<P> The high temple was a special type of temple that was home to the patron god of the city . Functionally, it served as a storage and distribution center as well as housing the priesthood . The White Temple of Anu in Uruk is typical of a high temple which was built very high on a platform of adobe - brick . In the Early Dynastic period high temples began to include a ziggurat, a series of platforms creating a stepped pyramid . Such ziggurats may have been the inspiration for the Biblical Tower of Babel . </P> <P> Ziggurats were huge pyramidal temple towers which were first built in Sumerian City - States and then developed in Babylonia and Assyrian cities as well . There are 32 ziggurats known at, or near, Mesopotamia--28 in Iraq and 4 in Iran . Notable ziggurats include the Great Ziggurat of Ur near Nasiriyah, Iraq, the Ziggurat of Aqar Quf near Baghdad, Iraq, Chogha Zanbil in Khūzestān, Iran (the most recent to be discovered), and the Sialk near Kashan, Iran . Ziggurats were built by the Sumerians, Babylonians, Elamites, and Assyrians as monuments to local religions . The earliest examples of the ziggurat were raised platforms that date from the Ubaid period during the fourth millennium BC, and the latest date from the 6th century BC . The top of the ziggurat was flat, unlike many pyramids . The step pyramid style began near the end of the Early Dynastic Period . </P> <P> Built in receding tiers upon a rectangular, oval, or square platform, the ziggurat was a pyramidal structure . Sun - baked bricks made up the core of the ziggurat with facings of fired bricks on the outside . The facings were often glazed in different colors and may have had astrological significance . Kings sometimes had their names engraved on these glazed bricks . The number of tiers ranged from two to seven, with a shrine or temple at the summit . Access to the shrine was provided by a series of ramps on one side of the ziggurat or by a spiral ramp from base to summit . It has been suggested that ziggurats were built to resemble mountains, but there is little textual or archaeological evidence to support that hypothesis . </P> <P> Classical ziggurats emerged in the Neo-Sumerian Period with articulated buttresses, vitreous brick sheathing, and entasis in the elevation . The Ziggurat of Ur is the best example of this style . Another change in temple design in this period was a straight as opposed to bent - axis approach to the temple . </P>

An artificial mountain with a temple on top in mesopotamia