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Updated: June 20, 2025
The foundation records showed that the edifice was one of great antiquity, which was permitted to fall into decay and was then restored by a ruler whose date can be fixed at the middle of the ninth century B.C. The ancient name of the place was shown to be Sippar, and the fame of the temple was such, that subsequent monarchs vied with one another in adding to its grandeur.
In fact, the Babylonian principalities arise from the extension of the city's jurisdiction, just as the later Babylonian empire is naught but the enlargement, on a greater scale, of the city of Babylon. Of these old Babylonian cities the most noteworthy, in the south, are Eridu, Lagash, Ur, Larsa, Uruk, Isin; and in the north, Agade, Sippar, Nippur, Kutha, and Babylon.
In the great temple to Shamash at Sippar, there appear to have been several days that were marked by religious observances. These garments are given to Shamash, to his consort Malkatu, and to Bunene.
When describing his operations at Sippar he speaks of himself as 'doing good to the flesh of Shamash and Marduk. Hammurabi felt himself to be honoring Marduk, through paying homage to a deity having affinity with the patron protector of Babylon. Innanna. We have already come across a deity of this name in a previous chapter.
The testimony of Hammurabi is therefore as direct as that of Sargon, who calls the sun-god of Sippar, Shamash.
A prayer of the same king addressed to Shamash, upon restoring the great temple at Sippar, E-babbara, runs: O Shamash, great lord, upon entering joyfully into thy glorious temple E-babbara, Look with favor upon my precious handiwork, Mercy towards me be thy command; Through thy righteous order, may I have abundance of strength. Long life, and a firm throne, grant to me. May my rule last forever!
The text then relates the founding by the god of five cities, probably "in clean places", that is to say on hallowed ground. The . . . of these cities, Eridu, he gave to the leader, Nu- dimmud, Thirdly, Larak he gave to Pabilkharsag, Fourthly, Sippar he gave to the hero, the Sun-god, Fifthly, Shuruppak he gave to "the God of Shuruppak",
We may assume, likewise, that at Sippar, Uruk, Ur, and Larsa the zikkurat was the center of a considerable group of buildings, while at Babylon in the days of her greatest power, the temple area of E-Sagila must have presented the appearance of a little city by itself, shut off from the rest of the town by a wall which invariably enclosed the sacred quarter.
But this association becomes the leading feature in the history of the two temples. To pay homage to Marduk and Nabu meant something quite different from making a pilgrimage to the seat of Bel or presenting a gift to the Shamash sanctuary at Sippar. It was an acknowledgment of Babylonia's prestige.
The old sacred centers like Ur, Nippur, Uruk, Sippar, with their great temples, their elaborate cults, their great storehouses of religious literature, and their great body of influential priests and theologians and astrologers were as dear to the people of the north as to those of the south; and in proportion as these old cities lost their political importance, their rank as sacred centers to which pilgrimages were made on the occasion of the festivals of the gods was correspondingly raised.
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