Ereshkigal and family " ( nineteenth or eighteenth century BC), which is believed to represent either Ereshkigal or her younger sister Inanna A number of deities were believed by the ancient Mesopotamians to reside in the underworld. The queen of the underworld was the goddess Ereshkigal. She was believed to live in a palace known as Ganzir. In earlier stories, her husband is
Gugalanna, but, in later myths, her husband is the god
Nergal. Her gatekeeper was the god Neti and her
sukkal is the god
Namtar. In the poem ''
Inanna's Descent into the Underworld'', Ereshkigal is described as Inanna's "older sister". Gugalanna is the first husband of Ereshkigal, the queen of the underworld. His name probably originally meant "canal inspector of An" and he may be merely an alternative name for
Ennugi. The son of Ereshkigal and Gugalanna is
Ninazu. In ''Inanna's Descent into the Underworld'', Inanna tells the gatekeeper Neti that she is descending to the underworld to attend the funeral of "Gugalanna, the husband of my elder sister Ereshkigal". During the
Akkadian Period ( 2334 – 2154 BC), Ereshkigal's role as the ruler of the underworld was assigned to Nergal, the god of death. The Akkadians attempted to harmonize this dual rulership of the underworld by making Nergal Ereshkigal's husband. Nergal is the deity most often identified as Ereshkigal's husband. He was also associated with forest fires (and identified with the fire-god,
Gibil), fevers, plagues, and war. In myths, he causes destruction and devastation. Ninazu is the son of Ereshkigal and the father of
Ningishzida. He is closely associated with the underworld. He was mostly worshipped in
Eshnunna during the third millennium BC, but he was later supplanted by the Hurrian storm god
Tishpak. A god named "Ninazu" was also worshipped at
Enegi in southern Sumer, but this may be a different local god by the same name. His divine beast was the
mušḫuššu, a kind of dragon, which was later given to Tishpak and then Marduk.
Ningishzida is a god who normally lives in the underworld. He is the son of Ninazu and his name may be etymologically derived from a phrase meaning "Lord of the Good Tree". In the Sumerian poem,
The Death of Gilgamesh, the hero
Gilgamesh dies and meets Ningishzida, along with
Dumuzid, in the underworld.
Gudea, the Sumerian king of the city-state of
Lagash, revered Ningishzida as his personal protector. In the myth of
Adapa, Dumuzid and Ningishzida are described as guarding the gates of the highest Heaven. Ningishzida was associated with the constellation
Hydra.
Other underworld deities ( 2000–1600 BC) showing a dead god (probably Dumuzid) resting in his coffin Dumuzid, later known by the
corrupted form Tammuz, is the ancient Mesopotamian god of shepherds and the primary consort of the goddess Inanna. His sister is the goddess Geshtinanna. In addition to being the god of shepherds, Dumuzid was also an agricultural deity associated with the growth of plants. Ancient Near Eastern peoples associated Dumuzid with the springtime, when the land was fertile and abundant, but, during the summer months, when the land was dry and barren, it was thought that Dumuzid had "died". During the month of
Dumuzid, which fell in the middle of summer, people all across Sumer would mourn over his death. An enormous number of popular stories circulated throughout the Near East surrounding his death. Geshtinanna is a rural agricultural goddess sometimes associated with
dream interpretation. She is the sister of Dumuzid, the god of shepherds. In one story, she protects her brother when the
galla demons come to drag him down to the underworld by hiding him successively in four different places. In another version of the story, she refuses to tell the
galla where he is hiding, even after they torture her. The
galla eventually take Dumuzid away after he is betrayed by an unnamed "friend", but Inanna decrees that he and Geshtinanna will alternate places every six months, each spending half the year in the underworld while the other stays in Heaven. While she is in the underworld, Geshtinanna serves as Ereshkigal's scribe.
Lugal-irra and Meslamta-ea are a set of twin gods who were worshipped in the village of Kisiga, located in northern
Babylonia. They were regarded as guardians of doorways and they may have originally been envisioned as a set of twins guarding the gates of the underworld, who chopped the dead into pieces as they passed through the gates. During the
Neo-Assyrian Period (911 BC–609 BC), small depictions of them would be buried at entrances, with Lugal-irra always on the left and Meslamta-ea always on the right. They are identical and are shown wearing horned caps and each holding an axe and a mace. They are identified with the constellation
Gemini, which is named after them. Neti is the gatekeeper of the underworld. In the story of ''Inanna's Descent into the Underworld
, he leads Inanna through the seven gates of the underworld, removing one of her garments at each gate so that when she comes before Ereshkigal she is naked and symbolically powerless. Belet-Seri is a chthonic underworld goddess who was thought to record the names of the deceased as they entered the underworld. Enmesarra is a minor deity of the underworld. Seven or eight other minor deities were said to be his offspring. His symbol was the suššuru'' (a kind of
pigeon). In one incantation, Enmesarra and Ninmesharra, his female counterpart, are invoked as ancestors of
Enki and as primeval deities. Ennugi is "the canal inspector of the gods". He is the son of Enlil or Enmesarra and his wife is the goddess
Nanibgal. He is associated with the underworld and he may be Gugalanna, the first husband of Ereshkigal, under a different name.
Demons The ancient Mesopotamians also believed that the underworld was home to many demons, which are sometimes referred to as "offspring of
arali". These demons could sometimes leave the underworld and terrorize mortals on earth. One class of demons that were believed to reside in the underworld were known as
galla; their primary purpose appears to have been to drag unfortunate mortals back to Kur. They are frequently referenced in magical texts, and some texts describe them as being seven in number. Several extant poems describe the
galla dragging the god Dumuzid into the underworld. Like other demons, however,
galla could also be benevolent and, in a hymn from King
Gudea of
Lagash ( 2144 – 2124 BC), a minor god named
Ig-alima is described as "the great
galla of
Girsu". Demons had no
cult in
Mesopotamian religious practice since demons "know no food, know no drink, eat no flour offering and drink no libation."
Lamashtu was a demonic goddess with the "head of a lion, the teeth of a donkey, naked breasts, a hairy body, hands stained (with blood?), long fingers and fingernails, and the feet of
Anzû." She was believed to feed on the blood of human infants and was widely blamed as the cause of
miscarriages and
cot deaths. Although Lamashtu has traditionally been identified as a demoness, the fact that she could cause evil on her own without the permission of other deities strongly indicates that she was seen as a goddess in her own right. Mesopotamian peoples protected against her using
amulets and
talismans. She was believed to ride in her boat on the river of the underworld and she was associated with donkeys. She was believed to be the daughter of
An.
Pazuzu is a demonic god who was well known to the Babylonians and Assyrians throughout the first millennium BC. He is shown with "a rather canine face with abnormally bulging eyes, a scaly body, a snake-headed penis, the talons of a bird and usually wings." He was believed to be the son of the god
Hanbi. He was usually regarded as evil, but he could also sometimes be a beneficent entity who protected against winds bearing pestilence and he was thought to be able to force Lamashtu back to the underworld. Amulets bearing his image were positioned in dwellings to protect infants from Lamashtu and pregnant women frequently wore amulets with his head on them as protection from her.
Šul-pa-e's name means "youthful brilliance", but he was not envisioned as a youthful god. According to one tradition, he was the consort of Ninhursag, a tradition which contradicts the usual portrayal of Enki as Ninhursag's consort. In one Sumerian poem, offerings are made to Šhul-pa-e in the underworld and, in later mythology, he was one of the demons of the underworld. ==See also==