Ishtar

Examples of Ishtar in the following topics:

• Neo-Babylonia

  • Some of the most important fragments that survive are from the Ishtar Gate, the eighth gate to the inner city of Babylon.
  • Dedicated to the Babylonian goddess Ishtar, it was a double gate, and its roofs and doors were made of cedar, according to the dedication plaque.
  • The reconstruction of the Ishtar Gate and Processional Way, built at the Pergamon Museum in Berlin in 1930, features material excavated from the original site.
  • An aurochs above a flower ribbon with missing tiles filled in (Ishtar Gate bas-relief, housed in the Pergamon Museum in Berlin).

• Architecture in Mesopotamia

  • However, the invention of the round arch in the general area of Mesopotamia influenced the construction of structures like the Ishtar Gate in the sixth century BCE.
  • Perhaps the best known surviving example of a round arch is in the Ishtar Gate, which was part of the Processional Way in the city of Babylon.
  • Elsewhere on the gate and its connecting walls were painted floral motifs and bas reliefs of animals that were sacred to Ishtar, the goddess of fertility and war.
  • The reconstruction of the Ishtar Gate in the Pergamon Museum in Berlin.

• Nineveh

  • The area was settled as early as 6000 BCE, and by 3000 BCE had become an important religious center for worship of the Assyrian goddess Ishtar.
  • The historic Nineveh is mentioned about 1800 BCE as a center of worship of Ishtar.

• Akkad

  • Cuneiform sources also suggest that the Akkadians worshipped Ishtar.

• The Akkadian Empire

  • Sargon claimed to be the son of La'ibum or Itti-Bel, a humble gardener, and possibly a hierodule, or priestess to Ishtar or Inanna.
  • Sargon, throughout his long life, showed special deference to the Sumerian deities, particularly Inanna (Ishtar), his patroness, and Zababa, the warrior god of Kish.

• Babylon

  • Nebuchadnezzar II ordered the complete reconstruction of the imperial grounds, including rebuilding the Etemenanki ziggurat and the construction of the Ishtar Gate—the most spectacular of eight gates that ringed the perimeter of Babylon.

• Hammurabi's Code

  • Other forms of codes of law had been in existence in the region around this time, including the Code of Ur-Nammu, king of Ur (c. 2050 BCE), the Laws of Eshnunna (c. 1930 BCE) and the codex of Lipit-Ishtar of Isin (c. 1870 BCE).

• The Assyrian Culture

  • The area was settled as early as 6000 BCE, and by 3000 BCE had become an important religious center for worship of the Assyrian goddess Ishtar.