Jason Fanning
Art 1301
4/20/09
The Ziggurat of Ur-Nammu
General Description
The Ziggurat of Ur-Nammu is one of the oldest free-standing monumental buildings in the world and one of the best preserved ziggurats built by the early Mesopotamian civilizations. It was built over approximately two decades centered about 2100 B.C.E. and was never completely finished. It has sustained damage in various wars, primarily by the Elamites roughly seventeen centuries after its initial construction and during the first Gulf War1.
Architectural Design
Ziggurats are similar in general form to pyramids and mastabas, though being of a simpler design. There are four basic layers to the Ziggurat of Ur-Nammu, with archaeological evidence pointing to each of these having been built and decorated as the structure was built upward. The Ziggurat was approximately 62 meters by 43 meters at the base. It was constructed of baked mud bricks, and had three staircases arranged in a T shape along the front region of the building. Each staircase contained one hundred steps and all converge to lead to the shrine. The Ziggurat is built at a slight incline and buttresses are used throughout the temple in order to brace the design and keep it from falling outward due to the weight of the mud bricks used in its construction2. In its current incarnation, it is approximately 11 meters tall, though when it was undamaged it appears to have been much closer to 13 or 14 meters. Interestingly, there are no straight lines used in the building, with each wall having a slight curve to it, similar to how the later Greeks would curve columns to take into account the distortion encountered by the human eye.
Harmony with Nature
The Ziggurat is built entirely of natural components and rises from the earth and sand of the area, almost as if it is a natural hill. The materials used were all found locally, and like other ziggurats, it was built in a time far prior to synthetic materials having been developed. Ziggurat loosely translates into "mountain" and the ancient Sumerians who constructed the temple seem to have succeeded greatly in their efforts to appropriate the earth into a place of worship.
Symbolism and Sacred Objects
As mentioned earlier, the Ziggurat of Ur-Nammu was built in layers - each of these represented one of the basic astrological views of the people at the time, with the base being the underworld, the second tier the earth, the third the sky, and the fourth tier/shrine being the heavens. These tiers were all painted to represent the symbolic divisions as well, with the base coated in black, the middle whitewashed, the upper tier bright red, and the shrine itself glazed in a brilliant blue3. The Sumerians who constructed this temple believed that their deities came from the mountains they could see in the distance, and many archaeologists believe that this is the reason the superstructure of the temple is shaped much like a mountain4.
How it is Used by Worshippers
Though the Ziggurat of Ur-Nammu is no longer used as a place of worship, it was originally designed as a temple to the city's god, Sin. The Ziggurat was referred to as Etemennigur, translating roughly to "House whose foundation creates terror5." Ziggurats, in general, followed this pattern, with each one built to honor the deity of the city in which it was constructed.
References:
1 http://www.nishra.com/post/2008/05/05/Observations-of-Mesopotamian-and-Elamite-Ziggurats
2 http://www.lmc.ep.usp.br/people/otavio/estruturas/ur.htm
3 http://www.nishra.com/post/2008/05/05/Observations-of-Mesopotamian-and-Elamite-Ziggurats
4 http://www.mesopotamia.co.uk/ziggurats/story/sto_set.html
5 http://www.mesopotamia.co.uk/ziggurats/explore/exp_set.html
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