It’s Pazuzu Time!
Meet the Godfather of All Demons…
Pazuzu? Isn’t that the name of the demon that possessed the young girl Regan MacNeil in the 1971 novel The Exorcistnovel and subsequent movie adaptation? So surely that’s just fiction? Well, the novel is a work of fiction but in history the demon Pazuzu dates to at least the 8th century BC in Mesopotamia. So, who or what was — or still is — Pazuzu?
In most statues and amulets Pazuzu is depicted as having a scaled, canine-like body, birds’ talons for feet, two pairs of wings, a scorpion’s tale, a doglike muzzle, human ears, the horns of a gazelle, and he typically has his right hand raised and his left hand lowered. In other words, he (and depictions leave no doubt that he is masculine in gender) is the prototype for almost all depictions of demons from ancient times through until the present day. But Pazuzu’s story is more complicated than might at first appear for there are actually two sides to his character.
On the one hand he is undoubtedly evil: in fact, on one Sumerian inscription Pazuzu describes himself as ‘The King of the Evil Wind Demons’, while in another he is held responsible for the southwest winds that would bring famine during the dry seasons and locusts during rainy season and is variously named as the ‘Agony of Mankind’ and the ‘Suffering of Mankind’. All in all, a bad guy, and the depiction of him possessing…
