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The First Mother
In the Enuma Elish, Tiamat is described as "Ummu-Hubur who formed all things." The name "Hubur" sometimes refers to the river in the underworld. She is also related to the Hebrew concept of Tehom, the great deep of the primordial waters. Tiamat and Apsu personify the cosmic abyss filled with primal energies which preceded the original Creation, while Apsu s vizier, Mummu, is thought to be the archetypal watery form, and his name is sometimes translated as "mold, matrix." The ancient Mesopotamians believed that the world was a flat circular disc surrounded by a saltwater sea. The earth was a continent which floated on a second sea, the freshwater apsu from which all waters, including springs, rivers, wells and lakes, flowed on the land. The sky was a solid disc above the earth, which curved to touch the earth at its rim. The heaven, or the habitation of the gods, was above the sky.
The first Mother Goddess was the primordial source of all life, the embodiment of Primal Chaos, the Cosmic Womb which gave birth to all gods and all souls. She held dominion over the forces of Creation and she possessed the power to shape destinies, which is symbolic of the supreme authority over the whole universe. In the Enuma Elish, "when of the gods none had been called into being, and none bore a name, and no destinies were ordained," she was the first force of Creation, the origin of life, the source of all movement and evolution. However, when she turned against her own children, the younger generation of gods, she also became the force of destruction, the devouring monster, the ever-gaping womb and the mother of abominations. Once a caring and nurturing parent, she turned into a vengeful warrior goddess, the mother of monsters and all evil of the world.
As the goddess of primordial waters, Tiamat was often portrayed in a monstrous, bestial form and imagined as a sea serpent or a dragon. However, not much is known about her appearance from the myth itself. In this sense, she is identified with the sea monsters from other mythologies, such as the biblical Leviathan, Yamm and Lotan from the Hebrew myths or Tannin, the sea demon from the Jewish legends. Etymologically, her name corresponds to such terms as the Greek word thalassa, "sea," Semitic tehom, "abyss," Akkadian ti'amtum and tamtu, "sea," or Sumerian ti and ama, meaning "life" and "mother."
Francois Lenormant, in his Chaldean Magic Its Origin and Development, mentions also such names as Tauthe of Damascius and Tha-vath-Omoroca, the latter being a form of the Great Mother as a type of the watery abyss, possibly inspired by the account of the Creation given by Ber-ossus in his History of Babylonia. There are also many theories concerning the possible meaning of the myth, in which the primordial state of "mixing of the waters" is interpreted as the meeting of salty and fresh waters in the Persian Gulf; the creation of gods and monsters is thought to refer to the rise of volcanoes and tectonic movements; or the battle of Tiamat and Marduk is viewed as a cosmic catastrophe in which the presently existing planets were created. Since no unanimous interpretation exists, the myth still leaves a great field for possible speculations.
Tiamat, above all, is the universal Mother who gives birth to all creation in her womb, the salty waters. This was the original habitation of the gods before Marduk created the earth and chose Babylon as his residence, while the gods moved to live in the heaven. Marduk does not possess the natural power of creation - his power is the divine speech, the attribute of all patriarchal gods from worlds religions. In the Enuma Elish, he has to prove that he possesses this power before he is allowed to face Tiamat in the battle. He is given a garment which he has to destroy and restore by the power of his word before he is entrusted by the gods as their champion.
As the Mother of Creation, Tiamat is sometimes identified with the Sumerian goddess, Nammu, the mistress of the primordial sea who gave birth to An and Ki, the heaven and the earth. They both were thought to personify the constellation in the northern sky known today as "the whale." In ancient times, it was called by the names of sea monsters, Tiamat or Cetus. It is located in the region of the sky known as the Water, along with other watery constellations, such as Aquarius, Pisces or Eridanus. In the myth of Enki and the creation of man, Nammu (also called Ninmah) is described as "the primeval sea," "the mother who gave birth to all the gods." Enki seeks her assistance in his work of creation, as he himself has no power to fashion a human being:
"О my mother, the creature whose name you uttered, it exists,
Bind upon it the image of the gods;
Mix the heart of the clay that is over the abyss...
You, do bring the limbs into existence...;
О my mother, decree its fate."
The creature fashioned by Enki is feeble and weak, for only the Mother Goddess has the power to create life and breathe the soul into the vessel of clay. But the salty waters of seas and oceans can hardly be considered a nourishing substance. They do not quench the thirst of living beings and they do not make the crops grow. The waters of Tiamat are dissolving, corroding, poisonous and deadly. Opposed to them are the fresh waters of Apsu, the source of all lakes, rivers, springs and wells, the life-giving waters of the earth. Apsu, abzu, or engur (or engurru), originally part of the cosmic Chaos, was transformed into the source of nourishing waters existing under the ground, as subterranean reservoirs and the veins of the earth. The name of this principle, as well as the mythology, depends on the tradition. The Akkadian and Assyrian abzu or apsd was the subterranean ocean, but it was also the great reservoir of cosmic waters surrounding the earth.
In Sumerian legends, apsu is the kingdom of Enki (Ea), "the lord of wisdom," but also the abode of sea monsters that are sent after Inanna when she descends to the watery abyss in order to obtain the me's, the divine decrees, which she needs to win the authority over the gods. The watery kingdom is transformed into the house of wisdom after Apsu is slain by his eldest son, but it retains its chaotic and destructive quality, still personified by monsters and abominations of the sea. Enki's temple in the city of Eridu was believed to be built on apzu and known as "the house of cosmic waters." From there, Enki (Ea) controlled Mummu, "the original watery form," thus creating and shaping the world with the multiplicity of forms, while Apsu himself remained motionless and still, resting in eternal sleep. Mesopotamian temples often had pools or watery basins which represented the concept of apsu, the subterranean source of water.
---The Grimoire of Tiamat by Asenath Mason
Post-script:
Originally posted to the #ppl group where Mr. Bisno commented what was "also interesting is 004's comment when i once specificaly asked about the sumerian myth of tiamat: "we saw that the enochians had built a weapon named choronzon, and we wanted one of them of our own, so we built something like that"
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