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{{short description|Lost ancient city in Iraq}}
'''Enegi''' or '''Enegir'''{{sfn|Asher-Greve|Westenholz|2013|p=19}} was an ancient [[Mesopotamia]]n city located in present-day [[Iraq]]. It is considered lost, though it is known that it was one of the settlements in the southernmost part of lower Mesopotamia, like [[Larsa]], [[Ur]] and [[Eridu]]. Attempts have been made to identify it with multiple excavated sites. In textual sources, it is well documented as the cult center of the god [[Ninazu]], and in that capacity it was connected to beliefs tied to the [[Ancient Mesopotamian underworld|underworld]]. It appears in sources from between the [[Early Dynastic Period (Mesopotamia)|Early Dynastic]] and [[Old Babylonian Empire|Old Babylonian]] periods. Later on the cult of its tutelary god might have been transferred to Ur.
==Name==
The earliest attested writing of the toponym Enegi in [[cuneiform]] is EN.GI.KI or EN.GI<sub>4</sub>.KI from the [[Early Dynastic Period (Mesopotamia)|Early Dynastic period]], replaced by EN.DIM<sub>2</sub>.GIG<sup>ki</sup> in subsequent [[Sargonic dynasty|Sargonic]] and [[Ur III]] sources.{{sfn|D'Agostino|Greco|2019|p=469}} A shorter logographic writing, IM<sup>ki</sup>, is also attested.{{sfn|Edzard|1980|p=63}} It occurs in sources from the [[Old Babylonian period]].{{sfn|D'Agostino|Greco|2019|p=469}} However, the same logographic writing was also used to represent the names of two other cities, [[Karkar (ancient city)|Karkar]] (the cult center of [[Ishkur]]) and Muru (the cult center of [[Ninkilim]]).{{sfn|Edzard|1980|pp=63-64}} While in the case of Karkar the use of this logogram reflected the writing of the name of its tutelary god as <sup>d</sup>IM, it is not known how a similar scribal convention developed in the cases of Enegi and Muru.{{sfn|Edzard|1980|p=64}}
It has been proposed that the name of Enegi was connected with the Early Dynastic [[Sumerian language|Sumerian]] term ''ki-en-gi'', corresponding to the [[Akkadian language|Akkadian]] phrase ''māt šumerim'', "land of [[Sumer]]".{{sfn|Frayne|2008|p=10}} Proponents of this view argue that the early name of the southern part of [[lower Mesopotamia]] would mean "region of Enegi" and reflect its importance as a religious center associated with the world of the dead and perhaps with burial traditions known from the [[Royal Cemetery at Ur|royal cemetery of Ur]], with the connection being forgotten by the end of the Early Dynastic period.{{sfn|Cooper|2013|p=295}} However, it is generally agreed that the final element of the term ''ki-en-gi'' is identical with that designated by the sign ''gi<sub>7</sub>'' (''gir'') in words such as ''[[Emeg̃ir|emegir]]'', ''ur-gi<sub>7</sub>'' ("dog"), ''dumu-gi<sub>7</sub>'' ("noble", "free citizen") and in the personal name [[Shulgi]], typically translated as "noble" and less commonly as "native".{{sfn|Cooper|2013|p=294}}
==Proposed location==
It is known that Enegi was located in the southernmost part of [[lower Mesopotamia]], in the proximity of cities such as [[Larsa]], [[Ur]] and [[Eridu]].{{sfn|Edzard|1980|p=64}} Its precise location remains unknown,{{sfn|Katz|2003|p=176}} with early proposals from the 1970s and 1980s including [[Tell Khaiber|Išan Khaiber]], Umm al-Wawiya and Diqdiqah (a [[Tell (archaeology)|mound]] located 2.4 kilometers away from the [[ziggurat of Ur]]).{{sfn|D'Agostino|Greco|2019|p=469}} In 2009 Douglas Frayne suggested it was located around 25 kilometers away from Ur (Al-Muqayyir), at the site of modern Mušar.{{sfn|Frayne|2008|p=10}} In 2019 Franco D'Agostino and Angela Greco proposed that the recently excavated site of [[Tal Abu Tbeirah|Abu Tbeirah]], located 10 kilometers southwest of [[Nasiriyah]],{{sfn|D'Agostino|Greco|2019|p=465}} might correspond to Enegi.{{sfn|D'Agostino|Greco|2019|p=469}} Material evidence indicates that it flourished roughly between 2450 and 2000 BCE,{{sfn|D'Agostino|Greco|2019|p=465}} and that it was an important economic and religious center connected with Ur.{{sfn|D'Agostino|Greco|2019|p=473}} D'Agostino and Greco point out that Enegi is the best textually documented city known to have been located in the proximity of the latter city.{{sfn|D'Agostino|Greco|2019|p=469}} However, they also stress that the epigraphic evidence from Abu Tbeirah itself is limited,{{sfn|D'Agostino|Greco|2019|p=465}} and conclude that certain identification will remain impossible until more texts are uncovered.{{sfn|D'Agostino|Greco|2019|pp=473-474}} They consider multiple other lost cities as possibilities as well, including Kiabrig (the cult center of [[Ningublaga]]),{{sfn|D'Agostino|Greco|2019|pp=470-471}} Ĝešbanda (the cult center of [[Ningishzida]]; alternatively identified as Tell Umm al-Dhab near [[Tell al-'Ubaid]]),{{sfn|D'Agostino|Greco|2019|pp=471-472}} Ga’eš (alternatively identified as Tell Sakhariyah){{sfn|D'Agostino|Greco|2019|pp=472-473}} or Aššu.{{sfn|D'Agostino|Greco|2019|p=473}}
==Textual attestations==
Textual sources indicate that Enegi was the cult center of the god [[Ninazu]]{{sfn|Edzard|1980|p=64}} and his wife [[Ningirida]].{{sfn|D'Agostino|Greco|2019|p=469}} Ritual texts, as well as literary compositions such as the ''[[Temple Hymns]]'', ''[[Lament for Sumer and Ur]]'' and the myth ''[[Enlil and Ninlil]]'', indicate that a [[É (temple)|temple]] dedicated to Ninazu existed there.{{sfn|George|1993|p=94}} It bore the ceremonial Sumerian name Egidda (also romanized as Egida{{sfn|Katz|2003|p=434}}), variously translated as "storehouse", "sealed house"{{sfn|Wiggermann|1998|p=333}} or "long house".{{sfn|George|1993|p=94}} Due to Ninazu's character as an [[Ancient Mesopotamian underworld|underworld]] god, Enegi was associated with the land of the dead, as already attested in sources from the [[Early Dynastic Period (Mesopotamia)|Early Dynastic period]].{{sfn|D'Agostino|Greco|2019|p=469}} It could be outright compared to it, with the ''Temple Hymns'' referring to it as the place where people gather after their deaths.{{sfn|Lambert|1980|p=61}} It could also be poetically compared to a type of clay pipe used for funerary [[libation]]s (''a-pa<sub>4</sub>'') designated as a property of [[Ereshkigal]].{{sfn|Artemov|2012|pp=24-25}} Furthermore, its association with beliefs centered on the underworld could be highlighted by referring to it as the "[[Kutha]] of Sumer", the latter city being regarded as the cult center of [[Nergal]], a god associated with the underworld worshiped further north.{{sfn|Katz|2003|pp=52-53}} Texts addressing Nergal as the god worshiped in the Egidda are known too.{{sfn|George|1993|p=94}}
In the Early Dynastic period rulers of [[Lagash]], including [[Urukagina]], apparently showed interest in the cults associated with Enegi, and its tutelary god as a result received offerings in two cities belonging to their kingdom, [[Girsu]] and [[Tell Zurghul|Niĝin]].{{sfn|Wiggermann|1998|p=334}} In one case, Ninazu of Enegi is followed in an offering list by Ereshkigal, which constitutes the earliest known reference to this goddess, who is absent from the early god lists from [[Shuruppak|Fara]] and [[Abu Salabikh]].{{sfn|Katz|2003|p=386}}
Attestations of Enegi are also available from the [[Ur III period]].{{sfn|Katz|2003|p=52}} The city was under direct control of [[Ur]]{{sfn|D'Agostino|Greco|2019|p=470}} and retained its religious role.{{sfn|Katz|2003|p=359}} It is presumed that an incantation from the Ur III period addressing Ninazu as the "king of the snakes" originated in Enegi.{{sfn|Katz|2003|p=394}} [[Ur-Nammu]] at one point dedicated a marble vase to [[Gilgamesh]] (presumably in this context acting as an underworld deity) of Enegi.{{sfn|Frayne|1997|p=82}} Frans Wiggermann argues that this dedication, as well as references to the worship of deities such as [[Ninshubur]], [[Ninsun]] and [[Mes-sanga-Unug]] in Enegi, indicate that its religious traditions were influenced by those of [[Uruk]].{{sfn|Wiggermann|1998|p=333}}
Dina Katz argues that Enegi was destroyed at the end of the Ur III period,{{sfn|Katz|2003|p=5}} relying on the literary account from the ''Lament for Sumer and Ur''.{{sfn|Katz|2003|p=430}} However, [[Dietz-Otto Edzard]] pointed out that in the [[Old Babylonian period]] the city appears in texts from [[Larsa]].{{sfn|Edzard|1980|p=64}} Frans Wiggermann states that the attestations are limited to references to [[Prebendary|prebends]], and while they can be considered evidence of the continuous operation of the Egidda in Enegi in the Old Babylonian period, the city and its cults for the most part appear only in literary texts, such as ''[[Sin (mythology)|Nanna]]'s Journey to [[Nippur]]'', which reflect situation in earlier periods.{{sfn|Wiggermann|1998|p=333}}
No references to Enegi occur in sources from the first millennium BCE, but a text from Ur from the reign of [[Ashurbanipal]] mentions a temple named Egidda, which according to [[Paul-Alain Beaulieu]] might indicate that the cult of Ninazu was eventually transferred to this city from its original center.{{sfn|Beaulieu|2021|p=165}}
==References==
{{reflist}}
===Bibliography===
{{refbegin|40em}}
*{{cite book|last=Artemov|first=Nikita|chapter=The elusive beyond: Some notes on the netherworld geography in Sumerian tradition|title=Altorientalische Studien zu Ehren von Pascal Attinger|url=https://www.zora.uzh.ch/id/eprint/135454/|publisher=Academic Press Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht|publication-place=Fribourg Göttingen|year=2012|isbn=978-3-7278-1724-3|oclc=811590755}}
*{{cite book|last1=Asher-Greve|first1=Julia M.|last2=Westenholz|first2=Joan G.|url=https://www.zora.uzh.ch/id/eprint/135436/1/Asher-Greve_Westenholz_2013_Goddesses_in_Context.pdf |title=Goddesses in Context: On Divine Powers, Roles, Relationships and Gender in Mesopotamian Textual and Visual Sources|year=2013|publisher=Academic Press Fribourg |isbn=978-3-7278-1738-0}}
*{{cite book|last=Beaulieu|first=Paul-Alain|title=Individuals and Institutions in the Ancient Near East|chapter=Remarks on Theophoric Names in the Late Babylonian Archives from Ur|publisher=De Gruyter|date=2021|pages=163–178 |doi=10.1515/9781501514661-006|isbn=9781501514661|s2cid=244620728 }}
*{{citation|last=Cooper|first=Jerrold S.|entry=Sumer, Sumerisch · Sumer, Sumerian|encyclopedia=Reallexikon der Assyriologie|year=2013|entry-url=http://publikationen.badw.de/en/rla/index#11193|access-date=2023-07-10}}
*{{cite book|last1=D'Agostino|first1=Franco|last2=Greco|first2=Angela|title=Abu Tbeirah excavations I. Area 1: last phase and building A – phase 1 |chapter=Abu Tbeirah. A Philological and Epigraphic Point of View|url=https://www.editricesapienza.it/node/7845|publisher=Sapienza Università Editrice|publication-place=Roma|year=2019|isbn=978-88-9377-108-5|oclc=1107331347}}
*{{citation|last=Edzard|first=Dietz-Otto|entry=IM|encyclopedia=Reallexikon der Assyriologie|volume=5|year=1980|entry-url=http://publikationen.badw.de/en/rla/index#5743|language=de|access-date=2023-07-08}}
*{{cite book|last=Frayne|first=Douglas|title=Ur III Period (2112-2004 BC)|series=RIM. The Royal Inscriptions of Mesopotamia|publisher=University of Toronto Press|date=1997|isbn=978-1-4426-5706-9|doi=10.3138/9781442657069}}
*{{cite book|last=Frayne|first=Douglas|title=Pre-Sargonic Period|series=RIM. The Royal Inscriptions of Mesopotamia|publisher=University of Toronto Press|publication-place=Toronto|date=2008|isbn=978-1-4426-8886-5|doi=10.3138/9781442688865}}
*{{cite book|last=George|first=Andrew R.|title=House Most High: the Temples of Ancient Mesopotamia|publisher=Eisenbrauns|publication-place=Winona Lake|year=1993|isbn=0-931464-80-3|oclc=27813103}}
*{{cite book|last=Katz|first=Dina|title=The Image of the Netherworld in the Sumerian Sources|publisher=CDL Press|publication-place=Bethesda, MD|year=2003|isbn=1883053773|oclc=51770219}}
*{{cite book|last=Lambert|first=Wilfred G.|title=Death in Mesopotamia|chapter=The Theology of Death|publisher=Akademisk Forlag|publication-place=Copenhagen|year=1980|isbn=87-500-1946-5|oclc=7124686}}
*{{citation|last=Wiggermann|first=Frans A. M.|entry=Nin-azu|encyclopedia=Reallexikon der Assyriologie|entry-url=http://publikationen.badw.de/en/rla/index#8527| year=1998|access-date=2023-07-10}}
{{refend}}
[[Category:Sumerian cities]]
[[Category:Lost ancient cities and towns]]
[[Category:Archaeological sites in Iraq]]
[[Category:Former populated places in Iraq]]
[[Category:Mesopotamian underworld]]