NABU

   Babylonian god whose main shrine, the Ezida temple, was at Borsippa, near Babylon. He was introduced to the Babylonian pantheon around the beginning of the second millennium B.C., at the same time that Marduk became prominent. He was first called the “scribe and minister of Marduk”; later he was known as the son of Marduk. Nabu became the patron of scribes and the scribal arts, and his symbol was the stylus. Beautifully written cuneiform tablets were popular offerings to this learned god. Nabu’s cult was introduced to Assyria in the 13th century, when Tukulti-Ninurta I built him a temple at Assur. He endured when other gods, who had been more closely identified with political power (e.g., Marduk), had lost popularity. In the late Babylonian period, he assumed many traits of other deities, such as wisdom and associations with water and fertility. Nabu’s cult lasted well into the Roman period.