Ereshkigal guards the Gates of the Underworld and keeps people from learning about the afterlife. He stands between the worlds of the living and the dead. She was the Lady of a Great Earth or even the Sumerian Queen of the Dead, and her job was to protect the future with all her strength and power. The goddess Ereshkigal wasn’t mean because she was just doing her job, which was to cry over the souls of men who were being sent to the afterlife. Find out more about the history and folklore of this strange Mesopotamian god.
Many people respect Ereshkigal and call him by different names and titles. The Akkadians worship the goddess as the Queen of the Great Below and call her both Irkalla and Allahu. Many books have been written about the old gods of Mesopotamia and how they lived. One of the most famous goddesses, Ereshkigal, is respected for being friendly to people. Ereshkigal is a very important person in Mesopotamian mythology. She is known as the Queen of the Dead. Anyone who hears her name should be scared, because being around her means certain death or endless punishment. It was her job to keep the dead safe in the underworld and keep the living from finding out about the future. This is a big and important job, and Ereshkigal really cared about it. Her connection to death made her a scary figure, even though she was also linked to giving life.
The goddess Ereshkigal gave birth to the god Ninazu. She was married to Gugalanna, the same Great Bull of Heaven. After Gugalanna died, Ereshkigal married the god Enlil. They had a son named Namtar. His name meant “destiny.” Ereshkigal had a girl with a third wife. She named her either Nungal or Manual. Last but not least, Nergal, her fourth husband, was the only person who decided to go to heaven with her. In Mesopotamian mythology, Ereshkigal is shown to have had a lot of different partnerships. One of her sons, Namtar, stayed true to her and finally became her minister. People in Mesopotamia worshiped Inanna, who was her younger sister and was also known as Ishtar.
Even though they were related, Ishtar and Ereshkigal had a very bad relationship. The older sister, Ereshkigal, is the guardian of the dead. Sister Ishtar, on the other hand, is a goddess of love and fertility who lives in heaven. You can also figure out that there is a big gap between them because their powers are opposite and cover both life and death. The goddesses finally ended their long-running fight after many deaths and tragedies.
It is true that Ereshkigal is the goddess of the underworld in Mesopotamian legend. Ganzir, her main palace, stands at the abyss gate and is watched over by Neti, her loyal helper. The whole domain, which can be reached through seven portals, is run by her and Negal, her husband who offered to rule the nether for six months a year. You can also guess that people respect her as Queen of Night Relief, which is a term that has been used for both the good goddess Inanna and the evil goddess Lilith.
He lives in a place deep below the Earth’s surface called Kur, which is also known as Irkalla. It is clear to those who have died here that Ereshkigal has changed the rules of life. The main thing is that their life at Kur always mirrors their life on earth. Even though they aren’t punished in Kur, how well they do in the next life depends on how well they were buried. It’s likely that they’re not having a good time at Kur since all they have to eat and drink is dry dust, unless their live relatives remember them by pouring prayers and drinks for them.
Everyone hates Kur because he is a lowly member of Mesopotamia’s underground. There is a story that there is a staircase in the Zagros Mountains that goes to the cold gates of the underworld. As you might expect, these stairs that lead to Kur are much deeper than Abzu, the body of water below the top of the Earth. Some people think Kur refers to a land that is empty or a scary place that no one has ever been. The ancients couldn’t give you a clear picture of the underworld, Kur, because no one had ever been there. You could only believe rumors and small pieces of evidence that have been passed down from generation to generation. For each spirit to get to this holy place, they have to go on a long trip. Seven gates with heavy bolts keep people out. Neti, Kur’s guardian, leads the dead to their final resting places in the underworld.
This place is completely dark and by itself. But at night, Utu, the sun god, would go through the whole area and light the way for the people who lived there. He would then go back to his post in the east to get ready for the next day. In Kur, it probably wasn’t just his job to take care of things; a lot of people thought he had to go around the area telling people what he thought about the future. The god Anunnaki shared this job with him. The Anunnaki also spoke about the afterlife for people who had died.
You should know that Utu started his daily journey to the underworld in the yard of the sun god. Some of the trees in this yard may have grown fruit with valuable stones inside it. Inanna, who was Utu’s sister, really wanted to go to that yard and eat the gem fruit. When she ate the fruit, she had a lot of private sexual thoughts, and she became the goddess of lust.
There are many well-known symbols that belong to Ereshkigal, the goddess of death. To begin, she is made of wood, which shows that she is temporary. Wood is a metaphor for how everything will finally break down and grow again. It’s a sobering reminder that no matter how healthy we are, we will all die eventually. A lioness or lion cub stands for her power in the underworld. Lapis lazuli, her valuable stone, was used to build her shrine.
She was shown as a naked goddess to show that being open at birth and at death is something everyone goes through. Two lions are sitting on either side of the figure of Ereshkigal, and two owls are sitting on either side of her shoulders. It is said that she is not wearing any clothes at all and that her thick, curly hair falls over her bust. In Akkadian folklore and literature, the number seven, which is sacred to her, means completion. She is also represented by a horse that stands for death, which many people took to mean a sign that they were going to die. A lot of people were scared to see the horse at the end because they thought it was Ereshkigal’s way of letting them into her world where they could never go back.
People were also scared of the stream of death, which was how she took the dead to the underworld. The Babylonians had a clear mental picture of a river called death that people had to accept when they were invited to do so. The ship represents the trip the dead will take to get to the underworld after they die.
In the end, the rainbow garden is a warm and friendly place for the dead to rest. It’s hidden as a magical rainbow garden so as not to scare people, but it makes you think that everyone will have a place to live after they die. The Ereshkigal sign shows a person kneeling on a horse that stands for death. People who see this will know it is time to leave this world.
Out of all the relationships Ereshkigal has with the gods, her friendship with Nergal is the most exciting. That’s when she saw the need to be free from the gods Anu, Enlil, and Ea, who were all connected to her. The gods in heaven have sent a messenger to invite her and her helper to a party in heaven. As expected, she sent Namtar, who was a trustworthy messenger, to the future. He finally reached the top of the long stairs that led to heaven’s gates. Nergal, the god of war and sickness, was the only one who didn’t meet him warmly. The other gods thought Nergal’s actions were rude. After Nergal did something wrong, the other gods told him he had to make amends by going to the underworld. Ea sent seven demons with strong orders not to accept Ereshkigal’s hospitality or kindness to go with him and watch out for him.
The first and most important rule was to never try to sex with Ereshkigal. When Nergal saw Ereshkigal taking off her clothes for a bath, he gave in to her charms because he wanted to do his job without question. Nergal fell in love with her because she was naked, and they were together for six days, until he left her asleep and went back to his throne in heaven. When Ereshkigal found out she had been left alone, she was heartbroken and furious.
Her screams of pain could be heard in the clouds as she talked about her life as the young guardian of the underground, living alone and away from her family. Every sound of pain she made showed how broken her heart and spirit were. When the gods didn’t answer her, she made her threat public: she would bring the dead back to life and crush the living. Nergal, meanwhile, tried to find safety in the sky but was turned away.
After having an intense makeout session, Ereshkigal gave Nergal a big hug. He promised to stay with her for six months if he came back. She said she would send him and his demons to the greatest world. Nergal stands for both pride and modesty. He is so full of himself that he looks down on people lower than him, but he shows humility by giving up and going back to the underground. His behavior was pleasantly realistic, like how real people act. Others are hurt by people who want recognition, but few people look forward to failing. Ereshkigal’s later meeting with Inanna gives us more information about how people really are.
She had spent a lot of time and effort in the underworld, but no one could save her now that she was stuck there. Not even the gods close to her could visit her. Because of this, she has dated many gods. If you were living in the underground, you could understand how bored she is.
Inanna or Ishtar, her sister and the goddess of love and war, was worshiped and feared by the ancients, but she was praised for all the good things about her. A lot of people thought Ishtar was selfish and unreliable, but her writings can be read to find out what kind of person she really was. She is shown to be a complicated person whose life is full of sadness, hate, and loss.
Gugalanna, Ereshkigal’s first husband, was the first man to die. She planned and schemed to have him killed. Because this event caused so much trouble in her relationship with her older sister, Ereshkigal killed her. Planned to meet up with the other gods or her demons, she was brought back to life by her uncle Ea. Ishtar liked sensual meetings, just like the Greek goddess Venus, who made people want to be with someone. So, the women were safe because her cult looked out for them. As Queen of the Universe, she is shown to be self-centered, and she doesn’t think twice about giving up other people to get what she wants. She wasn’t worried about whether or not what she was doing caused chaos. The world was really thrown into chaos because of what she did.
The biosphere was put into chaos because she wasn’t paying attention. The rate of failure was scary for all living things, including people and other animals. Because of this, both animals and people quit having babies. The beings in heaven were worried about this, but they blamed Ishtar for what she did. Instead of punishing the careless goddess, they want the quarrel settled. But you have to wonder who was brave enough to speak up and calm things down. It was her uncle Ea who helped the two goddesses stop being mean to each other.
Ishtar was set free, but she had to find someone else to stand in for her. When she got back to her house, she found her husband, Dumuzid or Tammuz, the Babylonian god of grain, sitting back and relaxing on her throne. With one swift move, she became enraged and grappled him, dragging him into the underworld to serve as her substitute for the next six months.
For the first time, you can blame for winter lasting so long squarely on her anger. Ereshkigal triumphed because she could preserve the Land of The no Return and maintain her throne inside the underworld. Mythologists will tell you that the sisters represent the opposites of one another. In contrast to her older sister, Ereshkigal, the goddess of the Underworld, Ishtar is the Goddess of Heaven.
Because of their envy and avarice, they fought bitterly, resulting in the murder of Ereshkigal’s husband, Gugalanna and the annual six-month banishment of Ishtar’s husband, Dumuzid, to the underworld. A tragic tale like this would represent the inherent nature of man.
Faithful to their gods and deities, the Mesopotamians learned a valuable lesson from Ereshkigal. She personifies the truth of the afterlife in all its glory. Her experience proves that death occurs at the proper time and that afterlife travel is needed. Since the dawn, you have known that death is nothing to be feared and that the cycle of life’s birth and death occurs naturally. Death goddess Ereshkigal isn’t a terrifying figure.
She is universally recognized as representing the inextricable link between life and death. Another allegory that describes the seasons is her feud with Ishtar. The six-month winter that Dumuzid spends in Hades is a metaphor. In the meantime, Ereshkigal’s heavenly attendant in Hades was the god Namtar, the offspring of her union with Enlil. He was the mastermind behind the proliferation of sickness and demonic entities and had complete command over the bugs that might cause havoc for humanity. He has the power to instigate harmful actions that impact others. You should also be aware that Ereshkigal isn’t the only deity who calls the underworld home. According to Mesopotamian mythology, many demons also made their home there.
In Mesopotamian mythology, Ereshkigal plays a pivotal role as the goddess of death. Considering her control over the ancient people’s ultimate fate, her impact on their daily lives was monumental. Wood, a lioness, and a lion cub represent her, as do the horse of mortality, the river for death, a boat, and a rainbow garden, all of which convey the idea that everyone must face death in this world at some point. Among the ancient Mesopotamians, the number seven represented completion; hence, she was often associated with this number.
Ereshkigal had a string of unsuccessful relationships before meeting and falling in love with Nergal, a God of War & Diseases, who visited her realm and then abandoned her. He left her, only to discover himself unable to enter heaven. After realizing his sins would prevent him from entering the realm of the gods, he returned to Ereshkigal, but this time he asked to be made underworld king. Power in the underworld was shared between Nergal and Ereshkigal. However, Ereshkigal had a younger sister named Inanna, who was always at odds with her.
Ancient prostitutes revered Inanna, also known as Ishtar, since she is the deity of battle and sexual love. She was presumably crowned Queen of the Universe because she had a large fan base in Mesopotamia. Even though Ereshkigal is associated with death, she is the essence of kindness, as seen by her tears whenever she had to take a life and watch her victim die.
