310 Kevin McGeough [She] put [her hand out] to her clay. She nipped off [fourteen] pieces of clay, Seven she put on the right, [Seven] she put on the left, Between them she placed the brick…the cutter of the umbilical cord…The birth-goddess, creatress of destiny — They completed them in pairs in her presence, Since Mami conceived the regulations for the human race. In the house of the pregnant woman in confinement. Let the brick be in place for seven days (8). This is not the only time that human birth is described using terminology derived from ceramic production. The shumma izbu omen series likewise employs the language of ceramics when discussing birth related issues. For those unfamiliar with Mesopotamian omens, this particular set of texts describes the messages or meanings that the gods grant through various phenomena. Of particular interest to us here are the descriptions of fetuses. Kilmer has convincingly demonstrated that the descriptions of deformed fetuses use clay terminology, otherwise used in discussion of ceramic production (9). Kilmer states: I believe that we have overlooked a deeper meaning and significance of the unbaked clay brick, in that it appears to have been likened to placental material. That is, the fetus may have been thought of as the product that developed in and from the malleable, clay-like placenta (10). To push Kilmer’s argument a little bit further, it is suggested that there was a connection between the manufacture of ceramics from unbaked clay and human reproduction that invited the use of the same language in both contexts. It is not just Mesopotamia where this conceptual link is apparent. In Egypt, the god Khnum is both a potter and the creator of humanity, at least in some accounts. A patron god of potters, Khnum is credited, in some texts, with fashioning humanity on a potter’s wheel, out of clay. In the Westcar papyrus, this deity is said to bring in birthing equipment, including a birthing stool for the woman to give birth on (11). In the (8) W. LAMBERT – A. MILLARD, Atra-Hasis: The Babylonian Story of the Flood (Winona Lake, IN 1999) 61-63. (9) A. KILMER, “Proportional Guidelines in Near Eastern Art: The Birth of Brick”, JNES 46 (1987) 211-213. (10) Ibid., 212. (11) For an early edition, see A. ERMAN, Die Märchen des Papyrus Westcar (Mittheilungen aus den orientalischen Sammlungen; Berlin 1890). For an English translation and further commentary, see The Literature of Ancient Egypt (ed. W. SIMPSON) (New Haven 1972) 15-30.