Ninurta

Anzû seized the Tablet of Destinies from Enlil. Whoever held it could decree the destinies, so the theft threatened the order of the gods. Enlil lost the power that the tablet carried, and the gods faced the danger created by its removal.

Anu took charge of the crisis. He summoned the gods and asked one of them to overcome Anzû and recover the tablet. Two respected gods were approached, but both refused the task. A god then proposed his own son, Ninurta. Ninurta accepted after the gods promised him a reward for defeating Anzû and taking back the tablet.

Ninurta went out to meet Anzû. Their first encounter ended in Ninurta’s defeat. The gods sent a messenger with Adad to report what had happened to Ea and to ask for further advice. Ea gave advice that showed Ninurta how he could face Anzû again. After receiving it, Ninurta prepared for a second attack.

Ninurta attacked Anzû again and defeated him. He recovered the Tablet of Destinies from the storm bird that had stolen it and took back the power that it carried. The danger created by Anzû’s theft ended when Ninurta regained the tablet for the gods.

Ninurta bound the stone creatures as he drove back the forces that threatened the land. He fought Asag, who was also called Asakku, and held the attack back. The stones formed part of the host that fell before him. Plants and other beings also belonged to the defeated host. The conflict joined the defeat of Asag with the defeat of these accompanying forces.

After the battle, Ninurta judged the stones according to their conduct. He gave some of them names and honoured places among his bound warriors. He assigned others lower ranks or hostile destinies because they had failed him or had opposed him. He treated the defeated beings as a controlled host, like oxen held by nose ropes. The judgement separated the stones that had helped or failed to attack him from those that had resisted him.

The stone battle formed part of a wider group of traditions about Ninurta’s victories. Other tellings named the flying Anzû and the Mighty Bull among his defeated enemies. The Mighty Bull was associated with the sea. Several tellings also recalled battles with mountains. These enemies appeared in differing groups, and some tellings kept them apart while others joined them in the same campaign.

One tradition counted seven victories, while two epics counted eleven. The epics treated some figures as separate even when they appeared together elsewhere, and they added or omitted members of the defeated host. In Lugal-e, Ninurta defeated Asakku, but that victory did not appear in the main lists of his exploits. The tellings therefore gave different counts and different groups of defeated enemies, while the stones remained bound under Ninurta’s judgement.