Originally worshipped in Sumer under the Sumerian name Inanna, this major divine figure was transmitted into East Semitic languages and cultures—Akkadian, Babylonian, and Assyrian—under the name Ishtar. Sources describe her as a central, polyvalent goddess whose titles include the "Queen of Heaven," and whose functions were integrated into state and civic religion across successive Mesopotamian polities.
Surviving textual summaries do not supply a single fixed iconographic portrait, but ritual and mythic descriptions link her with rich ritual regalia: in The Descent of Inanna/Ishtar she is stripped of robes and garments at successive gates of the underworld, implying association with ceremonial dress. Cultic and civic imagery connected to her name survives in monumental architecture (notably the Ishtar Gate of Babylon) and later scholarship and summaries associate her cult with symbols and temple iconography (the Ishtar Gate being a named element of her public cult). The provided sources do not offer a full, consistent visual description beyond these attestations.
Texts and summaries consistently attribute to Ishtar authority over fertility, love and sexual potency, and war; she is also tied to political sovereignty, divine law, and procreative power. Mythic narratives—most prominently The Descent—depict her actively entering the underworld to confront Ereshkigal, undergoing disempowerment (being stripped at seven gates), and participating in cycles of loss and restoration that connect her to seasonal renewal and to the figure of Tammuz/Dumuzi in fertility-resurrection motifs. These roles mark her as an agent both of generative life and of destructive/martial force within the Mesopotamian pantheon.
Adapa
Adapa is a mythic figure from ancient Mesopotamian (Sumerian and Akkadian) literature: a mortal fisherman and temple sage of Ea at Eridu endowed with exceptional wisdom. He appears in a fragmentary tale in which he breaks the wings of the south wind and is summoned to the divine court; his name was later invoked in exorcistic and ritual contexts as an authoritative identity.
Aga of Kish
Aga of Kish (Aga, Agga, Akka) is an Early Dynastic Mesopotamian king recorded in the Sumerian King List, the Tummal Inscription, epigraphic objects, and the Sumerian poem "Gilgamesh and Aga." He functions in texts as a historical/legendary political actor who attempted hegemonic demands on Uruk and was ultimately captured and released by Gilgamesh.
Akhkhazu
Akhkhazu (also Ahhazu; Sumerian Dimme-kur) is an Akkadian-era Mesopotamian malignant spirit described as a demon of jaundice who 'seizes' victims, brings fever and plagues, and is cited in later summaries as one member of a triad with Labasu and Labartu. Later popular summaries also describe her as preying on nursing infants while mothers slept.
Alulim
Alulim is the legendary antediluvian 'first king' of Eridu in Mesopotamian tradition, presented in king lists and mythic compositions as the initial ruler appointed by the gods. He functions etiologically to explain the origin of kingship and, in late ritual texts, is invoked in agricultural incantations associated with driving off field pests.
Alû (Alu)
A named lemma attested in modern reference lists as 'ALU / Alu', but for which the supplied research corpus contains no substantive primary- or secondary-source information about nature, appearance, powers, or rituals in Mesopotamian tradition.
Amurru (Martu)
Amurru, Sumerian Martu, is a Mesopotamian deity who functions as the divine personification of the Amorites. Originating in Mesopotamian textual practice, he is associated with the steppe and mountains, depicted with a crooked staff, portrayed in hymnography as warlike and lightning-armed, and from the Old Babylonian period acquires a prominent exorcistic cultic role.
Ancestors of Enlil (Enki-Ninki deities)
A sequence of Sumerian divine pairs (en-/nin- names) conceived as the primordial ancestors culminating in Enlil; chiefly attested in god lists and invoked as authoritative primordial names in ritual, especially in incantations and exorcisms.
Anshar
Anshar is a Mesopotamian primordial deity whose name (Cuneiform AN.ŠÁR) literally means "whole sky" or "the whole heaven." He functions as an abstract ancestral figure in theogonic genealogies (not actively worshiped as a regular cult deity) and appears in literary contexts—most notably the Enūma Eliš—and in god lists where he legitimizes later supreme gods.
Anu
Anu (Sumerian An; Akkadian Anu/Anum) is the divine personification of the sky in ancient Mesopotamian religion, traditionally ranked at the top of god‑lists as the source of heavenly authority (anûtu/anuti) and the fount of legitimate rule for gods and kings. Though supreme in genealogies and astronomical schema, many periods portray him as a relatively passive or figurehead deity whose active cultic role is limited until a late Seleucid reinvention in Uruk.
Anunnaki
A variable collective of major deities in ancient Sumerian, Akkadian, Assyrian and Babylonian religious literature, described as offspring or descendants linked to the sky god An (Anu) and an earth/mother figure (Ki/Ninhursag). Texts portray them as participants in the divine assembly, decreers of human fate, and in some traditions a group of seven underworld judges; their number, membership, and functions vary across sources.
Anzû (Imdugud)
Anzû, also called dZû or Imdugud, is a large storm-associated bird-figure in Sumerian/Akkadian/Babylonian myth. Portrayed as a hybrid (commonly a massive bird with a lion's head or as a half-human storm-bird), Anzû is credited in mythic narratives with seizing the Tablet of Destinies and thereby challenging the authority of chief gods such as Enlil.
Apkallu (Abgal)
Apkallu (Akkadian; Sumerian: Abgal) are polyvalent Mesopotamian wisdom figures attested as mythic/semi-divine sages (notably a group of seven), as professional human experts (ummânu), and as apotropaic images used in household and cultic ritual. They are closely associated with the god Ea (Nudimmud) as transmitters of secret knowledge and are represented in diverse iconography including fish-man and bird-headed types.
Community Record
- [1]Inanna. Wikipedia: Inannawiki
- [2]Ishtar (Wikidata). Wikidata: Ishtarwiki
- [3]The Descent of Ishtar. The Descent of Ishtar (summary/excerpt)other
- [4]Ishtar Gate. Wikipedia: Ishtar Gatewiki
- [5]THE DESCENT OF ISHTAR (alternative online text). The Descent of Ishtar (online reproduction/summary)other
- [6]Ishtar (film). Wikipedia: Ishtar (film) — modern cultural reuse of the namewiki
- [7]Ishtar — Hyborian fiction page. Modern fictional treatment referencing Ishtar name and aspectsother