o emphasize local gods, less for their own sake,
than because of the eclat furnished by the enumeration of a large
pantheon, which shall be coequal in extent and dignity to the district
claimed by the rulers and to the rank assumed by them.

FOOTNOTES:

[110] Inscr. B, cols. viii. ix.

[111] See above, p. 101.

[112] See Winckler's excellent remarks on the relationship between the
city and the god in ancient Babylonia (_Altorientalische Forschungen_,
III. 232-235).

[113] _Records of the Past_, N.S., i. 57-59.

[114] In a paper on "The Gods of Shirpurla," read before the American
Oriental Society in April, 1895. (_Proceedings_, ccxiii-ccxviii.)

CHAPTER VII.

SUMMARY.

We have thus passed in review the old Babylonian pantheon, so far as the
discovered texts have revealed their names and epithets. The list does
not claim to be exhaustive. That future texts will add to its length, by
revealing the existence at this early period of many known to us at
present only from later texts or from the religious literature,[115] is
more than likely. The nature of the old Babylonian religion entails, as
a necessary consequence, an array of gods that might be termed endless.
Local cults would ever tend to increase with the rise of new towns, and
while the deities thus worshipped would not rise to any or much
importance, still their names would become known in larger circles, and
a ruler might, for the sake of increasing his own lustre, make mention
of one or more of them, honoring them at the same time by an epithet
which might or might not accurately define their character. As long as
the various districts of Babylonia were not formally united under one
head, various local cults might rise to equally large proportions, while
the gods worshipped as the special patrons of the great centers, as
Lagash, Ur, Uruk, Nippur, and the like, would retain their prominence,
even though the political status of the cities sacred to them suffered a
decline. The ruler of the district that claimed a supremacy over one
that formerly occupied an independent position, would hasten to
emphasize this control by proudly claiming the patron deity as part of
his pantheon. The popularity of Sin at Ur suffered no diminution because
the supremacy of Ur yielded to that of Uruk. On the contrary, the god
gained new friends who strove to rival the old ones in manifestations of
reverence; and when, as happened in several instances, the patron
deit