Nergal
From Freepedia
The name Nergal (or Nirgal or Nirgali) refers to a deity in Babylonia with the main seat of his cult at Cuthah (or Kutha) represented by the mound of Tell-Ibrahim. Nergal is mentioned in the Hebrew bible as the deity of the city of cuth (Cuthah): "And the men of Babylon made Succoth-benoth, and the men of Cuth made Nergal" (2 Kings, 17:30).
Nergal actually seems to be in part a solar deity, sometimes identified with Shamash, but a representative of a certain phase only of the sun. Portrayed in hymns and myths as a god of war and pestilence, Nergal seems to represent the sun of noontime and of the summer solstice which brings destruction to mankind, high summer being the dead season in the Mesopotamian annual cycle. Nergal was also the deity who presides over the nether-world, and who stands at the head of the special pantheon assigned to the government of the dead (supposed to be gathered in a large subterranean cave known as Aralu or Irkalla). In this capacity he has associated with him a goddess Allatu or Ereshkigal, though at one time Allatu may have functioned as the sole mistress of Aralu, ruling in her own person. In some texts the god Ninazu is the son of Nergal by Allatu/Ereshkigal.
Ordinarily Nergal pairs with his consort Laz. Standard iconography pictured Nergal as a lion, and boundary-stone monuments symbolise him with a mace surmounted by the head of a lion.
Nergal's fiery aspect appears in names or epithets such as Lugalgira, Sharrapu ("the burner," perhaps a mere epithet), Erra, Gibil (though this name more properly belongs to Nusku), and Sibitti. A certain confusion exists in cuneiform literature between Ninurta and Nergal. Nergal has epithets such as the "raging king," the "furious one," and the like. A play upon his name – separated into three elements as Ne-uru-gal (lord of the great dwelling) – expresses his position at the head of the nether-world pantheon.
In the astral-theological system Nergal becomes the planet Mars, while in ecclesiastical art the great lion-headed colossi serving as guardians to the temples and palaces seem to symbolise Nergal, just as the bull-headed colossi probably typify Ninurta.
Nergal's chief temple at Cuthah bore the name Meslam, from which the god receives the designation of Meslamtaeda or Meslamtaea, "the one that rises up from Meslam". The name Meslamtaeda/Meslamtaea indeed is found as early as the list of gods from Fara while the name Nergal only begins to appear in the Akkadian period.
The cult of Nergal does not appear to have spread as widely as that of Ninurta. Hymns and votive and other inscriptions of Babylonian and Assyrian rulers frequently invoke him, but we do not learn of many temples to him outside of Cuthah. Sennacherib speaks of one at Tarbisu to the north of Nineveh, but significantly, although Nebuchadnezzar II (606 BC–586 BC), the great temple-builder of the neo-Babylonian monarchy, alludes to his operations at Meslam in Cuthah, he makes no mention of a sanctuary to Nergal in Babylon. Local associations with his original seat – Kutha – and the conception formed of him as a god of the dead acted in making him feared rather than actively worshipped.
Text adapted from the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica.
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Nergal in Demonology
Being a deity of the desert, and a god of fire, the negative aspects of the sun, and the underworld, and also being a god of one of the rivalling religions of Christianity and Judaism, Nergal was sometimes called a demon and even being identified with Satan. According to Collin de Plancy and Johann Weyer, Nergal was said to be the chief of Hell's secret police, and said to be "an honorary spy in the service of Belzebuth".
Nergal in fiction
Nergal's name is featured in other areas, such as:
- Fire Emblem's (the first one released in the U.S.) main villain is Nergal, who uses the magic tome Ereshkigal to fight.
- The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy features a monster from the center of the earth named Nergal. His son is Nergal, Jr.
- Martian Successor Nadesico has Nergal Corporation, a large corporation who is heavily involved in Mars research and settlement.
- Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy has a character named Nirgal, who is a Martian native. Many of the Martian natives in Nirgal's group are named after the names of Mars in various languages.
- John Constantine was haunted by a demon named Nergal in the Hellblazer comic book.
- Nurgle is one of the four main gods of Chaos in Warhammer 40,000. Nurgle is seen as the Chaos god of Pestilence, and his greater daemon champions are called "great unclean ones."
- Nergal is the core entity in the end-of-2005 Storyline Tournaments of White Wolf, Inc.'s collectible card game Vampire: The Eternal Struggle
- David Weber's Mutineers' Moon includes a battleship named Nergal.
See also:
External links
- ETCSL "A hymn to Nergal" and "A tigi to Nergal": Unicode and ASCII
- Ereskigal.net – "Ereshkigal and Nergal": Assyrian version and Amarna version
- Gateway to Babylon: Nergal and Ereshkigal
