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Updated: June 26, 2025
That Ashur should be referred to at this period is what we might expect, inasmuch as it was known to have been the earliest capital of Assyria; more striking is the reference to Nineveh, proving as it does that it was a flourishing city in Hammurabi's time and that the temple of Ishtar there had already been long established.
On the other hand, Herodotus does not appear to have understood the religious significance of the custom that he designates as 'shameful. The name given to the harlot among Babylonians and Hebrews, Kadishtu or K'deshâ, that is, 'the sacred one, is sufficient evidence that, at its origin, the rite was not the product of obscene tendencies, but due to naïve conceptions connected with the worship of Ishtar as the goddess of fertility.
With the prayer to Sin, appeals to other gods and also goddesses are frequently combined, to Marduk, Ishtar, Tashmitum, Nabu, Ramman, and the like.
The title Kore became almost a proper name, though the designation was not so definite as in the cases of Bel and Ishtar. +787+. As the Kore is the representative of vegetable life, so Hestia stands in general for the indoor life, the family.
If a fragment of the tale were only better preserved, we would have an episode of Etana's earlier career. But such is the condition of this fragment that, at the most, it can be said that Etana is engaged in some conflict against a city, in which Ishtar, Bel, the Anunnaki, the Igigi, and some minor gods, as En-ninna, Sibittum, are involved.
The spread of the Gilgamesh epic and of the Ishtar cult into Asia Minor and Greece may be instanced as illustrations of Babylonian influence; and granting that the Phoenicians acted largely as the mediators in carrying these ideas to the Greek settlements, still there must have been influences at work long before this direct contact with Semitic culture that prepared the way for the ready acceptance which Semitic conceptions and Semitic practices found.
The few fragments of the seventh and eighth tablets do not suffice for determining exactly in what way this happened, but Ishtar is evidently the cause of the misfortune. A fatal illness, it would seem, seizes hold of Eabani, whether as the result of a further contest or directly sent, it is impossible to say. For twelve days he lingers and then is taken away.
As it is, Eabani asks Ukhat to conduct him To the glorious dwelling, the sacred seat of Anu and Ishtar, To the seat of Gilgamesh, perfect in power, Surpassing men in strength like a mountain bull.
It is difficult to account for this fact, which is the more remarkable, since in Phoenicia Astarte, which corresponds closely to Ishtar, is found repeatedly as an element in the royal titles.
A goddess who, while sharing the fate of her sister goddesses in being overshadowed by Ishtar, yet merits a special treatment, is one whose name is plausibly conjectured to be read Ninâ.
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