Fine arts of Mesopotamia presentation. Presentation on the discipline "art" on the topic "ancient mesopotamia". The culture of ancient Mesopotamia

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Mesopotamia lat. Mesopotamia - "Mesopotamia"

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Mesopotamia is a country where the world's oldest civilization arose, which existed approx. 25 centuries, from the time of the creation of writing and ending with the conquest of Babylon by the Persians in 539 BC.

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This country, separated from the rest of Asia Minor by barely passable deserts, began to be populated around the 6th millennium BC. NS. During the VI-IV millennia, the tribes who settled here lived extremely poorly: barley, sown in a narrow strip of land between swamps and a scorched desert and irrigated by unregulated and uneven floods, brought small and unstable yields. Sowing was better on lands that were irrigated by canals diverted from the small river Diyala, a tributary of the Tigris. Only in the middle of the 4th millennium BC. NS. individual groups of communities have coped with the creation of rational drainage and irrigation systems in the Euphrates basin.

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Residents of Mesopotamia

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Religion. The religion of Mesopotamia in all its main points was created by the Sumerians. Over time, the Akkadian names of the gods began to replace the Sumerian ones, and the personifications of the elements gave way to the star deities. Local gods could also lead the pantheon of a particular region, as happened with Marduk in Babylon or Ashur in the Assyrian capital. But the religious system as a whole, the view of the world and the changes taking place in it differed little from the initial ideas of the Sumerians. None of the Mesopotamian deities were the exclusive source of power, none had supreme power. The full power belonged to the assembly of the gods, which traditionally elected a leader and approved all important decisions. Nothing was established forever or taken for granted. But the instability of space led to intrigue among the gods, which means it promised danger and gave rise to anxiety among mortals.

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Economy. The economy of Mesopotamia was determined by the natural conditions of the region. Fertile soils the valleys gave rich harvests. The South specialized in the cultivation of the date palm. The vast pastures of the nearby mountains made it possible to maintain large herds of sheep and goats. On the other hand, the country felt a shortage of stone, metal, wood, raw materials for the manufacture of dyes and other vital materials. The surplus of some goods and the lack of others led to the development of trade relations.

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At the same time, there was always the possibility that events would turn into better side if the person will behave correctly. The temple tower (ziggurat) was the place where the celestials stayed. She symbolized the human desire to establish a connection between heaven and earth. As a rule, the inhabitants of Mesopotamia relied little on the favor of the gods. They tried to appease them by performing increasingly complex rituals.

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Writing and Science. The supreme rule of law was a characteristic feature of Mesopotamia during the historical period and may even precede it, but the effectiveness of legislative activity is associated with the use of written evidence and documents. There is reason to believe that the invention of writing by the ancient Sumerians was primarily driven by concern for private and communal rights. Even the earliest texts known to us testify to the need to fix everything, be it objects necessary for temple exchange, or gifts intended for a deity. Such documents were certified by an imprint of a cylindrical seal.

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The oldest writing was pictographic, and its signs depicted objects of the surrounding world - animals, plants, etc. The signs formed groups, each of which, consisting, for example, of images of animals, plants or objects, was composed in a certain sequence. Over time, the lists acquired the character of a kind of reference books on zoology, botany, mineralogy, etc. Since the Sumerian contribution to the development of local civilization was perceived as very significant, and after the establishment of the Akkad dynasty, colloquial Sumerian became uncommon, the Akkadians did everything in their power to preserve the Sumerian language. Efforts in this direction did not stop with the fall of the III dynasty of Ur and continued into the Amorite time. As a result, word lists, numerous Sumero-Akkadian dictionaries, and studies of grammar were created.

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There were many other cultural phenomena that were systematized through writing. Among them, a special place is occupied by omens, through which people tried to find out their future through various signs, such as the shape of the liver of a sacrificed sheep or the location of the stars. The list of omens helped the priest predict the consequences of certain phenomena. It was also common to compile lists of the most common legal terms and formulas. In mathematics and astronomy, the ancient Mesopotamians also made significant progress. According to modern researchers, the system of Egyptian mathematics was crude and primitive in comparison with Babylonian; it is believed that even Greek mathematics learned much from the achievements of the earlier Mesopotamian. A highly developed area was also the so-called. "Chaldean (ie Babylonian) astronomy".

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CULTURE Material culture. Ceramics gradually improved in terms of manufacturing techniques, a variety of shapes and ornaments, this can be traced from the ancient Jarmo culture through other prehistoric cultures to the emergence of a single technology for the production of stone and metal vessels. It is now impossible to say what important discoveries in the field of pottery making were brought to Mesopotamia from the outside. A significant achievement was the introduction of a closed kiln, which allowed the craftsman to achieve a higher temperature and easier to control it, and as a result, to obtain high-quality cookware in shape and precision. The first such ovens were discovered at Tepe Le Havre, north of present-day Mosul. The oldest known samples of carefully made seals were found in the same settlement.

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Mesopotamia created the oldest known structures of monumental architecture in the north - in Tepe Le Havre, in the south - in Eridu. The high technical level of this time can be judged by the aqueduct in Jervan, approx. 50 km, through which water entered Nineveh. Mesopotamian craftsmen brought metalwork to the level of high art. This can be judged by items made of precious metals, remarkable samples of which, dating back to the early Dynastic time, were found in burials in Ur; a silver vase of the Lagash ruler, Entemena, is also known.

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Sculpture in Mesopotamia reached a high level of development even in prehistoric times. Known cylindrical seals with depressed images, the rolling of which on clay made it possible to obtain convex impressions. The reliefs on the Naram-Suena stele, carefully executed portrait sculptures of the ruler of Lagash Gudea, and other monuments are examples of the large form of the ancient era. The highest development of Mesopotamian sculpture reached in the 1st millennium BC. in Assyria, when colossal figures and exquisite reliefs were created with images of animals, in particular, galloping horses, being hit by hunters of wild donkeys, dying lionesses. In the same period, magnificent reliefs were sculptured depicting individual episodes of hostilities.

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Little is known about the development of painting. The mural painting could not survive due to the effects of moisture and soil characteristics, but surviving samples from different eras show that this art form was widespread. Excellent examples of painted ceramics have been found, in particular, in Ashur. They indicate that their creators preferred bright colors.

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Art culture Ancient World Art Mesopotamia

Ancient civilizations known to science arose in 4 thousand years BC. NS. This is primarily Ancient East - Sumer, Akkad, Babylon, Assyria, Egypt.

The fertile plain of the Tigris and Euphrates began to be called Mesopotamia ("mesos" - middle, "potamos" - river, Greek), which means Mesopotamia. You do not have this name on the modern map. Today there is the Arab state of Iraq with the capital Baghdad.

Historical stages of development of Mesopotamia
IV millennium BC NS.- the time of the collapse of the primitive communal system.
III millennium BC NS... - the formation of the Sumerian-Akkadian kingdom.
- 27-25th centuries. BC NS. - the rise of the Sumerian city-states.
- 24-23rd centuries. BC NS. - Power passes to the city of Mesopotamia - Akkad.
- 23-21st centuries. BC NS. - new strengthening of the Sumerian cities of Ur and Lagash.

II millennium BC NS.

II millennium BC NS.- the rise of Babylon. 19th -12th centuries BC NS. - the unification of Mesopotamia under the rule of Babylon.
1st millennium BC NS.:
- 9-7th centuries. BC NS. - strengthening the power of Assyria, which gained the upper hand over Babylon.
- 7-6th centuries. BC NS. - the new rise of Babylon, the New Babylonian kingdom.
- 536 BC NS. - the conquest of Babylon by Cyrus, king of Iran.
- 4th - 2nd centuries. before and. NS. - the domination of the Greco-Macedonian conquerors in Mesopotamia.

Achievements of the peoples of Mesopotamia

knew the exact time;
they knew how to orient the walls of cities and towers to 4 cardinal points, precisely aligning the horizontals of the foundations;
erected the world's first "skyscrapers" (the Tower of Babel);
connected by the Tigris and Euphrates shipping canals;
compiled solar and lunar calendars;
laid the foundations of medical knowledge;
installed a 7-day system;
at the beginning of the 3rd millennium BC NS. the first numeric symbols appeared (they knew how to use strikingly large numbers).
invented a writing system that made it possible to read the history of Ancient Mesopotamia.

Religious and mythological representations of the peoples of Mesopotamia Ebih-il statuette from Mari. Alabaster. Mid III millennium BC NS. Paris, Louvre

The adorers' figurines (from Lat. Adore - "to worship") depict people praying. They had to turn to the gods (on behalf of the one who was represented by this statuette) and assure them of their loyalty.

Literature and writing of Ancient Mesopotamia

the creation of the first cuneiform books (the world's first library of the Assyrian king Ashurbanipal);
Mesopotamian literature includes epic poems, fairy tales, collections of proverbs, works of authorship;
the most ancient epic poem "The Epic of Gilgamesh"

A relief depicting this mythical hero of Mesopotamia is now kept in Paris in the Louvre. Culture of the Sumerian-Akkadian kingdom

The Sumerians had many gods. A temple was built for each of the gods. The oldest known Sumerian temples are dedicated to the goddess Inanna (Ishtar) and the god Anu. These are the "white temple" and "red temple" in Uruk, named for the color of the walls.

The head of the goddess from the "white temple" in Uruk. Marble. III millennium BC NS. Baghdad, Iraqi Museum Portrait head of Sargon the Ancient. Copper. XXIII-XXII centuries BC NS. Baghdad, Iraqi Museum One of the best examples of Akkadian sculpture is the victorious stele of King Naram-Sina. In the III millennium BC. NS. in the kingdom of Sumer and Akkad, the main type of temple architecture of Mesopotamia developed - ziggurat.

The ziggurat is a stepped temple tower, consisting of several trapezoidal platforms descending upward, built of raw bricks. At the top is a sanctuary; on the facade there are three steep staircases.

The main directions of the Sumerian-Akkadian culture:

1) cult , in which a special type of temple architecture develops - ziggurat and temple accessories associated with it appear - adherents.
2) secular manifested itself primarily in decorative and applied art (glyptics - the art of carving on precious and semiprecious stones) and in sculpture (dedicatory steles depicting the feats of tsars and portrait statues of rulers).

Assyro-Babylonian culture

Babylon reached its heyday during the reign of Hammurabi, one of the greatest politicians of antiquity.
The time of Hammurabi left an amazing monument of art - a diorite pillar, decorated with reliefs - a cuneiform code of laws. Hammurabi's code of laws covered all aspects of the life of Babylonian society, both religious and civil.

Stele of Hammurabi from Susa. Diorite. XVIII century BC NS. Berlin, State Museum It was not a cult character like in Sumer, and secular... Here

Assyrian art was performed the pathos of strength, glorified the power, victories and conquests of the rulers. It was not a cult character like in Sumer, and secular... Here mainly palaces were built.
The main achievement of the Babylonian and, accordingly, Assyrian architects is the invention of the arch and vault.(later they were taken as the basis of all the building art of Ancient Rome and medieval Europe).

In Assyria appeared new type cities - a fortress city with a single layout. The architecture of such a city is based on a brick wall. The urban planning is characterized by the following features:

1) the presence of a citadel; it contains a palace and a temple (the citadel is a fortified part of the city);
2) the location of the citadel against the wall;
3) the rectangular shape of the fortifications.

I am walking from the palace of Sargon II in Dur-Sharrukin. Sandstone. XVIII century BC NS. Berlin, State Museum Features of the Assyrian-Babylonian culture

The development of Assyro-Babylonian culture is dominated not by the cult, but by the secular line. This manifested itself in the construction of magnificent cities with magnificent temples and palaces decorated with reliefs. Art was intended to glorify the victories and wealth of the rulers, to perpetuate the names of the kings.

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Ancient Mesopotamia(Mesopotamia, Mesopotamia) In a fertile valley between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in the IV - I millennium BC. such large city-states as Sumer, Akkad, Babylon, and the Assyrian state were formed. Here, over the centuries, as a result of numerous bloody wars, states arose and died, nationalities replaced each other, ancient communities disintegrated and re-emerged. Here lived peoples of high culture, to whom we owe the basics of mathematical knowledge and the division of the hour dial into 12 parts. Here they learned to calculate with great accuracy the motion of the planets, the time of the Moon's revolution around the Earth.

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The ancient palaces of Nineveh, the capital, built by the Assyrian king Ashshurnas and rpalom II in the 9th century. BC. The richest mythology of the peoples of Mesopotamia had a tremendous impact on the culture of Europe and Asia. Subsequently, some of their legends became part of the Bible and even the Scandinavian sagas. In Mesopotamia, they knew how to erect the highest towers, drained marshlands, laid canals and irrigated fields, planted beautiful gardens, invented the wheel, Potter's wheel, built ships, made tools and weapons from copper.

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Small city-states with adjacent lands had their own ruler and patron - some deity of fertility, which was part of the numerous pantheon of gods. Unlike Dr. Egypt, man dr. Mesopotamia was not too worried about the afterlife; he was much more attracted by the momentary joys of earthly life. The fertility goddess feeding the goats. 14th century BC

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The emergence of writing By the 3rd millennium BC in the southern valley of Mesopotamia, the city-state of Sumer was formed. The Sumerians entered the history, first of all, thanks to the invention of writing, which arose here about 200 - 300 years earlier than in Dr. Egypt. The culture of ancient Mesopotamia is known for its ancient clay tablets with cuneiform writing.

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In Mesopotamia, there were schools for scribes - eddubba, which meant "house of tablets". From the surviving clay tablets, we can judge how the educational process was built. The teachers kept the students in strictness and obedience. Numerous ancient complaints left on the tablets by the pupils tell us about this.

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“In the house of the tablets, the overseer remarked to me:“ Why are you late? ” I was scared, my heart was pounding wildly. Approaching the teacher, I bowed to the ground. The father of the house of plates begged for my plate, he was dissatisfied with it and hit me. Then I was zealous with the lesson, I was tormented with the lesson ... The class supervisor ordered us: "Rewrite!" I took my tablet in my hands, wrote on it, but there was also something on the tablet that I did not understand, which I could not read ... The fate of the scribe was disgusting to me, I hated the fate of the scribe! (translated by L. Shargina)

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In the city of Nenevia, the library of Tsar Ashurnasirpal (669 - c. 633 BC) was discovered, numbering more than 30 thousand tablets. Sacred Urnan Tablet.

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An outstanding literary monument "The Epic of Gilgamesh" ("About everything that has seen") III millennium BC. - the ruler of the Sumerian city of Uruk - preserved on clay tablets, subsidized by the beginning of the 2nd millennium BC. “Gilgamesh, where are you going? The life that you are striving for, you can never achieve. Because when the gods created man, they instilled mortality in him, leaving immortality to themselves. Gilgamesh, fill your womb, rejoice day and night, may your days be full of fun ... "

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Architecture of Mesopotamia The most notable pieces of architecture in Mesopotamia are temples and palaces. The earliest of the temples, scientists date back to 4-3 millennia BC. These were z and kurats, which means "holy mountain". In Mesopotamia, they did not attach such great importance to burial structures, as in Egypt, since the population did not find a connection between immortality and the safety of the body of the deceased.

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Due to the fact that there was not enough wood and stone on these lands, the temples were erected from fragile raw bricks and in conditions of high humidity required constant renovation. The tradition of not changing the place and building the "dwelling of God" on the same platform led to the appearance of z and k urat - a multi-stage temple consisting of cubic volumes stacked on top of each other, and each subsequent volume was smaller in volume than the previous one ... On the upper platform of the zikkurat there was a sanctuary, in which a statue of a deity was placed. Simple people were never admitted to the sanctuary, only kings or priests who watched the heavenly bodies could be there.

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The most famous is the ziggurat of the moon god in Ur (modern Iraq). Frequent and at times catastrophic rise of groundwater to the surface and sandstorms forced to build structures on high platforms with stairs or a shallow entrance - a ramp.

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The cities covered an area of 2-4 sq. km and numbered more than tens of thousands of inhabitants. In the center of the city was a walled temple complex with a ziggurat erected in honor of the patron god of the city. The palace of the king or ruler and the main state economic buildings were also located here. The rest of the city was occupied by residential buildings and other buildings, between them were small temples of less important deities. The houses stood close to each other, forming winding streets 1.5-3 m wide. On the banks of the river or canal, near which the city grew up, there was a harbor where merchant ships were stationed. Brisk trade was going on in the square adjacent to the harbor. The life of the townspeople was centered around numerous temples and palaces.

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Ziggurat Etemennigiru in Ur Very few architectural structures of Mesopotamia have survived to this day. Most often these are just the foundations of buildings. They were built from unbaked raw clay and quickly collapsed in conditions of high humidity. Numerous wars did not spare them either.

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The most important architectural achievement of Mesopotamia was the invention of the vaulted-arched structure. The gate of the goddess Ishtar was built by order of King Nebuchadnezzar, the ruler of Dr. Babylon in the 6th century BC NS. ... They are a huge semicircular arch, bounded on the sides by high walls. They faced the Processional Road and were made of bricks covered with white, black, blue and yellow glaze. Of extraordinary beauty, bas-reliefs depicting animals adorned the walls of the gates and the Processional Route. Bulls and sirrushi (dragons) were depicted on the walls of the gate in alternating rows. In total, about 575 animals were depicted on the gate.

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In the 1930s, the Ishtar Gate and Processional Route were remodeled in Berlin at the Pergamon Museum. The restored gate is 14 meters high and 10 meters long. In Iraq, a replica of the gate was built at the entrance to the museum, which was never completed.

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Hanging gardens Semiramis is one of the Seven Wonders of the World. The correct name of this structure is the Hanging Gardens of A m and t and s: this was the name of the wife of the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar, for whose sake the gardens were created.

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Nebuchadnezzar ordered his soldiers to dig up all the unknown plants that he encountered during military campaigns and immediately deliver them to Babylon. There were no caravans or ships that did not bring more and more plants here from distant countries. So a large and varied garden grew in Babylon - the first botanical garden in the world. There were miniature rivers and waterfalls, ducks swam in small ponds and frogs croaked, bees, butterflies and dragonflies flew from flower to flower.

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The very name of the miracle - the Hanging Gardens - misleads us. The gardens did not hang in the air. The gardens were, rather, not hanging, but protruding. Architecturally, the gardens were a pyramid that consisted of four tiers-platforms. They were supported by columns up to 25 meters high. The pyramid resembled an ever-flowering green hill. Pipes were placed in the cavity of the columns. Day and night, hundreds of slaves turned a lifting wheel with leather buckets, pumping water from the Euphrates into the gardens.

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The Hanging Gardens have existed for about two centuries. At first, they stopped caring for the garden, then powerful floods destroyed the foundations of the columns, and the entire structure collapsed. This is how one of the wonders of the world perished. Modern archaeologists are still trying to collect enough evidence before drawing final conclusions about the location of the Gardens, their irrigation system and the true reasons for their appearance and disappearance.

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It was possible to slightly reveal the secret of the existence of a grandiose monument of engineering thought only in 1898 thanks to the excavations of Robert Koldevei. During excavations, he discovered a network of intersecting trenches near the Iraqi city of Hille (90 km from Baghdad), in the sections of which traces of dilapidated masonry are still visible. Now tourists visiting Iraq are invited to look at the ruins left from the Gardens, but these ruins are unlikely to impress.

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The visual arts The visual arts of Mesopotamia are represented mainly by the reliefs and mosaics that adorned the inner state rooms of temples and palaces.

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A significant part of them is devoted to the life of the kings and their entourage. The main place is occupied by themes of solemn processions. Ur standard 3 thousand BC

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Winged bull Shedu from the palace of Sargon II. Bas-relief In Akkadian mythology, there were good demons shedu - winged bulls (or lions - lamassu) with male heads decorated with rectangular beards typical of Assyrian and Iranian culture. The main function of the walk was to protect the home. Two small shedu figures were usually placed near the doors (or a clay tablet with their image was buried under the threshold). The entrances to the cities were guarded by statues of colossal size, adorned with incantatory carvings. The beard was identified with the mind.

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Tiles of the Processional Road Thanks to the enamel brick technique, the ancient painting of Mesopotamia looked realistic and impressive. The structure of the brick made it possible to build huge walls on which were depicted sacred emblems, zoomorphic figures and other motives. The bricks could be painted in different colors, and some parts of the drawing were made voluminous.

In the IV - I millennium BC. NS. in the lower reaches of the large rivers Tigris and Euphrates lived peoples of high culture, to whom we owe the basics of mathematical knowledge and the division of the hour dial into 12 parts. Here they learned to calculate with great accuracy the motion of the planets, the time of the Moon's revolution around the Earth. In Mesopotamia, they knew how to erect the highest towers, where they used brick as a building material, drained swampy areas, laid canals and irrigated fields, planted orchards, invented a wheel, a potter's wheel and built ships, knew how to spin and weave, made tools of labor from copper and bronze and weapons. The richest mythology of the peoples of Mesopotamia had a tremendous impact on the culture of Europe and Asia. Subsequently, some of their legends became part of the holy book of the Bible.

An example of cuneiform

2200-2000 biennium BC NS.

Unlike architecture

Babylon. Reconstruction

Hanging Gardens of Babylon

Review questions:

3. What are outstanding achievements culture of the Nars of Ancient Asia? In the IV - I millennium BC. NS. in the lower reaches of the large rivers Tigris and Euphrates lived peoples of high culture, to whom we owe the basics of mathematical knowledge and the division of the hour dial into 12 parts. Here they learned to calculate with great accuracy the motion of the planets, the time of the Moon's revolution around the Earth. In Mesopotamia, they knew how to erect the highest towers, where they used brick as a building material, drained swampy areas, laid canals and irrigated fields, planted orchards, invented a wheel, a potter's wheel and built ships, knew how to spin and weave, made tools of labor from copper and bronze and weapons. The richest mythology of the peoples of Mesopotamia had a tremendous impact on the culture of Europe and Asia. Subsequently, some of their legends became part of the holy book of the Bible.

The Sumerians entered the history of world culture primarily due to the invention of writing, which arose here about 200-300 years earlier than in Egypt. It was originally a pictographic letter. They wrote on "tablets" on soft clay, for this purpose they used reed or wooden sticks sharpened in such a way that when pressed into wet clay, they left a wedge-shaped mark. Then the tablets were burned. At first, they wrote to the right to the left, but this was inconvenient, since the right hand covered what was written. We gradually moved on to a more rational writing - from left to right.

"Planks" made of soft glige and reed sticks for writing

An example of cuneiform

Religion played a huge role in public life. In Mesopotamia, there was no developed funeral cult, there was no idea of resurrection and immortality. Death seemed inevitable and natural, only earthly life was real. In this struggle for life, gods can come to the aid of man, they must be propitiated, they must be served. In Mesopotamia, heavenly bodies, water and other natural forces were deified.

God Enlil (lord of wind and water) is one of the greatest deities, who was the son of the sky god Anu and the earth goddess Ki. Enlil is the god of fertility. According to the mythology of the ancient Sumerians, Enlil divided heaven and earth, presented people with agricultural tools and helped develop cattle breeding, agriculture, introduced to culture. But not only good things are attributed to him. Enlil, in order to teach people a lesson for their stupidity, sent natural disasters to them, and in the epic of Gilgamesh, it is mentioned that Enlil was the initiator of a global flood in order to destroy all of humanity. Enlil is often depicted as an insidious, evil, cruel deity. His wife, Ninlil, was a goddess with unusual beauty and intelligence. He also had sons - the god of the moon Nannu, the god of the underground element Norgal, the warrior Ninurta and the ambassador of the gods Namtar.

In comparison with Egypt, few monuments of art of the peoples of Mesopotamia have come down to us. There was no stone in the valley of the Tigris and Euphrates, and how construction material used a short-lived raw brick. Temples, houses and fortress walls were created from clay. Only mountains of clay and debris, which were previously beautiful cities, have survived to this day. However, even from the found remains, it can be concluded that here, as well as in Egypt, monumental architecture played a leading role.

The center of the city in Mesopotamia was the temple of the patron god, next to which stood a multi-stage tower, the so-called ziggurat. The ziggurat could have from three to seven terraces, connected by wide, gentle ramps. At the very top was the sanctuary of the god, the place of his rest. Only initiated priests were admitted there. The cladding of the ziggurat was made of baked bricks and painted, each tier being painted in its own color, black, red or white. The area of the terraces was occupied by gardens with artificial irrigation. During solemn services, processions of the gods went up the ramps of the temple to the sanctuary. The ziggurat was not only a cult building, but also a kind of observatory of antiquity. From the top of the ziggurats, the priests observed the planets and stars. Temples were the focus of knowledge. Two-thirds of the preserved ziggurat of the moon god Nannu, built in 2200-2000, gives a clear idea of the architecture of Mesopotamia. BC. in ancient Ur. Its three huge terraces tapering towards the top with three flights of stairs still make a majestic impression.

Ziggurat is a stepped temple. Reconstruction

Ziggurat of the moon god Nanna in Ur

2200-2000 biennium BC NS.

Unlike architecture

the fine arts of Mesopotamia look relatively poor and primitive. Fine examples of Sumerian sculpture, created at the beginning of the 3rd millennium BC, have survived to our time. NS. A very common type of sculpture was the so-called adorant - a statue of a praying man with his arms folded on his chest, sitting or standing. The character's legs are very strong and are depicted parallel on a round base. The body is not given too much attention, it only serves as a pedestal for the head. The face was usually executed more carefully than the body, although it had to comply with certain conventions, which deprived the sculpture of individual features: the nose, eyes, ears were emphasized. Big ears (for the Sumerians - receptacles of wisdom), wide open eyes, in which a pleading expression is combined with the surprise of magical insight, hands folded in a gesture of prayer. This created the image of an all-hearing and all-seeing human figure. On the shoulder of the adherent, an inscription was usually engraved informing who was its owner. Finds are known when the first inscription was erased and later replaced by another.

During the rise of Assyria, the cities were powerful fortresses, surrounded by high walls with numerous towers. The entire city was dominated by a formidable citadel - the king's palace. An idea of it can be given by the palace of King Sargon II in Dur-Sharrukin (VIII century BC). With a total area of 18 hectares, the palace occupied 10 hectares. It stood on an artificially erected platform 14 m high, with wide ramps leading to it, along which chariots could pass. There were more than 200 rooms in the palace: living and auxiliary rooms, ceremonial halls and religious buildings. On the sides of the entrances to the palace stood five-meter statues of winged bulls "walking" with the heads of people and the wings of eagles. These were the genius guardians of the king and his house. Interestingly, these statues had five legs - thus the illusion of movement towards the viewer was achieved. Favorite subjects are wars and victorious feasts, hunting for wild animals and solemn processions of kings and nobles.

Palace of King Sargon II in Dur-Sharrukin Shedu

During the period of the new rise of Babylon, the capital of the state turns into a flourishing fortress city. According to Herodotus, two chariots could freely disperse on the Babylonian walls. A wide road of white and red tiles led from the Ishtar gate to the city center. The double gates themselves were an outstanding piece of architecture. High crenellated towers with an arched passage were decorated with a mosaic of multi-colored tiled tiles. The magnificent friezes depicted a procession of fantastic lions and griffins - the guardians of the city. In Babylon, there were 53 temples, the most magnificent of which was the temple of the patron saint of the city of the god Marduk, the Ziggurat of Marduk rose 90 meters in height.The sanctuary was covered with gold leaf, and it housed a golden statue of Marduk weighing about 2.5 tons. entered under the name of the Tower of Babel.

Babylon. Reconstruction

The Greeks considered the famous "Hanging Gardens" of Queen Semiramis to be one of the wonders of the world. Architecturally, they were a pyramid that consisted of 4 tiers-platforms. They were supported by columns up to 25 meters high. To prevent irrigation water seepage, the surface of each platform was first covered with a layer of reed mixed with asphalt, then two layers of bricks, and lead slabs were placed on top of everything. On them a thick carpet lay fertile soil, where seeds of various grasses, flowers, shrubs and trees were planted. The pyramid resembled an ever-blooming green hill. In the cavity of one of the columns, pipes were placed, through which water from the Euphrates was constantly pumped to the upper tier of the gardens, from where it, flowing down streams and small waterfalls, irrigated the plants of the lower tiers.

Hanging Gardens of Babylon

The culture of Mesopotamia, one of the oldest cultures on earth, amazes everyone who gets acquainted with it with its originality. The original writing system, high level development of law, the epic tradition of Mesopotamia had a significant impact on the subsequent development of world culture.

Review questions:

1. What are the architectural features of the Ancient Mesopotamia? Tell us about the most important achievements of temple and town-planning architecture?

2. Identify the leading themes of the visual arts of Mesopotamia. What circumstances and reasons are they caused by?

3. What are the outstanding achievements of the Nar culture of Ancient Asia?

Fine arts of Mesopotamia presentation. Presentation on the discipline "art" on the topic "ancient mesopotamia". The culture of ancient Mesopotamia

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