Reading track · 14,637 tablets
The Gods
Religion as the Mesopotamians lived it — hymn, offering, omen, and temple, not fable.
What this site files under "Religion & Myth" was, for the people who wrote these tablets, simply the way the world worked. Every city belonged to a god: Enlil at Nippur, Enki at Eridu, Inanna at Uruk, Marduk — eventually — at Babylon. The temple was the god's literal house; statues were washed, dressed, and fed; and a king who built or restored a sanctuary recorded the deed as the most durable proof of a successful reign.
The written record of this religion is layered. At the bottom are god lists from the Early Dynastic scribal schools of Fara and Abu Salabikh — among the oldest literary-religious documents on earth. Above them: temple hymns, laments, incantations against demons and witchcraft, prayers embedded in royal inscriptions, and the great narrative poems — Gilgamesh's confrontation with death, the flood story of Atrahasis, the creation account Enuma Elish — which circulated as living school texts, copied and adapted for well over a thousand years.
A large share of the religious corpus is practical rather than narrative: divination. The gods were held to write their intentions into the world — into the livers of sacrificed sheep, the flights of birds, oil on water, and above all the night sky — and trained specialists read those signs and reported to the palace. Scholarly compendia of omens were among the most copied texts in any Mesopotamian library. If the modern reader wants to feel the distance and the closeness of this world at once, the omen literature — anxious, systematic, strangely empirical — is the place to start.
Anchor tablets below are selected automatically from the corpus — the richest readable witnesses of this subject in each era — and new ones surface as the translation engine works through the backlog. Every translation is labeled with its source; engine translations carry their confidence level on the tablet page.
2900 – 2334 BCE
Early Dynastic
The scribal schools of Fara and Abu Salabikh copy god lists and the earliest temple hymns; rulers of Lagash record temple-building for Ningirsu as the crowning work of their reigns.
~2800 BCE · MS 1952/37 — Schøyen Collection, Oslo, Norway
MS 1952/37“1. [fish (KU6~a)] TU~b 2. NAM2 NAM2 3. NAM2(?) GIR2~b 4. DU AN A 5. SZUDUN(?) RI 6. SZUDUN(?) GIR2~b 7. [X] A NI~b 8. NE~a U4 RA 9. NI~b RA 10. SZE3 BU~a 11. U4 SZIDIM GIR3@g~b[?] 12. IL GUB3~c [X] 13. [X] ZATU726~a(?) UR~a(?) NI~b DUR2(?) 14. HI A[?]”
Source: engine:claude-sonnet-4-6 (2026-05-28/v6-glossary-aware)
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CDLI Literary 006205, ex. 010
[...] she-goat(?) [LAK20] — [...] place(?) — not having [...] ... place GU [...] LUM — not having [...] servant/Subarian [...] MAR — not having [... ...] ... not(?) — [dairy/ghee?] [complex sign cluster] — not eggs/roe — fish — not LI TAR [...] ... [...] KU [... ...]
Religion & MythDaily Life
CUSAS 32, 002
Enuru, [... serpent(?),] dark — of the Abzu [...]; its tail rising, its nature — the mouth opened and opened. Its mouth-enclosure — matched, declared. The serpent bites; the great dragon bites. The spotted field — [pure-water ...] [laden-water ...] [...] ... The serpent — its mouth laden. Its tongue, the voice — very small, very small — filled. The serpent — mouth burdened — [the sun's mouth?] — may it not [harm ...] [harm ...]. The sanga-administrator Ur-Gibil, the scribe, [wrote it].
Religion & Myth
Abzu-kidu 2
Dedicatory bowl inscription naming Abzu-kidug and her spouse: one of the sparse Early Dynastic records attesting elite women by name in Sumerian royal dedicatory practice, c. 2450 BCE.
Writing & LiteratureReligion & MythBrowse all 512 religion & myth tablets of this period in the catalogue →
2334 – 2154 BCE
Akkadian Empire
Enheduanna, daughter of Sargon and high priestess of the moon god at Ur, is traditionally credited with hymns to Inanna — on that attribution, the first named author in world literature.
~2300 BCE · Penn Museum, Philadelphia
Disk of Enheduanna“Lady of all the divine powers, resplendent light, righteous woman clothed in radiance, beloved of An and Uraš …”
Source: ETCSL t.4.07.2 (Black, Cunningham, Robson, Zólyomi)
The literary tradition is no longer anonymous from this point. Authorship — the idea that a specific human voice composes a specific work — enters the historical record with her.
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Gudea 003
Gudea's dedication of Bau's temple at Iri-kug documents the pre-Ur III ruler of Lagaš as a temple-builder for An's daughter, anchoring his legitimacy in divine patronage rather than military conquest.
Writing & LiteratureReligion & Myth
Gudea 004
Records Gudea of Lagaš's construction of a temple to Bau at Iri-kug, anchoring the goddess's cult site to a specific Lagašite ruler and expanding the known catalogue of his building projects beyond the celebrated E-ninnu.
Writing & LiteratureReligion & Myth
Gudea 008
Gudea's dedication of a temple to Dumuzid-abzu at Ĝirsu attests the ruler's active patronage of a goddess otherwise sparsely documented in royal building inscriptions of the Lagaš II period.
Writing & LiteratureReligion & MythBrowse all 875 religion & myth tablets of this period in the catalogue →
2112 – 2004 BCE
Ur III · Neo-Sumerian
The state and the sacred fuse: kings of Ur are deified in their lifetimes, temple offerings are logged with bureaucratic precision, and lamentation priests maintain the cult's soundscape.
~2050 BCE · Reconstructed composite — see ORACC entry for manuscript witnesses
Amar-Suena 10“(i 1) I am Amar-Suena, whose name was proclaimed by Enlil in Nibru, the steadfast supporter of Enlil's temple, the powerful king, king of Urim, king of the four quarters. (i 10) The name of this statue is "Amar-Suena is the beloved of Urim". (i 13) Whoever removes this statue from the place it was set up, tears out its socle, may Nanna, king of Urim, (and) Ningal, the mother of Urim, curse him! May they put an end to his lineage!”
Source: Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Royal Inscriptions (ETCSRI), University of Vienna, edited by Gábor Zólyomi et al. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/etcsri/Q000985/
Dedicatory curse clause invokes Nanna and Ningal against anyone who displaces the statue, preserving the standard Ur III formula for protecting royal monuments through divine sanction rather than human enforcement.
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Amar-Suena 12
Records Amar-Suena's construction of a royal jail at Ur — one of the earliest explicit textual attestations of a dedicated carceral institution in Mesopotamian history.
Writing & LiteratureReligion & Myth
Amar-Suena 15
Dedicatory inscription of Amar-Suena for Enki's Abzu temple at Eridu, attesting the third Ur III king's building programme and his claim to universal rule under Enlil's authority.
Religion & MythWriting & Literature
Amar-Suena 16
Records Amar-Suena's foundation of the first ĝipar (high-priestess residence) at Karzida, attesting the Ur III crown's active role in extending Nanna's cult into previously unserved cult centres.
Religion & MythWriting & LiteratureBrowse all 705 religion & myth tablets of this period in the catalogue →
2000 – 1600 BCE
Old Babylonian
The classical age of Mesopotamian literature in the schools: flood narratives, Inanna's descent, hymns, and the Sumerian Gilgamesh poems are copied even as spoken Sumerian dies.
~1900 BCE · Reconstructed composite — see ORACC entry for manuscript witnesses
Šamši-Adad I 02“[...] I, / [Šamši]-Adad, / [king] of the universe, / [caus]ed him to be expelled; / [...] -s / and the z̄iqqurratum / [...] / Šamši-Adad, / the mighty, / king of the universe, / appointee of Enlil, / viceroy of Aššur, / beloved of Ištar, / the house Emenu'e / which on the site of Emaš-maš / — the old house / whose foundations / Maništusu (lit. 'son of Sargon'), / king of Agade, / had built — had fallen into ruin; / the house which…”
Source: engine:claude-sonnet-4-6 (2026-05-28/v6-glossary-aware)
Claims the Emašmaš temple in Nineveh as a restoration of a structure built by Maništušu of Agade, asserting Assyrian dynastic continuity across seven generations of post-Akkadian history.
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Sumerian King List (Weld-Blundell Prism)
The single most influential Mesopotamian king list — the model for every later attempt to chronicle the deep history of the region. It transmits the political theology of divinely granted kingship, an idea that would echo through Babylon, Assyria, and into the Hebrew Bible. The Weld-Blundell prism (WB 444) at the Ashmolean is the most complete surviving copy.
Religion & MythWriting & Literature
Šamši-Adad I 11
Attests Šamši-Adad I's self-presentation as temple-builder of Aššur, anchoring his reign within the city-god's cult at the moment Assyria first emerged as a territorial kingdom.
Writing & LiteratureReligion & Myth
Enlil-bani 02
Attests Enlil-bani's construction of Isin's great city wall ca. 1925 BCE, with its dedicatory name preserving the ideological formula that equated a king's name with the physical permanence of urban fortification.
Writing & LiteratureReligion & MythBrowse all 4,779 religion & myth tablets of this period in the catalogue →
2000 – 1700 BCE
Old Assyrian
Away from the temples of the south, the merchant letters still swear by the gods and invoke them in contract oaths — religion in its everyday, commercial register.
~1900 BCE · Reconstructed composite — see ORACC entry for manuscript witnesses
Erišum I 03“Erišum, viceroy of Aššur, son of Ilušuma, viceroy of Aššur — for Aššur, his lord, for his own life and the life of his city, the temple in its entirety he restored for Aššur. He caused two ḫuburēnum-birds to be hatched; two duck-birds, each of one talent of bronze, he set at their bases.”
Source: engine:claude-sonnet-4-6 (2026-05-28/v6-glossary-aware)
Documents Erišum I's temple construction at Aššur and its ritual furnishings — bronze duck weights and beer vats — giving the earliest detailed record of cultic equipment in an Assyrian royal building inscription.
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Erišum I 06
Attests Erišum I's construction of Aššur's temple in the god's own city, anchoring the earliest stratum of Assyrian royal piety and the vice-regent (iššiak Aššur) titulature that defined Old Assyrian kingship.
Writing & LiteratureReligion & Myth
Erišum I 10
Erišum I consecrates the Aššur temple 'Wild Bull' by mixing ghee and honey into the mortar — one of the earliest Assyrian royal building inscriptions, and evidence that the ritual deposit of clay cones as dynastic markers was already standard practice c. 1900 BCE.
Writing & LiteratureReligion & MythAzuzu 2001 / Man-ištušu 2002
(1) Man-ištūšu, the king of the world. Azuzu, his servant, dedicated (this spear) to the god Beʾal-SI.SI.
Writing & LiteratureReligion & MythBrowse all 44 religion & myth tablets of this period in the catalogue →
1600 – 1155 BCE
Middle Babylonian
Kassite kings patronize the old sanctuaries; prayers and dedications continue in Sumerian and Akkadian, and boundary stones invoke long rosters of gods as guarantors.
~1300 BCE · Reconstructed composite — see ORACC entry for manuscript witnesses
Šamši-Adad IV 1“Šamši-Adad [IV], strong king, king of the universe, king of the land of Assyria, son of Tiglath-pileser [I], king of the universe, king of the land of Assyria, son of Aššur-rēša-iši [I], king of the universe, king of the land of Assyria — when the house of the panther-shrine [of the temple of Ištar] of Assyria, my lady, which a former prince who preceded me [had ... to] its full extent restored/completed, [the stelae and?] the boundary-posts I inscribed (and) within it [I set up] — [Month: ...], day 8, eponym [Šamši-Adad, king of the land of] Assyria.”
Source: engine:claude-sonnet-4-6 (2026-05-28/v6-glossary-aware)
Documents Šamšī-Adad IV's restoration of the Assyrian Ištar temple at Aššur, anchoring the reign's chronology to a specific eponymy date and establishing the dynastic continuity he claimed from Tiglath-pileser I.
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BM 090715
The mighty king, king of the four quarters (of the world), the Ekišnugal — the ancient temple — from time immemorial had been built, [then] had fallen into ruin; he rebuilt it [for him], to its [former] place he restored it; its foundations...
Writing & LiteratureReligion & Myth
BM 137412
[The king of the] four [quarters], the Ekišnugal — the [temple] of old, which from [distant] days had been built (and) had fallen into ruin — he (re)built (it) for him; to its (former) place he restored it; its foundations he refounded.
Writing & LiteratureReligion & Myth
Šamši-Adad IV 3
Dedicates a restored shrine to Ištar and threatens divine destruction of any future king who neglects it — an early Assyrian formula binding successors to temple maintenance under penalty of dynastic annihilation.
Writing & LiteratureReligion & MythBrowse all 244 religion & myth tablets of this period in the catalogue →
1400 – 1077 BCE
Middle Assyrian
Assur's own cult and calendar consolidate; rituals and temple regulations from this period underpin the later imperial religion.
~1300 BCE · Reconstructed composite — see ORACC entry for manuscript witnesses
Adad-narari I 01“Adad-narari, the pure prince, adornment of the gods, pre-eminent one, appointee of the gods, establisher of cult-centres, who slew the mighty Kassite forces, the Qutians, the Lullumeans, and the Subareans, who scattered all enemies above and below, who trampled their lands, from Lubdu and Mount Rapiqu to Eluḫat — conqueror of the city of Taidi, the city of Šuri, the city of Kaḫat, the city of Amasaki, the city of Ḫurra, the city of Šuduḫi, the city of Nabula, [...]”
Source: engine:claude-sonnet-4-6 (2026-05-28/v6-glossary-aware)
Lists the cities and peoples — Kassites, Gutians, Lullumê, Šubareans — subjugated by Adad-nārārī I, documenting Assyria's territorial expansion toward the Euphrates and into Mitanni's former heartland around 1300 BCE.
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Adad-narari I 06
A building inscription of Adad-nārārī I dedicating a standard to Ištar and invoking Aššur's favour for any future ruler who restores the monument — an early attestation of the Assyrian royal restoration formula that would persist for centuries.
Writing & LiteratureReligion & Myth
Adad-narari I 1001
Attests Adad-nārārī I's campaign into the Lullumê highlands, placing Assyrian military reach into the Zagros within the generation that transformed Assyria from a vassal into an imperial power.
Writing & LiteratureReligion & Myth
Adad-narari I 25
Labels booty taken from Naḫur, placing the city within Adad-nārārī I's documented conquests and anchoring his western campaigns in the archaeological record of early Middle Assyrian expansion.
Writing & LiteratureReligion & MythBrowse all 461 religion & myth tablets of this period in the catalogue →
911 – 609 BCE
Neo-Assyrian
State religion at imperial scale: the great akitu festival, royal rituals, exorcistic series like Maqlû, and a flood of omen reports and priestly correspondence advising the kings of Nineveh.
~900 BCE · Reconstructed composite — see ORACC entry for manuscript witnesses
Adad-nerari II 8“(1) Palace of Adad-nārārī (II), great king, strong king, king of the world, king of Assyria, son of Aššur-dān (II), [king of the world], king of Assyria, son of Tigla[th-piles]er (II), [(who was) also] king of the world (and) [king of Assyria].”
Source: Royal Inscriptions of Assyria online (RIAo), Munich Open-access Cuneiform Corpus Initiative (MOCCI), Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München; in association with the RINAP Project, University of Pennsylvania. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/riao/Q006027/
Standard titulary of Adad-nārārī II anchoring his legitimacy through two generations of royal descent, attesting the formulaic language by which Assyrian kings asserted dynastic continuity around 900 BCE.
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Ashurnasirpal II 060
One of the surviving royal inscriptions of Ashurnasirpal II (r. 883–859 BCE), preserved in the RIAo corpus as a witness to the formulaic and historical record of early Neo-Assyrian kingship.
Writing & LiteratureReligion & Myth
Ashurnasirpal II 061
One of the surviving royal inscriptions of Ashurnasirpal II, whose annals collectively document the territorial expansion and brutal suppression campaigns that defined early Neo-Assyrian imperial statecraft.
Writing & LiteratureReligion & Myth
Adad-nerari III 13
Records Adad-nārārī III completing a palace left unfinished by his father Šamšī-Adad V, attesting the dynastic continuity rhetoric Assyrian kings used to legitimise building projects inherited across reigns.
Writing & LiteratureReligion & MythBrowse all 6,157 religion & myth tablets of this period in the catalogue →