military victories and