Athtar
Canaanite · deity · mythic · deity
Athtar's scene is four lines long and it has been read for a century as the ancestor of Isaiah's fallen morning star. Baal is dead; the throne of Zaphon is empty; Athirat proposes her own candidate; and Athtar climbs up, sits down, and discovers that his feet do not reach the stool. He says, in effect, that he will not be king up here — and goes down and rules the earth. Nothing is said about humiliation and nothing needs to be: the poem makes its argument about kingship by measuring a chair. The registry already carried the South Arabian and Aksumite gods of this name and not the Ugaritic one.
Domains
- sovereignty
- irrigation
Relations
Sources
- The Baal Cycle (KTU 1.6).
- Reference treatments of Athtar and of his relation to the South Arabian and Aksumite gods of the same name.