One of the world's most ancient goddesses, she corresponds to TIAMAT (salt or sea water) in Babylonian mythology, the Sumerian equivalent of Tiamat being ENGUR. As time went on, she was subsumed by ENKI: the Enki and Ninmah neo-Sumerian text has Enki the son of AN (heaven) and Nammu, who is said to have 'given birth to the great gods'. Nammu is also the mother of KI, the earth, so she is mother to both heaven and earth. Enki (An + Ki) is in later stories the supreme god of both heaven and earth. She has the idea of creating mankind, and wakes Enki up from his sleep in the APSU (sweet or fresh water) to set the idea in motion. In another story it's Enki that asks Nammu for permission to create humans 'in the image of the gods'.
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