An / Anu, the Sky-Father

An — Anu in Akkadian — is the sky itself personified, the oldest and most exalted of the gods and the formal head of the pantheon. From him flows authority: kingship and the highest honors are said to be granted 'by An,' and to be raised up by An is the ultimate legitimation. Yet he is a distant, dignified figure who seldom acts directly in the stories; the practical governance of the cosmos falls to Enlil, and later Marduk. An embodies sovereignty in its purest, most remote form — the source of legitimacy that stands above the fray.