It is assumed that these deities could be partially conflated with each other or shared a similar origin, though proposals that there was only one Ninmada are also present in modern scholarship.
[1] Nin is a grammatically neutral term and can be found in the names of both female (Ninisina, Ninkasi, Ninmena) and male (Ningirsu, Ninazu, Ningishzida) deities.
[3] It is assumed that there were two separate deities named Ninmada, but Antoine Cavigneaux and Manfred Krebernik consider it possible that they either shared the same origin or that they could have been partially conflated.
[1] The god list An = Anum refers to Ninmada both as a snake charmer and as the "worshiper of An," and apparently considers the deity to be male.
[1] The same sequence mentions Ninkurra, described as "lord who digs up lapis lazuli," Ninzadim, Ninnisig (the butcher of Ekur), Kusu (a purification goddess), Siris (here labeled as the cook of Anu, an otherwise unknown role[12]), and Nisaba.
[15] According to Andrew R. George, the female snake charmer Ninmada could be regarded as a daughter of the brewer goddess Ninkasi, and appears with her in enumerations of Enlil's courtiers.
[18] Since he has no permission to do so, Ninmada advises him to ask the sun god Utu for help, but as the rest of the narrative is not preserved, it is unknown how did he aid them and in which way the crop eventually reached Sumer.
[20] Frans Wiggermann notes that the information about grain preserved in the myth appears to match conclusions of archaeologists, as it is assumed domesticated cereals arrived in Mesopotamia from the so-called Hilly Flanks surrounding the area.