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330 Editions of Cuneiform Texts, vol. VI) is especially valuable, be- cause it is in the original Sumerian language and, moreover, it is a bilingual text in which the Sumerian is accompanied by a line-by- line Akkadian translation. It is thus undoubtedly one of the earliest texts on the subject; and its wording indeed gives the impression that it is this or similar Sumerian originals that had served as a source for the biblical narrative. Addressed to a god whose identity tena ad Lord, bearer of the Scorcher that burnt up the adversary; Who obliterated the disobedient land; Who withered the life of the Evil Word's followers; The deed performed by the two gods Ninurta and Nergal, when the Anunnaki guarding the Spaceport, forewarned, had to escape by "ascending to the dome of heaven," was recalled in a Babylo- nian text in which one king recalled the momentous events that had taken place "in the reign of an earlier king." Here are the king's words: At that time, in the reign of a previous king, conditions changed. Good departed, suffering was regular. The Lord [of the gods] became enraged, he conceived wrath. He gave the command: the gods of that place abandoned it. . . The two, incited to commit the evil, made its guardians stand aside; its protectors went up to the dome of heaven. The Khedorlaomer Text, which identifies the two gods by their epithets as Ninurta and Nergal, tells it this way: was consumed with anger. The devastators again suggested evil; He who scorches with fire [Ishum/Ninurta] THE WARS OF GODS AND MEN is not clear from the fragment, it says: Who rained stones and fire upon the adversaries. Enlil, who sat enthroned in loftiness,