Ishtar

Originally a Mesopotamian mother-goddess of love and war; also known as Astarte; later the goddess of love, identified with the planet Venus. She travelled to the Underworld to rescue her consort Tammuz, an event commemorated in annual ceremonies.

Fertile Crescent myth series
Mesopotamian
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Arabian
Mesopotamia
Primordial beings
The great gods
Demigods & heroes
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Tales from Babylon
7 Gods who Decree
4 primary: Anu Enlil Ki Enki	3 sky: Ishtar Sin Sama

Ishtar is the Assyrian counterpart to the Sumerian Inanna and to the cognate northwest Semitic goddess Astarte. Anunit, Astarte and Atarsamain are alternative names for Ishtar.

Ishtar is a mother goddess, fertility goddess, the goddess of spring, a storm goddess, a warrior goddess and goddess of war, a goddess of the hunt, a goddess of love, goddess of marriage and childbirth, and a goddess of fate.

She was also an underworld deity, her twin sister being Ereshkigal the Goddess of Death. But her dominant aspects are as the mother goddess of compassion and the goddess of love, sex and war.

As the goddess of love, Ishtar was irresistable. Ishtar herself was the 'courtesan of the gods' and she was the first to experience the desires which she inspired. Sovereign of the world by virtue of love's omnipotence, Ishtar was the most popular goddess in Assyria and Babylonia.

In late Babylonian astrology, the goddess Ishtar was related to the planet Venus and was the divine personification of the planet. The meaning of Ishtar is not known, though it is possible that the underlying stem is the same as that of Assur, which would thus make her the "leading one" or "chief". Some who seek to trace Christian practices to pagan origins claim that Eostre, an Anglo-Saxon goddess of spring (whose name later gave rise to modern English "Easter") may be etymologically connected to that of Ishtar, though there is no linguistically-meaningful evidence to support such a link.

One story involving Ishtar, and one of the most famous, is the story of her descent to the underworld. Ishtar, who was already regarded as the queen of the living due to her status as supreme goddess, desired to rule the underworld. The gatekeeper accepted her explanation, but also made sure to tell Ereshkigal, the Queen of the Dead and sister of Ishtar, of Ishtar's visit. Ishtar then grabbed Ereshkigal, pulling her off her throne and sitting in her place, but the Annunaki, the seven demon-gods of the underworld, sentenced her to death. However, Ea, the cunning uncle of Ishtar, managed to get Ereshkigal to let Ishtar live again provided she sent a substitute. Ishtar was greeted by minor deities upon her return, who had been wearing only rough sacks and groveling in the dirt for days mourning for Ishtar, and so Ishtar decided that she couldn't send any of them.

In all the great centres Inanna and then Ishtar had her temples: E-anna, "house of An", in Uruk; Ishtar was the guardian of prostitutes, and probably had priestess-prostitutes to serve her. The (later) votaries of Ishtar were virgins who, as long as they remained in her service, were not permitted to marry.

Ishtar is also a significant figure in the epic of Gilgamesh.

One of the most famous places named after Ishtar is Tarout Island in the Persian Gulf.