A Seal Impression from el-Qiṭār/Til-Abnu (Syria)

Abstract

The seal rolled on the six sides of the envelope containing a legal document found at el-Qiṭār (Pls. XXXV–XXXVI), on the west bank of the Euphrates some 33 km. downstream from Tell Ahmar, has its best parallels in the imprints of the Hittite seals from Ugarit and Emar of the thirteenth century B.C.The scene is framed above and below by a border à guilloche. To the left is the Weather-god, standing on two triangles representing mountains, which do not seem to be marked with a scale pattern as in Yaz. 64.The god wears a beard and his hair falls in a long pigtail down his back to his waist. He is wearing a short kilt and probably a shirt which leaves his arms bare. On his head he wears a tiara with horns, and a curved sword hangs from his waist, with the tip pointing downward and with the usual half-moon pommel. In his right hand, raised behind his head, he brandishes an axe. Behind his back, beneath the pigtail, is a filling motif (cf. SBo II no. 229). His raised left arm reaches out in front, and on the fist rests the god's symbol: TONITRUS, L 199, to the right of which is a star.