Lamashtu amulets against a child-killing demon

Bronze and stone plaques from Assyria and Babylonia show the lion-headed demoness Lamashtu, blamed for miscarriages and infant deaths, being driven away.

800 BCE · 36.36, 43.15 · status: account

The account

Incantation texts tell how to make her leave: offer her a comb, a spindle and shoes and send her off on a donkey or boat. The plaques were hung in houses, and the demon Pazuzu, her enemy, was often shown on the back. They date mostly to the first millennium BC.

Sources

1. Wikipedia: Lamashtu