Used by Sumerians and other Mesopotamian cultures beginning in the third millennium BC, clay nails, also referred to as dedication or foundation pegs, cones, or nails, were cone-shaped nails made of clay, inscribed with cuneiform, baked, and stuck into the mudbrick walls to serve as evidence that the temple or building was the divine property of the god to whom it was dedicated.[1] Versions were also made of metal, including castings with figurative designs,[2] such as the Hurrian foundation pegs (Syria, c. 2300 – c. 2159 BCE).
Additionally, uninscribed clay cones painted in different colors were used by Sumerians to create decorative mosaic patterns on walls and pillars of buildings, which also offered some protection against weathering.[3]
The similar funerary cones of ancient Egypt used the cone base as the major writing surface.
- ^ Edward Chiera (1938). George G. Cameron (ed.). They Wrote on Clay. Babylonian Tablets Speak Today. University of Chicago Press. p. 93. ISBN 978-0-226-10425-6.
- ^ Muscarella, Oscar White, Bronze and Iron: Ancient Near Eastern Artifacts in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, pp. 303-312, 1988, Metropolitan Museum of Art, ISBN 0870995251, 9780870995255, Google books
- ^ "Cone mosaic excavated at the "Columned Hall," Uruk, Mesopotamia". Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Retrieved March 30, 2014.