stuff as air, but especially endowed with the quality of
luminosity.

Mythologically expressed, it was the air-god Enlil who,
after separating heaven from earth, begot the moon-god
Nanna-Sin; presumably he did so because after separating
heaven from earth, he found himself living in utter darkness,
with the unlit sky forming the ceiling and walls of his house
and the black earth its floor. Nanna-Sin in turn begot the
sun-god Utu and the Venus planet Inanna, as well as the
other planets and stars. Nanna-Sin was conceived as travel-
ling across the sky in a magur-boat; ¹⁰ Utu rode a chariot
drawn by two teams of four mythological beasts; ¹¹ Inanna
rode seven dogs. ¹² The planets and stars seemed to be con-
ceived figuratively as cows tended by Nanna-Sin; "the little
ones," presumably the stars, are scattered about him like
grain, while "the big ones," perhaps the planets, walk about
him like wild bulls.

The organization of the earth. The air-god Enlil, desig-
nated "the father of the gods," "the king of the universe,"
"the king of all the lands," was responsible for the planning
of all its most productive features, especially the vegetation
essential to man and beast. ¹³ It was Enlil who himself fash-
ioned the pickax and probably the plow as the prototypes of
the agricultural implements to be used by man. It was Enlil
who copulated with "the great mountains" and impregnated
them with the seed of Emesh (Summer) and Enten (Winter),
the two brothers who provide man with everything he needs
in the form of food and shelter. What Enlil meant to civilized
life on earth is revealed in a resounding magnificat that is
part of a hymn only recently pieced together and that reads:

Without Enlil, the Great Mountain,
No cities would be built, no settlements founded,
No stalls would be built, no sheepfolds erected,
No king would be raised high, no en-priest born,
No lumah-priest, no nindingir-priestess would be chosen by the
sheep omen,
Workers would have no controller, no supervisor,

-xv-