Abzu

The abzu (cuneiform|𒍪 cuneiform|𒀊, Akkadian: "apsû" also engur, cuneiform|𒇉, Akkadian: "engurru") from the Sumerian "ab" 'far' and "zu" 'water' was the name for fresh water from underground aquifers that was given a religious quality in Sumerian and Akkadian mythology. Lakes, springs, rivers, wells, and other sources of fresh water were thought to draw their water from the abzu.

In Sumerian cosmology

The Sumerian god Enki (Ea in the Akkadian language) was believed to have lived in the abzu since before human beings were created. His wife Damgalnuna, his mother Nammu, his advisor Isimud and a variety of subservient creatures, such as the gatekeeper Lahmu, also lived in the abzu. In the city Eridu, Enki's temple was known as E₂-abzu (house of the cosmic waters) and was located at the edge of a swamp, an abzu. ["Eridu in Sumerian Literature", Margaret Whitney Green, pages 180-182, Ph.D. dissertation, University of Chicago, 1975.] Certain tanks of holy water in Babylonian and Assyrian temple courtyards were also called abzu ("apsû"). [Black and Green 1992] Typical in religious washing, these tanks are precursors to the washing pools of Islamic mosques, or the baptismal font in Christian churches.

As a deity

Abzu ("apsû") is depicted as a deity only in the Babylonian creation epic, the "Enûma Elish", taken from the library of Assurbanipal (c 630 BCE) but which is a millennium older. In this story, he was a primal being made of fresh water and a lover to another primal deity, Tiamat, who was a creature of salt water. The "Enuma Elish" begins:

When above the heavens did not yet exist nor the earth below, Apsu the freshwater ocean was there, the first, the begetter, and Tiamat, the saltwater sea, she who bore them all; they were still mixing their waters, and no pasture land had yet been formed, nor even a reed marsh...

It is believed Abzu or Engur was the original divinity later known as Enki. Joseph Campbell follows the mainstream in a sociopolitical reading: "Such a mythology represents an actual historical substitution of cult...." [Campbell, "The Masks of God: Occidental Mythology" 1964, p 76. Campbell's further assertion, that a matriarchal culture was overtaken by a patriarchal one, however, is fiercely debated.] The main intention of the cosmic genealogy was to change an earlier theology in favor of the gods and moral order of a later one. In Akkadian and Neo-Babylonian times, Enki identified as Ea, in this guise become the 'conqueror' of Abzu, in a way uncharacteristic of the earlier god. After Enki ("Ea") tore off Abzu's ("Apsû's") tiara and carried away his splendor, he killed Abzu ("Apsû"), and set up his dwelling upon the dead god. This is considered as the origin of the "apsû" where Ea lives in myths set during later time periods. It is also thought the myth demonstrates an older association of abzu and Enki, which would suggest that Abzu may have been the original name by which the divinity of Enki later became known.

ee also

*Ancient Mesopotamia

Notes

References

*Jeremy Black and Anthony Green, 1992. "Gods, Demons, and Symbols of Ancient Mesopotamia: an illustrated dictionary", "s.v." "abzu, apsû". ISBN 0-292-70794-0