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Ishtar Babylonian culture flowered from 600 to 200 BCE under Ishtar, She who endowed [the king] with prestige. A version of the ancient Sumerian Goddess Inanna , Ishtar's priestess-queens may have engaged in periodic ritual sacrifice of their kings to insure good omens and prosperity. Her king's blood, whether symbolic or real, was assumed to fertilize fields and bring bountiful harvest. The city of Mari worshiped Ishtar as a birth Goddess symbolized by the Urn of Life held tight to her belly. Worship of her consort Tammuz was imported by the Jews after the Babylonian captivity, and his symbolic death was lamented annually in the temple at Jerusalem. The identifications with Mary , the Virgin Queen, and her divine yet dying son whose blood brings life, are important Christian borrowings. |
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Item Code
Size (usually inches)
Price
IS9
9
$30
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