Bible Dictionaries
Erech

Holman Bible Dictionary

(ee' rehch) Hebrew transliteration of Akkadian place name: Uruk, one of the oldest Sumerian cities founded before 3100 B.C. Genesis' Table of Nations reports that Nimrod, the mighty hunter, included Erech in his kingdom (Genesis 10:10 ). Ashurbanipal, king of Assyria (668-629 B.C.), exiled “men of Erech” (NAS) to Samaria about 640 B.C. (Ezra 4:9 ). Sumerian literature lists Erech as one of the first cities after the flood. Gilgamesh, the hero of Akkadian flood stories, appears as king of Erech. Excavations at Erech provide early evidence of pictographic writing and numerical notation on clay tablets and reveal an astronomical observatory and a scribal school. It is modern Warka, about 120 miles southeast of Babylon and 40 miles northwest of Ur.