[ Previous ][Contents][ Next ]

executed.(44) Back of the bust can be seen a drapery or veil suspended from two rosettes, from which two small palm leaves rise. This attribute was originally thought to indicate the interior of a house,(45) and it may be explained as , indicating here the interior of the tomb, the eternal house of the deceased. It is, as a matter of fact, used on a number of reliefs to distinguish between those still living and those deceased, only the latter having this drapery background. 46) On several Small steles in the museum in Palmyra the drapery only is represented with no sculptural rendering of the person for whom the stele was made ; on others, the person is figured back of the drapery.(47) As to these last sculptures, it has been suggested that the drapery symbolizes the boundary between the world of the living and the Beyond(48)-an interpretation which might have developed from the one given above. The palm leaves in symbolic language would stand for victory, reminders that immortality is a victory over the powers of evil.(49)

The bust of Haggûr is a welcome addition to the list of dated male busts of the third group, fitting chronologically between the bust of Zebîdâ in the National Museum, Damascus (from 233-34)(50) and the bust of Sî'ônâ in the Whitall Collection, Istanbul (from 240-41).(51)

The name of Haggûr occurs here for the first time in Palmyra. It is formed according-to the formula qattûl, much in favor on Semitic ground.(52) As with Nassûm,(53) the Palmyrene proper name of similar formation, Haggûr was probably also originally an adjective, meaning limp or lame. 54) The name of Haggûr's father, Malkibel, as we pronounce it, is also new in the Palmyrene nomenclature. It is spelled with exactly the same consonants as the name of Palmyrene solar god which is generally pronounced Malakbel,(55) "the messenger of Bet", the first element corresponding to the Hebrew, Phoenician and Aramaic "mal'âk, "messenger". In favor of this interpretation speaks not only the existence of similar gods in the Hebrew and Phoenician religions,(56) but, also the fact that all the Greek and Latin transcriptions of the name have an a in the second syllable : ,(57) (58), Malachibelus, Malachbelus, Malagbelus.(59) It is, of course, strange

44. Studier, p. 91.
45. Farmakowsky, Bulletin de l'Institut Russe Archéologique à Constantinople, VIII, 1903, P. 19. 46. Cf. Studier, p. 25-26.
47. Cantineau, Inventaire des inscriptions de Palmyre, fasc. VIIIA, Beyrouth 1932, p. 21.
48. Déonna, Revue de l'Histoire des Religions, LXXIV, 1916, p. 217f.
49. Cf. Cumont, Catalogue des sculptures et inscriptions antiques, Bruxelles 1913, p. 106.
50. Studier, p. 47-48, PS 24; pl. VIII, 2.
51. Studier, p. 48-49, PS 25; pl. VIII, 3.
52. Cf. Lidzbarski, Ephemeris fuer semitische Epigraphik, 11, p. 21-22. 		    53. Cantineau, Inventaire des inscriptions de Palmyr, 111, Beyrouth 1930, nr. 8, line 4, p. 11-13. It probably means asthmatiç Noeldeke, Zeitschrift d. deutschen morgenlaendischen Gesellschaft, 1870, p. 89.
54. Cf. the Syriac hagar, "to halt" and the name "the limp", to which Dr. Zurayk calls my attention. See Noeldeke, Die ghassdnischen Fuersten, Berlin 1887, p. 35. As to the qattûl-adjectives in Syriaç see Noeldeke, Kurzgefasste syrische Grammatik, 2. edition, Leipzig 1899, p. 71-72, 119.
55. Cf. Gesenius-Buhl, s.v. : -Berger, L'ange dAstarté, La faculté de théologie protestante de Paris à M. Edouard Reuss, Paris 1879, p. 47-Fèvrier, La religion des Palmyréniens, p. 65-81,

[ Previous ][Contents][ Next ]
Created by the Digital Documentation Center at AUB in collaboration with Høgskolen i Østfold, Norway.

980519 pas - Email: hseeden@aub.edu.lb