NERGAL (Hebr. Nèrghal, Ass. 'Epyè). — Name of the idol which «the colonists sent to populate the city of Cutha in Samaria» made for themselves (2 Kings 17:30).
He is a very well-known deity from cuneiform
Nereus and Achilles, saints, martyrs — Ciborium column with the martyrdom of St. N. (late 4th century) — Rome, Domitilla catacomb.
literature, in which hymns and incantations call him the god of the infernal regions (like the classical Pluto), and through his demons he is the author of plagues, famines, wars, enemy invasions, fires, diseases, as means by which he gathers population for his subterranean kingdom. In some texts, however, he is also the god of farmers, who sends water not to devastate but to irrigate, and grants fertility to animals: and as such he must have been venerated by the colonists of Cutha.