Ruhurater

Ruhurater or Lahuratil[1] was an Elamite deity.

Character

Ruhurater's gender is uncertain,[1] though some researchers refer to him as a male deity.[2] It has been proposed that his name means "(the god who is the) creator (of) man" and that he was connected to various creator deities (collectively known as Napratep), but his role in Elamite beliefs remains uncertain.[2] It is possible that he was regarded as a creator deity in a specific area of Elam, but not in the entire region.[2]

Many documents mentioning Ruhurater are legal texts which cast him in the role of a divine witness, alongside the Mesopotamian Shamash.[1] He is also described as capable of bestowing kiten, an Elamite religious concept which can be translated as "divine protection."[1] Wouter Henkelman notes that his role in them can be compared to that played by Inshushinak in similar texts from Susa.[1]

Worship

The oldest attestion of Ruhutater comes from Tepe Bormi, possibly to be identified with the ancient Elamite city of Huhnur.[1] The text in mention, an inscription of Amar-Sin, a Mesopotamian king from the Third Dynasty of Ur, states that Huhnur was the cult center of this god.[1] Amar-Sin apparently rebuilt Ruhurater's temple located there and returned a statue of the god to it.[3] Association between him and Huhnur is also attested in two texts from the Sukkalmah period.[1] Another temple of Ruhurater, shared with Hishmitik, was located at Chogha Zanbil.[4] It has been proposed that Hishmitik was his spouse, but this remains unproven.[1]

Two Elamite kings bore the theophoric name Tan-Ruhurater, "obedient to Ruhurater."[5] Tan-Ruhurater I was the eighth ruler from the Shimashki dynasty,[5] while Tan-Ruhurater II belonged to the Kidinuid dynasty.[6]

Ruhurater is mentioned on a stele of the neo-Elamite king Atta-hamiti-Insushinak, who reigned in the sixth century BCE.[1] While Ruhurater is not directly mentioned in the Persepolis Administrative Archives, it is possible that offerings to unspecified gods made in Huhnur mentioned in it constituted an Achaemenid continuation of his cult.[1]

In Mesopotamia

In Mesopotamian scholarly texts, Ruhurater was considered to be an equivalent of Ninurta.[1]

An Elamite bearing a theophoric name invoking Ruhurater, Kutir-Ruhurater, is also mentioned in records from archives of the Mesopotamian First Sealand dynasty.[7]

References
  1. Henkelman 2011, p. 449.
  2. Jahangirfar 2018, p. 113.
  3. Malbran-Labat 2018, p. 465.
  4. Potts 1999, p. 223.
  5. De Graef 2013, p. 443.
  6. De Graef 2013, p. 444.
  7. Zadok 2014, p. 225.

Bibliography
  • De Graef, Katrien (2013), "Tan-Ruhurater", Reallexikon der Assyriologie, retrieved 2022-03-25
  • Henkelman, Wouter F. M. (2011), "Ruhurater", Reallexikon der Assyriologie, retrieved 2022-03-25
  • Jahangirfar, Milad (2018). "The Elamite Triads: Reflections on the Possible Continuities in Iranian Tradition". Iranica Antiqua. 53: 105–124. Retrieved 2022-03-25.
  • Malbran-Labat, Florence (2018). "Elamite Royal Inscriptions". The Elamite World. Abingdon, Oxon New York, NY: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group. ISBN 978-1-315-65803-2. OCLC 1022561448.
  • Potts, Daniel (1999). The archaeology of Elam: formation and transformation of an ancient Iranian state. New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-511-48961-7. OCLC 813439001.
  • Zadok, Ran (2014). "On Population Groups in the Documents from the Time of the First Sealand Dynasty". Tel Aviv. Maney Publishing. 41 (2): 222–237. doi:10.1179/0334435514z.00000000036. ISSN 0334-4355.
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