7. To the people of Shumir and Accad, then, the universe was peopled with Spirits, whom they distributed according to its different spheres and regions. For they had formed a very elaborate and clever, if peculiar idea of what they supposed the world to be like. According to the ingenious expression of a Greek writer of the 1st century A.D. they imagined it to have the shape of an inverted round boat or bowl, the thickness of which would represent the mixture of land and water (_ki-a_) which we call the crust of the earth, while the hollow beneath this inhabitable crust was fancied as a bottomless pit or abyss (_ge_), in which dwelt many powers. Above the convex surface of the earth (_ki-a_) spread the sky (_ana_), itself divided into two regions:--the highest heaven or firmament, which, with the fixed stars immovably attached to it, revolved, as round an axis or pivot, around an immensely high mountain, which joined it to the earth as a pillar, and was situated somewhere in the far North-East--some say North--and the lower heaven, where the planets--a sort of resplendent animals, seven in number, of beneficent nature--wandered forever on their appointed path. To these were opposed seven evil demons, sometimes called "the Seven Fiery Phantoms." But above all these, higher in rank and greater in power, is the Spirit (_Zi_) of heaven (_ana_), ZI-ANA, or, as often, simply ANA--"Heaven." Between the lower heaven and the surface of the earth is the atmospheric region, the realm of IM or MERMER, the Wind, where he drives the clouds, rouses the storms, and whence he pours down the rain, which is stored in the great reservoir of Ana, in the heavenly Ocean. As to the earthly Ocean, it is fancied as a broad river, or watery rim, flowing all round the edge of the imaginary inverted bowl; in its waters dwells EA (whose name means "the House of Waters"), the great Spirit of the Earth and Waters (_Zi-ki-a_), either in the form of a fish, whence he is frequently called "Ea the fish," or "the Exalted Fish," or on a magnificent ship, with which he travels round the earth, guarding and protecting it. The minor spirits of earth (_Anunnaki_) are not much spoken of except in a body, as a sort of host or legion. All the more terrible are the seven spirits of the abyss, the MASKIM, of whom it is said that, although their seat is in the depths of the earth, yet their voice resounds on the heights also: they reside at will in the immensity of space, "not enjoying a good name either in heaven or on earth." Their greatest delight is to subvert the orderly course of nature, to cause earthquakes, inundations, ravaging tempests. Although the Abyss is their birth-place and proper sphere, they are not submissive to its lord and ruler MUL-GE ("Lord of the Abyss"). In that they are like their brethren of the lower heaven who do not acknowledge Ana's supremacy, in fact are called "spirits of rebellion," because,