STONE OF THE DEITIES: HEMATITE'S SIGNIFICANCE IN DEPICTING DEITIES ON OLD BABYLONIAN AND OLD ASSYRIAN CYLINDRICAL SEALS

Abstract

This study delves into searching for a connection between hematite and cylindrical seals depicting certain deities from ancient Mesopotamian cultures. The key deities of interest are Ishtar, the Suppliant Goddess, the Sun God, and the Storm God. The main aim is to ascertain whether there is a link between the one deity and the choice of stone used for their portrayal on the seal. The corpus of 177 seals from the Old Babylonian and Old Assyrian periods was crafted from stone materials, primarily iron oxide, specifically hematite. using an archaeometric approach, it was observed that there is no association between specific deities and hematite, as most seals featuring these four deities were predominantly carved on hematite or other forms of iron oxide. This could be attributed to other reasons rather than one deity related to hematite.