Texts — Mesopotamia Registry

Atra-Hasis Epic Eighteenth-century BCE Old Babylonian epic titled from its opening words Inūma ilū awīlum ("When the gods like men"), preserved across three large cuneiform tablets copied by the Junior Scribe Ipiq-Aya (often read Ku-Aya) under King Ammi-ṣaduqa of Babylon . It narrates the labor strike of the lesser Igigi gods, the creation of humankind from clay and divine blood by Enki (Ea) and the mother goddess Ninhursag (Mami / Belet-Ili ), and the catastrophic Great Flood decreed by Enlil when human clamor disturbed his sleep. Cuneiform Tablets Wedge-shaped clay inscriptions impressed with a reed stylus across ancient Sumer , Akkad, Babylon , and Assyria from the late fourth millennium BCE (Uruk IV period, c. 3200 BCE) through the first century CE. Over half a million excavated tablets preserve the administrative accounts, royal inscriptions, lexical lists, astronomical diaries, incantations, and mythological poems through which the Anunnaki deities are known to modern scholarship. Enki and Ninhursag Old Babylonian Sumerian mythological poem (282 lines, ETCSL 1.1.1) set in the pure primordial land of Dilmun . It recounts how the freshwater and wisdom god Enki endows Dilmun with sweet water from the subterranean Abzu , fathers a chain of vegetal deities with the mother goddess Ninhursag (including Uttu , goddess of weaving), falls mortally ill after consuming eight sacred plants, and is healed when Ninhursag gives birth to eight restorative deities corresponding to each afflicted part of his body. Enki and the World Order Sumerian mythological composition of roughly 470 lines (ETCSL 1.1.3), preserved primarily on Old Babylonian tablets from Nippur and Ur . The poem celebrates how the wisdom god Enki decrees the destinies of Sumer and neighboring lands, fills the Tigris and Euphrates with life-giving water, and assigns specific spheres of civilization ( Divine Essence (Me) ) to individual Anunnaki deities , before answering Inanna 's complaint that she had been overlooked. Enuma Elish Babylonian creation epic (*Enūma eliš*, "When on High") composed across seven cuneiform tablets of roughly 1,100 lines and recited annually during the Akitu New Year festival in Babylon . It traces theogony from the mingling of primordial Apsu (fresh water) and Tiamat (salt sea) to the cosmic victory of Marduk , who fashions heaven and earth from Tiamat's divided body, creates humankind from the blood of Kingu , and is proclaimed supreme king of the Anunnaki and Igigi with fifty sacred names. Epic of Anzu Akkadian mythological epic (*Bīn šar dadmē*, "Son of the King of the Inhabited World") preserved in an Old Babylonian single-tablet version and a Standard Babylonian three-tablet recension (~720 lines). It relates how the lion-headed storm bird Anzû steals the Tablet of Destinies from Enlil while the god is bathing, paralyzing cosmic authority until the warrior god Ninurta ( Ningirsu in the Old Babylonian version), aided by the counsel of Ea and the mother goddess Belet-Ili , slays Anzû and restores the Divine Hierarchy . Epic of Gilgamesh Masterwork of ancient Mesopotamian literature centered on Gilgamesh , fifth king of the First Dynasty of Uruk and son of the goddess Ninsun . Growing from five independent third-millennium Sumerian poems into an eleven-tablet (plus twelfth appendix) Standard Babylonian epic titled Ša nagba īmuru ("He Who Saw the Deep"), redacted by the exorcist-scribe Sîn-lēqi-unninni, it follows Gilgamesh's friendship with Enkidu, their confrontation with Humbaba and Ishtar , Enkidu's death, and Gilgamesh's journey to the flood survivor Utnapishtim in search of immortality . Etana Myth Akkadian narrative poem attested in Old Babylonian (Susa), Middle Assyrian (Assur), and Neo-Assyrian (Nineveh) recensions. Set at Kish after the Anunnaki and Igigi establish the institution of kingship on earth, it tells how the childless shepherd-king Etana rescues a wounded eagle from a pit at the guidance of the sun god Shamash and ascends on the eagle's wings toward the Heaven of An and Ishtar to obtain the "Plant of Birth" ( šammu ša alādi ) and secure a royal heir. Inanna and Enki Sumerian mythological narrative of more than 800 lines (ETCSL 1.3.1), recounting how Inanna , patron goddess of the Eanna temple in Uruk , journeys to the E-abzu sanctuary in Eridu , feasts and drinks beer with the wisdom god Enki , receives from him over a hundred sacred decrees of civilization ( Divine Essence (Me) ), and successfully brings them upriver to Uruk aboard the "Boat of Heaven" despite seven attempts by Enki's minister Isimud and sea monsters to reclaim them. Inanna's Descent into the Netherworld Four-hundred-twelve-line Sumerian mythological poem (ETCSL 1.4.1) preserved on Old Babylonian tablets from Nippur and Ur . It narrates how Inanna , Queen of Heaven, abandons her seven major Sumerian temples to descend into the Underworld (Kur) ruled by her older sister Ereshkigal , is stripped of her garments and me at seven gates, is condemned to death by the seven Anunnaki Judges of the Underworld , and is revived through the intervention of Enki on the condition that she provide a substitute—ultimately her consort Dumuzi and his sister Geshtinanna . Ishtar's Descent to the Underworld First-millennium BCE Akkadian mythological poem (~145 lines) titled from its opening clause Ana Kurnugê qaqqari lā târi ("To the Land of No Return"), preserved on tablets from the Library of Ashurbanipal at Nineveh and from Assur. Compacting the older Sumerian Inanna's Descent into the Netherworld , it recounts how Ishtar descends into the realm of her sister Ereshkigal , is afflicted with sixty diseases by the vizier Namtar , and is released after Ea ( Enki ) sends the assinnu Asushu-namir to sprinkle her with the water of life before the Anunnaki Judges of the Underworld . Let Me Praise the Lord of Wisdom Babylonian wisdom poem of roughly 480 lines across four tablets, known by its Akkadian incipit Ludlul bēl nēmeqi ("Let me praise the Lord of Wisdom") and composed during the Kassite period (c. fourteenth–twelfth century BCE). Spoken in the first person by the Babylonian courtier Šubši-mešrê-Šakkan, it laments his inexplicable abandonment by his personal deities, his social ruin and physical torment despite pious observance, and his miraculous restoration by Marduk and his consort Zarpanitu. Myth of Adapa Akkadian mythological narrative (*Adapa and the South Wind*), known primarily from a fourteenth-century BCE tablet excavated in the Egyptian royal diplomatic archives at Tell el-Amarna (EA 356) alongside seventh-century BCE fragments from the Library of Ashurbanipal at Nineveh (plus a Middle Babylonian Sumerian version from Tell Haddad). It tells how Adapa , the blameless priest and first of the seven antediluvian sages ( apkallu ) of Eridu endowed with superhuman wisdom by Ea ( Enki ), breaks the wing of the South Wind after it capsizes his fishing boat and is summoned to the Heaven of An (Anu). Myth of Nergal and Ereshkigal Akkadian mythological narrative preserved in two distinct recensions: a concise fourteenth-century BCE Middle Babylonian tablet from Tell el-Amarna in Egypt (EA 357) and an expanded seventh-century BCE Neo-Assyrian version from Sultantepe (STT 28) and Uruk. It relates how Ereshkigal , Queen of the Underworld , sends her vizier Namtar to the banquet of the celestial gods because she cannot ascend to Heaven ; when Nergal fails to kneel before Namtar, he descends to the netherworld, overcomes its seven gates, and becomes Ereshkigal's consort and co-ruler of the dead. Poem of Erra First-millennium BCE Babylonian epic across five tablets (~750 lines), known in antiquity as Šar gimir dadmē ("King of All Habitations") and commonly called Erra and Ishum . According to its colophon in Tablet V, the entire composition was revealed in a nocturnal vision to the Babylonian priest Kabti-ilāni-Marduk, who woke and recited it without omitting or adding a single line. It narrates how the plague and war god Erra persuades Marduk to step down from his throne so his soiled cultic insignia can be cleaned, unleashing civil war and devastation across Babylon , Sippar , Uruk , and Der until Erra's herald Ishum appeases his fury. Sumerian King List Sumerian historiographical chronicle (*nam-lugal*, "Kingship"; ETCSL 2.1.1, ~431 lines) compiled during the Ur III and Isin-Larsa periods (most famously preserved on the Weld-Blundell four-sided clay prism written by the scribe Nur-Ninsubur c. 1800 BCE). It traces the single legitimate seat of kingship from the moment "kingship descended from heaven" at Eridu under Alulim , through five antediluvian cities before the Great Flood swept over the land, and down through the post-diluvian dynasties of Kish , Uruk , Ur , Akkad, and Isin.