The victors carried off its statue — because the statue WAS the god
To Mesopotamians a cult statue was not a symbol of the deity; it was the deity, living in the temple. So a conqueror would haul the defeated city's statue home, a practice scholars nickname 'godnapping.' Babylon's god Marduk was abducted in this way several times over the centuries, each loss read as proof that the god had deserted his people.
