title: Final Fantasy XIII

text: In contrast, reviewers from GamesRadar and "Computer and Video Games" appreciated the linear nature; the former stated that "the streamlined, focused structure eliminates potential tedium without dumbing anything down", while the latter felt it was "a clever move", and kept the player from being "[bogged] down with mundane number crunching, [and] finicky and repetitive leveling-up." Many negatively noted the gradual unfurling of the player's abilities over this first part of the game, from battle gameplay to selecting the party leader. Combined with the game's linear nature, some reviews went as far as to describe these chapters as "boring" until the world of Gran Pulse was revealed. "Edge" noted that while it did not do enough to make up for the opening chapters, at Gran Pulse the game "hits a sweet spot" as the narrative offers "hunting side-quests and the simple joy of exploring to see what visual marvel is around the next corner."


title: Final Fantasy XIII

text: After release, director Motomu Toriyama felt that the lower-than-expected review scores for a main "Final Fantasy" series game came from reviewers who approached the game from a Western point of view. These reviewers were used to games in which the player was given an open world to explore, he said, noting that this expectation contrasted with the vision the team set out to create. He noted that it "becomes very difficult to tell a compelling story when you're given that much freedom". Yoshinori Kitase stated that they "didn't really intend to work within the RPG template," but "wanted to create a new game, even a new genre." He stated that "in a lot of senses FFXIII is more like an FPS than an RPG."


title: Final Fantasy XIII

text: Toriyama and Kitase later said, in July 2011, that the biggest complaints about the game were that it was too linear and that there was not enough interaction between the player and the world, which they described as a lack of towns and minigames compared to the previous "Final Fantasy" games. They also named the amount of time it took to access all of the gameplay elements as a common criticism, saying that people interpreted it as a "lengthy tutorial".


title: Final Fantasy XIII

text: Yoichi Wada, then-president of Square Enix, made his thoughts about the reception of the game known to Gamasutra. He said "some value it highly and some are not very happy with it". He added, "Should "Final Fantasy" become a new type of game or should "Final Fantasy" not become a new type of game? The customers have different opinions. It's very difficult to determine which way it should go."


title: Final Fantasy XIII

text: Square Enix released a Microsoft Windows port of the game in October 2014, where it was met with a more critical reception than the original versions. "PC Gamer"s Samuel Roberts, when reviewing the port, criticized not only the original gameplay, but heavily criticized the quality of the port itself, decrying the low resolution, limited graphical options and low framerate. He was especially critical of the time taken for the port given that an unofficial patch was produced by modder Peter Thoman within a day of release that fixed many of the issues. Michael McWhertor of Polygon also noted a similar critical response by consumers. A patch was released by Square Enix in December 2014, which was noted by Thoman as adding only the graphical features that his external patch had, with no other additions or performance improvements.


title: Final Fantasy XIII

text: At the Square Enix First Production Department Conference held on January 18, 2011, Square Enix announced that they were developing a direct sequel to "Final Fantasy XIII", entitled "Final Fantasy XIII-2", which they intended to build on the game's story and characters while taking on board the criticism and other feedback about the original. It was released on December 15, 2011, in Japan, January 31, 2012, in North America and February 3, 2012, in Europe, for both the PlayStation 3 and the Xbox 360. Motomu Toriyama and Yoshinori Kitase returned to their respective roles as director and producer. The game begins three years after the events of "Final Fantasy XIII", and features Serah and newcomer Noel as the main protagonists. "XIII-2" is the fifth sequel game in the "Final Fantasy" series, after "Final Fantasy X-2", "", "", and "". Most of the team returned again to create a second sequel entitled "", meant to wrap up the story of Lightning and the "Final Fantasy XIII" universe. The game was released in November 2013 in Japan and in February 2014 in North America and Europe. Toriyama stated in the "Ultimania Omega" companion book prior to "XIII-2"s announcement that he hoped to write a story "where Lightning ends up happy", though at the time Square Enix had no plans to make a sequel.


title: The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (film)

text: The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants is a 2005 American comedy-drama film directed by Ken Kwapis from a screenplay by Delia Ephron and Elizabeth Chandler, based on the 2001 novel of the same name by Ann Brashares. The film stars America Ferrera, Amber Tamblyn, Blake Lively, and Alexis Bledel. The story follows four best friends who buy a mysterious pair of pants that fits each of them despite their differing sizes. The girls share the pants equally as they spend their first summer apart.


text: "The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants" was released in the United States on June 1, 2005, by Warner Bros. Pictures. A sequel, "The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2" was released on August 6, 2008, while a third film is in development. A musical adaptation based on the film is also in development.


text: Lena Kaligaris, Tibby Rollins, Carmen Lowell, and Bridget Vreeland are teenagers from Bethesda, Maryland, who have been best friends their whole lives. The girls are about to spend their first summer apart: Lena is visiting her grandparents in Santorini, Greece; Bridget is going to soccer camp in Baja California, Mexico; Carmen is visiting her father in South Carolina; and Tibby is staying home. While shopping together, the girls find a pair of jeans that inexplicably fit them all perfectly. The girls decide to share the jeans equally over the summer, before parting the next day.


text: While wearing the Pants, Lena nearly drowns, but a local Greek boy, Kostas Dounas, rescues her. Lena later learns from her grandmother that her and Kostas' families are enemies. Kostas pursues Lena, saying that the dispute between their families has nothing to do with them. Lena initially rebuffs Kostas' advances, but eventually begins a secret relationship with him. Later, Kostas tells Lena that he loves her, but her family interrupts and drags her away before she can answer. Lena appeals to her grandfather, who agrees to allow her to see Kostas before he leaves for Athens.


text: Working at a discount department store, Tibby finds a young girl, Bailey Graffman, has fainted and calls an ambulance. Later, Bailey delivers the pants to Tibby's house after they are accidentally delivered to her home by mistake. Fascinated by Tibby's self-made film, Bailey appoints herself as Tibby's assistant. Initially annoyed, Tibby grows to accept Bailey, and learns that Bailey has leukemia. When Bailey again is taken to the hospital, Tibby avoids her for a while, but eventually visits her with the pants. She pleads with Bailey to take them, but Bailey says the pants have already worked their magic by bringing her and Tibby together. Tibby continues to spend time with Bailey in the hospital, until she eventually passes away overnight. She decides to make a film inspired by Bailey.


text: Carmen arrives in South Carolina, only to discover that her father, Al, is about to marry Lydia, who has two children around Carmen's age: Paul and Krista. They are blonde WASPs, unlike Carmen, who was raised by her Catholic, Puerto Rican mother. Although Carmen's father and step-family initially seem welcoming, they emotionally neglect her. Carmen feels uncomfortable with her father referring to Paul and Krista as his kids, and resents him being an enthusiastic, present father to them while he has usually been absent in her life. Carmen is embarrassed at a dress shop when she tries on the bridesmaid dress picked out for her for the wedding, which is too small and unflattering to her voluptuous figure. Angered when the saleswoman calls her, "the other one," Carmen shouts at Lydia and runs away. She eventually takes a taxi home and assumes her father and Lydia are out looking for her, but finds them happily enjoying dinner together in their dining room, apparently unconcerned that she's missing. Carmen throws a stone through their dining room window and returns to Maryland. When Carmen returns home, Tibby tries to help Carmen with her feelings toward her father. Carmen lashes out at Tibby, who leaves in tears, though they eventually reconcile. Tibby convinces Carmen to confront her father with a phone call, during which she finally reveals her feelings of neglect and abandonment. He apologizes sincerely, but Carmen tells him it isn't enough.


text: Arriving at soccer camp, Bridget develops a crush on coach Eric Richman. Despite relationships between coaches and campers being forbidden, Bridget flirts with Eric, and tries to seek his attention during games. When Bridget's turn with the Pants begins, she leads Eric to the beach at night where they have sex and she loses her virginity. Bridget becomes depressed afterwards, and isolates herself when she returns home. After hearing about what happened in a letter, Lena calls Carmen and Tibby, and they go to Bridget's house. Bridget worries she is like her mother, whose mood swings and mental issues culminated in deep depression and her suicide. However, Carmen and Tibby reassure Bridget that she is stronger than her mother and comfort her with happy memories of her mother. On his way back to Columbia University, Eric visits and apologizes to Bridget for his behavior and expresses his hope that she will give him a chance when she is older.


text: The girls meet Lena at the airport and drive to South Carolina to attend Carmen's father's wedding, despite Carmen's reluctance. Carmen's father publicly apologizes for neglecting her. Carmen accepts his apology and joins the blended family onstage for the ceremony.


text: Principal photography started on May 17, 2004. Filming began on the island of Santorini, Greece. Filming then continued in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico.


text: On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 77% based on 134 reviews, with an average rating of 6.7/10. The site's critical consensus reads "This adaptation of a beloved novel charms with its heartwarming tale of friendship and young adulthood; realistic portrayals of the lives of teenage girls lend the comedy drama sincerity, and may capture hearts outside the female-centric demographic." Metacritic gives the film a weighted average score of 66 out of 100 based on 34 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews".


text: Shondaland mentioned in its review of the film that Bridget's white underwear (seen in the trial scene at the beginning of the film) was iconic.


text: On its opening weekend, the film opened #5 at the box office with $9,833,340. As of November 14, 2008, the film has grossed $42,013,878 worldwide.


text: Demi Adejuyigbe has mentioned that he coerced director Malcolm D. Lee to have characters from the film appear as background cameos in . Though not confirmed, this was likely a joke given that Adejuyigbe comically suggested to "“decide how much of this anecdote is real.”"


text: The DVD and VHS were released in the US on October 11, 2005. The film has yet to be released on Blu-ray.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: Gabriela Beatriz Sabatini (; born 16 May 1970) is an Argentine-Italian former professional tennis player. A former world No. 3 in both singles and doubles, Sabatini was one of the leading players from the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s, amassing 41 titles. In singles, Sabatini won the 1990 US Open, the Tour Finals in 1988 and 1994, and was runner-up at Wimbledon 1991, the 1988 US Open, and the silver medalist at the 1988 Olympics. In doubles, Sabatini won Wimbledon in 1988 partnering Steffi Graf, and reached three French Open finals. Among Open era players who did not reach the world No. 1 ranking, Sabatini has the most wins over reigning world No. 1 ranked players. In 2006, she was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame and in 2018 "Tennis" Magazine ranked her as the 20th-greatest female player of the preceding 50 years.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: Sabatini was born 16 May 1970 in Buenos Aires, Argentina, to Osvaldo and Beatriz Garofalo Sabatini. Her father was an executive in General Motors. Her elder brother, Osvaldo, is an actor and producer.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: Sabatini started playing tennis at the age of six, and won her first tournament at eight. In 1983, age 13, she became the youngest player ever to win the Orange Bowl in Miami, Florida. She won the girls' singles at the 1984 French Open and the US Open girls' doubles with fellow Argentinian Mercedes Paz. Sabatini reached world No. 1 in the junior rankings that year and was named 1984 Junior World Champion by the International Tennis Federation.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: Sabatini stated that she deliberately lost matches in her youth to avoid having to do on-court interviews and therefore avoid media attention. She said that her shyness had been a major problem, and she thought she had to speak on-court after playing in the final of a tournament; so, she would lose in the semifinals.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: In 1985, aged 15 years and three weeks, Sabatini became one of the youngest-ever players to reach the semifinals of the French Open, where she lost to Chris Evert. She won her first WTA Tour singles title later that year in Tokyo. She first entered the world's top ten (at #10) in September 1985, and ended the year ranked number 12. She received the WTA Newcomer of the Year award.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: Sabatini reached the semifinals of Wimbledon in 1986, losing to Martina Navratilova, before winning her second WTA title in Buenos Aires, She re-entered the world's top ten in September 1986 and would remain there for 508 consecutive weeks until May 1996.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: Sabatini reached the semifinals of the 1987 French Open, and reached the final of the 1987 WTA Tour Championships, losing to Steffi Graf both times. She also won three WTA titles, including defeating world No. 4, Pam Shriver in Brighton.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: In February 1988, Sabatini entered the top five in rankings, and would remain there uninterrupted until August 1993. Having reached her third French Open semifinal, she then reached her first Grand Slam singles final at the US Open, where she lost to Graf in three sets. Sabatini represented Argentina in the 1988 Summer Olympics held in Seoul and was selected to carry her country's flag in the opening ceremony. She went on to win the silver medal in the women's singles competition, losing to Graf in the final. Sabatini teamed-up with Graf to win the women's doubles title at Wimbledon that year. At the end of 1988, Sabatini won her first WTA Tour Championships, without dropping a set.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: In 1989, Sabatini reached seven tournament finals and won four titles, including the Miami Open (defeating Evert in the final). In defeating world No. 2, Martina Navratilova, and No. 1, Steffi Graf, to obtain the Amelia Island title, she became only the fifth player in Open Era history to defeat both the No. 1 and 2 ranked players at the same tournament. She also reached the semifinals of the Australian Open and US Open Grand Slam tournaments.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: At the Australian Open, Sabatini sprained her ankle during a third-round match while one set up, and had to be taken off Centre Court in a wheelchair. 80 minutes later, in the following match, Mark Woodforde also sprained his ankle on the same court and was forced to retire by wheelchair too. Multiple players had complained of the dangers of playing on the Rebound Ace hard court surface used at the tournament, which they claimed became very sticky – and therefore potentially dangerous – in very hot conditions. Sabatini was sidelined for six weeks by the injury, returning to the tour in mid-March and winning her first tournament back – the Virginia Slims of Florida – without the loss of a set.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: She reached the semi-finals of Wimbledon, losing to eventual champion Martina Navratilova, in straight sets.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: At the US Open, Sabatini progressed to her second Grand Slam final where she defeated world No. 1 Graf in straight sets 6–2, 7–6 to win the title, having saved two set points against her while 5-6 down in the second set. She credited her win with being more aggressive and coming to the net whenever she could to attack Graf's shorter balls. Sabatini also beat Graf in the semifinals of the WTA Championships in Madison Square Garden later that year, losing in the final to Monica Seles, 6–4, 5–7, 3–6, 6–4, 6–2. It was the first five-set match to be played on the women's tour since 1901.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: Sabatini won five tournaments in the first half of the year. She beat three top five players (Graf, Navratilova and Fernandez) on her way to winning the title in Tokyo, and beat Graf on three further occasions in Boca Raton, Key Biscayne and Amelia Island. In the Italian Open final, Sabatini defeated world no. 1 Seles for the loss of just five games. She reached the semifinals at Roland Garros (saving two match points in defeating Jana Novotna in the quarter finals) and then her third Grand Slam singles final at Wimbledon, where she lost to Graf 4–6, 6–3, 6–8 (having served for the match twice). Sabatini came close to attaining the world No. 1 ranking in 1991, but was narrowly denied by Graf and then Monica Seles. All three players' rankings were within a few points of each other for much of the year. Her year was capped by receiving the WTA Most Improved Player of the Year award.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: Sabatini reached eight finals and won five titles, including her fourth Italian Open (where she beat world No. 1 Seles in the final again), Amelia Island (defeating Graf in the final) and Hilton Head. She also reached the semifinal stage at three of the four grand slams:- the Australian Open, French Open and Wimbledon; and a quarterfinal at the US Open.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: At the Australian Open, Sabatini reached the semifinals, saving three match points in the quarterfinals against Mary Pierce to defeat her 4–6, 7–6, 6–0, before losing to eventual champion, Seles. She reached consecutive finals at the Italian Open and German Open during the clay-court season. At the French Open in June, Sabatini lost to Mary Jo Fernandez in the quarterfinals 8–10 in the final set, in what was – at the time – the third longest match in Open Era tennis, having led 5–1 in the second set. Sabatini also reached the quarterfinals at Wimbledon, and at the US Open where she lost to Graf in three sets.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: That year in May, following the stabbing attack of Monica Seles in the WTA Hamburg tournament, a vote among the top players was held by the tour organisers to decide whether Seles should be allowed to have her world no. 1 ranking protected while recovering from the knife attack. Of the 17 players voting, all players voted against protecting Seles' ranking, apart from Sabatini (who abstained). Despite the vote result, Seles was eventually granted a joint No. 1 ranking (with Graf) upon her return to the tour two years later.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: In 1994, Sabatini reached the finals of Amelia Island and Strasbourg, and the semifinals of both the Australian Open and US Open. Across 15 consecutive Grand Slam events from Wimbledon 1990 to Australian Open 1994, she did not lose before the quarterfinal stage; this was the third longest streak of consecutive quarterfinal Grand Slam appearances in women's tennis ever (behind Graf and Navratilova tied on 19). In November, Sabatini defeated Lindsay Davenport in the final of the WTA Championships in New York to win her second title at that tournament. In the first round, she beat world No. 6, Martina Navratilova, in what was Navratilova's last match before retirement.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: Sabatini won the title at the Sydney International, defeating Davenport in the final in straight sets. As well as the reaching a record seventh final in the Amelia Island Championships and her third final at the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix, she also reached the quarterfinals of both the French Open and Wimbledon, and the semifinals of the US Open (where she lost to eventual champion Graf 4–6, 6–7). Their semifinal was the 40th and final match between the pair, in which Graf led 29–11. Sabatini's 11 wins meant she had defeated Graf more times than any other player ever managed to defeat her.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: Sabatini missed several months of the season due to a pulled stomach muscle injury. In New York in October, she announced her retirement from professional tennis. At the end of the year, she received the WTA Diamond Aces Award (given to the player considered to have done the most to promote tennis both on and off the court).


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: From 1986 until her five-month injury absence in 1996, Sabatini spent 508 consecutive weeks within the world's top 10. This remains the fourth longest top-10 streak among any player in WTA-tour history. She spent 312 of those weeks in the world's top five, and finished six consecutive seasons with a top-5 ranking. Sabatini reached the semifinal stage or better in Grand Slam championships on 18 occasions in singles and 14 times in doubles, and reached at least one Grand Slam singles semifinal for 11 consecutive years. She defeated the reigning world No. 1 on ten occasions (Graf seven times, Seles twice and Navratilova once) during her career.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: Sabatini won the Diamond Konex Award in 2000 as the most distinguished "Sportsperson of the Decade" in Argentina, and in July 2006 she was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: In the late 1980s, Sabatini launched a line of fragrances after partnering with the German perfume company Mülhens. Her signature scent debuted in 1989. Since retiring, she has continued to promote her lines of perfumes.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: In 1992, Sabatini became the first ever tennis player to have a rose named after her, an orange-red bloom.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: Great American Doll Company created a doll in Sabatini's likeness in 1994, dressed in tennis attire. That same year, Sabatini published a motivational book entitled "My Story".


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: In 2003, she obtained Italian citizenship "jus sanguinis" through her paternal great-grandfather – David Sabatini – who was born in Potenza Picena in Central Italy, and immigrated to Argentina at the end of the 19th century with his wife Rosa Vivani.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: A statue of Sabatini was unveiled in central Buenos Aires by Mauricio Macri in 2014. Within weeks of its unveiling, however, the bronze-coloured racket was stolen from the statue's grip. The statue is placed alongside memorials to other Argentinian sports stars including Lionel Messi, Diego Maradona, Guillermo Vilas and Roberto de Vicenzo.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: Sabatini was awarded the International Club's prestigious Jean Borotra Sportsmanship Award in 2017 in recognition of both the sportsmanship she demonstrated throughout her career, and for her charitable projects post-retirement. She received the award from Rod Laver at the 2018 Wimbledon Championships.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: In 2019, the ITF presented Sabatini with its highest accolade, the Philippe Chatrier Award, for her achievements both during her tennis career and post-retirement charity work, specifically her work involving UNICEF, UNESCO, the Special Olympics, and as an 'Athlete Role Model' at the 2018 Youth Olympic Games.


title: Gabriela Sabatini

text: Through her brother Osvaldo, Sabatini's sister-in-law is Venezuelan actress Catherine Fulop and her niece is Argentinian singer and actress Oriana Sabatini. Sabatini resides in Buenos Aires, Boca Raton (Florida) and Pfäffikon in Switzerland.


title: Pad thai

text: Pad thai, phat thai, or phad thai ( or ; , , ISO: "p̄hạd thịy", , 'Thai stir fry'), is a stir-fried rice noodle dish commonly served as a street food in Thailand as part of the country's cuisine. It is typically made with rice noodles, shrimp, peanuts, a scrambled egg, and bean sprouts, among other vegetables. The ingredients are fried in a wok.


title: Pad thai

text: Pad thai is made with rehydrated dried rice noodles with some tapioca flour mixed in, which are stir fried with eggs and chopped firm tofu, flavored with tamarind juice, fish sauce, dried shrimp, garlic or shallots, red chili pepper and palm sugar, and served with lime wedges and often chopped roasted peanuts. It may contain other vegetables like bean sprouts, garlic chives, pickled radishes or turnips, and raw banana flowers. It may also contain fresh shrimp, crab, squid, chicken or other fish or meat.


title: Pad thai

text: Many of the ingredients are provided on the side as condiments, such as the red chili pepper, lime wedges, roasted peanuts, bean sprouts, spring onion and other miscellaneous fresh vegetables. Vegetarian versions may substitute soy sauce for the fish sauce and omit the shrimp entirely.


title: Pad thai

text: Though stir-fried rice noodles were introduced to Thailand from China centuries ago, the dish "pad thai" was invented in the mid-20th century.


title: Pad thai

text: Author Mark Padoongpatt maintains that pad thai is "...not this traditional, authentic, going back hundreds of years dish. It was actually created in the 1930s in Thailand. The dish was created because Thailand was focused on nation-building. So this dish was created using Chinese noodles and called it pad Thai as a way to galvanize nationalism."


title: Pad thai

text: Another explanation of pad thai's provenance holds that, during World War II, Thailand suffered a rice shortage due to the war and floods. To reduce domestic rice consumption, the Thai government under Prime Minister Plaek Phibunsongkhram promoted consumption of noodles instead. His government promoted rice noodles and helped to establish the identity of Thailand. As a result, a new noodle called "sen chan" (named after Chanthaburi Province) was created. Pad thai has since become one of Thailand's national dishes. Today, some food vendors add pork or chicken (although the original recipe did not contain pork because of the government's perception that pork was a Chinese meat). Some food vendors still use the original recipe.


title: Pad thai

text: Thai-American food writer Kasma Loha-unchit disputes the claim of a native Thai origin and suggests that pad thai was actually invented by the Chinese immigrants themselves, because "for a dish to be so named in its own country clearly suggests an origin that isn't Thai". Noodle cookery in most Southeast Asian countries was introduced by the wave of immigrants from southern China settling in the region the past century. Loha-unchit states that the ethnic Chinese of Thailand were aware that "Central Thai people were very fond of the combination of hot, sour, sweet and salty flavors, they added these to their stir-fried noodle dishes and gave it a fusion name, much like Western chefs today are naming their dishes Thai this or Thai that on their East-West menus."


title: Pad thai

text: At least as early as 2001, the Thai government used pad thai as a form of "soft power," creating "the Global Thai Restaurant Company, Ltd., in an effort to establish at least 3,000 Thai restaurants worldwide." The plan included numerous government agencies and resulted in nearly tripling the number of Thai restaurants globally in seventeen years.


title: Anu

text: Anu ( , from 𒀭 "an" “Sky”, “Heaven”) or Anum, originally An ( ), was the divine personification of the sky, king of the gods, and ancestor of many of the deities in ancient Mesopotamian religion. He was regarded as a source of both divine and human kingship, and opens the enumerations of deities in many Mesopotamian texts. At the same time, his role was largely passive, and he was not commonly worshiped. It is sometimes proposed that the Eanna temple located in Uruk originally belonged to him, rather than Inanna, but while he is well attested as one of its divine inhabitants, there is no evidence that the main deity of the temple ever changed, and Inanna was already associated with it in the earliest sources. After it declined, a new theological system developed in the same city under Seleucid rule, resulting in Anu being redefined as an active deity. As a result he was actively worshiped by inhabitants of the city in the final centuries of history of ancient Mesopotamia.


title: Anu

text: Multiple traditions regarding the identity of Anu's spouse existed, though three of them—Ki, Urash, and Antu—were at various points in time equated with each other, and all three represented earth, similar to how he represented heaven. In a fourth tradition, more sparsely attested, his wife was the goddess Nammu instead. In addition to listing his spouses and children, god lists also often enumerated his various ancestors, such as Anshar or Alala. A variant of one such family tree formed the basis of the "Enūma Eliš".


title: Anu

text: Anu briefly appears in the Akkadian "Epic of Gilgamesh", in which his daughter Ishtar (the Akkadian counterpart of Inanna) persuades him to give her the Bull of Heaven so that she may send it to attack Gilgamesh. The incident results in the death of Enkidu. In another myth, Anu summons the mortal hero Adapa before him for breaking the wing of the south wind. Anu orders for Adapa to be given the food and water of immortality, which Adapa refuses, having been warned beforehand by Enki that Anu will offer him the food and water of death. In the Hurrian myths about Kumarbi, known chiefly from their Hittite translations, Anu is a former ruler of the gods, who was overthrown by Kumarbi, who bit off his genitals and gave birth to the weather god Teshub. It is possible that this narrative was later the inspiration for the castration of Ouranos in Hesiod's "Theogony". It has also been proposed that in the Hellenistic period Anu might have been identified with Zeus, though this remains uncertain.


title: Anu

text: Anu was a divine representation of the sky, as indicated by his name, which simply means "sky" in Sumerian. In Akkadian, it was spelled as Anu, and was written either logographically (AN) or syllabically ("a-nu(m)"). In Sumerian texts, unlike the names of other deities, his was never prefaced by the dingir sign, referred to as the "divine determinative" in modern literature, since it would result in unnecessary repetition, as the same sign was also read as "an". In addition to referring to sky and heaven and to Anu, the same sign could also be read as "dingir" or "ilu", the generic term "god" in, respectively, Sumerian and Akkadian. As the number 60 was associated with him, the corresponding numeral could represent his name, and in esoteric texts by extension also the other readings of the sign DINGIR.


title: Anu

text: Anu was regarded as the supreme god, and the major god lists, such as "An = Anum," place him on top of the pantheon. He could be described as the king of the gods, and was believed to be the source of all legitimate power, who bestowed the right to rule upon gods and kings alike. The highest god in the pantheon was said to possess the "anûtu" or "anuti" ("a-nu-ti"), which means "heavenly power" or more literally Anuship. In the Babylonian "Enûma Eliš", the gods praise Marduk, shouting "Your word is Anu!"


title: Anu

text: Although Anu was a very important deity, his nature was often ambiguous and ill-defined. The number of myths focusing on him is small and he was only rarely actively worshiped. His position has therefore been described as that of a "figurehead" and "otiose deity" by Assyriologist Paul-Alain Beaulieu. Wilfred G. Lambert characterized his position as head of the pantheon as "always somewhat nominal" and noted that "Enlil in practice wielded greater power" according to the Mesopotamians. Beaulieu similarly states that functionally the active head god was Enlil and later Marduk in Babylonia and Ashur in Assyria, not Anu. Evidence from Lagash indicates that at least in the Early Dynastic period, during the reign of Eannatum and Entemena, it was Enlil, rather than Anu, who was the head of the pantheon of this city, though later offering lists provide evidence on the contrary, possibly indicating a change occurred during the reign of either the Sargonic dynasty or Gudea. Xianhua Wang points out that in the Early Dynastic period, the rulers who mention Anu in the inscriptions and refer to him as "lugal kur-kur", "king of the lands," seem to be connected with either Ur or Uruk, while elsewhere the same epithet designates Enlil instead. A text known from copies from Shuruppak and Ebla only refers to Anu as the divine "king of Uruk." In later inscriptions from the period of the Old Babylonian Empire, Enlil could be mentioned both alongside Anu or on his own as the head of the pantheon. A trinity consisting of both of them and Ea is also attested. Only in Uruk in the final centuries of the first millennium BCE a change occurred, and Anu was reinvented by theologians as an active god.


title: Anu

text: In Mesopotamian astronomy, the sky was divided into three zones, with the stars closest to the pole belonging to Enlil and those close to the equator to Ea. The stars located between these two zones were the domain of Anu. All three were referred to as the "Ways" of the respective deities. Astronomer John G. Rogers assumes that the boundaries of each "Way" were at 17°N and 17°S. The division is best attested in the astronomical treatise MUL.APIN. The date of its composition is unknown, though it is known that it is more recent than the Old Babylonian period, and the oldest reference to the tripartite division of the sky comes from a document from the thirteenth century BCE, a version of the so-called "Prayer to the Gods of the Night", whose oldest copies do not mention this concept yet.


title: Anu

text: In Seleucid Uruk, Anu's astral role was extended further, and in a text composed in year 71 of the Seleucid era (216/215 BCE) he is described as responsible for the entire firmament. Furthermore, two circumpolar stars started to be called the "Great Anu and Antu of Heaven," and received offerings as if they were deities. They typically appear alongside the other seven major celestial bodies which were known to Mesopotamian astronomers in the late first millennium BCE: the sun, the moon, and the planets Nebēru (Jupiter), Dilbat (Venus), Šiḫṭu (Mercury), Kayamānu (Saturn), and Ṣalbatānu (Mars).


title: Anu

text: Anu almost never appears in Mesopotamian artwork and has no known recognizable anthropomorphic iconography. References to him holding typical symbols of divine kingship, such as a scepter and a ring-shaped object, are known from textual sources.


title: Anu

text: A text from the Kassite period explains that Anu's symbol was a horned crown on a pedestal. It is attested on some "kudurru" (boundary stones), where it is typically present in the upper half of the decoration, below the symbols of Ishtar, Shamash and Sin, who were depicted on the very top of such monuments due to representing celestial bodies. Anu was also depicted in the form of a horned crown in Neo-Assyrian reliefs. According to Andrew R. George, references to the "seat" of a deity known from various topographical texts from both Babylonia and Assyria likely also refer to a representation in the form of an emblem placed on a pedestal. It has been pointed out that Anu's symbolic depictions were identical to Enlil's. A similar symbol could also represent Assur in the Neo-Assyrian period. All three of these gods could be depicted in this form in the same reliefs.


title: Anu

text: Ki, "earth," is well attested as Anu's spouse. Her name was commonly written without a divine determinative, and she was usually not regarded as a personified goddess. Another of Anu's spouses was Urash. According to Frans Wiggermann, she is his most commonly attested wife. She is well attested starting with the Sargonic period and continues to appear as a wife of Anu often until the Old Babylonian period. A different, male, deity named Urash served as the tutelary god of Dilbat. Wiggermann proposes that while Ki, as generally agreed, represented earth as a cosmogonic element, Urash was a divine representation of arable land. He suggests translating her name as "tilth," though its etymology and meaning continue to be a matter of debate. A single Neo-Assyrian god list known from three copies appears to combine Ki and Urash into a single deity, "ki-uraš". An early incorrect reading of this entry was "ki-ib", which early Assyriologist Daniel David Luckenbill assumed to be a reference to the Egyptian god Geb, an identification now regarded as impossible.


title: Anu

text: The goddess Antu is also attested as a wife of Anu. Her name is etymologically an Akkadian feminine form of Anu. The god list "An = Anum" equates her with Ki, while a lexical text from the Old Babylonian period – with Urash. There is evidence that like the latter, she could be considered a goddess associated with the earth. She is already attested in the third millennium BCE, possibly as early as in the Early Dynastic period in a god list from Abu Salabikh, though no references to her are known from Uruk from before the first millennium BCE, and even in the Neo-Babylonian period she only appears in a single letter. However, she is attested as Anu's wife in documents from the Seleucid period from this city, and at that point in time became its lead goddess alongside her husband.


title: Anu

text: An inscription on a votive figurine of king Lugal-kisalsi (or Lugal-giparesi), who ruled over Uruk and Ur in the twenty fourth century BCE, refers to Nammu as wife of Anu. Julia Krul proposes that this was a traditional pairing in Early Dynastic Uruk, but according to Frans Wiggermann no other direct references to Nammu as Anu's wife are known. A possible exception is an Old Babylonian incantation which might refer to her as "pure one of An," but this attestation is uncertain.


title: Anu

text: In older literature, an epithet of Ashratum was often translated as "bride of An," but this is now considered to be a mistake. The Sumerian term used in it, "é-gi-a", equivalent of Akkadian "kallatum", meant both "daughter-in-law" and "bride," but the latter meaning relied on the social practice of fathers picking the brides of their sons. As an epithet of goddesses, it denotes their status as a daughter-in-law of a specific deity. For example, Aya was often called "kallatum" due to her position as the daughter in law of Sin and wife of his son Shamash.


title: Anu

text: A goddess named Ninursala is described as Anu's "dam-bànda", possibly to be translated as "concubine," in the god list "An = Anum". According to Antoine Cavigneaux and Manfred Krebernik, she is also attested in an Old Babylonian god list from Mari.


title: Anu

text: Many deities were regarded as Anu's descendants, and he could be called "the father of the great gods." It has been argued that Anu's primary role in the Sumerian pantheon was as an ancestor figure, and that the term Anunna (also Anunnaki, Anunna-anna), which referred to various Mesopotamian deities collectively, means "offspring of Anu" and designates specific gods as particularly prominent.


title: Anu

text: Ishkur (Adad), the weather god, was consistently regarded as a son of Anu. While some literary texts may refer to Enlil as his father instead, this view was less common and is no longer attested in any sources later than the Old Babylonian period. The only source to directly name his mother places Urash in this role. Another god frequently regarded as Anu's son was Enki. Nammu was the mother of Enki in the local tradition of Eridu and in the myth "Enki and Ninmah", but a hymn from the reign of Ishme-Dagan confirms that a tradition in which his mother was Urash instead also existed. In texts dedicated to Ishkur, he and Enki could be referred to as twins, but no analogous epithet can be found in compositions which focus on the latter god, according to Daniel Schwmer because due to his higher rank in the pantheon he would not benefit from being called the brother of a comparatively lower ranked deity.


title: Anu

text: Enlil could be called a son of Anu, as already attested in an inscription of Lugalzagesi. Xianhua Wang proposes that this development was meant to reconcile a northern tradition, in which the king of the gods was Enlil, with a southern one, where the same role was played by Anu, though even in the south Lagash seemingly belonged to this proposed Enlil tradition. Another source which presents Enlil as Anu's son is the myth "Enki and the World Order", which also specifies that he was the older brother of Enki. However, Enlil's parentage was variable. The tradition in which his ancestors were the so-called Enki-Ninki deities is now considered conventional by Assyriologists, though materials pertaining to it are difficult to interpret. Enki, the ancestor of Enlil, is not to be confused with the god Enki, as indicated by different spelling of their names in cuneiform. In yet another tradition, Enlil's father was Lugaldukuga, but the texts placing him in this role are relatively late. It is first attested in the god list "An = Anum", most likely composed in the Kassite period.


title: Anu

text: Amurru (Martu) was universally regarded as a son of Anu. Dietz-Otto Edzard argued that the fact he was not regarded as a son of Enlil instead might stem from his secondary role in Mesopotamian religion. It is also possible that the comparisons between him and Ishkur contributed to the development of this genealogy. It has additionally been argued that a variant writing of Amurru's name, AN.MARTU (AN.AN.MAR.TU) represents a conjoined deity consisting of Amurru and Anu. However, according to Paul-Alain Beaulieu it most likely should simply be read as the Akkadian phrase "Il Amurrim", "the god of Amurru," as indicated by a Hurrian translation known from a bilingual text from Emar, "e-ni a-mu-ri-we", which has the same meaning.


title: Anu

text: Texts from the reign of Rim-Sîn I and Samsu-iluna identify the love goddess Nanaya as a daughter of Anu. This notion is also present in an inscription of Esarhaddon. Paul-Alain Beaulieu speculates that Nanaya developed in the context of a local theological system in which Anu and Inanna were viewed as a couple, and that she was initially regarded as their daughter. However, as noted by Olga Drewnowska-Rymarz, direct references to Nanaya as the daughter of Inanna are not common, and it is possible this epithet was not treated literally, but rather as an indication of closeness between them. Furthermore, Nanaya could also be regarded as a daughter of the male Urash, and was sometimes specifically called his firstborn daughter.


title: Anu

text: In late sources, Nisaba could be called a daughter of Anu. However, as noted by Wilfred G. Lambert at least one text "seems to imply a desire not to have Anu as Nisaba's father," and instead makes her the daughter of Irḫan, in this context identified with Ea and understood as a cosmic river, "father of the gods of the universe."


title: Anu

text: While Inanna (Ishtar) could be regarded as the daughter of Anu and Antu, the view that she was a daughter of Nanna and Ningal is agreed to be the most commonly attested tradition regarding her parentage. While the "Standard Babylonian" version of the "Epic of Gilgamesh", an astronomical text and the "Hymn to the Queen of Nippur" refer to her directly as Anu's daughter, according to Paul-Alain Beaulieu it is not impossible that these statements do not reflect parentage but merely indirect descent, with an implied genealogy in which Anu was the father of Enlil, grandfather of Nanna and great-grandfather of Inanna. Furthermore, the hymn in mention also addresses her as a daughter of the moon god.


title: Anu

text: Ishtaran was at least sometimes described as a son of Anu and Urash, and as a result the Old Babylonian Nippur god list associates him with Uruk. He also could be referred to as "Anu Rabu" (AN.GAL), "the great Anu," but Wouter Henkelman proposes this epithet is instead a sign that a connection existed between him and the Elamite god Napirisha, whose name was written with the same combination of cuneiform signs. It is possible that in the late first millennium BCE attempts at syncretizing Ishtaran and Anu were made during a period of cooperation between the theologians from Uruk, Nippur and Der, but direct evidence is presently lacking.


title: Anu

text: Further deities attested as children of Anu include the medicine goddesses Ninisina and Ninkarrak (also directly identified as daughters of his wife Urash), Bau (who could be called his firstborn daughter), the weaver goddess Uttu (in a single source), the messenger god Papsukkal, Geshtinanna (in a hymn of Shulgi, which also mentions Urash as her mother), the fire god Gibil (and through association with him also Nuska), Šiḫṭu, the divine representation of the planet Mercury (in Seleucid Uruk), and possibly the male Urash. Whether Anu was the father of Shara in the tradition of his cult center, Umma, cannot be determined with a certainty, as the most direct reference, the phrase "aia DINGIR ù-TU-zu" in a hymn, has two possible translations: "your father An who engendered you," or "your divine father who engendered you." Additionally, some references to Anu as the father of a specific deity might be metaphorical or indirect, as in the case of Nanna (typically a son of Enlil and Ninlil) or Nungal.


title: Anu

text: Anu could also be regarded as the father of various demons. Lamashtu was viewed his daughter. A group of seven, eight or nine Asakku demons called "the sons of Anu" is also known. In a text referred to as the "Nippur Compendium" by modern researchers, Latarak is identified both as an Asakku and as a son of Anu. The "Epic of Erra" describes the Sebitti as his creations, subsequently given to the eponymous god as weapons.


title: Anu

text: The earliest texts do not discuss Anu's origin, and his preeminence is simply assumed. In later traditions, his father was usually Anshar, whose spouse was Kishar. Another tradition most likely regarded Alala and Belili as his parents. A larger group of his ancestors, arranged into multiple generations, is known from mythological and scholarly sources. Wilfred G. Lambert coined the term "Theogony of Anu" to refer to arrangements of these deities collectively. At least five versions are known from incantations, though in three out of five the first pair are Duri and Dari, and the last – Alala and Belili. A slightly different version is known from the god list "An = Anum", though there are differences between individual copies as well. Lambert proposes that initially at least two different traditions existed, but they were later combined into a list patterned on those associated with Enlil. At least in some cases, long lists of divine ancestors were meant to help avoid the implications of divine incest, which were hard to reconcile with strong incest taboos attested from various periods of Mesopotamian history.


title: Anu

text: Duri and Dari likely represented time understood as a primary force in creation, and their names are derived from an Akkadian phrase meaning "ever and ever." The pairing of Alala and Belili was most likely based entirely on both of their names being iterative, and elsewhere they occur in unrelated roles independently from each other. Further attested pairs of deities regarded as ancestors of Anu include Egur and Gara, whose character is unknown, Lahmu and Lahamu, derived from the name of a type of aquatic mythical creature, two deities whose names were written logographically as ALAM possibly representing another of the known pairs or associated with the underworld, and Enurulla and Ninurulla, the "lord" and "lady" of the "primeval city," whose inclusion in Anu's family tree most likely reflected "the importance of the city in ancient Mesopotamian thought." The genealogy of gods presented in the "Enūma Eliš" is a derivative of the lists of Anu's ancestors from earlier sources. The pairs listed in this composition are Apsu and Tiamat, Lahmu and Lahamu, and Anshar and Kishar. The first of them is not attested in any earlier sources.


title: Anu

text: The god list "An = Anum" refers to Nammu as the "mother who gave birth to Heaven and Earth," "ama-tu-an-ki", but as noted by Frans Wiggermann, the terms "an" and "ki" were most likely understood collectively in this case. A similar reference is known from an exorcism formula assumed to predate the Middle Babylonian period. There is no indication that this act of creation involved a second deity acting as Nammu's spouse. She appears in a variant of Anu's genealogy in "An = Anum", though as remarked by Lambert, she was "pushed out (...) into a kind of appendix." Due to the sparse attestations of Nammu it is assumed today that she "was not generally acknowledged outside Eridu."


title: Anu

text: A single prayer to Papsukkal might allude to a tradition in which Anu was a son of Enmesharra. In another text, Anu and Enlil receive their positions from this deity, not necessarily peacefully.


title: Anu

text: Due to his connection with various ancestral deities, Anu could be occasionally associated with the underworld. One Assyrian explanatory text mentions Antu making funerary offerings for him. However, according to Julia Krul, it is impossible to tell how widespread the recognition of this aspect of his character was, and broad statements about Anu being outright identified with deities of the underworld in the theology of Seleucid Uruk should be generally avoided.


title: Anu

text: While it is often assumed that Hurrian Alalu was the father of Anu, similar to his Mesopotamian counterpart Alala, and that Kumarbi was in turn viewed as Anu's son, it has also been argued that two separate lineages of gods appear in the prologue of the Kumarbi myth, and therefore that Alalu and Anu should not be regarded as father and son in Hurrian sources. Kumarbi is directly referred to as Alalu's "seed" in the "Song of Kummarbi". He also addresses himself as "Alalu's son" in another myth belonging to the same cycle, "Song of Ḫedammu". The order of deities in international treaties also supports the notion that Alalu and Kumarbi belong to the same line, but Anu does not. Hittitologist Gary Beckman notes that the two lines were seemingly only united with the birth of the new generation of gods (Teshub, Tashmishu and others), a result of Kumarbi's castration of Anu, which resulted in a "burden," Anu's seed, being placed inside him. The process is poetically compared to production of bronze from tin and copper.


title: Anu

text: Ninshubur, the "archetypal vizier of the gods," was primarily associated with Inanna, but she could also be described as the sukkal (divine vizier, attendant deity) of Anu. The association between her and Anu is attested from the reign of Third Dynasty of Ur onward. Her role as a popular intercessory deity in Sumerian religion was derived from her position as a servant of major deities, which resulted in the belief that she was capable of mediating with her masters, both with Inanna and with Anu, on behalf of human petitioners. Another deity who could be placed in the same role was Ilabrat. In texts from the second millennium BCE, Ninshubur and Ilabrat coexisted and in at least some cases Ninshubur's name, treated as masculine, was a logographic spelling of Ilabrat's, for example in Mari in personal names. It has been proposed that the variance in Ninshubur's gender is related to syncretism with him. The goddess Amasagnudi could be regarded as Anu's sukkal too, as attested in a single Old Babylonian lexical text. Kakka is also attested in this role in a few cases, though in the "Enūma Eliš" he is the sukkal of Anshar instead.


title: Anu

text: In later periods, other sukkals of Anu were eclipsed by Papsukkal, originally associated with the god Zababa, whose rise was likely rooted simply in the presence of the word sukkal in his name. In the context of the so-called "antiquarian theology" relying largely on god lists, which developed in Uruk under Achaemenid and Seleucid rule, he was fully identified with Ninshubur and thus became Anu's sukkal and one of the eighteen major deities of the city. He was not worshiped in this city earlier.


title: Anu

text: According to a "Šurpu" commentary, Anu's Elamite counterpart was Jabru. However, according to the god list "An = Anum", a god bearing the name Yabnu ("ia-ab-na") was the "Enlil of Elam." Wilfred G. Lambert concluded that Jabru and Yabnu should be considered two spellings of the same name. While Jabru is described as an Elamite god in Mesopotamian sources, no known Elamite texts mention him.


title: Anu

text: In the god list "Anšar = Anum", one of the names of Anu is Hamurnu, derived from the Hurrian word referring to heaven. However, while Hurrians did worship earth and heaven, they did not regard them as personified deities. Furthermore, Anu appears under his own name in Hurrian mythology.


title: Anu

text: While Robert Monti argues that the Canaanites seem to have ascribed Anu's attributes to El, no equivalents of Anu were actually present in the pantheons of various ancient Syrian states. Both the head of the hinterland pantheon, Dagan, and the head of the coastal pantheon, El, were regarded as analogous to Enlil, rather than Anu. Monti additionally describes a god he refers to as "Shamem" as the most direct equivalent to Anu in the Canaanite pantheon and as a personification of the sky, but this name was a title of the weather god Baal which developed into a separate deity, Baalshamin, and Aramaic texts indicate that he was viewed as an equivalent of Hadad, rather than Anu, further east.


title: Anu

text: It it sometimes proposed that in the Hellenistic period Anu was identified with the Greek god Zeus, but most Assyriologists consider this possibility to be uncertain, one exception being Eleanor Robson. Julia Krul points out authors who propose it do not clarify whether they mean if "the Seleucids made such an equation themselves (...), or that the Urukean priest-scholars convinced their new kings of the similarity between the two gods (...), or even that they genuinely believed that Anu and Zeus were the same." No direct evidence of any of these possibilities is available. According to Walter Burkert, a researcher of ancient Greek religion, direct literary parallels exist between Anu and the Zeus. According to him, the scene from Tablet VI of the "Epic of Gilgamesh" in which Ishtar comes before Anu after being rejected by Gilgamesh and complains to her mother Antu, but is mildly rebuked by Anu, is directly paralleled by a scene from Book V of the "Iliad". In this scene, Aphrodite, who Burkert regards as the later Greek development of Ishtar, is wounded by the Greek hero Diomedes while trying to save her son Aeneas. She flees to Mount Olympus, where she cries to her mother Dione, is mocked by her sister Athena, and is mildly rebuked by her father Zeus. Not only is the narrative parallel significant, but so is the fact that Dione's name is a feminization of Zeus's own, just as "Antu" is a feminine form of "Anu". Dione does not appear throughout the rest of the "Iliad", in which Zeus's consort is instead the goddess Hera. Burkert therefore concludes that "Dione" is clearly a calque of Antu.


title: Anu

text: An equivalence between Anu and Ahura Mazda has been proposed based on the assumption that non-Perian subjects of the Achaemenid Empire might have viewed the latter simply as a sky god.


title: Anu

text: Anu was chiefly associated with the city of Uruk, where he was one of the major deities next to Inanna (Ishtar) and Nanaya, but before the end of the Neo-Babylonian period his cult had a smaller scope than theirs. It is often assumed that the so-called "White Temple," which dates back to the Uruk IV period (3500–3100 BCE) was his original cult center, and it is even sometimes referred to as the "Anu ziggurat" in modern literature. However, there is no evidence that Anu was actually worshiped in this structure. His presence in the oldest texts remains a matter of debate, as it is uncertain if the cuneiform sign DINGIR present in them does not necessarily denote a specific god. Paul-Alain Beaulieu concludes that whether he appears in these sources is unprovable.


title: Anu

text: There is also no indication that Eanna, "House of Heaven" (Sumerian: e-anna; Cuneiform: E.AN), the main temple of Uruk in historical times, was originally the abode of Anu alone, as sometimes proposed in the past. It was already associated with Inanna in the fourth millennium BCE, and her role as the tutelary goddess of Uruk most likely dates at least to this period as well. Julia Krul proposes that even if Anu was already worshiped in the Uruk period, he likely had to share the Eanna temple with Inanna. The oldest texts do not mention the Eanna yet, and it is not certain if a sanctuary most likely called "Ean" attested in them was a temple of Anu and if it corresponded to any later structure. Through the Early Dynastic, Sargonic and Ur III periods, Inanna was the main deity of the city, and Eanna was regarded as her temple first and foremost. The Bassetki inscription of Naram-Sin in particular supports the view that Inanna was the goddess of Uruk and that she was perceived as more significant than Anu. No references to Anu are known from inscriptions of the Ur III rulers mentioning the Eanna, even though he does appear in offering lists. However, royal inscriptions from the Old Babylonian period indicate that Anu was believed to dwell in the Eanna. In the Old Babylonian version of the "Epic of Gilgamesh", Eanna is described only as the dwelling of Anu, but the later "Standard Babylonian" version associates it both with Ishtar and Anu. It has been proposed that similar to the Bull of Heaven episode, the former tradition might simply indicate the existence of anti-Ishtar sentiment among compilers of this work. Simultaneously Anu does not play any major role and Inanna is the sole owner of Eanna in the myths about Enmerkar and Lugalbanda, other legendary kings of Uruk commonly referenced in Mesopotamian literature. A mythological tradition in which the Eanna originally belonged to Anu, but was later usurped by Inanna is known from multiple literary compositions, but it might have only been a founding myth explaining how the first temples were established.


title: Anu

text: Starting in the Ur III period, Anu came to be seen as a member of a triad of foremost deities invoked in royal inscriptions, which also included Enlil and Enki. A seat, known as Barakiskilla ("dais, pure place") and a garden dedicated to him are mentioned in documents from the reign of Ur-Nammu. Their location is uncertain, but Andrew R. George tentatively proposes Ur. In the following Isin-Larsa period, kings of Isin made no reference to Anu in their year formulas. Rim-Sîn I of Larsa revived the tradition and invoked the traditional triad in them, possibly to show that he planned to control all of southern Babylonia. It has been also suggested that one of his predecessors, Gungunum, invoked Anu, Enlil and Nanna as a similar trinity in his inscriptions to show he was in control of their major cult centers. After conquering Rim-Sin I's kingdom, Hammurabi of Babylon started to invoke Anu and Enlil, though not Ea, in his own formulas. Similar evidence is not available from the reign of Samsu-iluna, who only invoked Anu and Enlil in a single inscription most likely pertaining to the reconquest of southern cities. Later kings of the same dynasty only infrequently mentioned the pair, most likely as a part of ceremonial formulas meant to tie their reigns to a longer tradition.


title: Anu

text: In Assyria, Anu appears for the first time in an inscription of Shamshi-Adad I, who described him as one of the gods who bestowed kingship upon him. A temple of Adad which he built in Assur later came to be a dedicated to both the weather god and Anu. It was accompanied by a ziggurat, Emelamanna ("house of the radiance of heaven"). Daniel Schwemer suggests that the pairing of those two gods was based on the common view that they were father and son.


title: Anu

text: No direct references to worship of Anu are known from the part of the Old Babylonian period during which the cults of Uruk were temporarily relocated to Kish in the north of Babylonia. A possible exception is a deity or deities designated by the logogram AN.INANNA. However, it has also been proposed that it represents not Anu and Inanna as a pair, as commonly assumed, but a specific manifestation of Inanna, Urkitum. Presently there is no agreement regarding this problem in scholarship and which deity or deities it refers to remains uncertain.


title: Anu

text: In documents from the reign of the First Sealand dynasty, the dyad of Enlil and Ea (Enki) replaced the triad containing Anu. The only god list known from the Sealand archives does not mention Anu at all, and simply begins with Enlil. He is nonetheless attested in a few offering lists. Furthermore, it is possible the name of the king Akurduana might be theophoric and should be translated as "raging flood of Anu," though this remains uncertain and the ordinary word "heaven" might be the correct translation of the sign AN in this case instead.


title: Anu

text: The so-called "Babylonian Temple List" most likely composed in the first millennium BCE mentions no temples of Anu, though with the exception of Larsa, Ur and Eridu the southernmost cities are generally poorly represented in it. A single liturgical text indicates that a temple of Anu called Ekinamma possibly existed in Kesh. The hymn BRM IV 8 lists ten names of temples associated with him, including the Eanki and the Egalankia, possibly located in Uruk.


title: Anu

text: In the Neo-Babylonian period, Anu only had a small sanctuary in Uruk. He has been described as a comparatively minor deity in the religious practice of this period. While multiple Neo-Babylonian archives from Uruk have been excavated and published, so far research revealed only a small number of people bearing theophoric names invoking Anu before the reign of Nabonidus, with a total of five being mentioned in known documents according to the highest estimate. The most historically notable example is Anu-aḫu-iddin, who was the governor of Uruk during the reign of Nabopolassar. The number of such names started to rise during the reign of Nabonidus. Documents from the reign of Darius I show further growth, though names invoking chiefly northern Babylonian deities, as well as Nanaya, Ishtar and Shamash (from Larsa) remain numerous. It has been proposed that the changed in favor of Anu accelerated during the reign of Xerxes I. After a rebellion of the northern Babylonian cities against Persian rule in 484 BCE, this king seemingly reorganized the traditional structure of Mesopotamian clergy, and while Uruk did not rebel, it was not exempt from changes. It has been proposed that the older priests, who were often connected to the northern cities and were predominantly involved in the cult of Ishtar, were replaced by a number of powerful local families dedicated to Anu. Julia Krul suggests that their members likely planned to expand the scope of Anu's cult in the Neo-Babylonian period already, but were unable to do so due to the interests of the kings, who favored Marduk as the head of the pantheon.


title: Anu

text: Xerxes' retaliation against the clergy of Uruk resulted in the collapse of Eanna as the center of Uruk's religious life and economy, and made the creation of a new system centered on the worship of Anu and his spouse of Antu, rather than Ishtar and Nanaya, possible. The details of its early development are not well understood, as Mesopotamian texts from the later years of Achaemenid rule pertaining to temple administration and other religious affairs are scarce. The city as a whole did not decline, and it served various administrative and military purposes, as attested for example in documents from the reign of Darius II. It has even been described as the biggest and most prosperous city in Mesopotamia in the final centuries of the first millennium BCE. It is assumed that Anu's ascent to the top of the official pantheon was complete by the year 420 BCE. In theophoric names, he already predominates in economic documents from the reigns of Artaxerxes I and Darius II. In sources from the following Seleucid period, the cult of Anu appears to be flourishing. A new temple, dedicated jointly to him and Antu, the Bīt Rēš (head temple) was constructed at some point and became the new center of the city s religious life. Oldest dated attestation of this structure comes from a text which was apparently originally compiled during "the reign of Seleukos and Antiochos," presumably either Seleucus I Nicator and Antiochus I Soter (292/1 – 281/0 BCE) or of Antiochus I and his son Seleucus (280/79 – 267/6 BCE). The Bīt Rēš complex also included a new ziggurat, the Ešarra (Sumerian: "house of the universe"), the biggest such structure known from Mesopotamia and second biggest overall after the Elamite complex at Chogha Zanbil. Its name was likely borrowed from a similar structure in Nippur dedicated to Enlil.


title: Anu

text: Multiple explanations have been proposed for the elevation of Anu, though they must remain speculative due to lack of direct evidence. It has been argued that it was modeled on the position of Ahura Mazda in religion of the Achaemenids, but Paul-Alain Beaulieu points out that since first signs of it are already visible under Nabonidus, it is implausible that it was patterned on Persian religion. At the same time, he considers it possible that Achaemenid administration encouraged the worship of Anu, viewing it as a way to limit the influence of Babylon and its elites on inhabitants of other Mesopotamian cities. Similar connection has been proposed in the case of Anu and Zeus but also remains uncertain. Beaulieu instead proposes that Anu's rise was in part inspired by a network of syncretism associations between him, Anshar, who was also worshiped in Uruk, and the Assyrian head god Ashur, who in Assyria could be identified with the latter. However, Julia Krul points out there is no certainty that Anshar was actually understood as Ashur in Uruk, let alone that he was regarded as a form of Anu by local clergy. Beaulieu himself admits that most of the evidence which might support his theory might instead simply indicate that both the elevation of Assur and Anu relied on similar preexisting models, such as the theology centered on Enlil. Since during the Neo-Babylonian period Uruk was forced to accept the theology of Babylon, it is also possible that the elevation of Anu was seen as a manifestation of local identity. At the same time, it is not impossible that the new centralized Anu cult was patterned on the Babylonian theology and even a number of festivals and rituals of Anu might have been patterned after those of Marduk. Instances of rewriting compositions dedicated to Marduk or Enlil to suit the new Anu cult are known too. A resource commonly employed by the theologians and antiquarians working on the elevation of Anu were god lists, such as An = Anum, which provided the evidence needed to justify both this change and other examples of restructuring the city pantheon. Most likely the growing interest in astronomy and astrology among the clergy also played a role.


title: Anu

text: While it is assumed that religious activity in Uruk continued through the late Seleucid and early Parthian periods, a large part of the Bīt Rēš complex was eventually destroyed by a fire. It was rebuilt as a fortress, and while a small temple was built next to it in the Parthian period, most likely Mesopotamian deities were no longer worshiped there. According to a Greek inscription dated to 111 CE, the deity worshiped in Uruk in the early first millennium was apparently otherwise unknown Gareus, whose temple was built during the reign of Vologases I of Parthia in foreign style resembling Roman buildings. The final cuneiform text from the site is an astronomical tablet dated to 79 or 80 CE, possibly the last cuneiform text written in antiquity. It is assumed that the last remnants of local religion and culture of Uruk disappeared by the time of the Sasanian conquest of Mesopotamia, even though the worship of individual deities might have outlasted cuneiform writing.


title: Anu

text: The main source of information about the Sumerian creation myth is the prologue to the epic poem "Gilgamesh, Enkidu, and the Netherworld", which briefly describes the process of creation: at first, there is only Nammu, the primeval sea. Then, Nammu gives birth to An (the Sumerian name for Anu), the sky, and Ki, the earth. An and Ki mate with each other, causing Ki to give birth to Enlil, the god of the wind. Enlil separates An from Ki and carries off the earth as his domain, while An carries off the sky.


title: Anu

text: In Sumerian, the designation ""An"" was used interchangeably with "the heavens" so that in some cases it is doubtful whether, under the term, the god An or the heavens is being denoted. In Sumerian cosmogony, heaven was envisioned as a series of three domes covering the flat earth; Each of these domes of heaven was believed to be made of a different precious stone. An was believed to be the highest and outermost of these domes, which was thought to be made of reddish stone.


title: Anu

text: "Inanna and Ebiḫ", otherwise known as "Goddess of the Fearsome Divine Powers", is a 184-line poem written in Sumerian by the Akkadian poetess Enheduanna. It describes An's granddaughter Inanna's confrontation with Mount Ebiḫ, a mountain in the Zagros mountain range. An briefly appears in a scene from the poem in which Inanna petitions him to allow her to destroy Mount Ebiḫ. An warns Inanna not to attack the mountain, but she ignores his warning and proceeds to attack and destroy Mount Ebiḫ regardless.


title: Anu

text: The poem "Inanna Takes Command of Heaven" is an extremely fragmentary, but important, account of Inanna's conquest of the Eanna temple in Uruk. It begins with a conversation between Inanna and her brother Utu in which Inanna laments that the Eanna temple is not within their domain and resolves to claim it as her own. The text becomes increasingly fragmentary at this point in the narrative, but appears to describe her difficult passage through a marshland to reach the temple, while a fisherman instructs her on which route is best to take. Ultimately, Inanna reaches An, who is shocked by her arrogance, but nevertheless concedes that she has succeeded and that the temple is now her domain. The text ends with a hymn expounding Inanna's greatness. This myth may represent an eclipse in the authority of the priests of An in Uruk and a transfer of power to the priests of Inanna.


title: Anu

text: In a scene from the Akkadian "Epic of Gilgamesh", written in the late second millennium BC, Anu's daughter Ishtar, the East Semitic equivalent to Inanna, attempts to seduce the hero Gilgamesh. When Gilgamesh spurns her advances, Ishtar angrily goes to heaven and tells Anu that Gilgamesh has insulted her. Anu asks her why she is complaining to him instead of confronting Gilgamesh herself. Ishtar demands that Anu give her the Bull of Heaven and swears that if he does not give it to her, she will break down the gates of the Underworld and raise the dead to eat the living. Anu gives Ishtar the Bull of Heaven, and Ishtar sends it to attack Gilgamesh and his friend Enkidu. A scene from the Ugaritic "Epic of Aqhat" in which the warrior goddess Anat confronts the head god El to demand a permission to kill the eponymous hero after being rebuked by him when she asked for his bow has been compared to this section of the "Epic of Gilgamesh".


title: Anu

text: In the myth of Adapa, which is first attested during the Kassite Period, Anu notices that the south wind does not blow towards the land for seven days. He asks his "sukkal" Ilabrat the reason. Ilabrat replies that is because Adapa, the priest of Ea (the East Semitic equivalent of Enki) in Eridu, has broken the south wind's wing. Anu demands that Adapa be summoned before him, but, before Adapa sets out, Ea warns him not to eat any of the food or drink any of the water the gods offer him, because the food and water are poisoned. Adapa arrives before Anu and tells him that the reason he broke the south wind's wing was because he had been fishing for Ea and the south wind had caused a storm, which had sunk his boat. Anu's doorkeepers Dumuzid and Ningishzida speak out in favor of Adapa. This placates Anu's fury and he orders that, instead of the food and water of death, Adapa should be given the food and water of immortality as a reward. Adapa, however, follows Ea's advice and refuses the meal. The story of Adapa was beloved by scribes, who saw him as the founder of their trade and a vast plethora of copies and variations of the myth have been found across Mesopotamia, spanning the entire course of Mesopotamian history. The story of Adapa's appearance before Anu has been compared to the later Jewish story of Adam and Eve, recorded in the Book of Genesis. In the same way that Anu forces Adapa to return to earth after he refuses to eat the food of immortality, Yahweh in the biblical story drives Adam out of the Garden of Eden to prevent him from eating the fruit from the tree of life. Similarly, Adapa was seen as the prototype for all priests; whereas Adam in the Book of Genesis is presented as the prototype of all mankind.


title: Anu

text: In the epic poem "Erra and Išum", which was written in Akkadian in the eighth century BC, Anu gives Erra, the god of destruction, the Sebettu, which are described as personified weapons. Anu instructs Erra to use them to massacre humans when they become overpopulated and start making too much noise (Tablet I, 38ff).


title: Anu

text: One of the myths belonging to the so-called "Kumarbi Cycle" features Anu among the deities involved. While known chiefly from a Hittite translation, the myth belongs to a Hurrian cultural milieu, and is largely set in locations in Syria and Mesopotamia, rather than Anatolia. It states that in the distant past, the "king in heaven" was Alalu, and Anu acted as his cupbearer, but does not explain the origin of either deity. After nine years, Anu revolted against his superior, dethroned him and made him flee to the underworld. However, after another nine years, his own cupbearer, Kumarbi, the "scion of Alalu," attacked him to seize kingship for himself. Anu attempted to flee to heaven, but Kumarbi bites off Anu's genitals and swallowed them. As a consequence of swallowing Anu's genitals, Kumarbi becomes impregnated with Anu's son Teshub (Tarḫunna in the Hittite translation) and two other deities, Tashmishu and the river Tigris. Anu taunts him about this. Teshub is subsequently born from Kumarbi's split skull in a manner compared by Beckman to the birth of Athena in Greek mythology, and while the rest of the narrative is poorly preserved it is known that he evades Kumarbi's attempts at destroying him.


title: Anu

text: Wilfred G. Lambert proposed that a hitherto unknown Mesopotamian myth about confrontation between Alala and Anu existed and inspired the Hurro-Hittite tradition regarding their conflict.


title: Anu

text: A reference to a genealogy of deities similar to "Enūma Eliš", and by extension to Anu, is known from the writings of Eudemus of Rhodes, a student of Aristotle, whose work is only preserved as quotations given by Damascius, a neoplatonist writer who lived in the sixth century CE:


title: Anu

text: It is not known what source Eudemos relied on, though Berossus can be ruled out with certainty as it is implausible that the former lived long enough to read the works of the latter. Furthermore, the inclusion of Enlil (Illilos) as an equal of Ea (Aos) and Anu (Anos) indicates that while similar to the "Enūma Eliš", the source used was not identical to it. A further difference in Eudemus' account is the fact that the origin of Mummu (Mōymis) is clear, while the Babylonian work in mention does not directly explain it.


title: Anu

text: It has been argued series of divine coups described in the Kumarbi myth later became the basis for the Greek creation story described in the long poem "Theogony", written by the Boeotian poet Hesiod in the seventh century BC. However, Gary Beckman points out that it is not impossible that the two myths simply developed from similar motifs present in ancient Mediterranean shared cultural milieu (""koine"")and Hesiod did not necessarily directly depend on the Kumarbi tradition. In Hesiod's poem, the primeval sky-god Ouranos is overthrown and castrated by his son Kronos in much the same manner that Anu is overthrown and castrated by Kumarbi in the Hurrian story. Kronos is then, in turn, overthrown by his own son Zeus. In one Orphic myth, Kronos bites off Ouranos's genitals in exactly the same manner that Kumarbi does to Anu. Nonetheless, Robert Mondi notes that Ouranos never held mythological significance to the Greeks comparable with Anu's significance to the Mesopotamians. Instead, Mondi calls Ouranos "a pale reflection of Anu", noting that "apart from the castration myth, he has very little significance as a cosmic personality at all and is not associated with kingship in any systematic way."


title: Anu

text: In late antiquity, writers such as Philo of Byblos attempted to impose the dynastic succession framework of the Hittite and Hesiodic stories onto Canaanite mythology, but these efforts are forced and contradict what most Canaanites seem to have actually believed. Most Canaanites seem to have regarded El and Baal as ruling concurrently.


title: Gin rummy

text: Gin rummy, or simply gin, is a two-player card game variant of rummy. It has enjoyed widespread popularity as both a social and a gambling game, especially during the mid twentieth century, and remains today one of the most widely-played two-player card games.


title: Gin rummy

text: Magician and writer John Scarne believes gin rummy to have evolved from 19th-century whiskey poker (a game similar to Commerce, with players forming poker combinations) and to have been created with the intention of being faster than standard rummy but less spontaneous than knock rummy.


title: Gin rummy

text: Card game historian David Parlett finds Scarne's theory to be "highly implausible", and considers the game of Conquian to be gin rummy's forerunner.


title: Gin rummy

text: Gin rummy is played using a standard deck of 52 cards. The ranking from high to low is King, Queen, Jack, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, Ace.


title: Gin rummy

text: The basic game strategy is to improve one's hand by forming "melds" and eliminating "deadwood". Gin has two types of meld: "Sets" of three or four cards sharing the same rank, e.g. ; and "runs" or sequences of three or more cards in the same suit, such as or more. Deadwood cards are those not in any meld. Aces are considered low—they can form a set with other aces but only the low end of runs ( is a legal run but is not). A player can form any combination of melds within their hand; all sets, all runs, or some sets and some runs.


title: Gin rummy

text: The "deadwood count" is the sum of the point values of the deadwood cards. Aces are scored at one point, face cards at 10, and others according to their numerical values. Intersecting melds are not allowed; if a player has a three-card set "and" a three-card run sharing a common card, only one of the melds counts, and the other two cards count as deadwood. For example; within the five cards , the seven of diamonds can be included in the set () or included in the run (), but it cannot be included in both.


title: Gin rummy

text: Dealership alternates from round to round, with the first dealer chosen by any agreed upon method. The dealer deals 10 cards to each player one at a time starting with their opponent, and then places the next card in the deck face up. This begins the "discard pile". The face down pile is known as the "stock pile".


title: Gin rummy

text: On the first turn of the round, the non-dealing player has first option of taking the upcard on the discard pile or passing. If the non-dealing player takes the upcard, they must then discard a different card to the discard pile. The player acting second can take the top card from the pile of their choice. However, if the non-dealing player passes the upcard, the dealer is given the opportunity to take the upcard or pass. If the dealer also passes, the non-dealing player must draw from the stock pile, then the next turn and after, players can draw from the pile of their choice.


title: Gin rummy

text: On each subsequent turn, a player must draw either the (face-up) top card of the discard pile, or the (face-down) top card from the stock pile, and discard one card from their hand onto the discard pile.


title: Gin rummy

text: Players alternate taking turns until one player ends the round by "knocking", "going Gin", or until only two cards remain in the stock pile, in which case the round ends in a draw and no points are awarded. The game ends when a player reaches 100 or more points (or another established amount). In tournament rules the game is played in best of five with 250 points per game.


title: Gin rummy

text: In standard gin, a player with 10 or fewer points of deadwood may "knock", immediately ending the hand without giving the opponent a chance to play. Knocking with no deadwood is known as "going Gin" or having a "Gin hand", while knocking with deadwood points is known as "going down".


title: Gin rummy

text: After discarding to end a turn, a player who wishes to knock must clearly indicate their intent; this is generally shown by laying the discard face down, but can also be done through a verbal declaration or by tapping the playing surface. The player then lays out their hand, organized into melds and with any deadwood separated from them. The opponent, or "defending" player, shows their melds and is entitled to "lay off" any deadwood cards that fit into the knocking player's melds, provided that the knocking player does not have a gin hand.


title: Gin rummy

text: For example, suppose that the knocking player has a meld of three Kings. If the defending player is holding the fourth King as deadwood, they may lay it off by adding it to the meld and thus reduce their deadwood count by 10.


title: Gin rummy

text: A player who can form melds using all 10 of their cards may choose to "go Gin" and end the round immediately. Doing so awards a bonus (typically 25 points) plus the defending player's deadwood count; that player is not allowed to lay off any cards. A player holding a gin hand may also choose to continue the round instead of revealing it, in hopes of attaining an 11-card "Big Gin" hand (see below).


title: Gin rummy

text: If a player draws or takes a card that can be used to form melds with the 10 cards already held, the player declares Big Gin and the hand ends. That player scores a Big Gin bonus (typically 31 points) plus the defending player's deadwood count; that player may not lay off any cards.


title: Gin rummy

text: Aces are scored at 1 point, face cards at 10, and all other cards are scored at their numerical values. The number of points awarded for bonuses may vary from region to region. No matter what the bonus amounts are, points are scored in Gin for the following:


title: Gin rummy

text: In some variations, if a match ends with one player in the lead by exactly 50 points, that player automatically loses.


title: Gin rummy

text: In straight gin, players are required to play until one of them can go gin. Knocking is not allowed. Scoring and rules remain the same as standard gin rummy.


title: Gin rummy

text: Similar to straight gin, knocking is not allowed. However, more than one card may be taken, in order, from the top of the discard pile. If more than one card is taken, the lowest position card taken must be used in a hand: e.g. <bottom> <top of discard> is the lowest position card and must be used in a hand; continue with one discard). Cards are shown to the table, with opponents being able to add on to straights of the same suit or finish a three of a kind with the fourth card for points. After a player has gin, points are added, with cards on the table being added up and cards in hand being subtracted. The player who gins receives 25 additional points, 2 through 9 = 5 points, 10 through K = 10 points, A = 15 points.


title: Gin rummy

text: In this version of gin rummy, the value of the first upcard is used to determine the maximum count at which players can knock. If the upcard is a spade, the hand will count double. So if the first upcard was a 4, you can knock and go out with only 4 or fewer points in your hand; and if the card was , you would get double points that hand. In this variation it is possible to knock any of cards from the discard pile so as long as you put down a suit or pair.


title: Gin rummy

text: Another version in this variation (mostly in match play) and in Hollywood gin (see below), a second deck of cards will be used to determine the knock value of a hand. The knock value card will be dealt from the bottom and turned over on top. Above rules apply but both players are dealt ten cards with the last hand winner picking first from the deck.


title: Gin rummy

text: This is a scoring style, not a rules change to the game of gin. In Hollywood gin, scoring is kept for three different games at the same time. A player's first win will be recorded in their column in Game One. A player's second win will be recorded in their columns for both Game One and Game Two. Their third win will be recorded in their column for all three games.Every game after that is scored in all three columns after that Game 1, Game 2 & Game 3. Once a game (column) is finished bonus are added to that game and hands are played until all three games are finished. Once all three games are finished the totals are added together for a total score.


title: Gin rummy

text: Similar to Oklahoma gin, except aces can be used high or low, and runs can be formed "around the corner" (such as ). If you are caught with an unmelded ace, it counts as 15 points against you. Hollywood scoring of three games to 200 when playing head-to-head or with two-person teams. Three-person teams play to 300, 25 points extra if all three teammates win. 50 points for four-person team, etc. This is a more complex gin game for all levels of player.


title: Gin rummy

text: When a single match is to be played, the players will continue to play rounds until one player has 100 points or more. This player wins the match.


title: Gin rummy

text: In multi-match games, match scores are reset to zero with the start of each match, while game scores accumulate until a predetermined winning score is reached, perhaps 500 or higher. Each individual match ends when one player scores 100 match points. At the end of the match, players' match scores are credited toward their game scores, as well as:


title: Rimac Nevera

text: The Rimac Nevera (pronounced: ]) is an all-electric sports car designed and manufactured by the Croatian automotive manufacturer Rimac Automobili. The first production prototype car was released in August 2021. Nevera production has been limited to 150 vehicles. Having completed crash testing for homologation, Rimac plans to deliver the Nevera to customers in mid-2022. The Nevera is manufactured in the same factory and at the same rate (of roughly 1 per week) as the Pininfarina Battista, which is based on the same platform.


title: Rimac Nevera

text: The car was unveiled at the 2018 Geneva Motor Show as the Rimac C_Two; it was later renamed to the Nevera upon its launch. It is the automaker's second car after the Rimac Concept One and is described as "the ultimate electric hypercar driving experience".


title: Rimac Nevera

text: The name Nevera comes from the Croatian word for sudden and short storms, usually accompanied by lightning, which occur primarily along the Croatian Adriatic coast.


title: Rimac Nevera

text: The Nevera was initially revealed as the C_Two concept car. Since 2018, Rimac spent over three years refining the car as part of an extensive test and development programme. Almost all key components of the Nevera are designed and manufactured at Rimac's headquarters near Zagreb, Croatia.


title: Rimac Nevera

text: During the global homologation process, the company constructed 4 prototypes for different testing purposes.


title: Rimac Nevera

text: In June 2020, Rimac opened a new facility in Veliko Trgovišće which serves as the assembly for Nevera homologation prototypes as well as production vehicles for customers. At full capacity, it was planned that the facility would produce 4 vehicles per month, including an additional 13 prototype vehicles for homologation testing to destruction and 10 pre-production vehicles, by the end of 2020.


title: Rimac Nevera

text: In February 2022, after four years of testing, the crash test program for the global homologation of the Nevera was completed, when US passive safety tests were completed. European crash testing had already been completed in 2021.


title: Rimac Nevera

text: In August 2022, Nico Rosberg (Formula One World Champion, 2016) took delivery of car number 1 of 150.


title: Rimac Nevera

text: Each of the Nevera's four wheels is individually driven by surface-mounted magnet motors. Combined, they produce a total of and of torque. A single-stage gearbox links the front and rear wheels.


title: Rimac Nevera

text: The Nevera allegedly has the ability to accelerate from in 1.85 seconds, making it potentially the fastest-accelerating production car in the world. According to Rimac Automobili, it accelerates from in 4.3 seconds, in 9.3 seconds, and has a top speed of .


title: Rimac Nevera

text: On 13 August 2021, the YouTube channel "Drag Times" tested a pre-production Nevera at Famoso Raceway, Bakersfield, California. After making several runs down the mile track, the following performance results were published:


title: Rimac Nevera

text: On 15 November 2022, Rimac released two videos showing the car reaching on the Automotive Testing Papenburg track in Germany, leading to media outlets calling it the 'fastest electric car in the world'.


title: Rimac Nevera

text: While also advertising a maximum range of on the NEDC cycle, and on the WLTP cycle, the car is also claimed to be able to complete two consecutive laps of the Nürburgring with a negligible drop in performance. Rimac claims the car was designed to be very durable and could be driven hard. In addition to this, the car is technologically capable of Level 4 of autonomous driving with full advanced driver-assistance system (ADAS). If connected to a fast charger, it can be recharged to 80% in less than 30 minutes. The car features an entirely new design and does away with the conventional doors, now incorporating butterfly doors instead. It also has a fire extinguisher in the back held in by a leather strap embossed with the words "In case of hill climb, extinguish fire", a reference to "The Grand Tour" host Richard Hammond who crashed a Concept One during a hill climb, causing it to catch on fire.


title: Rimac Nevera

text: Jonathan Lopez of "Top Speed" magazine acclaimed the Nevera stating that "it is an absolute game changer, and not just in the EV segment. Between the onboard tech and mind-boggling performance specs, this machine has the goods to take on the best of the best".


title: Rimac Nevera

text: Tom Ford of "Top Gear" tested the early prototype in March 2020. He praised the "punch out" in the corners despite the weight of the car, as well as giving plenty of feedback, concluding that "it tastes good raw, even without the torque-vectoring wizardry. ... But with a base car that shows this level of promise, and a company that focuses on fun rather than figures, this bodes well".


title: Rimac Nevera

text: Vlad Savov of "The Verge" criticized its looks by describing them as "anonymous and unexciting", and describing them as less flamboyant than that of Lamborghini Huracán, but admitted that the car is "more forgiving and accommodating than most other hypercars", but also stated that the readouts on the infotainment were too distracting.


title: Rimac Nevera

text: "Top Gear", in its 2021 review of a pre-production vehicle, praised the "head spinning performance, incredible tech, ultra-stiff chassis, engineering and build quality" but noted that the brakes need getting used to and some detail finessing, giving it 9 out of 10. Chris Perkins, writing for "Road & Track", called the acceleration "savage and unrelenting", noting that the "step up in performance between 'quite fast' and 'so fast it makes breathing difficult' is quite something", and ultimately calling it "the most advanced, most powerful, quickest car out there". "Car and Driver" had similar impressions in its review, stating that "hypercars like the Nevera aren't for everyone, but there's no denying its significance as the moment a battery-powered car toppled the Bugatti Chiron. The internal-combustion engine may never catch up". Robb Report journalist Ben Oliver noted in his impressions while driving the car that "the noise adds to the drama, as much psychological as physical, in a way no other road car can match, making for a dangerously charismatic split personality worth every one of its seven figures".


title: Greek genocide

text: The Greek genocide (, "Genoktonia ton Ellinon"), which included the Pontic genocide, was the systematic killing of the Christian Ottoman Greek population of Anatolia which was carried out mainly during World War I and its aftermath (1914–1922) on the basis of their religion and ethnicity. It was perpetrated by the government of the Ottoman Empire led by the Three Pashas and by the Government of the Grand National Assembly led by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, against the indigenous Greek population of the Empire. The genocide included massacres, forced deportations involving death marches through the Syrian Desert, expulsions, summary executions, and the destruction of Eastern Orthodox cultural, historical, and religious monuments. Several hundred thousand Ottoman Greeks died during this period. Most of the refugees and survivors fled to Greece (adding over a quarter to the prior population of Greece). Some, especially those in Eastern provinces, took refuge in the neighbouring Russian Empire.


title: Greek genocide

text: By late 1922, most of the Greeks of Asia Minor had either fled or had been killed. Those remaining were transferred to Greece under the terms of the later 1923 population exchange between Greece and Turkey, which formalized the exodus and barred the return of the refugees. Other ethnic groups were similarly attacked by the Ottoman Empire during this period, including Assyrians and Armenians, and some scholars and organizations have recognized these events as part of the same genocidal policy.


title: Greek genocide

text: The Allies of World War I condemned the Ottoman government–sponsored massacres. In 2007, the International Association of Genocide Scholars passed a resolution recognising the Ottoman campaign against its Christian minorities, including the Greeks, as genocide. Some other organisations have also passed resolutions recognising the Ottoman campaign against these Christian minorities as genocide, as have the national legislatures of Greece, Cyprus, the United States, Sweden, Armenia, the Netherlands, Germany, Austria and the Czech Republic.


title: Greek genocide

text: At the outbreak of World War I, Asia Minor was ethnically diverse, its population included Turks and Azeris, as well as groups that had inhabited the region prior to the Ottoman conquest, including Pontic Greeks, Caucasus Greeks, Cappadocian Greeks, Armenians, Kurds, Zazas, Georgians, Circassians, Assyrians, Jews, and Laz people.


title: Greek genocide

text: Among the causes of the Turkish campaign against the Greek-speaking Christian population was a fear that they would welcome liberation by the Ottoman Empire's enemies, and a belief among some Turks that to form a modern country in the era of nationalism it was necessary to purge from their territories all minorities who could threaten the integrity of an ethnically-based Turkish nation.


title: Greek genocide

text: According to a German military attaché, the Ottoman minister of war Ismail Enver had declared in October 1915 that he wanted to "solve the Greek problem during the war … in the same way he believe[d] he solved the Armenian problem", referring to the Armenian genocide. Germany and the Ottoman Empire were allies immediately before, and during, World War I. By 31 January 1917, the Chancellor of Germany Theobald von Bethmann-Hollweg reported that:


title: Greek genocide

text: The Greek presence in Asia Minor dates at least from the Late Bronze Age (1450 BC). The Greek poet Homer lived in the region around 800 BC. The geographer Strabo referred to Smyrna as the first Greek city in Asia Minor, and numerous ancient Greek figures were natives of Anatolia, including the mathematician Thales of Miletus (7th century BC), the pre-Socratic philosopher Heraclitus of Ephesus (6th century BC), and the founder of Cynicism Diogenes of Sinope (4th century BC). Greeks referred to the Black Sea as the "Euxinos Pontos" or "hospitable sea" and starting in the eighth century BC they began navigating its shores and settling along its Anatolian coast. The most notable Greek cities of the Black Sea were Trebizond, Sampsounta, Sinope and Heraclea Pontica.