Endnote 4 – The Birth of Kingship

Shulgi was not the first deified ruler in Mesopotamia, however. The Old Akkadian king Naram-Sin, who preceded Shulgi by about a century and a half, was the first king who assumed divinity in Mesopotamia. Naram-Sin’s empire extended over all of Mesopotamia and beyond, and in order to control the Sumerian city-states in the south, which were opposed to the Akkadian overlord and whose rulers derived their authority from the local city gods, he assumed a divine status, not unlike the Roman emperors in late antiquity. However, Naram-Sin based his divine status on a decision of the citizens of his city, who deified him in a general assembly. Unfortunately, we know nothing about the nature of this first type of divine kingship. After the fall of the Old Akkadian Empire, this divine kingship was discontinued. Shulgi, following the precedent of Naram-Sin, decided in the middle of his reign to introduce divine kingship into Sumer, developing this institution in a unique Sumerian way so that it was accepted by his and future generations.