lamassu

lamassu (LEH-ma-soo) - n., an Assyrian, Akkadian, and Sumerian protective deity depicted as having the head of a human, the body of an ox or lion, and the wings of a bird.



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Also called shedu. Evolved from the protective Sumerian goddess Lamma or Lama, who was depicted as a woman with wings stretched wide. The iconography of the description seems to have been codified by the epic of Gilgamesh, while the name is from Akkadian, from the earlier Sumerian.

---L.