The object I have chose for this paper is Standing Female Worshiper(figure 1). This is a small votive figure from the Sumerian time period. The statue was carved out of limestone and inlaid with shell and lapis lazuli.1 Sumer was located in the south of the fertile land of Mesopotamia, which in Greek stands for the "land between the rivers". Sumer is located where modern day Iraq is currently located.The land of Sumer was prone to both droughts and flooding, which led to fertile land but also created the need to control the water supply. This led to the forming of the first cities. With these cities being formed it led to social hierarchies, with each city having their own governments and gods. The Sumerians were the first culture to invent writing, they are the culture credited with inventing cuneiform. The Sumerians were also polytheistic, meaning they worshiped more than one god.2.
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This object is a votive figure. The Sumerians believed offerings needed to be placed to each of their gods everyday. For many people this was not possible because there were so many temples due to their polytheistic culture. This is where the votive figurines come in. They were used as surrogate worshiper's in place of the person themselves. Mainly wealthier worshipers were able to afford this luxury of not having to visit the temple everyday.3 .
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Figure 1 depicts a woman votive figure, she has large eyes and clasped hands in front of the chest. She has an attentive gaze and also appears that both of her eyes were made blue. She also more defined hair then was common for votive statues of this time period. The two images I would like to compare this figure to is the Votive Statue and the Votive Statue of Gudea from the Stokstad textbook. .
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The Votive Statue image has a lot of similarities to the object I have chosen. This image shows an assortment of votives from the Sumerian time period. All of the votives have broad shoulders, a very plain dress and big wide eyes.