Some Rituals Associated with Parturition in Antiquity

Abstract

THE natural processes of birth and death were always considered with a considerable degree of awe and fear by most peoples in antiquity; both processes were under the influence of powerful deities who might cause harm to members of the society. It is not surprising therefore that the birth of an infant had to be accompanied by ritual and cult practices, designed to ensure good health for mother and child. The goddess Ninharsag was the supreme Sumerian goddess of childbirth in ancient Mesopotamia. Among the deposits found in the early 'Eye Temples' at Tell Brak, near the Habur river which now lies within the state of Syria, was an 'eye idol' engraved with a stag, the symbol of the goddess; it is dated c. 3000 B.C. or slightly earlier. Amulets of the same period (the Jemdet Nasr) in the shape of frogs were also recovered from the same site. It is probable that frogs were considered to be symbols of fertility or of childbirth.' Numerous clay discs, considered to represent birth stools, dated c. 4000 B.C., were found at Chagar Bazar which was also in the Habur area. Modelled female figurines squatting in the position of giving birth were discovered there.2 Later in time, literayv references mention the use of birth-bricks or birth-stones, both of which were usually used inside a house of birth (bit im-ti), but such records are only to be found from the early part of the second millenium B.C. onwards.3 It is known that Ninharsag had a chapel in the temple of Ninazu at E'nunna which was especially connected with childbirth.4 Both deities and humans used the birth-bricks, the special birth house and similar rituals associated with parturition in ancient Mesopotamia. In ancient Egypt too, childbirth required specific ceremonies, for the assistance of birth goddesses during and after parturition was essential for a normal birth. Numerous deities were associated with the act of parturition, but the chief ones were Hath6r, Isis and Neith, all of whom may have been assimilated to one another. Meskhenet was a goddess associated with the birth chamber and was also considered to be the goddess of the birth-brick itself. The pregnant woman was delivered in a special house of birth which was attached to the temples of goddesses. She squatted on two bricks when giving birth to her baby, being supported in the act by nursing midwives and by attendant goddesses of birth.5 The birth-bricks soon developed into a low birth-stool, the earliest representation of such a stool being sculpted in a birth house at Luxor, where the pharaoh Ammenophis III was born in 1450 B.C,6'The ancient Egyptians thus employed very similar rituals for parturition as the Mesopotamians, both for deities and for humans. The ancient Hebrews also used a birth-stool, but the pregnant woman may have actually sat on the knee of an assistant while giving birth to her baby.7 This latter method appears to have been the earlier of the two. It is now generally accepted that there were trade and cultural relationships between Egypt and Mesopotamia as far back as the early predynastic times in Egypt, but the importance of these influences, both tenuous and intermittent, is still in doubt.8 It is significant, however, that foreign influences in predynastic and early dynastic periods were mainly of a religious or military nature, the former predominating. These influences were initially centred on Upper Egypt, and the strong possibility was that