The only other materials now wanting for the construction of the temple were the sun-dried bricks of clay, of which the temple platform and the structure of the temple itself were in the main composed.  Their manufacture was now inaugurated by a symbolical ceremony carried out by the patesi in person.  At dawn he performed an ablution with the fitting rites that accompanied it, and when the day was more advanced he slew a bull and a kid as sacrifices, and he then entered the temple of Ningirsu, where he prostrated himself.  And he took the sacred mould and the fair cushion on which it rested in the temple, and he poured a libation into the mould.  Afterwards, having made offerings of honey and butter, and having burnt incense, he placed the cushion and the mould upon his head and carried it to the appointed place.  There he placed clay in the mould, shaping it into a brick, and he left the brick in its mould within the temple.  And last of all he sprinkled oil of cedar-wood around.

The next day at dawn Gudea broke the mould and set the brick in the sun.  And the Sun-god was rejoiced at the brick that he had fashioned.  And Gudea took the brick and raised it on high towards the heavens, and he carried the brick to his people.  In this way the patesi inaugurated the manufacture of the sun-dried bricks for the temple, the sacred brick which he had made being the symbol and pattern of the innumerable bricks to be used in its construction.  He then marked out the plan of the temple, and the text states that he devoted himself to the building of the temple like a young man who has begun building a house and allows no pleasure to interfere with his task.  And he chose out skilled workmen and employed them on the building, and he was filled with joy.  The gods, too, are stated to have helped with the building, for Enki fixed the temennu of the temple, and the goddess Nina looked after its oracles, and Gatumdug, the mother of Shir-purla, fashioned bricks for it morning and evening, while the goddess Bau sprinkled aromatic oil of cedar-wood.  Gudea himself laid its foundations, and as he did so he blessed the temple seven times, comparing it to the sacred brick, to the holy libation-vase, to the divine eagle of Shirpurla, to a terrible couching panther, to the beautiful heavens, to the day of offerings, and to the morning light which brightens the land.  He caused the temple to rise towards heaven like a mountain, or like a cedar growing in the desert.  He built it of bricks of Sumer, and the timbers which he set in place were as strong as the dragon of the deep.

While he was engaged on the building Gudea took counsel of the god Enki, and he built a fountain for the gods, where they might drink.  With the great stones which he had brought and fashioned he built a reservoir and a basin for the temple.  And seven of the great stones he set up as stelae, and he gave them favourable names.  The text then recounts the various parts and shrines of the temple, and it describes their