Šubtu

Authors: Gennady Kurtik, Susanne M Hoffmann, Wayne Horowitz, Euin Choung Kim

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The Akkadian word šubtu, with its wide range of meanings related to domiciles and locations large and small, from seats to thrones to throne daises to temples to army camps to even more extended territories, is applied to deities on a few occasions in astronomical contexts. In the Astrolabes MUL ^mulIKU 'the Field' (Pegasus) is the 'seat of Anu,' and in MUL.APIN the asterism MUL AL LUL, 'The Crab,' also the 'seat of Anu' with MUL IKU here being the seat of Ea.

Concordance, Etymology, History

Schema of the Babylonian Globe devided into the paths of three main gods of the Babylonian pantheon in the early 2nd millennium BCE (by Susanne M Hoffmann, published in Hoffmann and Krebernik 2023). Anu's path is around the celestial equator, ±17° (roughly, not always accurate).

The exact significance of the term in these contexts is uncertain but it is notable that 'The Crab' whose seat belongs to Anu is in the Path of Enlil, north of the Path of Anu. Likewise, 'The Field' whose seat belongs to the Path of Ea is further north in the Path of Anu. Thus, the picture one can gather from these two entries is that the seats of the gods are placed above the position of their stars. Given that both Ea and Anu are both royal figures in the Mesopotamian pantheon - Anu (the King of Heavaen), and Ea (the King of the Apsu), the image of the asterisms serving as a throne seems most likely. As such, it is interesting to note that both 'The Field' and 'The Crab' include square elements suggestive of seats. For MUL IKU, the square of Pegasus, for MUL AL.LUL, the square within a square outline of Cancer the Crab. For the older tradition of Standing and Sitting Gods, astral deities preserved in the later MUl.APIN compendium see Hoffmann and Horowitz 2023.

Wayne look for more stuff

see glossary of Hoffmann and Krebernik (2023):

if exists ...

Kurtik with Hilder, Hoffmann, Horowitz, Kim

Sources	Identifications
MUL.APIN (AL.LUL). (1) The list of the stars of Enlil (no. 7): mulAL.LUL šu-bat dA-nim "Constellation Crab, the seat of Anu" (I i 7), parallel in MLC 1866 (col. ii 18).	Throne of Anu in constellation Cancer, drawing by Kay Elzner in Hoffmann (2021),
"Three Stars Each (Astrolabes).” Astrolabe B. (1) Menology: [itibara2] mulAŠ.GAN2 bar2.an.na: itibara2 i-ku-u2 šu-bat dA-nim "Nisanu month, the Field, dwelling of Anu" (A i 1, 7); for a parallel see. [Çağirgan 403:1], see also [BPO 2, 81; CAD I, 69b; Emelyanov 1999, 50, Horowitz 2014: 54].	Drawing of AL.LUL on the Sippar Planisphere (W. Horowitz and F. N. H. Al-Rawi 2001), highlighting by Hoffmann 2024.
MUL.APIN. (1) The stars of Anu (no. 1): mulAŠ.IKU šu-bat dE2-a a-lik IGI MUL.MEŠ šu-ut dA-nim "The field, the seat of Ea which goes before the stars of Anu" (I i 40), for a parallel see. MLC 1866 i 1; see also (Kurtik s19) SIM.MAḪ.

Historical Dictionaries

Kurtik (2022)	Gössmann (1950)
no entry for Šubtu	Example
	Example

References

• Kurtik's references