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Updated: June 3, 2025
Ashurnasirbal calls him so in his annals, e.g., col. iii. 1. 130. Bavian Inscription, ll. 48-50. See also Meissner-Rost, Bauinschriften Sanherib's, p. 102. The reading of the name of the city is not certain. It signifies 'city of palaces. c. 1120 B.C. II Rawlinson, 57, 33. So Tiglathpileser associates Ashur and Nin-ib, as those 'who fulfill his desire.
He declares that on one occasion he killed 10 elephants and 920 lions in various parts of northwestern Mesopotamia; and he ascribes his success to Nin-ib, who loves him, and who, again, in association with Nergal, and Ashur, has placed in the king's hands the mighty weapons and the glorious bow.
Like Marduk, who, it will be remembered, is also originally a phase of the solar deity, Nin-ib is called the first-born of Ea; and as the rising sun he is appropriately called the offspring of Ekur, i.e., the earth, in allusion to his apparent ascent from a place below the earth.
He loves, too, to vary the style of his inscriptions by naming various groups of deities in pairs: now Ashur and Shamash, again Ashur and Nin-ib, or Ashur and Bel; then Shamash and Ramman, or a group of three deities, Ashur, Shamash, and Ramman, or Sin, Anu, and Ramman. His successors imitate this example, though each one chooses his own combinations.
The conclusion is justified that in the century covered by the reigns of Ashurnasirbal and Shamshi-Ramman, the cult of Nin-ib must have acquired great popularity, though suffering, perhaps, an interruption during the reign of Shalmaneser II., midway between these two kings, whose favorite we have seen was Shamash.
The natural desire for novelty together with other circumstances that escape us led one to choose Ramman, another Nin-ib, a third Shamash, and a fourth, as we shall see, Nabu. In doing so they were not conscious of any lack of respect towards Ashur, of whose good will they always felt certain.
Different from Nin-ib, who is also a god of war, Nergal symbolizes more particularly the destruction which accompanies war, and not the strong champion who aids his subjects in the fight. Nergal is essentially a destroyer, and the various epithets applied to him in the religious texts, show that he was viewed in this light.
This has long been recognized, but it is the merit of Jensen to have demonstrated that it is the east sun and the morning sun which is more especially represented by Nin-ib. On this supposition, some of the titles given to him in the inscriptions of Ashurnasirbal and Shamshi-Ramman become perfectly clear.
If Ashur is the king of Igigi and Anunnaki, Nin-ib is the hero of the heavenly and earthly spirits. To him the rulers fly for help. Of all the kings, Ashurnasirbal seems to have been especially devoted to the service of Nin-ib.
At the same time he is also the lord of plenty, and in his capacity as the wise god he is regarded as the lord of decisions. But by the side of new epithets that are attached to him in the Assyrian inscriptions, there is one which, just as in the case of Nin-ib, connects the Assyrian Sin cult with the oldest phase of moon-worship in the south.
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