Talk:List of Mesopotamian deities

Good comprehensiveness and accuracy 2012

I believe this article has good elements of comprehensiveness and accuracy, myself having devoted recent time to reading material on Sumer though I am not expert. I look forward to reading the some good future comments on the background of the list entries.Tangled001 (talk) 17:12, 19 August 2012 (UTC)

Someone should change entry Shu-pa-e here to Shul-pa-e and then also fix the heading of the article Shu-pa-e to which this erroneous entry is directed.Dubsarmah (talk) 16:39, 26 March 2014 (UTC)

I would not rate myself as a 'Near East Expert' but these are very difficult pages. Here's a few ideas that might clear things up. 1. According to the Bible (That is a source acceptable here?) Genesis 10:8-12, the same man, Nimrod, Built Babylon and Nineveh. That would indicate that the theologies started with a common base. This fact would allow for a fair bit of merging of these pages. 2. Early history in Babylon merged into theology, and the standard massaging of facts in court records mean that there are in fact no reliable sources available for this period. The account(s) of Semiramis is a case in point. 3. What is of much more interest than a family tree of deities is a listing of the most influential ones and details of their place in history and in the lives of people. That is an altogether more achievable task, and limits concern of page authors to the main Gods continually mentioned. That would compromise a smaller number than the whole early pantheon. 4. If we accept the comments of Alexander Hislop (his book Two Babylons has a Wikipedia page) on Jewish tradition, there may have been conflict or attempts at oppression after Nimrod's (apparently violent) death.That could lead to further confusion. 5. The final structure might be Main Page on Assyrio-Babylonian Ancient Religion, with A. Links to pages on the better known Gods: Bel/Baal; Nebo/Nabu; Tammuz; Astarte/Queen of Heaven: etc. Frankly I feel the genealogy of mythical Gods(i.e.gods who never existed) is low on the list of priorities. B. Other comments on the mythological religious systems. Business.kid (talk) 08:34, 7 July 2014 (UTC)

I think it was not needed to combine all religions into one

Due to the fact this made it incredibly hard to figure out where exactly these deities really originated from. Other sources state that deities like Ishmuh came from the Babylonian Pantheon while this source is stating it is a Akkadian Pantheon god. This is a big problem for a lot of articles on here. I believe whoever originally set this up did not think about scholars who want to study the pantheons separately for comparison. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.11.51.217 (talk) 17:13, 16 October 2015 (UTC)

Consider adding boxes for cuneiform, astral body and color

Katolophyromai,

Consider adding a box for cuneiform to the table. Here are some of the names of the deities, others can be constructed.

There should also be boxes for the deities' astral body (since all the gods are stars, or planets—note that for the Sumerians "planets" are "stars") and for their respective color (since all gods are assigned a color).

• For the seven major seven planetary gods: https://www.folklore.ee/folklore/vol16/planets.pdf

• For the colors of the seven planetary gods: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.694.36&rep=rep1&type=pdf

• For the colors of the three skies (An, Enlil, Enki): https://books.google.com/books?id=onRJDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA78 ; https://books.google.com/books?id=lKvMeMorNBEC&pg=PA35

Red, white and black the inner-northern sky (Path of Enlil); lapislazuli-blue the middle sky (Path of An); jasper-green the outer-southern sky (Path of Enki).

I also suggest a better division of the table. A first one should be separated and contain only the supreme trinity of An, Enlil and Enki. The second table should contain the seven planetary gods.

--188.218.122.169 (talk) 10:21, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

Also, there is a confusion between the "seven gods who decree" and the seven planetary gods. I suspect that many authors lumped together some gods in the category without proper research, and that the category of the "seven" Anunnaki (though this term was used for the gods in general and not just for the seven) actually contains the seven planetary gods.--188.218.122.169 (talk) 10:32, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

Further addition: The article should be renamed simply "Mesopotamian deities/gods". I personally do not like "lists" and this article has evolved from a mere list to an article with substantial text.--188.218.122.169 (talk) 10:38, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

Further addition: A box for the Semitic name of the given god, for instance An → El, Enlil → Bel, etc. https://www.britannica.com/topic/Enlil

--188.218.122.169 (talk) 12:10, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

I do not think I can add the cuneiform because I would need reliable sources to support all of the cuneiform spellings for each and every deity and I do not know of any sources that list them. (WikiSource is not a reliable source.) In any case, I do not think the cuneiform spellings are necessary, or even preferable here. I am just trying to give some very basic explanation of each deity. The part about the colors is interesting, but also nonessential; none of my major sources mention anything about the deities' associations with different colors and even the source you cite here only talks about the planets the deities are associated with being associated with those colors. In any case, the colors would only apply to major deities. I do plan on including mention of the (known) astral associations of major deities, but, for the vast majority of the minor deities, the astral associations are either unknown or ambiguous.

Regarding the "Seven Gods Who Decree", I assure you there is absolutely no confusion here; this categorization is well-attested in numerous sources and is discussed at length by no less an authority than Samuel Noah Kramer, in his book The Sumerians: Their History, Culture, and Character.

I will not be changing the title of this article. My plan is to bring this article up to "Featured List" status once I am done with it. I known there is plenty of text in this article, but it is still a list and the text included here is actually required by the FL criteria. Current "Featured Lists" have just as much text, or sometimes even more.

The Semitic names of the deities are already listed in the "Details" columns, right after the Sumerian name. Also, An's Semitic name is Anu and Enlil's Semitic name is Elil. El and Bel are West Semitic deities who were not really worshipped in Mesopotamia and were not routinely syncretized with Mesopotamian deities, or at least not until later times, which would make mentioning them here mostly pointless. --Katolophyromai (talk) 12:37, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

Katolophyromai,

The mention of the West Semitic names is indeed not necessary, although An was also Dingir in Sumerian, and Ilu in Akkadian.

Concerning the astral body and colors, as you noted only the major deities (the three and the seven) have clear associations, and there's no need to add them for the minor deities, but they would fit into the table for the heavenly triad and the table for the planetary gods. The colors should be mentioned since, as different sources testify, there was no ontological distinction between the given god and the associated star.

Regarding the seven gods, I did not mean that the "seven gods who decree" are not attested, but there are also the "seven planetary gods", important enough to have a dedicated table. The problem is that the two "seven gods" categories overlap: Three of the "seven planetary gods" (Inanna/Ninanna, Nanna/Nannar and Utu) are already contained among the "seven who decree".

In general, the current table "other major deities" should be further divided into a table for the "primordial chaos/abyss" coming before An, containing Abzu and Nammu (actually two aspects of the same), and a table for the "seven planetary gods" (and this would require the dismemberment of the table for the "seven who decree" [I see no way to keep both the "seven gods" categories]). Besides, Ki should go in the same box as Ninhursag.

So, the result would be:

• 1. primordial abyss
• 2. heavenly triune supreme
• 3. seven planetary gods

--188.218.122.169 (talk) 16:29, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

I would have preferred to have had a section for the "Seven Gods Who Decree" and none for the seven planetary deities because I would consider the "Seven Gods Who Decree" a far more significant categorization, but, for organizational purposes, I have gone ahead and done as you have suggested. I will keep Ninhursag and Ki as separate entries, because it is still disputed whether or not they should be considered the same. Also, Black & Green's 1992 Illustrated Dictionary of Gods, Demons and Symbols of Ancient Mesopotamia has two separate entries for them and I am trying to follow their example. I still maintain that the colors are not significant enough to warrant inclusion here, since they are not discussed in any of my major sources and, indeed, the articles about the deities themselves do not mention associated colors. Nonetheless, I am not militant on this conviction and, if you really think the colors need to be included, I am willing to incorporate them. --Katolophyromai (talk) 17:30, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

Regarding the "seven gods who decree", I have no doubt that it is an important categorization. You could mention it in the lede and/or create a note.

I think that the colors had a relevance in Mesopotamian religion, given that they were extensively used in architecture and handicraft (though, unfortunately, nothing has survived of the colorful ziggurats of the temples). So, I think that they should be put in the table, although without giving them undue prominence. You can put them to the right of the "description" box, in the last position.

Regarding Ki, I have no objection to keep it separate from Ninhursag. Besides, in the same category of the primordials you have forgotten to add the Whole Heaven and Whole Earth.

In general you are doing a very good work, and not just on this article. My compliments and keep it up!--188.218.122.169 (talk) 18:31, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

I already knew I was missing Anshar and Kishar. I just have not had time to add them yet. I am also missing Tiamat and Abzu from that same category. The article is still a work in progress. --Katolophyromai (talk) 18:34, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

---

Katolophyromai: I am the same anonymous who has followed the development of this article and the article "Anu" over the last weeks. Today, I have added the colours and made little rewording to this article. I noted that there is some inconsistency in tenses (some descriptions are present, some others are past), which should be fixed.--2.37.140.36 (talk) 16:11, 1 April 2018 (UTC)

Thank you for all your help! I I have not yet had a chance to fully and properly review all your changes, but they seem to be significant improvements, at least for the most part; I might make a few small changes to what you added. I was still trying to figure out how to handle the colors, but you seem to have solved that problem for me. Thank you for that. Once again, I would like to invite you to create an account; it is completely free, it is easy, and it is still anonymous, but it makes it easier to keep track of you and tell you are the same person as before, and it would make it easier to ping you on talk pages and thank you for your edits using the "Thank" feature. I will look at the tenses used and see what needs fixing. I have been trying to introduce the deities in present tense, but describe their myths and worship in past tense, since the myths are, obviously, set in the past and I do not presume there is anyone who still worships these deities, or at least not in the same ways they were worshipped four thousand years ago. --Katolophyromai (talk) 22:36, 1 April 2018 (UTC)

Katolophyromai: The associations of the former color palette are right; the various identities of colors are discussed throughout the source where the authors pick from their various sources to reconstruct the right order. This is the reason why I suggested to look passim to the source. "Silver" and "gold" are technically metals, since all the planets are also associated to a metal (p. 66), and the respective color is not easily reproducible. Yellow is listed in place of gold at p. 58 (and in popular symbolism it is considered the color of gold); green is the color of silver (p. 58, they cite Rawlinson, their main source: "and of the moon, green—a hue which is applied by the orientals to silver"); then there are "rich red" and "bright red", in other cases cited as "vivid red" and "light red", with the second identified as orange (p. 57, they cite Herodotus: "The battlements of the first circle are white, the second black, the third scarlet, the fourth blue, the fifth orange", also see the interesting note 1; p. 68: "white, black, purple, blue, orange, gold, silver").--2.37.140.36 (talk) 03:52, 2 April 2018 (UTC)

Simo Parpola

Katolophyromai,

"The Assyrian Tree of Life: Tracing the Origins of Jewish Monotheism and Greek Philosophy" written by the scholar Simo Parpola would be of great behoof for this article (for the organisation of deities) and for other articles on Mesopotamian religion.

Note that in recent scholarship "Nammu" is better rendered as "Mummu". See page 191 note 110.--5.94.61.72 (talk) 15:03, 18 March 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for your suggestion. I am already aware of Parpola's work and I find it interesting, but much of what he has written is usually regarded as fringe or at least highly controversial. I think his ideas might be worth mentioning briefly in some of the articles. (In fact, I already reference him and his brother in the "Later influence" section of my article Inanna.) Nonetheless, I do not think they should be used as the organizing factor for this article, which I intend to be based on accepted, mainstream perspectives. I just want to give a very basic sketch of each deity for the sake of explanation and I do not intend to go at all in depth here.

The part about Nammu/Mummu is helpful. Thanks for that. I was aware there were other spellings (There pretty much always are.), but I had not heard that "Nammu" was considered outdated. I will have to do more research on this to back this up. --Katolophyromai (talk) 15:52, 18 March 2018 (UTC)

I think it is a mistake to classify Parpola as fringe (like, to say, the groundless nonsense of Zecharia Sitchin & co.). Parpola has an academic stature and his works are well-acknowledged within the academia. In his works he outlines the philosophical fabric of Mesopotamian religion. It would be undue to give an extensive coverage of Parpola's work in this article, which has a succinct nature (though some definitions of the deities could be added), but surely he deserves to be used as a source in other major articles, including Mesopotamian religion.--5.94.61.72 (talk) 16:31, 18 March 2018 (UTC)

I would completely agree that he is definitely not at all comparable to Sitchin; that was not a comparison I was even thinking about. I think there is no doubt that Parpola is a real scholar. My point is that his ideas are not very widely accepted and some of them have been extensively criticized for (at least according to his critics) being nothing more than fodder for modern-day Assyrian nationalists. I have not really worked much on the article ancient Mesopotamian religion, but I have worked fairly extensively on the article Sumerian religion. It is still nowhere close to GA status, however, and I am planning on working on more of the articles about particular deities before I try to tackle that one. It still needs a lot more work. --Katolophyromai (talk) 17:22, 18 March 2018 (UTC)

By the way, I think that the articles "ancient Mesopotamian religion", "Sumerian religion" and "Babylonian religion" should be merged under the simpler title "Mesopotamian religion", since it was a unified religious system, even proven by the fact that Sumerian persisted as the holy/religious language throughout much of Mesopotamian history, even when Semitic populations had become the majority (much like Latin remained the holy language throughout the history of the Western Christian civilisation).--5.94.61.72 (talk) 23:04, 18 March 2018 (UTC)

I would prefer to keep them separate, at least for now. I may consider possibly merging them after I start working on those articles. Mesopotamian religion is complicated and there are vast disparities depending on the region and era of Mesopotamia we are talking about, with different deities and different practices being prominent in some areas and time periods, but not in others, so we must be careful not to lump everything together. We can still properly distinguish between periods and regions in a single article, but I would need to consider whether or not that would be the best option before we do anything. If we do merge them, we would have to merge them to the article "Ancient Mesopotamian religion," since simply "Mesopotamian religion" would include all religions that have ever been practiced in the region, including present-day Islam. --Katolophyromai (talk) 17:40, 2 April 2018 (UTC)

The currently unsourced article "Family tree of the Babylonian gods", which contains just the table of the genealogy, should be merged into this article "List of Mesopotamian deities".--2.37.140.36 (talk) 17:19, 2 April 2018 (UTC)

Oh wow. I actually had no idea that article even existed. --Katolophyromai (talk) 17:40, 2 April 2018 (UTC)

Clarification of melam and ni

I think that the nature of melam and ni should be clarified. Is ni the paresthesia (i.e. flesh tingling such as formication) as currently explained in the article or rather the inner shivering given by inspiration?

Regarding melam, I suspect that rather than a substance it is the force/strength/power which expresses in shining/luminous appearence (with a clear complexion and big eyes) similar to the Latin augus (which was characteristic of emperors; from which comes the honorific augustus, "saint", "venerable") and Sanskrit ojas.--2.37.140.36 (talk) 17:44, 1 April 2018 (UTC)

Black and Green 1992 defines ni on page 130 as "a physical creeping of the flesh". That definition sounds exactly like paresthesia, as far as I can tell. The entry does not say anything at all about "inspiration", although it does reference the Akkadian word puluhtu as a synonym for ni, translating the word as "fear". The same entry defines melam as "a brilliant, visible glamour which is exuded by gods, heroes, sometimes by kings, and also by temples of great holiness and by gods' symbols and emblems." It states that Mesopotamian texts describe deities as "wearing" melam. That certainly makes it sound like a substance. --Katolophyromai (talk)

The Akkadian rendering puluhtu is close to what I meant by "inspiration", maybe better describable as "sacred terror", the internal type of "tingling". I think puluhtu should be added to the article text.--2.37.140.36 (talk) 02:50, 2 April 2018 (UTC)