Mummu
Encyclopedia
Mummu vizier
Vizier
A vizier or in Arabic script ; ; sometimes spelled vazir, vizir, vasir, wazir, vesir, or vezir) is a high-ranking political advisor or minister in a Muslim government....

 of primeval gods Apsu, the fresh water, and Tiamat
Tiamat
In Babylonian mythology, Tiamat is a chaos monster, a primordial goddess of the ocean, mating with Abzû to produce younger gods. It is suggested that there are two parts to the Tiamat mythos, the first in which Tiamat is 'creatrix', through a "Sacred marriage" between salt and fresh water,...

, the salt water.
An ancient Sumer
Sumer
Sumer was a civilization and historical region in southern Mesopotamia, modern Iraq during the Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age....

o-Babylon
Babylon
Babylon was an Akkadian city-state of ancient Mesopotamia, the remains of which are found in present-day Al Hillah, Babil Province, Iraq, about 85 kilometers south of Baghdad...

ian craftsman-god, and personification of technical skill. Mummu is also referred to as "the deep" several times in Mythological Texts.

In ancient Sumerian, the word mummu translates to "the one who has awoken".

Deity ruler of "The Ancients", Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia is a toponym for the area of the Tigris–Euphrates river system, largely corresponding to modern-day Iraq, northeastern Syria, southeastern Turkey and southwestern Iran.Widely considered to be the cradle of civilization, Bronze Age Mesopotamia included Sumer and the...

n purveyors of technical knowledge, mathematics and abstract concepts.

Mummu is a Mesopotamian deity present in the Babylonian creation myth. Sometimes referred to as 'the son of Apsu and Tiamat
Tiamat
In Babylonian mythology, Tiamat is a chaos monster, a primordial goddess of the ocean, mating with Abzû to produce younger gods. It is suggested that there are two parts to the Tiamat mythos, the first in which Tiamat is 'creatrix', through a "Sacred marriage" between salt and fresh water,...

', Mummu is the third god in the primordial cosmogenous divine trinity. As the third of the first gods Mummu symbolizes the mental world, or logos
Logos
' is an important term in philosophy, psychology, rhetoric and religion. Originally a word meaning "a ground", "a plea", "an opinion", "an expectation", "word," "speech," "account," "reason," it became a technical term in philosophy, beginning with Heraclitus ' is an important term in...

. Mummu appears also the Sumerian Myth of Zu where Imdugud, whose name is translated as 'flashing wind', steals the Tablets of Destiny
Tablets of Destiny
In Mesopotamian mythology, the Tablet of Destinies - Dup Shimati in Sumerian - was envisaged as a clay tablet inscribed with cuneiform writing, also impressed with cylinder seals, which, as a permanent legal document, conferred upon the god Enlil his supreme authority as ruler of the universe.In...

 but in turn is defeated by Ningirsu. In their battle an arrow in midair is ordered to return to its 'mummu', which in this case meant the shaft's return to the living reed from which it was cut, the guts return to the animal's rump and finally the feathers to the bird's wings. Therefore in a larger magnitude, mummu is detransformation, the return to chaos, demanifacturing. Through the Second law of thermodynamics
Second law of thermodynamics
The second law of thermodynamics is an expression of the tendency that over time, differences in temperature, pressure, and chemical potential equilibrate in an isolated physical system. From the state of thermodynamic equilibrium, the law deduced the principle of the increase of entropy and...

, the dissipation of energy from matter and its 'return' to its simplest common denominator, mummu can be understood as Entropy
Entropy
Entropy is a thermodynamic property that can be used to determine the energy available for useful work in a thermodynamic process, such as in energy conversion devices, engines, or machines. Such devices can only be driven by convertible energy, and have a theoretical maximum efficiency when...

. Towards the middle of the Babylonian creation myth, Ea (a more powerful deity) locks Mummu and Apsu away, reversing the process of degeneration and thus creating the physical world.

Mummu is also one of the names, given to Marduk (34-th name in Enuma Elish
Enûma Elish
The is the Babylonian creation myth . It was recovered by Austen Henry Layard in 1849 in the ruined Library of Ashurbanipal at Nineveh , and published by George Smith in 1876.The Enûma Eliš has about a thousand lines and is recorded in Old Babylonian on seven clay tablets, each holding...

).

In popular culture

In popular writing, Mummu is mentioned in Robert Shea
Robert Shea
Robert Joseph Shea was an American novelist and former journalist best known as co-author with Robert Anton Wilson of the science fantasy trilogy Illuminatus!. It became a cult success and was later turned into a marathon-length stage show put on at the British National Theatre and elsewhere. In...

 and Robert Anton Wilson
Robert Anton Wilson
Robert Anton Wilson , known to friends as "Bob", was an American author and polymath who became at various times a novelist, philosopher, psychologist, essayist, editor, playwright, poet, futurist, civil libertarian and self-described agnostic mystic...

's Illuminatus! Trilogy as 'The Spirit of Pure Chaos'.
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