The Ishtar Gate was the eighth gate to the inner city of Babylon (in the area of present-day Hillah, Babil Governorate, Iraq). It was constructed circa 575 BC by order of King Nebuchadnezzar II on the north side of the city. It was part of a grand walled processional way leading into the city.
The original structure was a double gate with a smaller frontal gate and a larger and more grandiose secondary posterior section. The walls were finished in glazed bricks mostly in blue, with animals and deities (also made up of colored bricks) in low relief at intervals. The gate was 15 meters high, and the original foundations extended another 14 meters underground.
German archaeologist Robert Koldewey led the excavation of the site from 1904 to 1914. After the end of the First World War in 1918, the smaller frontal gate was reconstructed in the Pergamon Museum in Berlin.
Other panels from the façade of the gate are located in many other museums around the world.
The façade of the Iraqi embassy in Beijing, China includes a replica of the Ishtar Gate. The façade of the Iraqi embassy in Amman, Jordan also evokes the Ishtar Gate.
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Ishtar Gate and Processional Way
Once per year, the Ishtar Gate and connecting Processional Way were used for a New Year's procession, which was part of a religious festival celebrating the beginning of the agricultural year. In Babylon, the rituals surrounding this holiday lasted twelve days. The New Year's celebrations started immediately after the barley harvest, at the time of the vernal equinox. This was the first day of the ancient month of Nisan, equivalent to today's date of March 20 or 21.
The Processional Way, which has been traced to a length of over 800 meters, extended north from the Ishtar Gate and was designed with brick relief images of lions, the symbol of the goddess Ishtar (also known as Inanna) the war goddess, the dragon of Marduk, the lord of the gods, and the bull of Adad, the storm god. Worshipped as the Mistress of Heaven, Ishtar represented the power of sexual attraction and was thought to be savage and determined. Symbolized by the star and her sacred animal, the lion, she was also the goddess of war and the protector of ruling dynasties and their armies. The idea of protection of the city is further incorporated into this gateway design by the use of crenelated buttresses along both sides to this entrance into the city.
Friezes with sixty ferocious lions representing Ishtar decorated each side of the Processional Way, designed with variations in the color of the fur and the manes. On the east side, they had a left foot forward, and on the west side, they had the right foot forward. Each lion was made of forty-six molded bricks in eleven rows. The lion is pictured upon a blue enameled tile background and an orange coloured border that runs along the very bottom portion of the wall. Having a white body and yellow mane, the lion of Ishtar was an embodiment of vivid naturalism that further enhanced the glory of Babylon's Procession Street.
The purpose of the New Year's holiday was to affirm the supremacy of Marduk and his representative on Earth, the king, and to offer thanks for the fertility of the land.
The Processional Way was paved with large stone pieces set in a bed of bitumen and was up to 20 meters wide at some points. This street ran from the Euphrates through the temple district and palaces and onto the Ishtar Gate.
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