Belili
Template:Short description Template:Infobox deity 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, and based on its structure it has been compared to other divine names whose origin also remains a mystery, such as Alala, Aruru, Bunene and Zababa.Template:Sfn Belili is also attested as an ordinary given name, one of the so-called banana names known from both Mesopotamia and Elam.Template:Sfn Names with this structure are particularly common in the earliest Akkadian documents from Gasur (later known as Nuzi).Template:Sfn It has been proposed that such names, both divine and ordinary, originate in a substrate language (so-called "proto-Euphratic"Template:Sfn), but this conclusion is not universally accepted, and Gonzalo Rubio points out that they might simply represent a naming pattern among speakers of Akkadian.Template:Sfn Manfred Krebernik suggests that they were a type of hypocorism (pet name).Template:Sfn
The proposal that the theonym Belili was a contracted or corrupted form of the epithet Belet-ili is regarded as baseless today.Template:Sfn
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.Template:Sfn Andrew R. GeorgeTemplate:Sfn and Wilfred G. Lambert consider the sister of Dumuzi and the ancestor of Anu to be the same goddess.Template:Sfn However, according to Manfred Krebernik, it is uncertain if Belili the sister of Dumuzi and Belili the primordial deity were related in any way.Template:Sfn
Sister of Dumuzi
An explicit reference to the Belili as Dumuzi's sister is only present in the myth Ishtar's Descent, though they appear together in other texts as well.Template:Sfn Other deities considered to be Dumuzi's relatives were Geshtinanna, well attested as his sister, and their mother Duttur.Template:Sfn Belili is described as a mourner in the incantation series Šurpu,Template:Sfn which might be a reference to her relation to Dumuzi.Template:Sfn
It has been argued that similar to Belet-Seri, Belili was understood as the Akkadian counterpart of Geshtinanna.Template:Sfn However, Manfred Krebernik considers Belili and Gesthinanna to be two independent goddesses each of whom could be described as Dumuzi's sister.Template:Sfn Furthermore, both of them appear in separate roles in the myth Dumuzi's Dream.Template:Sfn
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.Template:Sfn This most likely indicates they could be regarded as Anu's parents.Template:Sfn In the incantation series Udug Hul they appear in an enumeration of primeval deities: "Dūri, Dāri; Laḫmu, Laḫamu; Engur, Ningarra; Alāla; Bēlili".Template:Sfn A single god list (K 4349) equates them with each other.Template:Sfn According to Andrew R. George, this pair is also present in an unpublished hymn dedicated to the city of Borsippa.Template:Sfn 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.Template:Sfn
Worship
Belili was commonly worshiped alongside Dumuzi.Template:Sfn 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.Template:Sfn Another temple dedicated to both of them was the E-erra (Sumerian: "house of lament"), though its location is unknown.Template:Sfn
A temple dedicated to Belili, the Ekadimma, was located in Babylon.Template:Sfn In a single administrative text it is paired with a sparsely attested temple of Shara for unknown reasons.Template:Sfn 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 and Assyria from the late second and first millennium BCE, postdating the fall of the Kassite dynasty.Template:Sfn Belili was also worshiped in Esagil complex, in this case sharing a cultic seat with Alala.Template:Sfn
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",Template:Sfn and the Euruku, "house, pure city".Template:Sfn
Mythology
Belili is attested in a number of literary texts dealing with the death of Dumuzi.Template:Sfn In Dumuzi's Dream, Dumuzi wants to hide in her house while being chased by demons.Template:Sfn 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.Template:Sfn She is described as an old woman.Template:Sfn Geshtinanna appears in the same myth in a different role.Template:Sfn In Ishtar's Descent, a late Akkadian reinterpretation of an earlier Sumerian myth,Template:Sfn Belili listens to the laments heard when Dumuzi dies and has to enter the underworld.Template:Sfn The term used to describe these sounds is ikkillu, "an inarticulate cry expressing suffering of high intensity".Template:Sfn
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.Template:Sfn
References
Bibliography
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