The Divine World: Mesopotamia

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The people of Mesopotamia believed their world to be inhabited not only by humans and animals, but also by a host of gods, spirits, ghosts, demons, and monsters. The gods ruled the world while humans were simply their servants. Religious activities were concerned with keeping these deities happy and maintaining their support. The center of religious cult was the temple, known as the god's "house." Each city had its main temple, the seat of the city god, with many others inhabited by lesser deities. To build temples and keep them in repair was the task of every king who would often leave records of their work as foundation deposits. By the end of the third millennium B.C. the god was represented by a statue and believed to live in the temple with their family, and servants (priests) provided them with meals on behalf of the state. In addition, offerings were made by individuals in order to receive divine protection.

Temple Building and Ritual

Temples were among the most important buildings in Mesopotamian cities of the Early Dynastic period. Each city had a patron deity, whose temple was built on a large platform and was visible for great distances in the flat countryside. The temple was literally a house for the god and a place of ritual, but it was also the most significant economic institution of the time, with large numbers of laborers to work its fields, produce goods for use in the temple, and to trade with distant lands. Temple building had its own series of rituals, including purifying the ground on which the temple would stand and dedicating foundation deposits to the resident god.