Depicted gestures and intersubjectivity in Assyrian palace reliefs

In the wild, gestures range from spontaneous reflexes in response to stimuli to choreographed series of movements used in games, dance, rituals, etc. Sometimes treated like language that is “readable,” these conventions are tightly linked to context—even natural gestures like a clenched fist can vary widely in meaning across time and space—and mutable. Like spoken words, gestures function intersubjectively in the spaces between people, pushing them apart and pulling them together to create dynamic networks of interaction.

Represented gestures add layers of interpretive complexity. In the case of the narrative and non-narrative reliefs decorating the Northwest Palace of the Assyrian king Ashurnasirpal II, a ninth century BCE ruler in what is now Nimrud, Iraq, images of gestures are embedded in a highly visible, prestigious, politically charged context, and literally carved in stone. Assyrian sources examining their own values and behaviors are too scarce to shed light on the precise meanings of depicted gestures, but it is possible to infer some social and religious norms from a wide range of written sources as well as from the narrative contexts of, and outcomes resulting from, particular gestures in the reliefs themselves. Finally, I will explore the sensorial, phenomenological aspect of represented gestures in Assyrian art, both within the pictorial frame where bodies interact in low relief, and outside of the pictures, where living bodies experienced and somatically reacted to the represented gestures, suggesting that visceral resonance of depicted gestures made them particularly effective for uniting viewers in support of the Assyrian king.