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As for the man who shall transgress his judgment or shall remove his gift, may the gods Shushinak and Shamash, Bel and Ea, Ninni and Sin, Mnkharsag and Nati may all the gods uproot his foundation, and his seed may they destroy!"

They have shed blood in Abzu-ega, they have set fire to the temple of Gatumdug, and they have carried away the silver and the precious stones therefrom, and have destroyed her statue! They have set fire to the.... of the temple E-anna of the goddess Ninni, and they have carried away the silver and the precious stones therefrom, and have destroyed her statue!

It is more in accord with what, as we have seen, has been the general character of the Babylonian pantheon, to account for the identification of Ninni, Nanâ, and Anunit with Ishtar on the supposition that the different names belonged originally to different localities. Ishtar was appropriately denominated the brilliant goddess.

In the earliest period which we are now considering, we can still distinguish a number of goddesses who afterwards became merged into this one great goddess. Ninni and Innanna are names that appear to have a common origin. Both embody the notion of 'ladyship. The worship of this goddess centers in the district of Lagash. For Gudea, Ninni is the "mistress of the world."

Thus one of the statues previously found was set up in the temple of Ninkharsag, two others in E-ninnû, the temple of the god Ningirsu, three more in the temple of the goddess Bau, one in E-anna, the temple of the goddess Ninni, and another in the temple of Gatumdug. Whosoever shall proclaim the god Ningirsu as his god, even as I proclaim him, may he do no harm unto the temple of my god!

Hammurabi tells us, in one of his inscriptions, that he has restored the temple in honor of Innanna at Hallabi a town near Sippar. Innanna, or Ninni, signifying merely 'lady, or 'great lady, appears to have become a very general name for a goddess, hence the addition 'of Hallabi, which Hammurabi is careful to make.

And the emblems of the god Ningirsu, and of the two great goddesses, Ninâ and Ninni, he installed before them in their shrines. Then Gudea sent far and wide to fetch materials for the construction of the temple. And the Elamite came from Elani, and men of Susa came from Susa, and men brought wood from the mountains of Sinai and Melukh-kha.

Prominent among such names are E-Sagila, 'the lofty house, the famous temple and temple area at Babylon; E-makh, 'the great house, a chapel to Nin-kharsag, situated perhaps within E-Sagila; E-gal-makh, 'the great palace, an old temple in Ur; E-anna, 'the heavenly house, that is, the house reaching up to heaven, which is the name of the temple of Ishtar or Nanâ at Erech; E-lgi-e-nir-kidur-makh, 'the tower of the great dwelling' sacred to Ninni at Kish.

Elsewhere, he is explicitly called a 'god of battle. Associated with Zamama of Kish was his consort, who, however, is merely termed again in a general way, 'Ninni, i.e., 'the lady. In the case of such a deity as Zamama, it is evident that the absence of the name in historical texts is accidental, and that we may expect to come across it with the increase of historical material.

Not only, however, does Nin-girsu precede, but two other deities who are closely related in general character to the 'warrior deity' of Gudea's dominion. Then, the two great goddesses, Bau and Ninni, are introduced, and it is not until they are disposed of that the sun-god, together again with Pa-sag as a kind of lieutenant, is invoked.