Title: Inanna As Depicted In The Burney Relief

This artwork is part of the series, “Make It Rain Fire: Ancient Wisdom Of The Divine Feminine”.

This painting was inspired by the archeological artifact known as "The Burney Relief", a pre-historic high relief terracotta plaque, that dates to about 1800–1750 BCE. It was originally purchased by Sydney Burney - a British Army Captain and President of the Antique Dealers Association in London, hence, the name of the relief.

According to historic accounts, Burney bought the artifact from a Syrian antiques dealer during the mid-1930s, and the plaque itself, was not archeologically excavated, but rather removed from its site of origin, therefore, promoting some speculation as to its origin and purpose. The artifact was analyzed and authenticated between 1933 and 1935, leading experts to point to Sumer (modern day Iraq) as its place of origin.

Archeologists who have studied this clay plaque point out as important, the fact that the piece was oven-baked instead of sun-dried; in pre-historic Mesopotamia, commissioned works of terracotta art (including architecture) were fired in an oven as if to highlight their importance, in contrast with sun-dried artifacts considered less relevant.

The figure on the Burney relief is commonly agreed upon as Inanna (as she was known in the southern Mesopotamian region of Sumer) and/or Ishtar (as she was known in the upper region during later periods throughout the Akkadian Empire). Inanna was the prominent female deity in Mesopotamia, symbolic of love, sacred sexuality, fertility, political power, justice and war.

The terracotta relief depicts an anthropomorphic figure believed to be the goddess Inanna, due to the fact that the figure is nude, wears a horned crown, holds the sacred rod-and-ring, has wings pointing downwards (alluding to Inanna’s voyage to the underworld), and possessing bird talons instead of feet, which grip on the backs of two lions (the lion was historically associated with the cult of Inanna). On each side of the goddess there are two owls, and although the owls were not animals attributed normally to the deity, they were indeed animals attributed to the ancient Sumerian cults of sacred prostitution which worshipped Inanna, given she was the goddess of divine sexuality and fertility; and thus the bird-human hybrid.

On the relief, Inanna is shown wearing a necklace, which is important to note, given the fact that certain necklaces were used in ancient Mesopotamia by Inanna priestesses as well as sacred prostitutes as means of identification. It is crucial to highlight that what is today called ‘prostitution’, in ancient times was a formal ritual practiced by trained priestesses of the fertility cult, not a sexual marketing of the female body. Modern-day understanding of the prestige and respectability of such ancient rituals and its practitioners, can be grasped by the sample of the Princess En-Hedu Anna, the daughter of Sargon the Great, who was one of the great priestesses of the fertility cult venerating Inanna, as sexual intercourse was considered divine.

The Burney Relief is also known as “The Queen of the Night”; it was acquired by the British Museum in 2003, and is on display and part of their permanent collection.

 

Certificate of Authenticity included.

 

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