Enlil, along with Anu / An, Enki and Ninhursag were gods of the Sumerians.

In one evocative passage in a Sumerian hymn, Enki stands at the empty riverbeds and fills them with his ' water '".

In the epic Enki and Ninhursag, Enki, as lord of Ab or fresh water ( also the Sumerian word for semen ), is living with his wife in the paradise of Dilmun where

Not knowing her to be his daughter, and because she reminds him of his absent consort, Enki then seduces and has intercourse with her.

Against Enki's wish the Gods decide to slay Kingu, and Enki finally consents to use Kingu's blood to make the first human, with whom Enki always later has a close relationship, the first of the seven sages, seven wise men or " Abgallu " (* Ab

In his connections with Inanna, Enki shows other aspects of his non-Patriarchal nature.

The seductive god plies her with beer, and the young goddess maintains her virtue, whilst Enki proceeds to get drunk.

Enki realises that he has been tricked in his hubris and accepts a peace treaty forever with Uruk.

Enki was considered a god of life and replenishment, and was often depicted with two streams of water emanating from his shoulders, one the Tigris, the other the Euphrates.

Enki and later Ea were apparently depicted, sometimes, like Adapa, as a man covered with the skin of a fish, and this representation, as likewise the name of his temple E-apsu, " house of the watery deep ", points decidedly to his original character as a god of the waters ( see Oannes ).

As Ea, Enki had a wide influence outside of Sumer, being equated with El ( at Ugarit ) and possibly Yah ( at Ebla ) in the Canaanite ' ilhm pantheon, he is also found in Hurrian and Hittite mythology, as a god of contracts, and is particularly favourable to humankind.

The word also appears in Sumerian texts ; for instance, in the lost book, when Enki tells his master scribe ( Edubsar ) to write down all that he says, the text mentions a stylus of electrum with a crystal at the tip that glowed.

These devotees were often from a particular city or city-state that held that deity as its patron deity, for instance the god Enki was often associated with the city of Eridu, and the god Marduk was associated with Babylon.

He was also regarded as the son of Ea ( Sumerian Enki ) and Damkina and the heir of Anu, but whatever special traits Marduk may have had were overshadowed by the political development through which the Euphrates valley passed and which led to people of the time imbuing him with traits belonging to gods who in an earlier period were recognized as the heads of the pantheon.

Among the interesting features of this version of the flood myth, are the identification, through interpretatio graeca, of the Sumerian god Enki with the Greek god Cronus, the father of Zeus ; and the assertion that the reed boat constructed by Xisuthros survived, at least until Berossus ' day, in the " Corcyrean Mountains " of Armenia.

Sitchin wrote that Enki suggested that to relieve the Anunnaki, who had mutinied over their dissatisfaction with their working conditions, that primitive workers ( Homo sapiens ) be created by genetic engineering as slaves to replace them in the gold mines by crossing extraterrestrial genes with those of Homo erectus.

In the myth recorded on cuneiform tablets, the deity Enki ( later Ea ) believed correctly that Apsu, upset with the chaos they created, was planning to murder the younger deities ; and so captured him, holding him prisoner beneath is temple the E-Abzu.

Cohen and Kangas suggest that the tree is probably associated with the Sumerian god of male fertility, Enki and that for both Osiris and Enki, an erect pole or polelike symbol stands beneath a celestial symbol.

Benito states " With Enki it is an interesting change of gender symbolism, the fertilising agent is also water, Sumerian " a " or " Ab " which also means " semen ".

This is also the title given in the Bible to Eve, the Hebrew Khavvah ( חוה ), the Aramaic Hawwah, who was made from the rib of Adam, in a strange reflection of the Sumerian myth, in which Adam — not Enki — walks in the Garden of Paradise.

This seems also implicated in the epic of the hieros gamos or sacred marriage of Enki and Ninhursag ( above ), which seems an etiological myth of the fertilisation of the dry ground by the coming of irrigation water ( from Sumerian a, ab, water or semen ).

Generally, however, Enki seems to be a reflection of pre-patriarchal times, in which relations between the sexes were characterised by a situation of greater gender equality.

Dilmun is also described in the epic story of Enki and Ninhursag as the site at which the Creation occurred.

A commercial failure but artistic success came along in 1977, when Delporte created the more adult supplement Le Trombone Illustré, which appeared inside Spirou for thirty weeks, and showcased new artists like Didier Comès, Enki Bilal, Claire Bretécher, F ' murr, Grzegorz Rosinski, and Frédéric Jannin, next to more established authors like René Hausman, Peyo, Roba, Marcel Gotlieb, and Franquin, who started his third major series, Idées Noires.

This is described in the poem, " Enki and the World Order " which also details how he parcels out responsibility for various crafts and natural phenomena to the lesser gods.

There is no direct connection implied in the mythological cycle between this poem and that which is our main source of information on the mes, " Inanna and Enki: The Transfer of the Arts of Civilization from Eridu to Uruk ", but once again Inanna's discontent is a theme.

In another even older tradition, Nammu, the goddess of the primeval creative matter and the mother-goddess portrayed as having " given birth to the great gods ," was the mother of Enki, and as the watery creative force, was said to preexist Ea-Enki.

Enki, the Water-Lord then " caused to flow the ' water of the heart " and having fertilised his consort Ninhursag, also known as Ki or Earth, after " Nine days being her nine months, the months of ' womanhood '... like good butter, Nintu, the mother of the land, ... like good butter, gave birth to Ninsar, ( Lady Greenery )".

Ninsar then gave birth to Ninkurra ( Lady Fruitfulness or Lady Pasture ), and leaves Enki alone again.

A second time, Enki, in his loneliness finds and seduces Ninkurra, and from the union Ninkurra gave birth to Uttu ( weaver or spider, the weaver of the web of life ).

Upset about Enki's reputation, Uttu consults Ninhursag, who, upset at the promiscuous wayward nature of her spouse, advises Uttu to avoid the riverbanks, the places likely to be affected by flooding, the home of Enki.

Shukaletuda seeks protection from Enki, whom Bottero believes to be his father.

Enki, as the protector of whomever comes to seek his help, and as the empowerer of Inanna, here challenges the young impetuous goddess to control her anger so as to be better able to function as a great judge.

After she presents her case, Enki sees that justice needs to be done and promises help, delivering knowledge of where the miscreant is hiding.

Finally, on the middle pages that used to be devoted to art, Fantastyka featured many renowned artists, including Enki Bilal, Wojciech Siudmak, Zdzisław Beksiński, Jacek Yerka and Jerzy Skarżyński.

Instead of punishing the rebels, Enki, who is also the kind, wise counselor of the gods, suggested that humans be created to do the work.

The boat is to have a roof “ like Apsu ” ( a subterranean, fresh water realm presided over by the god Enki ), upper and lower decks, and to be sealed with bitumen.

Anak could be related to the Sumerian god Enki.

Enki () or Enkil ( Sumerian: ) is a god in Sumerian mythology, later known as Ea in Akkadian and Babylonian mythology.

A large number of myths about Enki have been collected from many sites, stretching from Southern Iraq to the Levantine coast.

The main temple to Enki is called E-abzu, meaning " abzu temple " ( also E-en-gur-a, meaning " house of the subterranean waters ""), a ziggurat temple surrounded by Euphratean marshlands near the ancient Persian Gulf coastline at Eridu.

Considered the master shaper of the world, god of wisdom and of all magic, Enki was characterized as the lord of the Abzu ( Apsu in Akkadian ), the freshwater sea or groundwater located within the earth.

His grandson Enki, chosen to represent the younger gods, puts a spell on Abzu " casting him into a deep sleep ", thereby confining him deep underground.

Enki subsequently sets up his home " in the depths of the Abzu.

" Enki thus takes on all of the functions of the Abzu, including his fertilising powers as lord of the waters and lord of semen.

This links Enki to the Kur or underworld of Sumerian mythology.

Nevertheless Dilmun had no water and Enki heard the cries of its Goddess, Ninsikil, and orders the sun-God Utu to bring fresh water from the Earth for Dilmun.

A third time Enki succumbs to temptation, and attempts seduction of Uttu.

And so, despite warnings, Enki consumes the other seven fruit.

Enki promises to help and confines Abzu in irrigation canals and places him in the Kur, beneath his city of Eridu.

The Gods gather again in terror and turn to Enki for help, but Enki who harnessed Abzu, Tiamat's consort, for irrigation refuses to get involved.

Enki, who might have otherwise come to their aid, is lying in a deep sleep and fails to hear their cries.

Enki then advises that they create a servant of the Gods, humankind, out of clay and blood.

According to Sumerian mythology, Enki also assisted humanity to survive the Deluge designed to kill them.

He successively sends drought, famine and plague to eliminate humanity, but Enki thwarts his half-brother's plans by teaching Atrahasis how to counter these threats.