Ereshkigal

deity underworld Sumerian single tradition · 20

Ereshkigal is the sister of the Sumerian goddess Inanna. Inanna travels to the Underworld to see her sister Ereshkigal.

↻ synthesized from 20 sources

When

First attested
3000 BCE
Attested period
-3000 – 2020
Historical notes
Mesopotamian cuneiform tablets.

Relationships

enemy of
Inanna, Nergal
parent of
Nungal, Ninazu
manifests as
Irkalla, Ninkigal
syncretized with
Sun goddess of the Earth, Hecate
sibling of
Inanna, Ištar
allied with
Nungal, Nintinugga
served by
Neti, Nam-tar, Belet-Seri, Bitu

Expand to full subgraph →

Sources

Source passages

“The Sumerian goddess Inanna travels to the Underworld to see her sister Ereshkigal.”

#12076 · extracted by google/gemini-2.0-flash-001

“Ereshkigal (Sumerian mythology, Akkadian mythology, Babylonian mythology), first lady of the Underworld”

#12230 · extracted by anthropic/claude-sonnet-4.5

“In later times, the Greeks appear to have applied the name Ereshkigal (Ερεσχιγαλ) to their own goddess Hecate. In the heading of a spell in the Michigan Magical Papyrus, which has been dated to the late third or early fourth century A.D. (and as such was written after the art of reading cuneiform texts was lost), Hecate is referred to as”

#12530 · extracted by google/gemini-2.0-flash-001

“Namtar appears in the role of Ereshkigal's sukkal in the myth Nergal and Ereshkigal. As the queen of the land of the dead cannot travel to heaven, he partakes in a banquet taking place there as her representative. While most of the gathered gods pay respect to him, Nergal refuses to, which is the reason”

#13592 · extracted by google/gemini-2.0-flash-001

“He reigned over Kur, the Mesopotamian underworld, depending on the myth either on behalf of his parents Enlil and Ninlil, or in later periods as a result of his marriage with the goddess Ereshkigal. Two well known myths focus on Nergal, Nergal and Ereshkigal and Epic of Erra. The former describes the circumstances of his marriage of Ereshkigal, the Mesopotamian goddess of the dead”

#13603 · extracted by google/gemini-2.0-flash-001