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Updated: June 4, 2025
The Anunnaki even more directly implicated than Ishtar in bringing on the catastrophe join the goddess in her lament at the complete destruction wrought. The gods, together with the Anunnaki, wept with her. The storm could no longer be quieted.
Ramman-nirari I. already designates the Anunnaki as belonging to the earth, though it is an indication of the vagueness of the notions connected with the group that in hymns, both the Anunnaki and the Igigi are designated as offspring of Anu, the god of heaven. They are not exclusively at the service of Nergal and Allatu. Bel, Ninib, Marduk, and Ishtar also send them out on missions.
All the gods, together with the Igigi and Anunnaki, are gathered around Dibbarra, who addresses them: Listen all of you to my words. Because of sin did I formerly plan evil, My heart was enraged and I swept peoples away. He tells how he destroyed the flocks and devastated the fruits in the fields, how he swept over the lands, punishing the just and the wicked alike, and sparing no one.
Their character is, on the whole, severe and cruel. They are not favorable to man, but rather hostile to him. Their brilliancy consumes the land. Their power is feared, and Assyrian kings more particularly are fond of adding the Igigi and Anunnaki to the higher powers the gods proper when they wish to inspire a fear of their own majesty.
As Ashur rules the Igigi, so Ishtar is declared to be 'mighty over the Anunnaki. Her commands are not to be opposed. Her appearance is that of a being clothed with fiery flames, and streams of fire are sent down by her upon the enemies of Ashurbanabal a description that expresses admirably the conception formed by the Assyrians of a genuine goddess of war.
Gudea's first act was to install the Anunnaki, or Spirits of the Earth, in the new temple, and when he had done this, and had supplied additional sheep for their sacrifices and food in abundance for their offerings, he prayed to them to give him their assistance and to pronounce a prayer at his side when he should lead Ningirsu into his new dwelling-place.
Evidently, the fact that their chief function was to injure mankind suggested the doctrine which gave them a place in the lower world with the demons. The distinction between Anunnaki and the Igigi is not sharply maintained in the religious literature. Though Ramman-nirari places the Igigi in heaven, it is not impossible that a later view transferred them, like the Anunnaki, to the lower world.
The Anunnaki and Igigi appear for the first time in an historical text in the inscription of the Assyrian king Ramman-nirari I., who includes them in his appeal to the great gods. He designates the Igigi as belonging to heaven, the Anunnaki as belonging to the earth.
This group was known as the Anunnaki and Igigi. Regarding these names it may be said that the former has not yet been satisfactorily interpreted.
At times the Igigi alone are mentioned, but generally the Igigi and Anunnaki appear in combination. To the latest period of Babylonian history these two groups continue to receive official recognition. Nebuchadnezzar II. dedicates an altar, which he erects at the wall of the city of Babylon, to the Igigi and Anunnaki.
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