The profound symbolic significance of ibex imagery in ancient Near Eastern art, has been deciphered in a new study, revealing how these majestic mountain goats served as powerful representations of fertility, femininity, and celestial worship across millennia of human civilization. The research, published in L’Anthropologie, offers compelling evidence that ibex motifs functioned as sophisticated cultural symbols that bridged the earthly and divine realms in ancient Persian and Mesopotamian societies.
Tracing the Sacred Ibex Through Ancient Civilizations
Dr. Shirin Torkamandi and colleagues from the University of Liège have conducted an extensive analysis of ibex symbolism spanning from the Paleolithic period through to the Iron Age. Their research demonstrates that the ibex (Capra aegagrus), the wild ancestor of the domestic goat, held extraordinary cultural significance throughout the ancient Near East, appearing consistently in rock art, pottery decorations, metal artifacts, and even tattoos.