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YouTube suggested this video on Tiamat by Mythology & Fiction Explained.

This video got me thinking (always dangerous). Decades of Dungeons & Dragons lore (whether playing or not) led me to thinking Tiamat was a purely evil creature.

I had forgotten that things aren’t so simple with her. So, I decided to re-read the Enūma Eliš. You can find one translation of it here. Considering how relatively little we have to work with, it remains the best look into the minds of Sumerian culture, and it paints a more complex picture of Tiamat. You have to remember that ancient cultures held very different ideas about right and wrong, so someone we’d consider evil can be responsible for very important things, some of which were quite generous or otherwise “good.”

This is my nerdly obsession.

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