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Updated: May 25, 2025
The name 'house of oracle' given to the zikkurat at Nippur is a valuable indication of the special sanctity that continued to be attached to the staged tower. The Temple and the Sacred Quarter. But the zikkurat, while the most characteristic expression of the religious spirit of Babylonia, was by no means the only kind of sacred edifice that prevailed.
As already pointed out, no special stress seems to have been laid upon the number of stories of which the zikkurat consisted, but the natural result of ambition and rivalry among builders tended towards an increase of the height, and this end could be most readily attained by adding to the number of stories.
The outcome of this ideal was the so-called staged tower, known as the zikkurat. The name signifies simply a 'high' edifice, and embodies the same idea that led the Canaanites and Hebrews to call their temples 'high places. The oldest zikkurat as yet found is the one excavated by Drs.
A list of zikkurats furnishes the names of no less than twenty; and while all of the important places are included, there are others which do not appear to have played an important part in either the religious or political history of the country, and which nevertheless had their zikkurat.
The names of the zikkurats at Erech and Borsippa, 'the house of seven zones' and 'the house of the seven divisions of heaven and earth, respectively, while conveying, as we saw, cosmological conceptions of a more specific character, may still be reckoned in the class of names that embody the leading purpose of the tower in Babylonia, as may also a name like E-temen-an-ki, 'the foundation stone of heaven and earth, assigned to the zikkurat to Marduk in Babylonia.
At no time does any special stress appear to have been laid upon the number of stories of which the zikkurat was to consist. It is not until a comparatively late period that rivalry among the rulers and natural ambition led to the increase of the superimposed stages until the number seven was reached.
But, on the other hand, it would appear that as the zikkurat developed from a one-story edifice into a tower, and as the number of the stages increased, the zikkurat assumed more of an ornamental character.
Another small quadrangle lay a little to the east and contained Russian buildings connected with the monastery by telephone. "That is the house of the Living God of Zain," the Mongol explained, pointing to this smaller quadrangle. "He likes Russian customs and manners." To the north on a conical-shaped hill rose a tower that recalled the Babylonian zikkurat.
The zikkurat always had a special name of its own.
Peters' estimate is eight areas for the zikkurat and surrounding structures, and to this we may add several acres more, since beyond the limits of the great terrace there were buildings to the southeast and southwest, used for religious purposes. It is likely that the extent of E-Sagila at Babylon was even greater.
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