Aranzaḫ
Aranzaḫ (alternatively romanized as Aranzah[1]), also known as Aranziḫ[2] or Araššiḫ[3] was a Hurrian deity who represented the river Tigris.
[9] In a single source, the deified Tigris, referred to as Idiqlat, appears as a servant of Enlil, while in the Old Babylonian forerunner of the later god list An = Anum the same deity is counted as a member of the circle of Enki.
[14] During a conflict over kingship in heaven, Kumarbi bites off the genitals of Anu, who earlier deposed the primordial god Alalu, and as a result becomes impregnated with a number of deities, including the representation of the Tigris.
[16] This seemingly occurs after Kumarbi's skull was broken and subsequently mended to enable the birth of Teshub, and thus it is not certain how the other child came to be born.
[18] This interpretation relies on the assumption that Kanzura was understood as the source of the Tigris, but according to Erik van Dongen it is not plausible, especially since it seems the mountain is only mentioned after the presumed birth of Aranzaḫ.
[22] A reference to someone being pregnant with Aranzaḫ is also present in Ea and the Beast,[23] which might represent a different version of the same tale[24] or a different part of the same cycle of myths.
[26] Based on the references to birth of deities and the presence of Aranzaḫ it has been proposed that they might deal with the rise of Teshub and his conflict with Kumarbi.
[1] The section of the text usually presumed to be its beginning describes how Gurparanzaḫ gained renown during a hunt organized by a king of Akkad, Impakru, how he was chosen to marry his daughter Tadizuli, and how he won an archery competition.
[41] Similarly to other rivers, mountains and cities regarded as numinous in Hurrian religion, Aranzaḫ could be invoked in theophoric names.
[42] While most rivers appear only in names with the element ar- and its derivatives, multiple predicatives are attested in the case of Aranzaḫ, including arip-, ḫašip-, -atal, -iwri and kirip-, in addition to use of hypocoristics such as Aranzi, which according to Ran Zadok might reflect the antiquity of their use, stemming from Hurrian culture plausibly originating in the proximity of the Tigris.
[7] A certain Ḫazip-Aranziḫ, "Aranzaḫ granted",[2] appears in an enumeration of men sent to Mari by allies of king Zimri-Lim and local officials responsible for their reception as a member of the latter group.
[43] Other individuals bearing names invoking Aranzaḫ have been identified in texts from sites located in all regions inhabited by Hurrians, for example Chagar Bazar, Tell al-Rimah, and Tikunani.
[45] The Mesopotamian lexical list Malku (tablet II, line 46) records “Aranzû” and “Aransuḫ” as the Hurrian names of the Tigris.
[42] According to Karen Radner, the importance of the Tigris Grotto in Shubria in the first millennium BCE, comparable to the position of Kumme and Musasir, can be connected to Hurrian traditions pertaining to the worship of the river as a deity.
