The Tablet of Destinies is unusual among Mesopotamian sacred objects in that no cultic tablet claiming to be it is known from the archaeological record. It exists entirely as a mythic object, described in narrative poetry rather than catalogued in temple inventories, and its power is never fully explained beyond the fact that whoever legitimately holds it commands the gods and fixes the destinies of the cosmos, a fusion of scripture, crown and oracle in a single physical thing. The clearest description comes from the Myth of Anzu, in which the eagle-headed monster Anzu, while Enlil bathes, seizes the Tablet from where it rests and flies off with it, instantly stripping Enlil of his authority and throwing the divine order into paralysis until the warrior god Ninurta can hunt Anzu down and recover it.
A second, better known appearance comes in the Enuma Elish, where Tiamat, preparing for war against the younger gods, hands the Tablet to Kingu, the champion she raises to lead her monstrous army, and fastens it to his breast as the visible sign that supreme command now rests with him. When Marduk kills Kingu in single combat during the climactic battle, he takes the Tablet from the body and seals it with his own seal before wearing it himself, an act the poem presents as the formal transfer of cosmic kingship from the older generation of gods to Marduk and, through him, to Babylon's own patron cult.