Dagon

Dagon (Phoenician: ???, romanized: Dāgūn; Hebrew: דָּגוֹן‎, Tib. /dɔːgon/) or Dagan (Sumerian: ???, romanized: dda-gan) is an ancient Mesopotamian and ancient Canaanite deity. He appears to have been worshipped as a fertility god in Ebla, Assyria, Ugarit and among the Amorites. Dagon (Phoenician: ???, romanized: Dāgūn; Hebrew: דָּגוֹן‎, Tib. /dɔːgon/) or Dagan (Sumerian: ???, romanized: dda-gan) is an ancient Mesopotamian and ancient Canaanite deity. He appears to have been worshipped as a fertility god in Ebla, Assyria, Ugarit and among the Amorites. The Hebrew Bible mentions him as the national god of the Philistines with temples at Ashdod and elsewhere in Gaza. A long-standing association with a Canaanite word for 'fish' (as in Hebrew: דג‎, Tib. /dɔːg/), perhaps going back to the Iron Age, has led to an interpretation as a 'fish-god', and the association of 'merman' motifs in Assyrian art (such as the 'Dagon' relief found by Austen Henry Layard in the 1840s). The god's name was, however, more likely derived from a word for 'grain', suggesting that he was in origin associated with fertility and agriculture. The name is recorded as Ugaritic Dgn (Dagnu or Daganu), Akkadian Dagana. In Ugaritic, the root dgn also means 'grain': in Hebrew, דגן‎, dɔːgɔːn (Samaritan Hebrew dīgan), is an archaic word for grain. According to Philo of Byblos, the Phoenician author Sanchuniathon explained Dagon as a word for 'grain' (siton). Sanchuniathon further explains: 'And Dagon, after he discovered grain and the plough, was called Zeus Arotrios.' The word arotrios means 'ploughman' or 'pertaining to agriculture' (from ἄροτρον, 'plow'). The theory relating the name to the Hebrew word 'fish', based solely upon a reading of 1 Samuel 5:2–7, is discussed in § Fish-god tradition below. The god Dagon first appears in extant records about 2500 BC in the Mari texts and in personal Amorite names in which the Mesopotamian gods Ilu (Ēl), Dagan, and Adad are especially common. At Ebla (Tell Mardikh), from at least 2300 BC, Dagan was the head of the city pantheon comprising some 200 deities and bore the titles BE-DINGIR-DINGIR, 'Lord of the gods' and Bekalam, 'Lord of the land'. His consort was known only as Belatu, 'Lady'. Both were worshipped in a large temple complex called E-Mul, 'House of the Star'. One entire quarter of Ebla and one of its gates were named after Dagan. Dagan is called ti-lu ma-tim, 'dew of the land' and Be-ka-na-na, possibly 'Lord of Canaan'. He was called lord of many cities: of Tuttul, Irim, Ma-Ne, Zarad, Uguash, Siwad, and Sipishu.