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Ugarit (; uga, 𐎜𐎂𐎗𐎚, ''ʾUgarītu''; ar, أُوغَارِيت ''Ūġārīt'' or ''Ūǧārīt'') was an ancient port city in northern
Syria Syria ( ar, سُورِيَا or سُورِيَة, translit=Sūriyā), officially the Syrian Arab Republic ( ar, الجمهورية العربية السورية, al-Jumhūrīyah al-ʻArabīyah as-Sūrīyah), is a Western Asian country loc ...
, in the outskirts of modern
Latakia , coordinates = , elevation_footnotes = , elevation_m = 11 , elevation_ft = , postal_code_type = , postal_code = , area_code = Country code: 963 City code: 41 , geocode ...
, discovered by accident in 1928 together with the Ugaritic texts. Its ruins are often called Ras Shamra, literally "Cape Fennel"). Se

after the headland where they lie. Ugarit had close connections to the Hittite Empire, sent tribute to Egypt at times, and maintained trade and diplomatic connections with Cyprus (then called Alashiya), documented in the archives recovered from the site and corroborated by Mycenaean and Cypriot pottery found there. The polity was at its height from c. 1450 BC until its destruction in c. 1185 BC; this destruction was possibly caused by the purported Sea Peoples or internal struggle. The kingdom would be one of the many dismantled during the Bronze Age Collapse.


History

Ras Shamra lies on the Mediterranean coast, some north of
Latakia , coordinates = , elevation_footnotes = , elevation_m = 11 , elevation_ft = , postal_code_type = , postal_code = , area_code = Country code: 963 City code: 41 , geocode ...
, near modern
Burj al-Qasab Burj al-Qasab ( ar, برج القصب) is a town in northwestern Syria, administratively part of the Latakia Governorate, located north of Latakia close to Ras Ibn Hani. Nearby localities include Al-Shamiyah and Burj Islam to the north, Kirsana ...
.


Origins and the second millennium

Neolithic Ugarit was important enough to be fortified with a wall early on, perhaps by 6000 BC, though the site is thought to have been inhabited earlier. Ugarit was important perhaps because it was both a port and at the entrance of the inland trade route to the
Euphrates The Euphrates () is the longest and one of the most historically important rivers of Western Asia. Tigris–Euphrates river system, Together with the Tigris, it is one of the two defining rivers of Mesopotamia ( ''the land between the rivers'') ...
and Tigris lands. The city reached its heyday between 1800 and 1200 BC, when it ruled a trade-based coastal kingdom, trading with Egypt, Cyprus, the Aegean, Syria, the Hittites, and much of the eastern Mediterranean. The first written evidence mentioning the city comes from the nearby city of Ebla, c. 1800 BC. Ugarit passed into the sphere of influence of Egypt, which deeply influenced its art. Evidence of the earliest Ugaritic contact with Egypt (and the first exact dating of Ugaritic civilization) comes from a carnelian bead identified with the Middle Kingdom pharaoh Senusret I, 1971–1926 BC. A stela and a statuette from the Egyptian pharaohs Senusret III and
Amenemhet III :''See Amenemhat, for other individuals with this name.'' Amenemhat III ( Ancient Egyptian: ''Ỉmn-m-hꜣt'' meaning 'Amun is at the forefront'), also known as Amenemhet III, was a pharaoh of ancient Egypt and the sixth king of the Twelfth Dy ...
have also been found. However, it is unclear at what time these monuments were brought to Ugarit.
Amarna letters The Amarna letters (; sometimes referred to as the Amarna correspondence or Amarna tablets, and cited with the abbreviation EA, for "El Amarna") are an archive, written on clay tablets, primarily consisting of diplomatic correspondence between t ...
from Ugarit c. 1350 BC record one letter each from Ammittamru I, Niqmaddu II, and his queen. From the 16th to the 13th century BC, Ugarit remained in regular contact with Egypt and Alashiya (Cyprus). In the second millennium BC, Ugarit's population was Amorite, and the Ugaritic language probably has a direct Amoritic origin.Pardee, Dennis. "Ugaritic", in
The Ancient Languages of Syria-Palestine and Arabia
' (2008) (pp. 5–6). Roger D. Woodard, editor. Cambridge University Press, , (262 pages).
The kingdom of Ugarit may have controlled about 2,000 km2 on average. During some of its history it would have been in close proximity to, if not directly within, the Hittite Empire.


Destruction

The last Bronze Age king of Ugarit, Ammurapi (circa 1215 to 1180 BC), was a contemporary of the last known Hittite king, Suppiluliuma II. The exact dates of his reign are unknown. However, a letter by the king is preserved, in which Ammurapi stresses the seriousness of the crisis faced by many Near Eastern states due to attacks. Ammurapi's response to an appeal for assistance from the king of Alashiya highlights the desperate situation that Ugarit and other cities faced: Eshuwara, the senior governor of Cyprus, responded: The ruler of Carchemish sent troops to assist Ugarit, but Ugarit had been sacked. A letter sent after Ugarit had been destroyed said: By excavating the highest levels of the city's ruins, archaeologists can study various attributes of Ugaritic civilization just before their destruction, and compare artifacts with those of nearby cultures to help establish dates. Ugarit also contained many caches of cuneiform tablets, actual libraries that contained a wealth of information. The destruction levels of the ruin contained Late Helladic IIIB pottery ware, but no LH IIIC (see Mycenaean period). Therefore, the date of the destruction of Ugarit is important for the dating of the LH IIIC phase in mainland Greece. Since an Egyptian sword bearing the name of pharaoh Merneptah was found in the destruction levels, 1190 BC was taken as the date for the beginning of the LH IIIC. A cuneiform tablet found in 1986 shows that Ugarit was destroyed after the death of Merneptah (1203 BC). It is generally agreed that Ugarit had already been destroyed by the eighth year of Ramesses III (1178 BC). Recent radiocarbon work, combined with other historical dates and the eclipse of January 21, 1192, indicates a destruction date between 1192 and 1190 BC. A large number of arrowheads were recovered from the destruction level. Their typology has not been published as yet.


Kings


Language and literature


Alphabet

Scribes in Ugarit appear to have originated the "
Ugaritic alphabet The Ugaritic writing system is a cuneiform abjad (consonantal alphabet) used from around either 1400 BCE or 1300 BCE for Ugaritic, an extinct Northwest Semitic language, and discovered in Ugarit (modern Ras Al Shamra), Syria, in 1928. It h ...
" around 1400 BC: 30 letters, corresponding to sounds, were inscribed on clay tablets. Although they are cuneiform in appearance, the letters bear no relation to Mesopotamian cuneiform signs; instead, they appear to be somehow related to the
Egyptian Egyptian describes something of, from, or related to Egypt. Egyptian or Egyptians may refer to: Nations and ethnic groups * Egyptians, a national group in North Africa ** Egyptian culture, a complex and stable culture with thousands of years of ...
-derived Phoenician alphabet. While the letters show little or no formal similarity to the Phoenician, the standard letter order (seen in the Phoenician alphabet as ʔ, B, G, D, H, W, Z, Ḥ, Ṭ, Y, K, L, M, N, S, ʕ, P, Ṣ, Q, R, ʃ) shows strong similarities between the two, suggesting that the Phoenician and Ugaritic systems were not wholly independent inventions.


Ugaritic language

The existence of the Ugaritic language is attested to in texts from the 14th through the 12th century BC. Ugaritic is usually classified as a
Northwest Semitic language Northwest Semitic is a division of the Semitic languages comprising the indigenous languages of the Levant. It emerged from Proto-Semitic in the Early Bronze Age. It is first attested in proper names identified as Amorite in the Middle Bronze Age ...
and therefore related to Hebrew, Aramaic, and Phoenician, among others. Its
grammatical In linguistics, grammaticality is determined by the conformity to language usage as derived by the grammar of a particular variety (linguistics), speech variety. The notion of grammaticality rose alongside the theory of generative grammar, the go ...
features are highly similar to those found in
Classical Arabic Classical Arabic ( ar, links=no, ٱلْعَرَبِيَّةُ ٱلْفُصْحَىٰ, al-ʿarabīyah al-fuṣḥā) or Quranic Arabic is the standardized literary form of Arabic used from the 7th century and throughout the Middle Ages, most notab ...
and
Akkadian Akkadian or Accadian may refer to: * Akkadians, inhabitants of the Akkadian Empire * Akkadian language, an extinct Eastern Semitic language * Akkadian literature, literature in this language * Akkadian cuneiform Cuneiform is a logo- syllabi ...
. It possesses two
genders Gender is the range of characteristics pertaining to femininity and masculinity and differentiating between them. Depending on the context, this may include sex-based social structures (i.e. gender roles) and gender identity. Most cultures u ...
(masculine and feminine), three cases for nouns and adjectives (
nominative In grammar, the nominative case (abbreviated ), subjective case, straight case or upright case is one of the grammatical cases of a noun or other part of speech, which generally marks the subject of a verb or (in Latin and formal variants of Engl ...
, accusative, and
genitive In grammar, the genitive case (abbreviated ) is the grammatical case that marks a word, usually a noun, as modifying another word, also usually a noun—thus indicating an attributive relationship of one noun to the other noun. A genitive can al ...
); three numbers: (
singular Singular may refer to: * Singular, the grammatical number that denotes a unit quantity, as opposed to the plural and other forms * Singular homology * SINGULAR, an open source Computer Algebra System (CAS) * Singular or sounder, a group of boar, ...
,
dual Dual or Duals may refer to: Paired/two things * Dual (mathematics), a notion of paired concepts that mirror one another ** Dual (category theory), a formalization of mathematical duality *** see more cases in :Duality theories * Dual (grammatical ...
, and plural); and verb aspects similar to those found in other Northwest Semitic languages. The word order in Ugaritic is
verb–subject–object A verb () is a word (part of speech) that in syntax generally conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual descri ...
, subject-object-verb (VSO)&(SOV); possessed–possessor (NG) (first element dependent on the function and second always in genitive case); and nounadjective (NA) (both in the same case (i.e. congruent)).


Ugaritic literature

Apart from royal correspondence with neighboring Bronze Age monarchs, Ugaritic literature from tablets found in the city's libraries include mythological texts written in a poetic narrative, letters, legal documents such as land transfers, a few international treaties, and a number of administrative lists. Fragments of several poetic works have been identified: the "
Legend of Keret The Legend of Keret, also known as the Epic of Kirta, is an ancient Ugaritic epic poem, dated to Late Bronze Age, circa 1500 – 1200 BC. It recounts the myth of King Keret of Hubur. It is one of the Ugarit texts. History The epic story ...
", the "Legend of Danel", the Ba'al tales that detail Baal-
Hadad Hadad ( uga, ), Haddad, Adad (Akkadian: 𒀭𒅎 '' DIM'', pronounced as ''Adād''), or Iškur ( Sumerian) was the storm and rain god in the Canaanite and ancient Mesopotamian religions. He was attested in Ebla as "Hadda" in c. 2500 BCE. ...
's conflicts with
Yam Yam or YAM may refer to: Plants and foods *Yam (vegetable), common name for members of ''Dioscorea'' * Taro, known in Malaysia and Singapore as yam * Sweet potato, specifically its orange-fleshed cultivars, often referred to as yams in North Amer ...
and
Mot Mot or MOT may refer to: Media * Ministry of Truth, the propaganda ministry in George Orwell 1949 novel ''Nineteen Eighty-Four'' * ''mot'' (magazine), former German car magazine * Mot (Star Trek), a minor character in ''Star Trek: The Next Gene ...
, among other fragments. The discovery of the Ugaritic archives in 1929 has been of great significance to biblical scholarship, as these archives for the first time provided a detailed description of Canaanite religious beliefs, during the period directly preceding the Israelite settlement. These texts show significant parallels to Hebrew biblical literature, particularly in the areas of divine imagery and poetic form. Ugaritic poetry has many elements later found in
Hebrew poetry Hebrew poetry is poetry written in the Hebrew language. It encompasses such things as: * Biblical poetry, the poetry found in the poetic books of the Hebrew Bible * Piyyut, religious Jewish liturgical poetry in Hebrew or Aramaic * Medieval Hebrew ...
: parallelisms, metres, and rhythms. The discoveries at Ugarit have led to a new appraisal of the Hebrew Bible as literature.


Religion

The important textual finds from the site shed a great deal of light upon the cultic life of the city. The foundations of the Bronze Age city Ugarit were divided into quarters. In the north-east quarter of the walled enclosure, the remains of three significant religious buildings were discovered, including two temples (of the gods
Baal Hadad Hadad ( uga, ), Haddad, Adad (Akkadian: 𒀭𒅎 '' DIM'', pronounced as ''Adād''), or Iškur (Sumerian) was the storm and rain god in the Canaanite and ancient Mesopotamian religions. He was attested in Ebla as "Hadda" in c. 2500 BCE. F ...
and Dagon) and a building referred to as the library or the high priest's house. Within these structures atop the
acropolis An acropolis was the settlement of an upper part of an ancient Greek city, especially a citadel, and frequently a hill with precipitous sides, mainly chosen for purposes of defense. The term is typically used to refer to the Acropolis of Athens, ...
numerous invaluable mythological texts were found. These texts have provided the basis for understanding of the Canaanite mythological world and religion. The Baal of Ugarit was not the same as the Baal of the Hebrew Bible. The Baal cycle represents Baal Hadad's destruction of
Yam Yam or YAM may refer to: Plants and foods *Yam (vegetable), common name for members of ''Dioscorea'' * Taro, known in Malaysia and Singapore as yam * Sweet potato, specifically its orange-fleshed cultivars, often referred to as yams in North Amer ...
(the god of chaos and the sea), demonstrating the relationship of Canaanite '' chaoskampf'' with those of Mesopotamia and the Aegean: a warrior god rises up as the hero of the new
pantheon Pantheon may refer to: * Pantheon (religion), a set of gods belonging to a particular religion or tradition, and a temple or sacred building Arts and entertainment Comics *Pantheon (Marvel Comics), a fictional organization * ''Pantheon'' (Lone St ...
to defeat chaos and bring order.


Archaeology


Discovery

After its destruction in the early 12th century BC, Ugarit's location was forgotten until 1928 when a peasant accidentally opened an old tomb while ploughing a field. The discovered area was the
necropolis A necropolis (plural necropolises, necropoles, necropoleis, necropoli) is a large, designed cemetery with elaborate tomb monuments. The name stems from the Ancient Greek ''nekropolis'', literally meaning "city of the dead". The term usually im ...
of Ugarit located in the nearby seaport of
Minet el-Beida Minet el-Beida ( ar, المينا البيضا, ''The White Harbor''; or ancient Ma'hadu) is a small bay located north of Latakia, Syria on the Mediterranean Sea.Michael C. Astour, Ma'Hadu, the Harbor of Ugarit, Journal of the Economic and Social ...
. Excavations have since revealed a city with a prehistory reaching back to c. 6000 BC.


Site and palace

The site is a sixty-five foot high mound. Archaeologically, Ugarit is considered quintessentially Canaanite. A brief investigation of a looted tomb at the necropolis of Minet el-Beida was conducted by Léon Albanèse in 1928, who then examined the main mound of Ras Shamra. But in the next year scientific excavations of Tell Ras Shamra were commenced by archaeologist Claude Schaeffer from the Musée archéologique in
Strasbourg Strasbourg (, , ; german: Straßburg ; gsw, label=Bas Rhin Alsatian, Strossburi , gsw, label=Haut Rhin Alsatian, Strossburig ) is the prefecture and largest city of the Grand Est region of eastern France and the official seat of the Eu ...
. Work continued under Schaeffer until 1970, with a break from 1940 to 1947 because of World War II.Claude F. A. Schaeffer et al., Le Palais Royal D'Ugarit III: Textes Accadiens et Hourrites Des Archives Est, Ouest et Centrales, Two Volumes (Mission De Ras Shamra Tome VI), Imprimerie Nationale, 1955. The excavations uncovered a
royal palace This is a list of royal palaces, sorted by continent. Africa * Abdin Palace, Cairo * Al-Gawhara Palace, Cairo * Koubbeh Palace, Cairo * Tahra Palace, Cairo * Menelik Palace * Jubilee Palace * Guenete Leul Palace * Imperial Palace- Massa ...
of ninety rooms laid out around eight enclosed courtyards, and many ambitious private dwellings. Crowning the hill where the city was built were two main temples: one to Baal the "king", son of El, and one to Dagon, the
chthonic The word chthonic (), or chthonian, is derived from the Ancient Greek word ''χθών, "khthon"'', meaning earth or soil. It translates more directly from χθόνιος or "in, under, or beneath the earth" which can be differentiated from Γῆ ...
god of fertility and wheat. 23 stelae were unearthed: nine stelae, including the famous Baal with Thunderbolt, near the
Temple of Baal The Temple of Bel ( ar, معبد بعل), sometimes also referred to as the "Temple of Baal", was an ancient temple located in Palmyra, Syria. The temple, consecrated to the Mesopotamian god Bel, worshipped at Palmyra in triad with the lunar god ...
, four in the
Temple of Dagon A temple (from the Latin ) is a building reserved for spiritual rituals and activities such as prayer and sacrifice. Religions which erect temples include Christianity (whose temples are typically called churches), Hinduism (whose temples ...
and ten more at scattered places around the city. File:Boar rhyton Louvre AO18521.jpg, Boar rhyton, Mycenaean ceramic imported to Ugarit, 14th–13th century BC ( Louvre). File:UgaritSite.jpg, Remains of the ancient city, some walls and what appears to be a small well.


Texts

On excavation of the site, several deposits of cuneiform clay tablets were found. These have proven to be of great historical significance.


See also

* Asherah *
Cities of the ancient Near East The earliest cities in history were in the ancient Near East, an area covering roughly that of the modern Middle East: its history began in the 4th millennium BC and ended, depending on the interpretation of the term, either with the conquest by ...
*
Elohim (gods) ''Elohim'' (: ), the plural of (), is a Hebrew word meaning "gods". Although the word is plural, in the Hebrew Bible it usually takes a singular verb and refers to a single deity, particularly (but not always) the God of Israel. At other time ...
* Short chronology timeline * Ugaritic mythology


Explanatory notes


References


Citations


General sources

* ''internal strugle'' Annalee Newitz, What Happened to the Original 1 Percent?, New York Times, May 11, 2020 * ''Ugarit Forschungen'' (Neukirchen-Vluyn). UF-11 (1979) honors Claude Schaeffer, with about 100 articles in 900 pages. pp. 95, ff, "Comparative Graphemic Analysis of Old Babylonian and Western Akkadian", ( i.e. Ugarit and
Amarna Amarna (; ar, العمارنة, al-ʿamārnah) is an extensive Egyptian archaeological site containing the remains of what was the capital city of the late Eighteenth Dynasty. The city was established in 1346 BC, built at the direction of the Ph ...
(letters), three others, Mari, OB,Royal, OB,non-Royal letters). See above, in text. * Bourdreuil, P. 1991. "Une bibliothèque au sud de la ville : Les textes de la 34e campagne (1973)". in ''Ras Shamra-Ougarit,'' 7 (Paris). * Caquot, André & Sznycer, Maurice. ''Ugaritic Religion''. Iconography of Religions, Section XV: Mesopotamia and the Near East; Fascicle 8; Institute of Religious Iconography, State University Groningen; Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1980. * Drews, Robert. 1995. ''The End of the Bronze Age: Changes in Warfare and the Catastrophe ca. 1200 BC'' (Princeton University Press). * de Moor, Johannes C. ''The Seasonal Pattern in the Ugaritic Myth of Ba'lu, According to the Version of Ilimilku''. Alter Orient und Altes Testament, Band 16. Neukirchen – Vluyn: Verlag Butzon & Berker Kevelaer, Neukirchener Verlag des Erziehungsvereins, 1971 * Gibson, J.C.L., originally edited by G.R. Driver.'' Canaanite Myths and Legends''. Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark, Ltd., 1956, 1977.*K. Lawson and K. L. Younger Jr, "Ugarit at Seventy-Five," Eisenbrauns, 2007, * L'Heureux, Conrad E. ''Rank Among the Canaanite Gods: El, Ba'al, and the Repha'im''. Harvard Semitic Museum, Harvard Semitic Monographs No. 21, Missoula MT: Scholars Press, 1979. * Meletinskii, E. M., 200
''The Poetics of Myth''
* Mullen, E. Theodore, Jr. ''The Assembly of the Gods: The Divine Council in Canaanite and Early Hebrew Literature''. Harvard Semitic Museum, Harvard Semitic Monographs No. 24, Cambridge, MA: Harvard Press, 1980/ Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press Reprint, 1986. (comparison of Ugaritic and Old Testament literature). * Dennis Pardee,'' Ritual and Cult at Ugarit'', (Writings from the Ancient World), Society of Biblical Literature, 2002, *
William M. Schniedewind William M. Schniedewind (born 1962, New York City) holds the Kershaw Chair of Ancient Eastern Mediterranean Studies and is a Professor of Biblical Studies and Northwest Semitic Languages at the University of California, Los Angeles. He has a B.A. ...
,
Joel H. Hunt Joel or Yoel is a name meaning "Yahweh Is God" and may refer to: * Joel (given name), origin of the name including a list of people with the first name. * Joel (surname), a surname * Joel (footballer, born 1904), Joel de Oliveira Monteiro, Brazili ...
, 2007. ''A primer on Ugaritic: language, culture, and literature'' p. 14. * Smith, Mark S. ''The Ugaritic Baal Cycle: Volume 1. Introduction with Text, Translation and Commentary of KTU 1.1–1.2'', (Vetus Testamentum Supplements series, volume 55; Leiden: Brill, 1994). * Smith, Mark S. ''The Ugaritic Baal Cycle: Volume 2. Introduction with Text, Translation and Commentary of KTU 1.3–1.4'', (Vetus Testament Supplement series, volume 114; Leiden: Brill, 2008). Co-authored with Wayne Pitard. * Smith, Mark S., 2001. ''Untold Stories. The Bible and Ugaritic Studies in the Twentieth Century'' Chapter 1: "Beginnings: 1928–1945" * Tubb, Jonathan N. (1998), ''Canaanites'' (British Museum People of the Past). * Wilfred G. E. Watson and Nicolas Wyatt, ''Handbook of Ugaritic Studies'', Brill, 1999, * Wyatt, Nicolas (1998): ''Religious texts from Ugarit: the worlds of Ilimilku and his colleagues'', The Biblical Seminar, volume 53. Sheffield, England: Sheffield Academic Press, paperback, 500 pages.


External links


Ugarit (Tell Shamra) 1999 application for UNESCO World Heritage Site

RSTI
The Ras Shamra Tablet Inventory: an online catalog of inscribed objects from Ras Shamra-Ugarit produced at the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago.
The Ras Shamra Tablet Inventory Blog

Ugarit - World History Encyclopedia




* ttp://www.ras-shamra.ougarit.mom.fr/ Le Royaume d'Ougarit (in French)
Dennis Pardee, Ugarit Ritual texts – Oriental Institute

Pictures from 2009
{{Authority control 1928 archaeological discoveries Amarna letters locations Bronze Age sites in Syria Destroyed cities Former populated places in Syria Late Bronze Age collapse Neolithic sites in Syria Phoenician cities Populated places disestablished in the 2nd millennium BC Populated places established in the 6th millennium BC States and territories disestablished in the 12th century BC States and territories established in the 18th century BC