Ancient Babylonia - The Babylonian Pantheon of Gods
The Babylonians had many gods. Some of these were Sumerian, some Akkadian and
other later groups and some imported from the mountainous regions to the north
and east of Mesopotamia. These gods reflected the various needs and fears of
the different peoples. The Sumerians would have had city gods and gods of the
harvest. The desert nomads who invaded Mesopotamia at various times would have had
water gods and sand gods. The people of the high mountains may have had gods
of thunder and lighting. Obviously some gods would have had importance to the
city-dwellers of Babylon as well as desert nomads and the inhabitants. These
would have been amalgamated into the existing pantheon either as a completely new
god or, much more often, be joined into an existing god. Often when this
happened the combined god continued under the name of the new people arriving in
Mesopotamia. Because of this the Babylonians had a great many gods. Of these not
many would be important and only a few would be city gods.
See also Religion of the Ancient Near East
List of some of the more important Babylonian gods
Anu: the god of the highest heaven
Marduk: national god of the Babylonians
Tiamat: dragon goddess
Kingu: husband of Tiamat
Enlil: god of weather and storms
Nabu: god of the scribal arts
Ishtar: goddess of love
Ea: god of wisdom
Enurta: god of war
Anshar: father of heaven
Shamash: god of the sun and of justice
Ashur: national god of the Assyrians
Kishar: father of earth
Ancient Babylonia
Return to Bible History Online