A team of researchers may have deciphered the mysterious code present in ancient Assyrian temples.
According to the researchers, whose work was presented in an article recently published in the Bulletin of the American Society of Overseas Research, these symbols refer to King Sargon II, who ruled between 721-704 BC.
In their abbreviated form, they consist of a lion, a fig tree and a plow. In their longer form, there are five symbols in sequence: a bird and a bull after the lion, then the tree and the plow.
These images appear in various places in temples in Dūr-Šarrukīn, which was for a short time the capital of Assyria. The buried ruins of the ancient city were excavated during the 19th and 20th centuries.
But the meaning of the images - whether they represent gods, supernatural forces, the king's authority or an attempt at Egyptian hieroglyphics - has long been debated.
"This region of the world, which includes present-day Iraq and parts of Iran, Turkey and Syria, is often referred to as the 'cradle of civilization'," says Assyriologist and historian Martin Worthington, from Trinity College Dublin in Ireland, and author of the study, in a statement from the institution.
"This is where cities and empires were born and their history is an important part of human history," he adds.
The clues collected by Worthington lead the researcher to conclude that these images evoke the name of Sargon II - a theory first proposed (but not explored) in 1948.
The author supports this suggestion by showing that the symbols can also refer to star constellations; the intention would be to pay homage to the sovereign king by writing his name in the stars and associating him with the gods.
It is important to note that the interpretation is valid for both the long and short forms of this graphic code.
Although previous theories have suggested that the icons could refer to the king and the night sky, due to the blue and yellow colors with which they were represented, this is the first research to systematically bring these ideas together.
Worthington explains in detail the language used: how, for example, the Assyrian word for "tree" sounds similar to "mandible", which is the name of a constellation that people of the time would have known.
