Depictions of Dogs in the Beni Hasan Tombs
Depictions of Dogs in the Beni Hasan Tombs Dogs also had a mixed profile in Semitic culture. Although the dog was associated with Gula, a Mesopotamian goddess of healing, and may have been a protagonist in restorative and apotropaic rites, there is a great deal of textual evidence that dogs were scorned as curs, the bearers of uncleanness, and harbingers of misfortune (see the Chicago Assyrian Dictionary, 8:68–73 , under kalbu). The dog almost always has negative connotations in the biblical text ( e.g. , Exod 22:31 , 1 Kgs 21:23 , Qoh 9:4 ). The dog figured prominently in a Greek legend about the discovery of the dye for which Phoenicia was reknown. When Melqart, king and deity of Tyre, was walking along the beach with the nymph Tyros, their dog bit into a large whelk that stained its mouth purple. Melqart immediately seized upon dyeing cloth with the substance and a flourishing industry was born (McGovern 1990). Although this particular legend is Greek, it must have had wide ...