Marduk (
Sumerian spelling in
Akkadian:
dAMAR.UTU "solar calf";
Greek ,
Mardochaios) was a late-generation god from ancient
Mesopotamia and
patron deity of the city of
Babylon. When Babylon became the political center of the
Euphrates valley in the time of
Hammurabi (
18th century BC), he slowly started to rise to the position of the head of the Babylonian pantheon, a position he fully acquired by the second half of the second millennium BC. In the city of Babylon, he resided in the temple Esagila. "Marduk" is the
Babylonian form of his name.