Enmerkar
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Enmerkar, according to the Sumerian king list, was the builder of Uruk in Sumer, and was said to have reigned for "420 years" (or 900 as some copies).
The king list adds that he brought the official kingship with him from the city of E-ana, after his father Mesh-ki-ang-gasher, son of Utu, had "entered the sea and disappeared."
Enmerkar is also known from a few other Sumerian legends, most notably Enmerkar and the Lord of Aratta, where a previous confusion of the languages of mankind is mentioned. Here, he himself is called 'the son of Utu' (Utu was the Sumerian Sun god). In addition to founding Uruk, he is said here to have had a temple built at Eridu, and is even credited with the invention of writing on clay tablets for purposes of threatening Aratta into submission.
David Rohl has claimed parallels between Enmerkar, founder of Uruk, and Nimrod the Hunter, founder of Erech (the Biblical name for Uruk) according to Genesis 10, and builder of the Tower of Babel in post-Biblical legends. Rohl has even suggested that Eridu near Ur was the original site of Babel, and that the incomplete ziggurat found there, by far the oldest and largest of its kind, are none other than the ruins of the Biblical tower[1]
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| Preceded by Mesh-ki-ang-gasher |
Ensi of Uruk early 3rd millennium BC or legendary |
Succeeded by Lugalbanda |
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| Ante-diluvian kings | Alulim · Dumuzid, the Shepherd · Ziusudra | 3rd Dynasty of Kish | Kubaba |
| 1st Dynasty of Kish | Etana · Enmebaragesi | 3rd Dynasty of Uruk | Lugal-Zage-Si |
| 1st Dynasty of Uruk | Enmerkar · Lugalbanda · Dumuzid, the Fisherman · Gilgamesh | Dynasty of Akkad | Sargon · Manishtushu · Naram-Sin · Shar-Kali-Sharri · Dudu · Shu-turul |
| 1st Dynasty of Ur | (Meskalamdug)* · Mesannepada · (Puabi)* | ||
| 2nd Dynasty of Uruk | Enshakushanna | 2nd Dynasty of Lagash | Puzer-Mama · Gudea |
| 1st Dynasty of Lagash | Ur-Nanshe · Eannatum · En-anna-tum I · Entemena · Urukagina | 5th Dynasty of Uruk | Utu-hegal |
| Dynasty of Adab | Lugal-Anne-Mundu | 3rd dynasty of Ur | Ur-Nammu · Shulgi · Amar-Sin · Shu-Sin · Ibbi-Sin |
| * Meskalamdug and Puabi, though not necessarily rulers, are famous for their grave finds. | |||
