Etymology
The semitic root L-Y-L layil in Hebrew, as layl in Arabic, means "night". Talmudic and Yiddish use of Lilith follows Hebrew.
In Akkadian the terms lili and līlītu mean spirits. Some uses of līlītu are listed in The Assyrian Dictionary of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago (CAD, 1956, L.190), in Wolfram von Soden's Akkadisches Handwörterbuch (AHw, p. 553), and Reallexikon der Assyriologie (RLA, p. 47).
The Sumerian she-demons lili have no etymologic relation to Akkadian lilu, "evening".
Archibald Sayce (1882) considered that Hebrew lilit (or lilith) Hebrew: לילית; and Akkadian: līlītu are from proto-Semitic. Charles Fossey (1902) has this literally translating to "female night being/demon", although cuneiform inscriptions exist where Līlīt and Līlītu refers to disease-bearing wind spirits. Another possibility is association not with "night", but with "wind", thus identifying the Akkadian Lil-itu as a loan from the Sumerian lil, "air" — specifically from Ninlil, "lady air", goddess of the south wind (and wife of Enlil) — and itud, "moon".
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