Malik--_i.e._, ruler--is one of the names frequently assigned to Shamash, just as the god's consort was known as Malkatu, but for all that Malik is not the same as Shamash.

Accompanying the inscription of Nabubaliddin is a design[210] representing the sun-god seated in his shrine.

Before him on a table rests a wheel, and attached to the wheel are cords held by two figures, who are evidently directing the course of the wheel.

These two figures are Malik and Bunene, a species of attendants, therefore, on the sun-god, who drive the fiery chariot that symbolized the great orb.

Bunene, through association with Malik, becomes the latter's consort, and it is interesting to observe the extent to which the tendency of the Babylonian religion to conceive the gods in pairs goes.