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Updated: July 23, 2025
A third double hour he carried him on high. The eagle spoke to Etana: Look, my friend, how the earth appears; The sea is a mere gardener's ditch. In this way they reach the gate of Anu, Bel, and Ea in safety, where they take a rest. The eagle is not yet satisfied, and urges Etana to follow him to the domain of Ishtar.
The gods, it will be seen, dwell on high in accordance with the view developed by astronomical speculations. Anu, Bel, and Ea are here evidently identified with the fixed stars bearing their names, while under Ishtar the planet Ishtar-Venus is meant. Etana yields to the eagle's suggestion. They mount still higher.
Etana, like Rustem, is accompanied by an eagle, and it would appear that the eagle aids Etana in obtaining the plant. The eagle, in many mythologies, is a symbol of the sun, and it is plausible to conclude that the bird is sent to Etana at the instigation of Shamash.
If a fragment of the tale were only better preserved, we would have an episode of Etana's earlier career. But such is the condition of this fragment that, at the most, it can be said that Etana is engaged in some conflict against a city, in which Ishtar, Bel, the Anunnaki, the Igigi, and some minor gods, as En-ninna, Sibittum, are involved.
In the literary form that the popular productions received, the influence of those who guided the religious thought into its proper channels is to be clearly seen. The Etana Legend. It will be recalled that we came across a hero Etana in the Gilgamesh epic.
There is therefore a reasonable doubt whether the identification made by Babylonian scholars represents an old tradition or is merely a late conjecture arising at a time when the traditions of Izdubar were confused with those of Etana.
He is here duly entered in the list, where we read that "Etana, the shepherd who ascended to heaven, who subdued all lands", ruled in the city of Kish for 635 years. The god Lugal-banda is another hero of legend. He is here recorded to have reigned in Erech for 1,200 years.
In coming to his conclusion he may have been influenced by what seems to me an undoubted correspondence between one of the rulers in our list and the sixth Antediluvian king of Berossus. I think few will be disposed to dispute the equation Each list preserves the hero's shepherd origin and the correspondence of the names is very close, Daonos merely transposing the initial vowel of Etana.
Where the cult of Dibbarra centered we do not know, but that he presided over a district that must have played a prominent part at some period of Babylonian history is shown by the elaborate legend of his deeds for which, as in the case of Gilgamesh and Etana, we are justified in assuming an historical background.
The force of na is not clear, unless it be a phonetic complement merely. Semitische Völker, p. 369. Very many of the names of the Semitic gods and heroes signify strong, e.g., El, Adon, Baal, Etana, Kemosh, etc. The final vowel i would, on the basis of the explanation offered, be paralleled by the i of Igigi an indication of the plural. See Delitzsch, Assyr. Gram. § 67, 1.
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