Archaeology, Ethnology & Anthropology of Eurasia 46 (4) 2018   DOI: 10.17746/1563-0110.2018.46.4.013-021

Annotation:  Ivory Figurines and the Symbolic Context of a Paleolithic Dwelling at Kovrizhka IV on the Lower Viti On the Interpretation of Stelae in the Cult Complexes of Northern Mesopotamia During the Pre-Pottery A Study of Finds from Excavation I at Suchu Island, the Lower Amur (the 1974 Field Season) Jade Artifacts from Bronze Age Cemeteries in the Cis-Olkhon Area, the Western Coast of Lake Baikal Sherubai-1: An Andronovo (Fedorovka) Cemetery in Central Kazakhstan Technologies Involved in Manufacturing Wooden Horns for the Ceremonial Masks of Horses from the Pazy On the Time and Context of the Earliest Bronze Mirrors in the Northern Pontic Region Procession of Horsemen on a Gold Plaque from the Siberian Collection of Peter I A Mongolian Era Female Headdress from the Upper Ob Basin Ancient Irrigated Soils of the Bozok Archaeological District, Northern Kazakhstan (11th to 12th Cent Chthonic Animals in the Traditional Buryat Culture Reconstruction of Wooden and Earthen Buildings in 17th to 18th-Century Russian Forts in Siberia: The Application of the Blue-Intensity Method for Dating Wooden Buildings in Siberia The Eastern Slavic Population of Central Asia After the Collapse of the USSR: Ethno-Demographic Proc An Unusual Burial of a Xiongnu-Sarmatian Era Warrior in the Western Siberian Forest-Steppe: Results Armed Violence Among the Altai Mountains Pastoralists of the Xiongnu-Sarmatian Age “Abandoned, Tied, Flexed”: An Anthropological Study of an Unusual Late Sarmatian Burial in the South   

On the Interpretation of Stelae in the Cult Complexes
of Northern Mesopotamia During the Pre-Pottery Neolithic

T.V. Kornienko

Voronezh State Pedagogical University, Lenina 86, Voronezh, 594045, Russia

Applying an interdisciplinary and semiotic approach, this manuscript presents original interpretation of vertical stelae/pillars/pilasters found in the religious complexes of Northern Mesopotamia during the transition to the Neolithic. We describe general trends in the content of rituals across the early sedentary period. One key theme appears to have been procreation, fertility, and prosperity. Monumental stelae and pillars of this period in Upper Mesopotamia, while depicting zoo-anthropomorphic deities, might also themselves referenced a male procreative force. The shift to sedentism likely contributed to worship of deities associated with specific locations and human groups. The Northern Mesopotamian archaeological record also hints at totemic beliefs typical of hunting-gathering societies, and differing from those practiced by the early farmers. Religious innovations of this period appear (albeit in transformed fashion) in later cultures of the Ancient Near East, as attested by both archaeological and written sources.

Keywords: Epipaleolithic, Neolithic, Northern Mesopotamia, fertility cult, totemism