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Belili was a Mesopotamian goddess. This name refers both to a sister of Dumuzi known from some of the texts pertaining to his death, and to a primordial deity paired with Alala and listed in enumerations of ancestors of Anu. There is no consensus among researchers if they should be considered one and the same.


Name

Belili's name has no plausible etymology in Sumerian or any
Semitic language The Semitic languages are a branch of the Afroasiatic language family. They include Arabic, Amharic, Tigrinya, Aramaic, Hebrew, Maltese, Modern South Arabian languages and numerous other ancient and modern languages. They are spoken by mo ...
, and based on its structure it has been compared to other divine names whose origin also remains a mystery, such as Alala, Aruru,
Bunene The ancient Mesopotamian deity Bunene, inscribed in cuneiform sumerograms as dḪAR and phonetically as d''bu-ne-ne'', was a subordinate to and '' sukkal'' ("vizier") or charioteer of the sun-god Šamaš, whom he drove from the eastern horizon at ...
and Zababa. Belili is also attested as an ordinary given name, one of the so-called banana names known from both Mesopotamia and Elam. Names with this structure are particularly common in the earliest Akkadian documents from Gasur (later known as Nuzi). It has been proposed that such names, both divine and ordinary, originate in a substrate language (so-called " proto-Euphratic"), but this conclusion is not universally accepted, and Gonzalo Rubio points out that they might simply represent a naming pattern among speakers of Akkadian. Manfred Krebernik suggests that they were a type of
hypocorism A hypocorism ( or ; from Ancient Greek ; sometimes also ''hypocoristic''), or pet name, is a name used to show affection for a person. It may be a diminutive form of a person's name, such as ''Izzy'' for Isabel or ''Bob (given name), Bob'' fo ...
(pet name). The proposal that the theonym Belili was a contracted or corrupted form of the
epithet An epithet (, ), also a byname, is a descriptive term (word or phrase) commonly accompanying or occurring in place of the name of a real or fictitious person, place, or thing. It is usually literally descriptive, as in Alfred the Great, Suleima ...
Belet-ili is regarded as baseless today.


Character

Belili appears in two distinct roles in Mesopotamian texts, as a sister of Dumuzi and as a primordial deity counted among the ancestors of Anu. Andrew R. George and Wilfred G. Lambert consider the sister of Dumuzi and the ancestor of Anu to be the same goddess. However, according to Manfred Krebernik, it is uncertain if Belili the sister of Dumuzi and Belili the primordial deity were related in any way.


Sister of Dumuzi

An explicit reference to the Belili as Dumuzi's sister is only present in the myth ''
Ishtar Inanna is the List of Mesopotamian deities, ancient Mesopotamian goddess of war, love, and fertility. She is also associated with political power, divine law, sensuality, and procreation. Originally worshipped in Sumer, she was known by the Akk ...
's Descent'', though they appear together in other texts as well. Other deities considered to be Dumuzi's relatives were Geshtinanna, well attested as his sister, and their mother Duttur. Belili is described as a mourner in the incantation series '' Šurpu'', which might be a reference to her relation to Dumuzi. It has been argued that similar to Belet-Seri, Belili was understood as the Akkadian counterpart of Geshtinanna. However, Manfred Krebernik considers Belili and Gesthinanna to be two independent goddesses each of whom could be described as Dumuzi's sister. Furthermore, both of them appear in separate roles in the myth ''Dumuzi's Dream''.


Primordial deity

In lists of the sky god Anu's ancestors, Belili was typically paired with Alala, and together they occupy the final place in multiple documents enumerating such deities. This most likely indicates they could be regarded as Anu's parents. In the incantation series '' Udug Hul'' they appear in an enumeration of primeval deities: "Dūri, Dāri; Laḫmu, Laḫamu; Engur, Ningarra; Alāla; Bēlili." A single god list (K 4349) equates them with each other. According to Andrew R. George, this pair is also present in an unpublished
hymn A hymn is a type of song, and partially synonymous with devotional song, specifically written for the purpose of adoration or prayer, and typically addressed to a deity or deities, or to a prominent figure or personification. The word ''hymn'' d ...
dedicated to the city of Borsippa. However, they were not associated with each other in other contexts, and according to Wilfred G. Lambert it is possible that they only came to be regarded as a couple because of both of their names being iterative.


Worship

Belili was commonly worshiped alongside Dumuzi. E-Arali (Sumerian: "house, netherworld"), a well known shrine dedicated to this god located in his cult center Bad-tibira, also occurs as a location dedicated to Belili in the ''Canonical Temple List''. Another temple dedicated to both of them was the E-erra (Sumerian: "house of lament"), though its location is unknown. A temple dedicated to Belili, the Ekadimma, was located in
Babylon Babylon ( ) was an ancient city located on the lower Euphrates river in southern Mesopotamia, within modern-day Hillah, Iraq, about south of modern-day Baghdad. Babylon functioned as the main cultural and political centre of the Akkadian-s ...
. In a single administrative text it is paired with a sparsely attested temple of Shara for unknown reasons. Andrew R. George used its absence from the ''Canonical temple List'' to estimate the date of this document's composition as the second half of the Kassite period, since it postdates the foundation of Dur-Kurigalzu, but makes no mention of temples commonly listed in sources from
Babylonia Babylonia (; , ) was an Ancient history, ancient Akkadian language, Akkadian-speaking state and cultural area based in the city of Babylon in central-southern Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq and parts of Kuwait, Syria and Iran). It emerged as a ...
and
Assyria Assyria (Neo-Assyrian cuneiform: , ''māt Aššur'') was a major ancient Mesopotamian civilization that existed as a city-state from the 21st century BC to the 14th century BC and eventually expanded into an empire from the 14th century BC t ...
from the late second and first millennium BCE, postdating the fall of the Kassite dynasty. Belili was also worshiped in Esagil complex, in this case sharing a cultic seat with Alala. Some temples dedicated to Belili alone are also known from the ''Canonical Temple List'', but their locations are unknown. They include the E-TIN-na, possibly to be read as Ekurunna, "house of
liquor Liquor ( , sometimes hard liquor), spirits, distilled spirits, or spiritous liquor are alcoholic drinks produced by the distillation of grains, fruits, vegetables, or sugar that have already gone through ethanol fermentation, alcoholic ferm ...
," and the Euruku, "house, pure city."


Mythology

Belili is attested in a number of literary texts dealing with the death of Dumuzi. In ''Dumuzi's Dream'', Dumuzi wants to hide in her house while being chased by demons. Belili agrees and offers him water, but later she has to leave, which lets the pursuers enter her house and take Dumuzi to the
underworld The underworld, also known as the netherworld or hell, is the supernatural world of the dead in various religious traditions and myths, located below the world of the living. Chthonic is the technical adjective for things of the underworld. ...
. She is described as an old woman. Geshtinanna appears in the same myth in a different role. In ''Ishtar's Descent'', a late Akkadian reinterpretation of an earlier Sumerian myth, Belili listens to the laments heard when Dumuzi dies and has to enter the underworld. The term used to describe these sounds is ''ikkillu'', "an inarticulate cry expressing suffering of high intensity." ''In the Desert by the Early Grass'', a collection of laments dedicated to temporarily dying gods mourned by their respective mothers or sisters, mentions Belili alongside Amashilama, Ninazimua, Geshtinanna and three deities whose names are not preserved.


References


Bibliography

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External links

*
Dumuzi's Dream
' in the Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature Mesopotamian goddesses