Moving Inland
Sumer to Akkad
Inanna to Ishtar
Ishtar’s Descent
     Babylon
     The Patriarchy’s Greatest Fear

Ongoing Research


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  The Emerging Patriarchy

Ishtar’s Descent

Review "Ishtar's Descent"

"Gatekeeper, ho, open thy gate!
Open thy gate that I may enter!
If thou openest not the gate to let me enter,
I will break the door, I will wrench the lock,
I will smash the door-posts, I will force the doors.
I will bring up the dead to eat the living.
And the dead will outnumber the living."
The gatekeeper opened his mouth and spoke,
Spoke to the lady Ishtar:
"Desist, O lady, do not destroy it.
I will go and announce thy name to my queen Ereshkigal."

~ from Descent of the Goddess Ishtar into the Lower World (from the Civilization of Babylonia and Assyria, M. Jastrow, 1915) Read the entire translation...

Ishtar in the Underworld
Ishatar in Hades, by Ernest Wallcousins who illustrated
Myths of Babylonia and Assyria, by Donald A. Mackenzie, 1915.