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The chief deity of Erech, it will be recalled, was always a goddess, a circumstance that supports the association of Aruru with that place. Aruru being a goddess, it was not so easy to have Marduk take up her rôle, as he supplanted Bel. Again, Erech and Babylon were not political rivals to the degree that Nippur and Babylon were.
His epithets mark priority and antiquity; the original chief, the father of the gods, the lord of darkness or death. The Maya gives us A, thy; NA, mother. At times he was called DIS, and was the patron god of Erech, the great city of the dead, the necropolis of Lower Babylonia. TIX, Maya is a cavity formed in the earth.
The variety of information contained in these reports is best gathered from the fact that they were sent from cities as far removed from each other as Assur in the north and Erech in the south, and it can only be assumed that they were despatched by runners, or men mounted on swift horses.
Erech was made his capital, and doubtless now received its Sumerian title of "the City" par excellence. The dynasty of Erech was supplanted by the First dynasty of Ur. Erech was captured by Lugal-kigub-nidudu of Ur, and took the second rank in the new kingdom.
Like the Chinese, the men of Erech regarded the sky itself as the highest god, and the maker and ruler of all things. In Babylonia, however, the notion became spiritualised more than in China; at first we hear that his dwelling became the refuge of the gods during the Deluge, but in later times he is regarded as a being quite above heaven and all created beings, and even all the gods.
Now when first the text of this inscription was published there existed only vague indications of the date to be assigned to Lugalzaggisi and the kingdom that he founded. It was clear from the titles which he bore, that, though Gishkhu was his native place, he had extended his authority far beyond that city and had chosen Erech as his capital.
First published by Pinches, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, 1891, pp. 393-408. Clay, it will be recalled, was the building material in Babylonia. The word in the text is generally applied to "a mass" of animals, but also to human productions. See Delitzsch, Assyr. Handwörterbuch, p. 467. Bel's temple at Nippur. Temple of Ishtar at Erech or Uruk. I.e., Apsu.
"The sons of Ham," we are told, "were Cush, and Mizraim, and Phut, and Canaan . . . . And Cush begat Nimrod . . . . And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar."
In this respect the Ishtar cult of Erech was not unique, for we have references to priestesses elsewhere. However, the function of the priestess in religious history differs materially from that of the priest. She is not a mediator between the god and his subjects, nor is she a representative of the deity.
Of this prince our knowledge is somewhat scanty. We learn from inscriptions of Nabonidus that he completed some of the buildings at Ur, which had been left unfinished by his father; while his own bricks inform us that he built or repaired two of the principal temples at Erech. On his signet-cylinder he takes the title of "King of Ur."
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