kur of Babylonian history, is described by
Herodotus, Strabo and other pagan authorities, as consisting of seven
stories and being surmounted by a sanctuary which was under the charge of
a virgin priestess and contained a couch (resting-place) for the god.(94)
It is amply demonstrated, moreover, that the central zikkurat was regarded
as the permanent resting and dwelling place of _the_ lord or god, par
excellence, and in this connection it is significant that among the names
of sanctuaries enumerated by Professor Jastrow there occur such as "the
true or fixed house," the house of the established seat, the sacred
dwelling, the permanent dwelling, etc.

The Babylonian ideas connected with the supreme god and his temple are,
moreover, sufficiently apparent in the prayers to Marduk, from which I
extract the following detached passages: "Marduk, king of heaven and
earth.... Look favorably upon the city, _O lord of rest_!... May the gods
of heaven and earth speak to thee _O lord of rest_!... A resting-place for
the lord of E-sagila is thy house, E-sagila, the house of thy sovereignty,
is thy house...."

The sanctuary surmounting the zikkurat, is also termed "the high place par
excellence, or the lofty house, the high edifice, the tower of the great
dwelling, the great palace, the house of the glorious mountain [or god]
the house of him who gives the sceptre of the world; also the house of
light, the house of great splendor, the house without rival, the gate of
widespread splendor, the light of Shamash, the heart of Shamash, the life
of the world."

The idea that the "mountain house" or "high place" was the consecrated
centre where the union of heaven and earth took place, is apparent from
the following names: "the house of heavenly construction, the heavenly
house, the house reaching to heaven, the point of heaven and earth, the
link of heaven and earth, the foundation stone of heaven and earth."

"Complementing," as Professor Jastrow says, "the cosmological associations
that have been noted in connection with the zikkurat," we find the inner
room or sanctuary of the Babylonian and Assyrian temple named Papakhu,
from the verb pakhu=to close. It was also known as the parakhu, from
paraku=to shut off, to lock. "Gudea describes the papakhu as 'the dark
chamber.' Professor Jastrow states that it was regarded as an imitation of
a cosmical 'sacred chamber,' and from his book we learn that it was
employed as an assembly room, or