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49 in the coming struggle for the loyalties of the people. The choice of a new king, to restart afresh kingship in and from Sumer, was also carefully made. Gone was the free hand given to (or assumed by) Inanna/Ishtar, who chose Sar- gon the Akkadian to start a new dynasty because she liked his lovemaking. The new king, named Ur-Nammu (“The joy of Ur’), was carefully selected by Enlil and approved by Anu, and he was no mere Earthling: He was a son—‘the beloved son’—of the goddess Ninsun; she had been, the reader will recall, the mother of Gilgamesh. Since this divine Of Gods and Demigods FIGURE 24 FIGURE 25