Property of Sekhmet

Squeezing in a few notes before New Year's Day, when I start writing my novel in earnest. This time for sure! :D

Fourth Millennium BCE
(roughly, the Uruk Period, 4000-3100)

Westenholz: "Inanna first appears in the late fourth millennium as the patron deity of Uruk, the first urban centre on the Mesopotamian alluvium". (But Beaulieu suggests 'Inanna and Enki' could "reflect the rise of Uruk to hegemony during the second half of the 4th millennium, when Inanna's city replaced Eridu as the main center of urban civilization in the southern alluvium.") She appears in four manifestations, each with its own temple and cult:

• Inanna the Princely (NUN)
  
• Inanna of the Morning (húd)
  
• Inanna of the Evening (sig)
  
• Inanna of the Mountain (kur)

Beaulieu: at Uruk her cult "continued almost uninterrupted until the Hellenistic and Parthian periods". Her name was written MÙŠ. The two manifestations as Venus show that her "astral identity" was "a very old and fundamental aspect of the goddess".

Third Millennium BCE
(including the Early Dynastic period, Sargon's Akkad, and the Ur III period)

Westenholz: Lots of local forms of the goddess, each with its own epithet: "In Kish she was known as Inanna-GAR, in Zabalam, as Inanna-Zabalam." It's in this millennium that the complex identification of the Sumerian Inanna with the semitic Ishtar takes place, and Enheduanna composes her hymns. Inanna was assigned a daughter (Nanaya) and three sons (Lulal, Latarak, and Shara), "although her maternity is of no consequence".

Beaulieu: Inanna is Uruk's most important deity - even superseding An. (Beaulieu discusses their relationship and relative status at length - I'll save that for another posting.) She is closely associated with the fortune of the city and its kings, as described in "the epic cycle centred on Enmerkar, Lugalbanda, and Gilgameš". The name Innin for Ishtar dates from this millennium.

Second Millennium BCE
(including the Old Babylonian and Middle Babylonian periods)

Westenholz: "The multiplication of manifestations... reaches its zenith... a cult of Inanna and/or Ishtar is performed in most major cities". (Beaulieu: the Canonical Temple List includes >79 temples dedicated to local Ištars.) Moreover, her character changes from a "troublesome young woman" into "the queen of heaven". But though Ishtar is the most prominent goddess, she and the other goddesses come second to the male gods. (Early in the millennium her astral manifestation is Ishtar-kakkabum "Ishtar the Star"; by the end it's Ishtar-kakkabi "Ishtar of the Stars". Just throwing this in 'cos I like it.)

Westenholz and Beaulieu: From the Middle Babylonian, cities have two major goddesses, a "lady" (beltu) and a "queen" (šarratu); Ishtar usually takes one of these roles. For example, at Babylon, Marduk's consort was Zarpanitu and Ishtar-of-Babylon was his "paramour". But at the same time, the two goddesses were identified - similarly, in late Uruk, Antu absorbed Ishtar's attributes (this syncretism is described in the hymn The Exaltation of Ishtar - not to be confused with Enhueduanna's Exaltation of Inanna!).

First Millennium BCE
(including the Neo-Babylonian period)

Beaulieu: "The tutelary goddess of Uruk appears under five different appellations in texts from the Eanna archive: Ištar, Ištar-of-Uruk, the Lady-of-Uruk (Beltu-ša-Uruk, Innin, and Beltiya." "In Neo-Babylonian Uruk it was Ištar who fulfilled the role of lady (beltu), and Nanaya that of queen (šarratu)." Nebuchadnezzar II states that he returned Ishtar to Uruk and restored her temple, Eanna - I'll save the possible abduction of the goddess ("who drives a team of seven lions") for another posting.

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Beaulieu, Paul-Alain. The Pantheon of Uruk during the Neo-Babylonian Period. Leiden ; Boston : Brill : STYX, 2003.
Westenholz, Joan Goodnick. "Inanna and Ishtar in the Babylonian World". in
Leick, Gwendolyn (ed). The Babylonian World. New York : Routledge, 2007.