Etemenanki

Etemenanki (Sumerian: "temple of the foundation of heaven and earth") was a ziggurat dedicated to the Mesopotamian god Marduk in the ancient city of Babylon. It now exists only in ruins, located about south of Baghdad, Iraq. Although Etemenanki has sometimes erroneously been identified with the Tower of Babel from Genesis 11 in the Bible, the archaeological record is incompatible with the biblical account of the Tower of Babel, particularly because Etemenanki was built in tribute to the god Marduk and because the existence of many languages in the region predates its reconstruction. However, many scholars believe that the biblical story was at least partly inspired by Etemenanki. It is unclear when Etemenanki was originally constructed. Andrew R. George says that it was constructed sometime between the 14th and the 9th century BCE. He argues as follows: The reference to a ziqqurrat at Babylon in the Creation Epic (Enûma Eliš· VI 63: George 1992: 301–2) is more solid evidence, ... for a Middle Assyrian piece of this poem survives to prove the long-held theory that it existed already in the second millennium BC. There is no reason to doubt that this ziqqurrat, described as ziqqurrat apsî elite, "the upper ziqqurrat of the Apsû", was [Etemenanki]. Babylon was destroyed in 689 BCE by Sennacherib, who claims to have destroyed the Etemenanki. It took 88 years to restore the city; work was started by the Assyrian king Esarhaddon, and continued under Nabopolassar followed by his son Nebuchadnezzar II who rebuilt the ziggurat. The city's central feature was the temple of Marduk (Esagila), with which the Etemenanki ziggurat was associated. Fenollós et al. note that, "The 'Tower of Babel' was not built in a single moment, but rather was the result of a complex history of successive constructions, destruction and reconstruction. Its origin dates back to the reign of Hammurabi and continues to this day with its inevitable and definitive destruction." (Translated from the Italian).