ISHUM- The wise minister of Marduk in the epic of Erra.
KINGU- The demon in Mesopotamian myth who became the second consort of the goddess Tiamat, after her first consort Apsu had been slain. She gave him the Tablets of Destiny and intended to make him lord of the gods. He was killed by the young god Marduk who took the Tablets and fastened them to his chest. He killed Kingu and created mankind from his blood. Kingu plays an important part in the creation epic Enuma elish.
MARDUK- Literally, "bulf calf of the sun". The son of Ea, and leader of the gods. He was a fertility god, but originally a god of thunderstorms. His consort was Sarpanitu According to Enuma Elish, an ancient epic poem of creation, Marduk defeated Tiamat and Kingu, the dragons of chaos, and thereby gained supreme power. Acknowledged as the creator of the universe and of humankind, the god of light and life, and the ruler of destinies, he rose to such eminence that he claimed 50 titles. Eventually, he was called simply Bel, meaning "Lord."
NABU- Ancient Sumero-Babylonian god of knowledge and writing, scribe of the gods. He is regarded as the son of Marduk.
NANNA- The Sumerian moon-god, called 'Lord of Destiny'. He is a son of Enlill and Ninlil and his wife is Ningal. Their children are Inanna, Utu, and Ishkur. Nanna's cult center was at Ur (the ruin-city Tell Muqayyir, in Iraq), as was the residence of his high priestesses. His Akkadian counterpart is Sin.
NANNAR- Early Sumerian name for the moon-god better known by his Babylonian name of Sin.
NERGAL- Nergal is an ancient Sumero-Babylonian deity and the god of the netherworld, where he rules with his consort Ereshkigal. He is an evil god who brings war, pestilence, fever and devastation. He is sometimes regarded as representing the sinister aspect of the sun god Shamash. He is the subject of an Akkadian poem which describes his translation from heaven to the underworld. The foremost center of his cult was the city Kuthu. His attributes are the club and the sickle.
NIN- The Sumerian title for 'mistress' or 'goddess', which forms a component of many names of goddess, such as Ningal, Ninsun and Ninchursanga.
NINGAL- The 'great queen' of ancient Sumer, and consort of the moon-god Nanna. She is the mother of the sun-god Utu. In Ur, she and Sin were regarded as the parents of Shamash and Ishtar. The Phoenicians called her Nikkal.
NINHURSAG- "Queen of the Mountain". The Sumerian earth and mother-goddess, and a goddess of fertility who created all vegetation. She is the consort of the supreme god Enki (and is as such identified with Damgalnunna). Ninhursag is one of the oldest members of the Sumerian pantheon and has prestigious titles such as 'mother of the gods' and 'mother of all children'. She is also called Nintu, "lady of bearth", and Ki, the earth. She was the tutelary deity of the Sumerian rulers, who styled themselves "children of Ninhursag". Ninhursag ensures fertile fields, but when she cursed her husband for his incestuous affairs (with the plants she gave birth to) and his descend into the underworld, the earth became barren. Only when the hastily assembled gods managed to mollify her, the earth became fertile again and the cycle of the seasons was instituted. A temple of Ninhursag was excavated near Tell Harriri (the ancient Mari) in Syria, near the Iraquian border.
NINLIL- An ancient Sumero-Babylonian goddess of heaven, earth, and air and in one aspect of the underworld. She is also a goddess of grain and is called 'queen wind'. She is the consort of Enlil, the 'lord wind'. She shows compassion to the unfortunate. She and Enlil were worspipped in Nippur.
PAZUZU- A winged demon, feared by the people of ancient Mesopotamia. It is a creature with a deformed head, the wings of an eagle, the sharp claws of a lion on its hands and feet, and the tail of a scorpion. This demon is the personification of the south-east storm wind, which brings diseases. The Mesopotamians believed that Pazuzu lived in the desert.
SHAMASH- The sun. For the Sumerians he was principally the judge and law-giver with some fertility attributes. For the Semites he was also a victorious warrior, the god of wisdom, the son of Sin, and 'greater than his father'. He was the husband and brother of Ishtar. Shamash is represented with the saw with which he cuts decisions. In the Mesopotamian poems 'Shamash' may mean the god, or simply the sun.
SIN- The Sumerian Nanna, the moon. The chief astral deity, sometimes regarded as the son of Enlil and Ninlil; father of Utu-Shamash, the sun, and of Ishtar. He is lord of the calendar, fixing the seasons, and also a vegetation-deity and patron of fertility. With Shamash and Hadad he makes up the second triad of Mesopotamian gods. His chief temple was in Ur.
TAMMUZ- The Akkadian vegetation-god, counterpart of the Sumerian Damuzi and the symbol of death and rebirth in nature. He is the son of Ea and husband of Ishtar. Each year he dies in the hot summer (in the month tammus, June/July) and his soul is taken by the Gallu demons to the underworld. Woe and desolation fall upon the earth, and Ishtar leads the world in lamentation. She then descends to the nether world, ruled by Ereshkigal, and after many trials succeeds in bringing him back, as a result of which fertility and joy return to the earth. In Syria he was identified with Adonis.
TIAMAT- In Babylonian myths, Tiamat is a huge, bloated female dragon that personifies the saltwater ocean, the water of Chaos. She is also the primordial mother of all that exists, including the gods themselves. Her consort is Apsu, the personification of the freshwater abyss that lies beneath the Earth. From their union, saltwater with freshwater, the first pair of gods were born. They are Lachmu and Lachamu, parents of Ansar and Kisar, grandparents of Anu and Ea. In the creation epic Enuma elish, written around 2000 BCE, their descendants started to irritate Tiamat and Apsu so they decided to kill their offspring. Ea discovered their plans and he managed to kill Apsu while the latter was asleep. Tiamat flew into a rage when she learned about Apsu's death and wanted to avenge her husband. She created an army of monstrous creatures, which was to be led by her new consort Kingu, who is also her son. Eventually, Tiamat was defeated by the young god Marduk, who was born in the deep freshwater sea. Marduk cleaved her body in half, and from the upper half he created the sky and from the lower half he made the earth. From her water came forth the clouds and her tears became the source of the Tigris and the Euphratus. Kingu also perished, and from his blood Marduk created the first humans.
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