,"
an interpretation which Delitzsch himself repudiated later
on. It is probable that the town, which, like Assur, was a
Chaldaean colony, derived its name from the goddess to whom
it was dedicated, and whose temple existed there as early as
the time of the vicegerent Samsiramman.

**** Belit is called by Tiglath-pileser I. "the great spouse
beloved of Assur," but Belit, "the lady," is here merely an
epithet used for Ishtar: the Assyrian Ishtar, Ishtar of
Assur, Ishtar of Nineveh, or rather--especially from the
time of the Sargonids--Ishtar of Arbeles, is almost always a
fierce and warlike Ishtar, the "lady of combat, who directs
battles," "whose heart incites her to the combat and the
struggle." Sayce thinks that the union of Ishtar and Assur
is of a more recent date.

[Illustration: 149.jpg ISHTAR AS A WARRIOR BRINGING PRISONERS TO A
CONQUERING KING]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from squeezes brought back by M. do
Morgan.

These two divinities formed an abstract and solitary pair, around whom
neither story nor myth appears to have gathered, and who never became
the centre of any complex belief. Assur seems to have had no parentage
assigned to him, no statue erected to him, and he was not associated
with the crowd of other divinities; on the contrary, he was called their
lord, their "peerless king," and, as a proof of his supreme sovereignty
over them, his name was inscribed at the head of their lists, before
those of the triads constituted by the Chaldaean priests--even before
those of Anu, Bel, and Ba. The city of Assur, which had been the first
to tender him allegiance for many years, took precedence of all the
rest, in spite of the drawbacks with which it had to contend. Placed at
the very edge of the Mesopotamian desert, it was exposed to the dry and
burning winds which swept over the plains, so that by the end of the
spring the heat rendered it almost intolerable as a residence. The
Tigris, moreover, ran behind it, thus leaving it exposed to the attacks
of the Babylonian armies, unprotected as it was by any natural fosse
or rampart. The nature of the frontier was such as to afford it no
safeguard; indeed, it had, on the contrary, to protect its frontier.
Nineveh, on the other hand, was entrenched behind the Tigris and the
Zab, and was thus secure from any sudden attack. Northerly and easterly
winds prevailed during the summer, and t