Thy chariot is as a voice of thunder. To the lifting of thy hands is the shadow turned. The spirits of the earth, the great gods, return to the winds.
Many of the hymns assist us to a better understanding of the precise nature of the gods, defining as they do their duties and offices and even occasionally describing their appearance. Thus in a hymn to Nebo we note that he is alluded to as "the supreme messenger who binds all things together," "the scribe of all that has a name," "the lifter up of the stylus supreme," "director of the world," "possessor of the reed of augury," "traverser of strange lands," "opener of wells," "fructifier of the corn," and "the god without whom the irrigated land and the canal are unwatered." It is from such texts that the mythologist is enabled to piece together the true significance of many of the deities of ancient peoples.
A hymn to Nusku in his character of fire-god is also descriptive and picturesque. He is alluded to as "wise prince, the flame of heaven," "he who hurls down terror, whose clothing is splendour," "the forceful fire-god," "the exalter of the mountain peaks," and "the uplifter of the torch, the enlightener of darkness."
Such descriptive hymns are the most valuable assets possible in the hands of the judicious student of myth or comparative religion.
[1] Vol. iii, p. 167. Second Edition. (By kind permission of Messrs Macmillan and Co.)
[3] This passage has, however, been interpreted by some Biblical scholars to mean that "Nimrod went out of this land into Asshur" (or Assyria) "and built Nineveh." See Bryant, _Antient Mythology_, vol. vi, pp. 191-2-3.
Few creation myths are more replete with interest than those which have literary sanction. These are few in number, as, for example, the creation story in Genesis, those to be found in Egyptian papyri, and that contained in the _Popol Vuh_ of the Maya of Central America. In such an account we can trace the creation story from the first dim conception of world-shaping to the polished and final effort of a priestly caste to give a theological interpretation to the intentions of the creative deity; and this is perhaps more the case with the creation myth which had its rise among the old Akkadian population of Babylonia than with any other known to mythic science. In the account in Genesis of the framing of the world it has been discovered that two different versions have been fused to form a single story; the creation tale of the _Popol Vuh_ is certainly a composite myth; and similar suspicions may rest upon the analogous myths of Scandinavia and Japan. But in the case of Babylonia we may be convinced that no other influences except those of the races who inhabited Babylonian territory could have been brought to bear upon this ancient story, and that although critical examination has proved it to consist of materials which have been drawn from more than one source, yet these sources are not foreign, and they have not undergone sophistication at the hands of any alien mythographer or interpolator.