Bel

Enmešarra entered before Marduk, with his seven sons behind him and Nergal as their escort. Marduk raised his head and roared in anger. The surviving passage breaks off during the attack, but it records Marduk seizing his weapons and striking Enmešarra and his sons. The sons were overcome and beheaded. Their forms were reduced before Marduk, in an image that compares them with figures diminished against a wall.

The seven sons also belong to the wider group of hostile beings that threatened the gods and the ordered world. Tiamat armed such monsters for battle, and Ea discovered her preparations. Ea knew that he could not resist them alone, so he called on his son Marduk. With Ea’s aid and the knowledge he received from him, Marduk confronted the hostile forces and brought their violence under control.

The surviving sources describe their defeat in different ways. One passage presents the monsters as terrified before Bēl and silent in his presence. Another says that Marduk defeated them and bound them to his feet. The wording may describe leading them as if on a leash. It may instead show Marduk standing on the monsters as he rode them. The passage does not settle the meaning.

The demons may therefore have been destroyed, defeated, or restrained, depending on the passage. After their defeat, they may have been placed within the sphere of Ea or Marduk rather than left outside it. The surviving narrative does not preserve every stage of the confrontation. It records Marduk’s anger and attack on Enmešarra’s sons, Ea’s support, and the subduing of the hostile beings.

Tiamat gathered a monstrous army against the younger gods. She raised vipers, dragons, hurricanes, raging hounds, scorpion-men, mighty tempests, fish-men, and rams. They carried cruel weapons and showed no fear. Kingu led the host. Tiamat appointed him commander and gave him the Tablet of Destinies, which controlled the fates of gods and humans. Ea discovered her plans but knew that he could not face the monsters alone. He called on his son Marduk, born to Ea and Damkina, to fight in his place.

The younger gods who joined Ea gave Marduk supreme authority. Marduk agreed to lead them if victory granted him the right to decree destinies and rule over the gods. He put on his armour and drove his chariot into battle. His appearance terrified Tiamat, Kingu, and their forces. Marduk attacked Tiamat and killed her. He took the Tablet of Destinies from Kingu, who had held it improperly, and killed him.

Marduk used Tiamat’s body to order the universe. He cut it in half and made the sky from the upper part. He established the phases of the moon, placed the stars in the sky, and set the seasons in motion. He then made humans from clay. He gave the clay life with Kingu’s blood. Marduk declared that humans would inhabit the earth, serve the gods, and build their shrines. After Marduk arranged the universe, the gods gathered to honour him and confirmed his kingship. Marduk later handed the Tablet of Destinies to Anu.