1) {ugrou gar ontos tou pantos kai zoon en auto
gegennemenon (toionde) ktl}. His creatures of the primaeval
water were killed by the light; and terrestrial animals were
then created which could bear (i.e. breathe and exist in)
the air.

For many years we have possessed a Sumerian myth of Creation, which has
come to us on a late Babylonian tablet as the introductory section of
an incantation. It is provided with a Semitic translation, and to judge
from its record of the building of Babylon and Egasila, Marduk's temple,
and its identification of Marduk himself with the Creator, it has
clearly undergone some editing at the hands of the Babylonian priests.
Moreover, the occurrence of various episodes out of their logical order,
and the fact that the text records twice over the creation of swamps and
marshes, reeds and trees or forests, animals and cities, indicate that
two Sumerian myths have been combined. Thus we have no guarantee that
the other cities referred to by name in the text, Nippur, Erech, and
Eridu, are mentioned in any significant connexion with each other.(1) Of
the actual cause of Creation the text appears to give two versions also,
one in its present form impersonal, and the other carried out by a
god. But these two accounts are quite unlike the authorized version
of Babylon, and we may confidently regard them as representing genuine
Sumerian myths. The text resembles other early accounts of Creation by
introducing its narrative with a series of negative statements, which
serve to indicate the preceding non-existence of the world, as will be
seen from the following extract:(2)

No city had been created, no creature had been made,
Nippur had not been created, Ekur had not been built,
Erech had not been created, Eanna had not been built,
Apsu had not been created, Eridu had not been built,
Of the holy house, the house of the gods, the habitation had not
been created.
All lands(3) were sea.
At the time when a channel (was formed) in the midst of the sea,
Then was Eridu created, Esagila built, etc.

Here we have the definite statement that before Creation all the world
was sea. And it is important to note that the primaeval water is not
personified; the ordinary Sumerian word for "sea" is employed, which
the Semitic translator has faithfully rendered in his version of
the text.(4) The reference to a channel in the sea, as the cause of
Creatio