Lamassus

My formal analysis is on the Lamassus or as it is named in the book Guardian Figures at the Gate A of the Citadel of Sargon II during its Excavation. It is a great example of Ancient Near East modern Kharsabad art. It is 13’ 10” tall, towering over who ever stands under it. The Lamassus is a huge cement lion or bull with wings and a man’s face. When looking at this massive structure it is hard not to feel intimidated and that they are very powerful beings. The Lamassus stands so tall and strong in this high relief that is very intimidated to look at, one could say they feel very powerless it their precise.

The first thing I would like to talk about is the obvious scale of this structure making whomever looking at it feel powerless. When walking up to the gate and seeing the Lamassus, and humans averaging around the height of 5 to 6’ we would only come up to the top of this beings legs. If it were alive it could easy just squish us. From every angle of this relief the legs are very long and strong. From the side view it could be taken as the Lamassus is running or coming towards you. Again looking at the side view we see these huge almost stretched out wings and for me showing another sign of running or charging. For me this would scare me if it were coming at me, having power over me and intimidation.

The medium of this relief also is another representation of strength and power. To what I can tell from the pictures of the Lamassus it looks like it is made out of a stone or brick like medium. Being made out of most liking stone, as a relief it shows a very powerful being. It is a hard and strong medium, meaning that even if you wanted to you couldn’t destroy it with your own two hands. I want to also point out that the whole stone is not carved into it has a sense of white space in the piece. When looking at the Lamassus in the frontal view the statue on the left and right sides is just blank stone. That for me shows strength too, reason being the figure is coming out of this stone, it not only has the strength of the Lamassus but also of this huge bolder. To put into better terms if the guardians fail to keep the enemy out this huge wall will not.

The style of the Lamassus I feel is representational style. With the huge lion like creature coming out of the stone makes it feel like it is very alive. The way the high relief is so strongly coming out of the stone and the creature’s life like features makes it feel scary. Also at the head of the Lamassus is a human face, showing the mix between power and strength in humans and beast. The very defined way everything is coming out of the stone and how detailed it is very life like. Something I found very interesting about the style is how the feet of the creature are hooves making it feel like it could jump right out of the stone.

When looking at the Lamassus it is easy to see how this huge guardian can be very intimating. It stands strong with its defined high relief body. It is a very powerful structure and was probably used to keep enemies away. It shows strength in the legs and body or the whole relief. Every feature of this piece is a representation of strength and power.