ADAD AND ISHTAR. 253 
It was about the twelfth century B. C. that the new Assyrian writing came into 
vogue, the earlier forms being old Babylonian. We have observed the old form of 
the designation of a deity, Ilu, by a star, on certain of these purely Assyrian cylinders, 
showing that they are presumably older than that period (see fig. 716), and from 
this period their type continues down to the end of the Empire and even later. 
The earliest Assyrian texts give us the gods chiefly worshiped. ‘The earliest 
inscription is that of Shamshi-Adad (Shamshi-Ramman) whose name includes two 
gods, Shamash and Adad. It thus reads: ‘‘Shamshi-Adad, patesi of Ashur, son 
Igurkakkapu, builder of the temple of Ashur.”’ He was then worshiper of three 
gods at least, Ashur, the homonymous god of his city, Shamash, and Adad. This 
king, or, rather, patesi, or viceroy, in the city of Ashur (Kala’at Shergat), is sup- 
posed to have flourished about 2000 B. C. Another patesi of Ashur, Int. . ., ina 
very brief inscription, offers a dedication to Ashur his god. Pudi-ilu, who reigned 
at Ashur about 1350 B. C., introduces another deity in the dedication of a temple 
to Shamash. We have a larger pantheon recorded by Adad-nirari, about 1325 
B. C., whose name suggests the high dignity of Adad. He speaks of himself as 
the priest of Bel, of his father Pudi-ilu as governor and priest of Bel and Ashur, 
and declares that “Anu, Ashur, Shamash, Adad, and Ishtar’? have subdued the 
conquered lands under his feet. It will be observed that here Anu is put before 
Ashur; but this does not indicate anything more than the formal convention bor- 
rowed from Babylonia, which put Anu, though a half-forgotten god, at the head 
of the pantheon; for at the end of the inscription Ashur comes to his proper pre- 
cedence: ‘“ Ashur, the exalted god, who inhabits Ekharsag-kurkura, Anu, Bel, Ea, 
and Ishtar, the great gods, the Egigi of heaven, the Annunaki of Earth.” These 
gods are petitioned to curse any one who should profane his inscription; and then 
the king proceeds, after this general malediction, to call on Adad separately to 
destroy any such enemy with storm, flood, and famine. We should judge from 
this that, while Ashur was the special supreme and national localized deity, prob- 
ably a variant of Shamash, Adad was the active, working deity who could most 
bless and curse; and Ishtar is the only goddess mentioned, and named in con- 
nection with Adad, after Anu, Ashur, and Shamash. 
About 1275 B.C. lived Tiglath-Adar, whose name brings in another god 
Adar (written Ninib). An inscription of his contains the names of Ashur and 
Adad: “Whosoever destroys my writing and my name, may Ashur and Adad 
destroy his name and his land”! From an inscription of Ashurrishili (1150 B. C.) 
we get the names of Ashur, Nusku, also of the triad Anu, Bel, and Ea, and we are 
told that he fought under the protection of Adar (Ninib). In his long, historical 
inscription, Tiglathpileser, 1100 B. C., at the beginning of his great Prism Inscrip- 
tion, offers an invocation to the gods in the following order: “Ashur who rules the 
company of the gods; Sin the wise one, lord of the disk of the moon; Shamash, 
judge of heaven and earth; Adad, the warrior, who overthrows the country of the 
foes; Adar, the mighty one, who destroys the wicked; and Ishtar, the goddess of 
battle, who arrays the slaughter.”” Again and again in his record of his victories 
he accredits his success to the might of his national god Ashur; but he brings back 
his spoils of victory not to any temple of Ashur, but to the temples of Belit, the 
lofty consort of Ashur, of Anu, Adad, and Ishtar; and prisoners he sets free, with 
the oath of loyalty, in the presence of Shamash. He mentions Adar and Nergal 
