Nergal

Definition and stakes

Portrait of Hammurabi Hammurabi,  The Great Events by Famous Historians… (1905)

“ May Nergal, the mighty among the gods, whose contest is irresistible, who grants me victory, in his great might burn up his subjects like a slender reed-stalk, cut off his limbs with his mighty weapons, and shatter him like an earthen image. May Nin-tu, the sublime mistress of the lands, the fruitful mother, deny him a son, vouchsafe him no name, give him no successor among men. ”
Source: Wikisource

Portrait of Morris Jastrow Morris Jastrow,  The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria

“ Nergal, who became the god of violent destruction in general, and, more particularly, the god of war, the god whose emblem was the lion, who was cruel and of forbidding aspect,—such a god was admirably adapted to rule those who could only look forward to a miserable imprisonment in a region filled with horror. Nergal, therefore, became the chief god of the pantheon of the lower world. ”
Source: Gutenberg

Portrait of Margaret Horton Potter Margaret Horton Potter,  Istar of Babylon: A Phantasy

“ Muffled as she was in the veil, she was like to suffocate for air to breathe, yet she would not expose herself to the gaze of human beings. It was noon when she entered the square of the great gods and passed the door of the temple of Nergal, looking with weary eyes into its vast and cool interior. At some distance within was a group of priests, Sangû, Enû, and Barû, men of importance in their several stations. These the plague-stricken eyes of the woman failed in the dim light to see. ”
Source: Gutenberg

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