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Updated: May 20, 2025
The name given to this sea was Apsu. Marduk however does not create the Apsu. It is in existence at the beginning of things, but he places it under the control of Ea. In front of Apsu, he prepared the dwelling of Nu-dimmud. This Apsu, as we learn from other sources, flows on all sides of the earth, and since it also fills the hollow under the earth, the latter in reality rests upon the Apsu.
Gudea already regards the zikkurat as a symbol. To make the ascent is a virtuous deed. The thought of adding a symbol of the apsu belongs, accordingly, to the period when this view of the zikkurat was generally recognized. The shape of the 'sea' was oblong or round. It was cut of large blocks of stone and was elaborately decorated.
The most common name is Aralû. We also find the term 'house of Aralû. The etymology of the term is obscure. Aralû was pictured as a vast place, dark and gloomy. It is sometimes called a land, sometimes a great house. The approach to it was difficult. It lay in the lowest part of the mountain that represented the earth, not far from the hollow underneath the mountain into which the 'Apsu' flowed.
Tiâmat is the equivalent of the Hebrew T'hôm, which occurs in the second verse of the opening chapter of Genesis, and which is, like Apsu, the personification of the 'watery deep. Apsu and Tiâmat are, accordingly, synonymous.
The upper 'rainbow' is formed by one-half of the carcass of Tiâmat stretched across in semi-circular shape; the lower one is the great structure Esharra made by Marduk, while the Apsu underneath is the dwelling of Ea. The creation epic, it may be noted once more, takes much for granted. Its chief aim being to glorify Marduk, but little emphasis is laid upon details of interest to us.
The combination of the two may be regarded as due to the introduction of the theological doctrine which we have seen plays so prominent a part in the systematized pantheon, namely, the association of the male and female principle in everything connected with activity or with the life of the universe. Apsu represents the male and Tiâmat the female principle of the primaeval universe.
Brief as it is, it affords a clear view of the manner in which the Babylonians regarded the beginning of things. Water was the primaeval element. 'Apsu' is the personified great 'ocean' the 'Deep' that covers everything. With Apsu there is associated Tiâmat.
These tell legends of the time when "nothing which was called heaven existed above, and when nothing below had as yet received the name of earth. Apsu, the Ocean, who was their first father, and Chaos-Tiamat, who gave birth to them all, mingled their waters in one, reeds which were not united, rushes which bore no fruit.
In Gudea's days the symbol is already known, and it continues in use to the end of the Babylonian empire. The zikkurat itself being, as we saw, an attempt to reproduce the shape of the earth, the representation of the 'apsu' would suggest itself as a natural accessory to the temple. The zikkurat and the basin together would thus become living symbols of the current cosmological conceptions.
There is nothing earlier than the two beings Apsu and Tiâmat. The massing together of the primaeval waters completes the picture of chaos in the cuneiform account. As the outcome of this union, the gods are produced. This dependence of the gods upon Apsu and Tiâmat is but vaguely indicated.
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