Mesopotamian Goddess Ishtar Astarte Venus Fertility Love War And Sex Figurine 12"Tall

Ishtar is the Mesopotamian East Semitic (Akkadian, Assyrian and Babylonian) goddess of fertility, love, war, and sex. Ishtar symbolizes love, including that between human and animals, its power, and its danger. Ishtar was the daughter of Anu.[3] She was particularly worshipped in the Upper Mesopotamian kingdom of Assyria (modern northern Iraq, north east Syria and south east Turkey), particularly at the cities of Nineveh, Ashur and Arbela (modern Erbil), and also in the south Mesopotamian city of Uruk.[3] Besides the lions on her gate, her symbol is an eight-pointed star. One type of depiction of Ishtar/Inanna The lion was her symbol (detail of the Ishtar Gate) In the Babylonian pantheon, she "was the divine personification of the planet Venus". Ishtar had many lovers; however, as Guirand notes, "Woe to him whom Ishtar had honoured! The fickle goddess treated her passing lovers cruelly, and the unhappy wretches usually paid dearly for the favours heaped on them. Animals, enslaved by love, lost their native vigour: they fell into traps laid by men or were domesticated by them. 'Thou has loved the lion, mighty in strength', says the hero Gilgamesh to Ishtar, 'and thou hast dug for him seven and seven pits! Thou hast loved the steed, proud in battle, and destined him for the halter, the goad and the whip.' Even for the gods Ishtar's love was fatal. In her youth the goddess had loved Tammuz, god of the harvest, and-if one is to believe Gilgamesh -this love caused the death of Tammuz. Her cult may have involved sacred prostitution,[5] though this is debatable. Guirand referred to her holy city Uruk as the "town of the sacred courtesans" and to her as the "courtesan of the gods".