While, therefore, the book is only in a secondary degree sent forth as an original contribution, the discussion of mooted points will enhance its value, I hope, for the specialist, as well as for the general reader and student for whom, in the first place, the volumes of this series are intended.
The disposition of the subject requires a word of explanation.

After the two introductory chapters (common to all the volumes of the series) I have taken up the pantheon as the natural means to a survey of the field.

The pantheon is treated, on the basis of the historical texts, in four sections: (1) the old Babylonian period, (2) the middle period, or the pantheon in the days of Hammurabi, (3) the Assyrian pantheon, and (4) the latest or neo-Babylonian period.

The most difficult phase has naturally been the old Babylonian pantheon.

Much is uncertain here.