Inana

 

Adapted from a 5000 year old Sumerian legend

 

Note: in this story Inana is called after her Babylonian form - Ishtar - and Ninurta is likewise called Tammuz. The Babylonian version of this ancient story, although written some 1000 years later, is the most complete. The earth aspect of Inana is her sister the older Ereshkigal. Ninurta (Tammuz), when he fell into the pit, fell into her realm and was her prisoner. This story is about the balance between this world and the underworld.

 

Part four: Descent

 

 

'After Tammuz had been taken by the followers of Ereshkigal, Ishtar wandered amongst the willows on the banks of the Tigris. She sat by a bed of wind-blown rushes where the waters of the quiet river slipped past her, and cried for him. She sang a lament, her voice filled with grief. "Tammuz, my lover, my lion, now you are not here the field has no grain. My bed chamber is empty and the meadows have no flowers." Her eyes filled with tears. "The garden has no honey and the grapes have dried on the vine. I miss your embrace and your caress. My honey-sweet, you lie sleeping in the cold embrace of my dark sister Ereshkigal."

 

 

For forty days and nights she sat, and the fields were not tended nor the ewes led to pasture. At last she arose and brushed the dust from her hair and robes. Her eyes glinted with purpose and she turned to her messenger. "I have decided that I am going to seek out Ereshkigal." A grim smile crossed her lips. "Go now and tell the people that I am seeking Tammuz and I will not return until he is found. I am determined to go to the Land of No Return, and in the caves there I shall confront my sister. I shall tread the road that is only travelled once and enter the dark house. There, where those without light dwell, those who are clothed in feathers like birds, I shall find him. Though dust is their food and clay their bread, I shall bring him back to the world."

 

 

Having told her messenger her plans, she set out towards the distant mountains once more. It was a hard path, and long. She slept by the side of the streams and ate only the nuts and berries of the forest. At last, tired and weary of the road, she approached the entrance of the cave. Around her feet wild poppies specked the grass and two hoary pillars of rock marked the opening. Ivy crawled up the lintel, obscuring a small, perfectly square inlet. Here Ishtar rested and after washing herself from a small spring that emerged from a crack in the cliff, she put on a fresh dress of white linen and took from her shoulder bag her badges of office. A crown of laurels she placed on her head and around her eyes she smudged mascara. On her ears she placed gold rings. Around her neck she hung her beads of lapis lazuli and on her breast she pinned a butterfly broach. Carefully she wrapped her birthstones around her waist so that they hung in loose clusters, and around her wrists and ankles she put bracelets of gold and silver. Having dressed herself thus, she took a deep breath and, bowing her head, walked into the velvet darkness.

 

 

A short way on, still lit by a faint light from the day outside, an oaken gate barred her way. It was criss-crossed with chevrons and a heavy bolt, full of rust, locked it shut. Ishtar paused and raising her voice she said, "Ho there, gatekeeper, open this doorway! Let me enter, for if you do not I will shatter the hinges and break the wooden beams. I will split the doorframe and loosen the bolt." Each word echoed in the chamber, reverberating and dying away in the depths of the cave. "What will you do then?" she questioned. "The dead will rise up and will be freed. They will outnumber the living."

 

 

There was a silence in the chamber, then a long hiss of a drawn breath. The gatekeeper spoke, his voice like the rustle of dry grasses. "Wait, lady, do not destroy the gate, for I will bring your message to Ereshkigal." The silence returned and with it the gloom of the cave. Ishtar sat on a shelf in the rock and with only the brooding door for company, meditated on what she had started.

 

 

Deep in the winding passages of the labyrinth, a temple cut from the living rock stood, black on black, seven even walls of polished basalt surrounding the round tower of the keep. It was to here that the gatekeeper made his way. At each of the gates he uttered a thin rasping call before passing through. He found Ereshkigal performing the rite of balance and quietly waited until she had finished. When the last of the yarrow sticks had been sorted and the incense lit, he spoke. "Lady of the Dark, your sister Ishtar is at your door."

 

 

Ereshkigal froze and turned slowly to face the keeper of the keys. Her face darkened, stretching her thin lips. "What" she questioned, "brings her to me? What has incited her? Who has moved her heart that she makes such an effort of will to come here?" She frowned and whimsically toyed with the smoke from the incense. "Surely it is not because I drink water with the gods?" She shook her head. "I am she who eats clay with the dead and drinks muddy water for beer - Ishtar certainly does not want to dwell with me. I weep for those taken before their time, the loved from the lover, the child from the mother." She stepped towards the gatekeeper and spoke as if she was still making up her mind. "Go back and open the gates for her. Treat her according to the ancient rituals."

 

 

The gatekeeper went out from the dark walls and back to the gate. He drew back the bolt which, despite its rusty appearance, moved easily under his hand. The door swung open and he pointed towards the long water-worn passage saying, "Enter, my lady. May the spirits of this world greet you, let the palace of the dark world be glad to see you." Ishtar rose and, concealing her excitement, walked slowly downwards. Dimly, through the shadows and dark solitude, she followed her guide.

 

 

At length she came to the first of the gates set into the black basalt walls of the citadel. They glinted faintly as if lit by a pale moon. Here she paused. The gatekeeper reached up and took the laurel leaves from her head. Ishtar allowed him to, but asked, "Gatekeeper, why have you taken my crown of laurel leaves from my head? For though I am the one who sees the past and the future, now I am blind."

 

 

The gatekeeper's face portrayed no emotion and instead of answering her question, he assured her that this was the price of entry and part of the rites of the goddess of the earth. Ishtar nodded and they went together to the second gate.

 

 

Gesturing towards her head, the gatekeeper held out a white cotton cloth and a small woven purse. Ishtar, wiping the mascara from her eyes and unclasping her earrings said, "Why do you take the symbols of the old powers from me? I am the vessel in which these reside."

 

 

"Go in, my lady," the gatekeeper replied, "for such are the rites of the goddess of the earth." The journey through the gates lasted seven days and at each gate the gatekeeper demanded that she pay the price of entry with one of her icons of power. Ishtar, for her part, only asked the meaning of the sacrifice and every time was rewarded with the same platitude. At the seventh door she stopped, for the gatekeeper had asked that she remove her white linen dress. Ishtar shrugged as if it meant nothing to her and slipped easily out of the garment. The gatekeeper picked it up and folded it neatly before placing it in a small closet set into the door-frame of the last gate. With this last protection removed, Ishtar stepped into the gloom naked and without fear. Her mind was set on Tammuz and this stern conviction marked her gait.

 

 

Ereshkigal had prepared herself well for the meeting. Around her were the spirits of the dark palace and she sat on a throne of stone, under which a black dog sat on its haunches. The dog barred its teeth at Ishtar, but made no sound. Despite her nakedness, Ishtar did not hesitate. "Ereshkigal, you hag of the world of men, you have taken from me my lover! Because of your serpent-eyed jealousy he lies now in your embrace. Take yourself from that throne! Take yourself away from me, for I am here to bring Tammuz home!" Ereshkigal stepped away from the seat of power and summoned her aides. She pulled herself up to her full height, her features moved and contorted, and gone was the thin hag. Her hair flew wildly about her and her breast was heaving. Larger than life she seemed and when she spoke it was with the deadly authority of the Queen of Darkness.

 

 

"You are beyond your place, for here in the Dark World I am the authority. You shall not make any demands on my name, for I keep the souls of the dead. I will bind you and imprison you, for you are yet living in the Land of the Dead, and to all things here you are abhorrent." She raised her hands above her head and her eyes widened. Unseen from the numerous passages came the roar of the elementals as they rushed to their mistress's aid.

"An end to this farce!" she cried. "The sixty diseases I summon to you, against your side, against your feet, against your heart and against your head. In torment your body shall writhe as if bitten by a hundred sharp fangs and in my palace you shall remain." Ishtar staggered as if hit by a powerful blow. She clutched her heart and sank to her knees, but no sound did she make. Ereshkigal slowly lowered her hands and, as she did so, Ishtar collapsed on the marble floor, her perfect skin becoming infested with boils and pus and her hair falling out in dark locks around her head. A second great wind entered Ereshkigal's chamber and gently picked up the prone body to carry it away to her dark prison that lay waiting beneath the room.

 

 

The world above that Ishtar had left behind was a world of mourning. The joy in the soul had fled, the bull in the field did not mount the cow, the maidens slept in their own rooms and the young men slept by themselves. Such was the depth of their loss that the very colours of the day were pale and grey. Ishtar's messenger, his head hanging low and tears on his face, went to the earth Goddess and prayed. "Ishtar has gone down into the earth and she has not arisen again. The world has stopped. The maid and the young man do not court, neither does the bull mount the cow." At that moment, a young man whose features were like the glory of the risen sun stepped into the room. His body moved with the lithe grace of a dancer as he stepped up towards the messenger. Golden curls, cropped and oiled, framed his face. "I am the child of the moon and the sun," he said, his voice as soft and modulated as silver. "I shall go to Ereshkigal, and there I will woo her and settle her fears, for she is rightly mine to claim and Tammuz has no place in her affections." As he stepped towards the edge of the sacred glade he reached out and touched a small oak sapling standing alone in the centre and looking back said, "I can pass once only through the seven gates and there I shall speak to Ishtar's dark sister. With an oath, binding and eternal, I shall win the waters of life and free Ishtar from her prison." He walked easily away into the night air, a vision or a mirage, his voice echoing back to the messenger, "For my part, I shall live with Ereshkigal in her palace and Tammuz will be reborn."

 

 

And so it happened. Ereshkigal spent nine days and nights with the seemly young man. Her heart and her soul were tranquil. When at last their passion had been sated and they were laying at ease, the comely child of the sun and moon made his request. He raised his head from the silk pillow and spoke. "You and I have fulfilled our destiny. Will you not grant me a boon for the love I have born?" Ereshkigal said, "Choose what you will, I shall not refuse you. As the earth Goddess is my witness, so your request will be honoured."

 

 

"Oh, my lady, let me have the waters of life kept in the sacred skin, so that Ishtar may drink from it." The fateful words stirred a horror in Ereshkigal, but there was no way she could renounce her vows, though she reached out to try and silence her lover's lips. She struck her thigh and bit her finger.

 

 

"I would that you could call back those words, you snake! You have made a request of me that should not have been made. Go from me! I will settle your destiny and decree a fate for you that will never be forgotten." She rose from the couch and where before there had been harmony, there was now a dark storm as Ereshkigal pronounced his doom. "The sweepings of the gutters will be your food, the sewers your drink. In the shadows of the walls you will live and on the doorsteps you will sleep. Become now a drunken sot!" She turned towards her helpers. The words were dragged from her lips but speak them she must, for her own vow bound her. "Go, now. Knock at the prison-gates, give the gifts of precious stones and place the gold around the altars. Sprinkle Ishtar with the waters of life and bring her back to the world of men."

 

 

Ishtar was escorted through the seven gates by the gatekeeper, who gave back to her the icons of her office. From there she left the caverns of the Underworld. The gatekeeper, after sealing the bolt, spoke after her. "You have paid the ransom and given back her lover, a soul for a soul, and it has been matched. Now born again is your lover, your Tammaz. Wash him in clear water and anoint him with fine oils. Clothe him in a red robe and let the lapis-lazuli flutes play as the dancers sing their lament." Ishtar responded, "You shall not rob me of my only brother again. On the day when Tammuz appears and plays for me the sweet songs of love, then on that day also the mourners and the dead will rise with him and breath the sweet breath of the living." '