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Geshtinanna
Geshtinanna was a Mesopotamian goddess best known due to her role in myths about the death of Dumuzi, her brother. It is not certain what functions did she fulfill in the Mesopotamian pantheon, though her association with the scribal arts and dream interpretation is well attested. She could serve as a scribe in the underworld, where according to the myth ''Inanna's Descent'' she had to reside for a half of each year in place of her brother. Evidence for the worship of Geshtinanna is mostly available from Early Dynastic state of Lagash, where she had her own cult center, Sagub. She was also present in the pantheons of other cities, for example in Uruk and Tell al-Rimah. She ceased to be venerated after the Old Babylonian period, though even later on she was still mentioned in god lists and in literary texts, some of which were still copied during the period of Seleucid rule over Mesopotamia. Name The oldest writing of Geshtinanna's name was Amageshtin or Amageshtinanna, as atte ...
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Mesopotamian Goddess
Deities in ancient Mesopotamia were almost exclusively anthropomorphic. They were thought to possess extraordinary powers and were often envisioned as being of tremendous physical size. The deities typically wore ''melam'', an ambiguous substance which "covered them in terrifying splendor" and which could also be worn by heroes, kings, giants, and even demons. The effect that seeing a deity's ''melam'' has on a human is described as ''ni'', a word for the " physical creeping of the flesh". Both the Sumerian and Akkadian languages contain many words to express the sensation of ''ni'', including the word ''puluhtu'', meaning "fear". Deities were almost always depicted wearing horned caps, consisting of up to seven superimposed pairs of ox-horns. They were also sometimes depicted wearing clothes with elaborate decorative gold and silver ornaments sewn into them. The ancient Mesopotamians believed that their deities lived in Heaven, but that a god's statue was a physical embodiment ...
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Ancient Mesopotamian Underworld
The ancient Mesopotamian underworld, most often known in Sumerian as Kur, Irkalla, Kukku, Arali, or Kigal and in Akkadian as Erṣetu, although it had many names in both languages, was a dark, dreary cavern located deep below the ground, where inhabitants were believed to continue "a shadowy version of life on earth". The only food or drink was dry dust, but family members of the deceased would pour libations for them to drink. In the Sumerian underworld, there was no final judgement of the deceased and the dead were neither punished nor rewarded for their deeds in life. A person's quality of existence in the underworld was determined by their conditions of burial. The ruler of the underworld was the goddess Ereshkigal, who lived in the palace Ganzir, sometimes used as a name for the underworld itself. Her husband was either Gugalanna, the "canal-inspector of Anu", or, especially in later stories, Nergal, the god of war. After the Akkadian Period ( 2334–2154 BC), Nergal s ...
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Belili
Belili was a Mesopotamian goddess. This name refers both to a sister of Dumuzi known from some of the texts pertaining to his death, and to a primordial deity paired with Alala and listed in enumerations of ancestors of Anu. There is no consensus among researchers if they should be considered one and the same. Name Belili's name has no plausible etymology in Sumerian or any Semitic language, and based on its structure it has been compared to other divine names whose origin also remains a mystery, such as Alala, Aruru, Bunene and Zababa. Belili is also attested as an ordinary given name, one of the so-called banana names known from both Mesopotamia and Elam. Names with this structure are particularly common in the earliest Akkadian documents from Gasur (later known as Nuzi). It has been proposed that such names, both divine and ordinary, originate in a substrate language (so-called " proto-Euphratic"), but this conclusion is not universally accepted, and Gonzalo Rubio points o ...
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Inanna
Inanna, also sux, 𒀭𒊩𒌆𒀭𒈾, nin-an-na, label=none is an ancient Mesopotamian goddess of love, war, and fertility. She is also associated with beauty, sex, divine justice, and political power. She was originally worshiped in Sumer under the name "Inanna", and later by the Akkadians, Babylonians, and Assyrians under the name Ishtar, (occasionally represented by the logogram ). She was known as the " Queen of Heaven" and was the patron goddess of the Eanna temple at the city of Uruk, which was her main cult center. She was associated with the planet Venus and her most prominent symbols included the lion and the eight-pointed star. Her husband was the god Dumuzid (later known as Tammuz) and her , or personal attendant, was the goddess Ninshubur (who later became conflated with the male deities Ilabrat and Papsukkal). Inanna was worshiped in Sumer at least as early as the Uruk period ( 4000 BCE – 3100 BCE), but she had little cult activity before the conqu ...
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Duttur
Duttur ( Sumerian language:𒀭𒁍𒁺, dBE-''du'') was a Mesopotamian goddess best known as the mother of Dumuzid. She frequently appears in texts mourning his death, either on her own or alongside Geshtinanna and Inanna. It is often assumed that she was associated with sheep. Name The name of Dumuzid's mother was usually written as dBE-''du''. The cuneiform sign BE has two possible readings, ''sír'' and ''dur7''. Duttur is the commonly accepted reading of the name in modern scholarship, though the variant Durtur is also in use. Other attested writings include the Emesal forms Zertu and Zertur and Akkadian Dutturru. A rare spelling only known from the Old Babylonian period is Turtur. However, dTUR.TUR is also attested as a name of an unrelated deity worshiped in the Ur III period, sometimes written with the plural morpheme -''ne'' and as a result interpreted as either "the small gods" (''Dingir''-TUR.TUR-''ne'') or "the divine children" (''ddumu-dumu-ne''). Duttur's name coul ...
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Ningishzida
Ningishzida ( Sumerian: DNIN-G̃IŠ-ZID-DA, possible meaning "Lord f theGood Tree") was a Mesopotamian deity of vegetation, the underworld and sometimes war. He was commonly associated with snakes. Like Dumuzi, he was believed to spend a part of the year in the land of the dead. He also shared many of his functions with his father Ninazu. In myths he usually appears in an underworld setting, though in the myth of Adapa he is instead described as one of the doorkeepers of the sky god Anu. Name Thorkild Jacobsen proposed that the Sumerian name ''Ningishzida'' can be explained as "lord of the good tree." This translation is still accepted by other Assyriologists today. Various syllabic spellings are known, including '' dNi-gi-si-da'', ''dNin-nigi-si-da'', ''dNin-ki-zi-da'' and ''dNin-gi-iz-zi-da''. While " nin" can be translated as "lady" in some contexts, it was grammatically neutral in Sumerian and can be found in the names of many deities, both male (Ningishzida, Ninazu, ...
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Belet-Seri
Belet-Seri was a Mesopotamian goddess who served as a scribe in the court of the underworld goddess Ereshkigal. She could be regarded as the Akkadian counterpart of Sumerian Geshtinanna, but the name could also function as a title of Ašratum, the wife of Amurru, or as a fully independent deity. Character The name Belet-Seri means "mistress of the steppe." The Akkadian word ''ṣēru'', in addition to its literal meaning, could also refer to the underworld. Old Babylonian incantations, such as Udug-hul, attest that Belet-Seri was envisioned as a scribe of the underworld (''ṭupšarrat arallê''). It has been proposed that she was meant to server as a mirror of the royal scribe (''ṭupšar ekalli'') in the underworld court of Ereshkigal. She was most likely believed to hold a list containing the names of the dead, on the basis of which they were admitted to the underworld. Her role is described in the '' Epic of Gilgamesh'' when Enkidu has a vision of the underworld in a dre ...
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Amurru (god)
Amurru, also known under the Sumerian name Martu, was a Mesopotamian god who served as the divine personification of the Amorites. In past scholarship it was often assumed that he originated as an Amorite deity, but today it is generally accepted that he developed as a divine stereotype of them in Mesopotamian religion. As such, he was associated with steppes and pastoralism, as evidenced by his epithets and iconography. While this was initially his only role, he gradually developed other functions, becoming known as a god of the mountains, a warlike weather deity and a divine exorcist. He is first attested in documents from the Ur III period, chiefly in Sumerian and Akkadian theophoric names. Later he also came to be worshiped in Babylon, Assur and other locations in Assyria and Babylonia. He had his own cult center somewhere in the area known as the Sealand in Mesopotamian texts. Only a single myth about Amurru is known. It describes the circumstances of his marriage to Adgar ...
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Akkadian Language
Akkadian (, Akkadian: )John Huehnergard & Christopher Woods, "Akkadian and Eblaite", ''The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the World's Ancient Languages''. Ed. Roger D. Woodard (2004, Cambridge) Pages 218-280 is an extinct East Semitic language that was spoken in ancient Mesopotamia ( Akkad, Assyria, Isin, Larsa and Babylonia) from the third millennium BC until its gradual replacement by Akkadian-influenced Old Aramaic among Mesopotamians by the 8th century BC. It is the earliest documented Semitic language. It used the cuneiform script, which was originally used to write the unrelated, and also extinct, Sumerian (which is a language isolate). Akkadian is named after the city of Akkad, a major centre of Mesopotamian civilization during the Akkadian Empire (c. 2334–2154 BC). The mutual influence between Sumerian and Akkadian had led scholars to describe the languages as a '' Sprachbund''. Akkadian proper names were first attested in Sumerian texts from around the mi ...
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Aruru (Babylonian Goddess)
Aruru was a Mesopotamian goddess. The origin of her name is presently uncertain. While initially considered an independent deity associated with vegetation and portrayed in hymns as violent, she eventually came to be viewed as analogous Ninhursag. Her name could also function as an epithet of goddesses such as Nisaba and Ezina- Kusu. She was often called the older sister of Enlil. Her cult centers most likely were the cities of Kesh, Adab and Irisaĝrig. She appears in a number of literary texts, some of which preserve information about her original character. She is also present in the ''Epic of Gilgamesh'', which her portrays her as the creator of Enkidu. Name and character The etymology of the theonym Aruru ('' dA-ru-ru'', 𒀭𒀀𒊒𒊒) is considered either uncertain or unknown. A connection with Sumerian ''a-ru'' or ''a-ri'', which can be translated as "the one who lets the seed flow," has been deemed implausible by Manfred Krebernik, as this term is only used in this se ...
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Aya (goddess)
Aya (rarely Nin-Aya) was an Akkadian goddess of dawn, and the wife of Shamash, the sun god. Her Sumerian equivalent was Sherida, wife of Shamash's equivalent Utu. Character Aya's name means dawn in Akkadian. She was associated with morning light and the rising sun. In this role she was called "morning-maker." It has also been suggested that the Sumerian name Sherida () was a loan from Akkadian ''šērtum'', "morning." Gebhard Selz notes that this would make her one of the first deities whose name has Akkadian origin to be integrated into the pantheons of Sumerian-speaking areas. Other such examples are Suen, a name of the moon god, and Ishtaran, a divine judge. Further attested names of the sun god's wife include Ninkar, Sudaĝ and Sudgan. Her another primary function was that of a divine bride, as exemplified by her epithet ''kallatum'' ("bride," "daughter in law"). As Shamash's wife she was regarded as epitome of beauty and charm. Shamash and Aya are the divine couple most ...
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Kassite Period
The Kassites () were people of the ancient Near East, who controlled Babylonia after the fall of the Old Babylonian Empire c. 1531 BC and until c. 1155 BC (short chronology). They gained control of Babylonia after the Hittite sack of Babylon in 1531 BC, and established a dynasty generally assumed to have been based first in that city, after a hiatus. Later rule shifted to the new city of Dur-Kurigalzu. By the time of Babylon's fall, the Kassites had already been part of the region for a century and a half, acting sometimes with the Babylon's interests and sometimes against. There are records of Kassite and Babylonian interactions, in the context of military employment, during the reigns of Babylonian kings Samsu-iluna (1686 to 1648 BC), Abī-ešuh, and Ammī-ditāna. The origin and classification of the Kassite language, like the Sumerian language and Hurrian language, is uncertain, and, also like the two latter languages, has generated a wide array of speculation over th ...
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