Babylonians

Laura Culbertson

Mesopotamians

The word “Babylonian” or “Babylonia” in modern usage are designations taken after the ancient city of Babylon (Babilim), which was in Mesopotamia (modern Iraq) on the Euphrates river south of modern Baghdad. Babylon was a major political and cultural center in the Near East between the early second and late first millennia BCE, although it was an occupied site before and after this span. Geographically, “Babylonia” refers to the southern half of Mesopotamia, with a settled heartland along the Tigris and Euphrates stretching between Babylon and the Persian Gulf in the south. Even though this region was politically unified in a series of states and empires, it did not see a total ethnic or cultural unification, and thus “Babylonia” at any time refers to a multicultural, multiethnic, and multilingual population. Nevertheless, these are often summarized together thanks to the acculturation of new groups to various local traditions, assimilation into political and cultural practices and representations, and threads of continuity over time. The persistence of a scribal culture enabled the transmission of myths, constructs of kingship and society, and ideas over this long span.

It is customary to classify the Babylonian population into two broad sectors: urban and rural, or city and countryside. This is a classification for modern convenience, as obviously cities were not sealed off economically or otherwise from rural areas, and shifts in delineation and the balance of population between the two occurred constantly. Non-urban settlements included settled and semi-nomadic tribes of different ethnicities, towns, villages, trade depots, fortresses and other military installations, and estates and manors. Though more populous overall, peoples of the countryside are less represented in the archival record compared to city-dwellers. Population estimates are developed through survey archaeology and archival studies on specific periods, but exact demographic figures do not exist. In addition to the constraints of data, the regular population movements and political upheavals of Babylonian history prevent fixed calculations. In the Neo-Babylonian period of the mid-first millennium BCE, major cities may have housed upwards of 100,000 people, and at its peak Babylon was likely the largest city in the world.

During the second millennium BCE, the Babylonians spoke and wrote in Akkadian, a language on the Semitic branch of the Afro-asiatic family. The formation of states and empires involved the introduction of new peoples and languages, but Akkadian remained the primary administrative language, via the cuneiform writing system. In the first millennium BCE, Aramaic overtook Akkadian as the vernacular, while dialects of Akkadian continued along with Aramaic for formal written functions. Sumerian, an isolate language not spoken since the third millennium BCE, was also used for scribal instruction as well as liturgical and literary traditions.

Writings on the history of Babylonian peoples often remain within the orbit of Babylon because it was the political, cultural, and cosmic center, though in reality the topic involves the integration of many native and external groups who manipulated, contended with, or drew upon traditional methods of expressing power and civilization. At the end of the third millennium BCE, Babylon was one of many city-states in southern Mesopotamia. Early in the eighteenth century a network of alliances built by Amorites (a Northwest Semitic-speaking people) culminated in a concentration of Amorite power at Babylon under Hammurabi (ca. 1792–1750 BCE). His dynasty united southern Mesopotamia into one polity and adopted local political and cultural traditions, such as using Akkadian as the administrative language. The dynasty ended with the arrival of Hittite forces in 1595 BCE. The Kassite ethnic group then assumed power in Babylon, likewise self-consciously appropriating traditional cultural expressions and retaining the idea of Babylon as the civilizational center. A series of conquests established other dynasties and political centers in Mesopotamia. With the fall of the Assyrian empire (911-612 BCE), the Neo-Babylonian kings (626-539 BCE) restored Babylon as the political capital. Population demographics shifted considerably over these centuries, not only because of imperial deportations and resettlements, but also due to an influx of tribal populations such as the Arameans.

Cities were the largest type of settlement in terms of built space. Major urban settlements included temples and palace institutions; the former usually served as the central feature. Constellations of settlements between urban centers included towns, villages, seasonal camps, estates, and military posts. The demographic balance between “rural” and “urban” settlements shifted from period to period. Settlement patterns reflected political history, but also were routine adaptations to disasters, resource availability, and challenges in the environment.

Agriculture, animal husbandry, and fishing were the bases of subsistence. Production of beer provided a nutrient-rich staple. Subsistence crops were managed on both local and state levels. Temple and palace institutions maintained large land holdings and dependent, unfree, or semi-free labor forces, providing the productive basis for coordinating a redistributive economy. During the first millennium BCE temples also paid in silver.

Two commercial sectors overlapped and interacted: institutional and entrepreneurial. The first included the temple and palace households that commissioned wide-scale production and trading activities (many historians prefer to identify three sectors to distinguish the two institutions and their respective spheres). The second sector included private actors, such as the entrepreneurial occupation of tamkaru (merchant)—independent business magnates who might also be contracted by the large institutions to undertake commercial voyages. Other mercantile activities were concentrated at sites called the karu, independent quasi-institutions overseen by officials. Lending was profitable and private debt was prevalent; regular royal edicts were needed to forgive debts and clear economic slates.

Numerous industries are reflected in rich lexicons of native craft specializations and archaeological finds. Local industries produced textiles and items in leather, ceramic, metal, stone, bone, shell, and ivory. Palaces and temple institutions funded workshops for specialized crafts. Production of both utilitarian and specialized goods also took place in villages and neighborhoods.

The need for long-distance trade emerged from an uneven distribution of natural resources. The Babylonians had an abundance of alluvium, bitumen, clay, and steppe pasture, but no metal ores, timber, stone, or “exotic” status items such as aromatics. Long-distance trade was enabled by agricultural surplus and coordination between nomadic and urban groups. Trade extended east to Central Asia and the Indus Valley, south to the Persian Gulf and Arabian coast, west to Egypt, and north to the Caucasus and Anatolia. Under the empires of the first millennium BCE, spoils from military excursions, tribute, and gifts also provided an influx of goods to the Babylonian heartland. Local trade, travel, and communication relied on waterways and irrigation canals. Overland caravan routes were constrained by geography, such as the availability of water; in the first millennium BCE the use of camels enabled passage through desert routes.

On a domestic level, labor was divided by gender, with management of the household and children falling to women. Men conducted labor in the public or industrial spheres, but women are sometimes noted as working in various industries. Some forms of production were gendered; women are often associated with brewing and alehouses, for example. People at the lower rungs of society or prisoners of war performed subsistence labor. The labor of institutional dependents or slaves was not always differentiated on the basis of gender or age; such families performed work together. In the first millennium BCE, the Neo-Babylonian palace assigned responsibilities for specific lands to ethnic groups.

Land was both privately owned and state or institutionally owned by the king or temples. Service to the state (ilku), such as corvée labor or military service, was rewarded with allotments of arable land (also called ilku). In most periods this land was essentially private once awarded (i.e., transferrable and inheritable). Elites could accumulate land and urban plots through awards from the king.

Kinship was established and described through patrilineal descent.

In a nuclear domestic context, the core members of a family included the father (abu), mother (ummu), son (maru), and daughter (martu). The term “brother” (ahu) described descendants of the same father and extended male relatives. The term “house” (bitu) signified a broad variety of contexts, from nuclear households to extended households, institutional households (palaces and temples), and even large extended kin-groups. In written sources, individuals were identified by their personal name followed by a patronymic and, in some cases, a matronymic.

Fathers and mothers arranged their children’s marriages as well as related gifts and financial exchanges, including the bride price (terhatu), which was given from the groom’s family to the bride, and the dowry (nudunnû), which was given by the bride’s father. Oaths cemented agreements and specified consequences and curses for breaching the agreement; if any special circumstances threatened the financial side of the arrangement, the parties drew up a written contract in advance. Marriage ceremonies involved feasting, rituals, and presentation of wedding gifts (biblu). The concluding act was the bride’s arrival at her husband’s household. Marriages could be dissolved, but often required the intervention of judicial officials to enforce financial agreements and divorce payments. Most marriages were monogamous, but kings and elites (i.e., people of economic means and political status) practiced polygamy. Men otherwise took second wives to increase the number of offspring, to tend for an ill or aged first wife, or as remarriages after the first wife’s death.

The family was patrilocal and the household consisted of a male patriarch, his wife (and in some cases a secondary wife), unmarried children, and slaves. Families typically had at least two or three children; wealthy families may have had more. Domestic slaves comprised parallel families in the household including, for example, mothers and their children. Female slaves could be taken as second wives in special circumstances.

Inheritance followed patrilineal lines, and estates included property, land, slaves and, in some contexts, temple offices. In normal circumstances, the father’s estate was divided among all his sons. Wives and married daughters had no claims, having received a dowry instead. But gifts were bequeathed to women, and records of contracts and lawsuits indicate deviations from normal inheritance patterns for special circumstances; for example, daughters installed in temple positions could inherit land and keep it within the family. Disputes over inheritance and disinheritance were litigated before judicial officials and witnesses. Older individuals adopted adults using legal contracts and ritual acts. Legal clauses stipulated that the adoptee promised to care for the adoptive parent in old age in exchange for inheritance of the estate. Many adoptive parents were unmarried women.

Children remained in their parents’ household until marriage, and contributed to the economic affairs of the household. Wet-nurses, nurses, and slaves participated in childcare.

The term “house” (bitu) signified nuclear households, extended households, institutional organizations (e.g., palaces and temples as “houses” of the king or gods), as well as large extended tribal groups and their territories (in which case the designation could be followed by the name of an eponymous ancestor). Sites of specialized craft production could also be called “houses.” Above the level of the family, one belonged to a town or city, or a quarter within a city (babtu). In urban state contexts, individual identity could entail a number of titles and affiliations to different institutions. Slaves were present at all levels of society, from the lowest rung to the royal court, and forms of slavery included domestic slaves, semi-free institutional dependents, debt slaves, and prisoners of war.

The king was at the apex of an administrative state consisting of a hierarchy of political elites, including royal relatives and local nobles, as well as the military. On the local end of the political spectrum, cities had mayors and communal decision-making assemblies (puhru) that included elders.

Both local and state-appointed judicial authorities witnessed and adjudicated private agreements and conflicts in public depositions. Oath taking was performed in a variety of contexts to secure economic, legal, and social agreements—oaths involved binding public declarations of self-reflexive curses and punishments. Kings encouraged order and loyalty with visual displays, demonstrations of brutality toward traitors, and systems of rewards, titles, and land grants for good service.

Conflict between the state and rival groups was resolved through treaties and loyalty oaths. On a local level, conflicts between households or individuals went before judges or city officials for adjudication and resolution. Recording of texts, oaths, and witnesses ensued to guarantee accountability.

A pantheon of gods—or divine assemblies—contained thousands of entities. Each major city had a patron god or goddess, and the pantheon’s structure and dynamics reflected the political organization of Babylonia (Babylon’s ascendancy is mirrored in the elevation of Marduk, the city’s patron god). Divinity was understood as a spectrum that included protective deities and semi-divine creatures such as malevolent demons and ghosts. Household shrines, amulets, and incantations helped people entreat or dispel them. Many personal names included theophoric elements, including references to both “state” gods and personal deities. Magic was a category of religion.

The king was the religious representative of the people and state, and participated in rituals to demonstrate his piety. In temple households a variety of specialized cultic personnel, including priests and priestesses, managed the care of the gods on both cultic and logistical levels. In the second millennium BCE unmarried nuns (naditu) were powerful women who lived in cloisters. Another female role was the qadištu, a type of priestess. Other types of practitioners circulated outside the formal institutions. Diviners (baru) were independent specialists who could decipher omens, for example by reading animal organs or astrological signs. By the first millennium BCE, diviners compiled all manner of omens into lengthy collections for making predictions. Kaššapu (male) and kaššaptu (female) were witches, or persons who practiced magic for malevolent purposes. Acts performed by an incantation and with a ritual specialist (ašipu) could counter their afflictions.

Regular public ceremonies factored into the calendars of major cities. The Akitu Festival was a New Year celebration that reaffirmed the relationship between the king and Marduk, the patron god of Babylon. On a more personal scale, there were ceremonies and rites for social transitions (marriages, adoptions), and to make legal practices official.

Works of art had purposes beyond aesthetics. Kings used intimidating visual displays involving stelae, monumental architecture, and statuary to express their submission to the gods and superiority to the people. Palaces and temples projected power and wealth through their scale and adornments. At a more intimate scale, artistry was expressed in the production of figurines, jewelry, and cylinder seals, worn as conspicuous signs of status. A scholarly culture flourished that, through the written arts, preserved and expanded literary and intellectual traditions. The Assyrian king Assurbanipal commissioned a library of Babylonian texts at Nineveh to compile and consolidate such works.

Magic and medicine were undifferentiated. The Babylonians understood illnesses and afflictions as the result of demonic interference or divine displeasure. Specialists (ašipu) were needed to perform incantations and rituals that either exorcised the demons or invoked protection, thus healing the afflicted person.

The dead were buried, and mortuary artifacts indicate belief in an afterlife. Both cemeteries and residential burials are known. Graves were furnished with basic provisions in pottery and, status permitting, luxury items such as adornments, weapons, tools, or seals.

The culture summary was written by Laura Culbertson in February, 2018.

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