Haldi: Urartians’ Triumph Fire Deity

Fire was treated respectfully in antiquity but a few studies have been accomplished in this regard in the case of Urartians. Usually there was a deity with the function of “Fire Deity” among ancient people, but this is not the case for Urartians. This is strange, as Urartians lived in a cold environment and therefore one can safely assume that fire must have had significant importance for them. There is no explicit reference regarding the importance of fire or a specific Fire Deity in Urartian royal inscriptions, but it is possible to trace the function of the Fire Deity in Urartian works with respect to the most important Urartian god Ḫaldi. This paper is an attempt to study some pieces of evidence, such as a depiction of Ḫaldi on a shield from the archaeological site Anzaf and fireplaces at the site of Ayanis to show that a fire was lit for Ḫaldi and this could be called “Triumph Fire”. Also Ḫaldi, himself, may have been the Fire Deity. His fire had the characteristics of the Triumph Fire such as ever-burning, relation with Triumph God, burning in temples and possibly even in requiring sacrifice and offerings.