The Connection Between Spirit and Matter Among the Akkad Research Paper

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Head of the Akkadian Ruler SargonI. Concept StatementThe work of art to be examined for this paper is the art piece known as the Head of the Akkadian Ruler Sargon, created ca. 2300–2200 BC in bronze and currently housed in the Iraq Museum. The piece reflects the belief of the people of the time that the image of a person could also contain the spirit, essence or presence of the individual it represented. The idea is not really very dissimilar from what today are known and used as voodoo dolls—representations of a person upon whom some sort of malice is inflected through violence committed against the doll. The belief that a representation can somehow be linked to the body and soul of another real, live human being is one that still exists today, just as it did thousands of years ago. Some might mark it as superstition, but the reality is that people seem to have always believed that there is a connection between spirit and matter, and the ancient nature of this belief is revealed in the Head off the Akkadian Ruler Sargon. The piece in its originality represented the identity of Sargon and would have served as an embodiment of his person. After the fall of the Nineveh, the piece was likely abused by Sargon’s enemies in the same way one takes vengeance upon another today by way of a voodoo doll. With the Akkadian Head, its ears were cut off, its beard ends demolished, its nose flattened, and its left eye gouged out. The violence committed against this head shows that belief in the relationship between spirit and matter was strong among the ancient people of Nineveh and Babylon. I want to research this idea more deeply in order to understand the connection between culture, beliefs about spirituality, and art.II. Outline/ThesisThe sources I want to use for this paper include the following:“Art: Royal Portrait Head (“Head of Sargon the Great”).” Annenberg Learner, 2020.https://www.learner.org/series/art-through-time-a-global-view/portraits/royal-portrait-head-head-of-sargon-the-great/“Art of Akkad: An Introduction.” Khan Academy, 2020.https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/ancient-art-civilizations/ancient-near-east1/akkadian/a/art-of-akkad-an-introduction#:~:text=Head%20of%20an%20Akkadian%20Ruler&text=This%20image%20of%20an%20unidentified,lips%20and%20a%20wrinkled%20brow.“Art of Akkad and Ur.” Lumen Learning, 2020.https://courses.lumenlearning.com/suny-arthistory1/chapter/art-of-akkad-and-ur/“Head of a Ruler.” Met Museum, 2020.https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/329077“Nineveh (Late Dynastic Period - The Imperial Akkadian Period), Temple of Ishtar :Bronze cast head of ruler, Imperial Akkadian II-III.” Australian National University, 2020. https://openresearch-repository.anu.edu.au/handle/1885/201458The thesis of this paper is that the Head of the Akkadian Ruler Sargon is both a work of art and an artifact that reveals the cultural belief of the ancient people of Nineveh and Babylon in the connection between spirit and matter. This paper will employ close visual analysis of the Head of the Akkadian Ruler Sargon, describing how the form of the work relates to the cultural belief of the spirit being possessed by the matter that represents the actual man.The outline for this paper will follow this structure:I. Introductiona. What can the examination of ancient art reveal?b. Art represents the culture and beliefs of the people who create it.c. It is an expression of the spirit of the times.d. Even art that is destroyed or attacked can tell something.e. Thesis statementsII. Visual description of the Head of the Akkadian Ruler Sargona. Depiction of Headb. What it is made ofc. Who made itd. Why it was madee. What it representsIII. How the form relates to the culture beliefs of the ancient peoplea. The belief of the people that spirit and matter were related and connectedb.

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The belief that rulers were godlikec. The belief that by attacking the representation of one it would be like attacking the rulerd. A contrary opinion of the Head’s identityIV. What the intentional damage of the Head suggestsa. The belief in the connection between spirit…

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…belief in the connection between spirit and matter. Even if the Head was not a representation of the likeness of Sargon, it represented some ruler whose enemies detached it from its body and then set about abusing it. The animosity shown to the Head surely was not random but rather illustrates the lengths to which the people of the ancient world would go to ensure that one’s foes were properly defeated.But is such behavior altogether difficult to understand for people living in the modern world? Even people today have heard tales of voodoo dolls being used to exact some sort of malevolence upon the person whose likeness is represented by the doll. This kind of behavior is really no different from that exhibited on the Head of the Akkadian Ruler Sargon. Whether the Head actually represented Sargon or a different ruler is immaterial when one considers the condition of the Head and what it means that it has been so abused. It means that the people then, as now in some cases, were keenly aware of the connection between spirit and matter.In conclusion, the Head of the Akkadian Ruler Sargon is a bronze work of art that is today an artifact of an ancient culture in which the people had strong beliefs in the relationship between spirit and form. The rulers of those ancient days were held to be godlike, and their spirits were important to the people they looked after. The spirit of Sargon was said to have been embodied in the likeness represented by the Head and the bronze body it had once been attached to. Although the body is now gone, the Head remains, and its appearance tells of the power of belief and the importance to which the ancient people attached such likenesses as this one—especially when….....

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