The Loss of Male Sexual Desire in Ancient Mesopotamia: ›Nīš Libbi‹ Therapies

Description

After more than fifty years since the last publication, the cuneiform texts relating to the treatment of the loss of male sexual desire and vigor in Mesopotamia are collected in this volume. The aim of the book is to present Mesopotamian medical tradition regarding the so-called nīš libbi therapies. šà-zi-ga in Sumerian, nīš libbi in Akkadian, lit. "raising of the 'heart'", is the expression used to indicate a group of texts intended to recover the male sexual desire. This medical tradition is preserved from the Middle Babylonian period to the Achaemenid one. This broad range testifies to the importance of the transmission of this material throughout Mesopotamian history. The book provides the edition of this textual corpus and analyzes it in the light of new knowledge on ancient Near Eastern medicine. Moreover, this volume aims to show how theories and methodologies of Cultural Anthropology, Ethnopsychiatry and Gender Studies are useful for understanding the Mesopotamian medical system. This edition is an important tool for understanding Mesopotamian medical knowledge for Assyriologist, however since the texts have been translated and discussed using the anthropological and gender perspectives they are accessible also to scholars of other research fields, such as History of Medicine, Sexuality and Gender. Foreword Acknowledgments Contents Introduction Bibliographical abbreviations Editorial abbreviations and sigla Part I: Interpretative analysis of the corpus Chapter I Nīš libbi therapies and theoretical and methodological introduction Chapter II Nīš libbi incantations Chapter III Rituals and prescriptions Conclusions. Therapeutic efficacy and analogical thinking Part II: Edition Nīš libbi catalogue LKA 94 I Texts from Aššur (with duplicates from other sites) II Texts from Nineveh (with duplicates from other sites) III Text from Sultantepe (with duplicates from other sites) IV Texts from Uruk (with duplicates from other sites) V Texts from Boghazköy VI Ritual fragments from Nineveh and Aššur VII Ritual fragments from Sippar and Uruk VIII Ritual fragments from Boghazköy List of mineral and botanical ingredients Index of ingredients Concordances Bibliography Index of Akkadian terms and expressions discussed Index