Isin
Isin (Sumerian: ššš š , romanized:Ā I3-si-inki,[1] modern Arabic: Ishan al-Bahriyat) is an archaeological site in Al-QÄdisiyyah Governorate, Iraq which was the location of the Ancient Near East city of Isin, occupied from the late 4th millennium Uruk period up until at least the late 1st millennium BC Neo-Babylonian period.
The tutelary deity of Isin, dating back to at least the Early Dynastic period, was the healing goddess Gula with a major temple (, E-gal-ma) sited there as well as smaller installations for the related gods of Ninisina and Sud.
[5] Two years later Raymond P. Dougherty, on behalf of the American Schools of Oriental Research, conducted a two-day survey of the site finding inscribed bricks of Bur-Sin and Neo-Babylonian ruler Nebuchadnezzar II.
[14] Early find included a Jemdet Nasr stamp seal and a small stone lion figurine of the Uruk period.
The complex showed construction through at least the Isin I, Kassite, and Neo-Babylonian periods with 3rd millennium BC finds suggested its earlier existence.
An inscribed brick of Adad-apla-iddina, 8th ruler of the 2nd dynasty of Isin, dedicated to the healing goddess Nin-ezena was also found.
On another section of the main mound 3rd millennium BC buildings provided "gold jewellery, bronze weapons, cylinder seals, and a few cuneiform tablets of which two date back to the Early Dynastic period", a clay nail of Isme-Dagan referring to construction of the bad-gal "Great Wall" city wall of Isin and an inscribed brick of Ur-du-kuga.
[16] In the Kassite layer an Early Dynastic III statue, 16.5Ā cm in height, of a kneeling man wearing only a triple belt.
[19] An intensive building program began at Isin during the Ur III empire in the late 3rd millennium BC.
[20] With the final decline of the Ur III empire at the end of the third millennium BC, a power vacuum was left that other city-states scrambled to fill.
Isin also endured an internal coup of a sort when Gungunum the royally appointed governor of Larsa and Lagash province, seized the city of Ur.
Around 1860 BC, an outsider named Enlil-bani seized the throne of Isin, ending the hereditary dynasty established by Ishbi-Erra over 150 years earlier.
After the First Dynasty of Babylon rose to power in the early 2nd millennium and captured Larsa, much significant construction occurred at Isin.
This ended with a destruction dated to around the 27th year of the reign of Samsu-iluna, son of Hammurabi, based on tablets found there.
The final significant stage of activity occurred during the Second Dynasty of Isin at the end of the 2nd millennium, most notably by king Adad-apla-iddina.
Isin remained occupied at least as late as the second decade of the reign of the Persian ruler Darius I (c 507 BC), then in the control of the region.
These year names combined with new tablet joins show that there were two additional rulers, Sumu-abum and IkÅ«n-pÄ«-IÅ”ta, slotting in between Erra-imittÄ« and Enlil-bÄn.
During this ritual, the king played the part of the mortal Dumuzi, and he had sex with a priestess who represented the goddess of love and war, Inanna (also known as Ishtar).
Right: Sumerian cuneiform "foundation stone". This clay cone was embedded in a wall, and contains the deed of foundation of the city walls of Isin (Tell Bahriyat) by king Ishme-Dagan of Isin (1953-1935 BC)
