At the beginning... Cosmogony, theogony and anthropogeny in Sumerian texts of the third and second millennium BCE

A diachronic survey of the Sumerian ideas about Beginnings __ cosmogony, theogony and anthropogeny __ is described. Third millennium Sumerian texts describe the 'marriage' of the primaeval pair an and ki __ Heaven and Earth, thereafter the sky god An and the mother goddess Nin__ursa_a __ and the birth of their children: gods. From the second millennium onwards the Sumerian culture disappeared, except from the scribal schools; there was an increasing Semitic influence. The beginning became a primaeval ocean, Namma who gave birth to an-ki. Later the pair Aps_ and Ti'amat produced heaven and earth __ not yet in their final form __ and the ancestors of An. Aps_ and Ti'amat were killed. Marduk gave heaven and earth their final appearance with both halves of Ti'amat's body. In the Sumerian myth 'Enki and Ninma__', man is created with the aid of clay (Enki's idea), and borne by Namma. In the Akkadian text atra-__as_s a god is killed; with his flesh and blood together with clay man was created. The purpose of the creation of man was always the same: the gods do not want to provide for themselves; the maintenance of the gods is man's daily duty.Middle Eastern Studie