Gula temple (Kalhu)

Akkadian inscriptions of the ninth-century-BC Assyrian king Ashurnasirpal II (r. 883–859 BC) record that that ruler built (or rebuilt) temples to the deities Adad, Damkina, Ea-šarru, Enlil, Gula, Nabû, Ninurta, Sîn, Šala, and Šarrat-niphi, as well as to the Sebetti and Kidmuri; for example, see RIAo Ashurnasirpal II 030 lines 53–78a. Of those, only four have been positively identified during nineteenth- and twentieth-century excavations: the Kidmuri temple, the Nabû temple, the Ninurta temple, and the Šarrat-niphi temple.

Despite the fact that the location of the Gula temple at Kalhu is not known from the archaeological record, it is sometimes thought that it was situated east of the Šarrat-niphi temple and north of the Kidmuri temple, both of which have been partially excavated; see, for example, Reade 2002: 137 fig. 2, 191–193. This proposal cannot be confirmed from in-situ inscriptions and, therefore, must remain conjectural.