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Updated: June 24, 2025
But the greater deities also had their share in the inauguration of the temple, and of these Gudea specially mentions Ana, Enlil, Ninkharsag, Enki, and Enzu, who all assisted in rendering the temple's lot propitious. In any case, it is clear that the composer of the text represents all the great gods as beholding the erection and inauguration of Ningirsu's new temple with favour.
From such evidence we may infer that in his temple at Eridu, now covered by the mounds of Abu Shahrain in the extreme south of Babylonia, and regarded in early Sumerian tradition as the first city in the world, Enki himself was once celebrated as the sole creator of the universe.
Then he created "the King", for the equipment probably of a particular temple, and finally men, that they might practise the cult in the temple so elaborately prepared. See Weissbach, Babylonische Miscellen, pp. 32 ff. One of the titles of Enki was "the Potter"; cf. Cun. Texts in the Brit. Mus., Pt. XXIV, pl. 14 f., ll. 41, 43.
The myth is only one of several that have been combined to form the introductory sections of an incantation; but in all of them Enki, the god of the deep water, plays the leading part, though associated with different consorts.
It is difficult not to associate the reference to a dream, or possibly to dream-divination, with the warning in which Enki reveals the purpose of the gods. For the later versions prepare us for a reference to a dream.
The Gilgamesh Epic, after relating how the great gods in Shuruppak had decided to send a deluge, continues as follows in the right-hand column: SUMERIAN VERSION SEMITIC VERSION At the wall I will speak a word O reed-hut, hear! Col. IV, ll. 1 ff. are there compared with Gilg. Epic, XI, ll. 19-31. Nin-igi-azag, "The Lord of Clear Vision", a title borne by Enki, or Ea, as God of Wisdom.
In both of them Anu, Enlil, and Enki appear as creators "through their sure counsel". In the Sumerian extract they create the Moon and ordain its monthly course, while in the Semitic text, after establishing heaven and earth, they create in addition to the New Moon the bright Day, so that "men beheld the Sun-god in the Gate of his going forth".
The god Enki issued oracles, and the god Nindub, the supreme priest of Eridu, brought incense. Ninâ performed chants within the temple, and brought black sheep and holy cows to its folds and stalls.
The combination of the three gods Anu, Enlil, and Enki, is persistent in the tradition; for not only were they the great gods of the universe, representing respectively heaven, earth, and the watery abyss, but they later shared the heavenly sphere between them.
Eannatum and Gudea of Lagash both place her immediately after Anu and Enlil, giving her precedence over Enki; and even in the Kassite Kudurru inscriptions of the thirteenth and twelfth centuries, where she is referred to, she takes rank after Enki and before the other gods.
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