Inanna's Descent: The Original Underworld Journey

28 de noviembre de 2025

BY NICOLE LAU

Before Persephone descended to the underworld, before Orpheus sang his way into Hades, before Isis searched for Osiris, there was Inanna.

Inanna, the Sumerian Queen of Heaven, goddess of love and war, of the morning and evening star, decides to descend to the underworld—the realm of her dark sister, Ereshkigal, the Queen of the Dead.

She passes through seven gates. At each gate, she is stripped of one of her divine powers, one of her royal garments. She arrives naked, powerless, vulnerable.

Ereshkigal kills her. Inanna's corpse is hung on a hook like a piece of meat.

But this is not the end. Through the intervention of Enki, the god of wisdom, Inanna is resurrected. She ascends from the underworld, transformed.

This is Inanna's Descent—the oldest recorded descent myth, written on clay tablets in ancient Sumer around 1900-1600 BCE. It is the template for all later descent myths, the original story of death and rebirth, the archetypal journey into the underworld.

This is the myth that teaches: To be reborn, you must first descend. To gain power, you must first be stripped of power. To rise, you must first die.

Who Is Inanna?

Inanna (later known as Ishtar in Akkadian/Babylonian mythology) is one of the most important goddesses of ancient Mesopotamia.

Inanna's Domains:

Love and sexuality: Goddess of erotic love, desire, fertility
War and battle: Fierce warrior goddess, protector of cities
The planet Venus: The morning and evening star
Sovereignty and kingship: She bestows kingship, she can take it away
The storehouse: Goddess of abundance, grain, the harvest

Inanna's Paradoxes:

Inanna is a goddess of paradoxes:

Love and war
Life and death
Heaven and underworld
Maiden and queen
Gentle and fierce

She contains opposites. She is whole because she is both.

The Myth: Inanna's Descent to the Underworld

The myth is preserved on clay tablets written in Sumerian cuneiform. Here is the story:

The Decision

Inanna decides to descend to the underworld. The text says she "set her mind" on it, she "opened her ear" to the Great Below.

Why does she descend? The text doesn't say explicitly. Scholars have proposed many reasons:

To attend the funeral of Gugalanna, the Bull of Heaven (Ereshkigal's husband)
To conquer the underworld and add it to her domains
To visit her dark sister, Ereshkigal
Because she must—it is her fate, her initiation

The Preparation

Inanna prepares for the descent. She gathers her seven divine powers (the me):

The shugurra (crown of the steppe)
The lapis lazuli necklace
The twin egg-shaped beads
The breastplate ("Come, man, come")
The golden ring
The measuring rod and line (symbols of sovereignty)
The royal robe

She instructs her servant, Ninshubur, to mourn for her if she does not return, and to seek help from the gods.

The Seven Gates

Inanna arrives at the first gate of the underworld. The gatekeeper asks why she has come.

She says she has come to attend the funeral of Gugalanna.

The gatekeeper consults Ereshkigal. Ereshkigal says: "Let her enter. But treat her according to the ancient rites."

The ancient rites require that Inanna be stripped as she passes through each gate.

Gate 1: The shugurra (crown) is removed.
"Why is this removed?"
"Be silent, Inanna. The ways of the underworld are perfect. They may not be questioned."

Gate 2: The lapis lazuli necklace is removed.

Gate 3: The twin egg-shaped beads are removed.

Gate 4: The breastplate is removed.

Gate 5: The golden ring is removed.

Gate 6: The measuring rod and line are removed.

Gate 7: The royal robe is removed.

Inanna arrives before Ereshkigal naked and bowed low.

The Death

Ereshkigal and the seven judges of the underworld (the Anunnaki) fix their eyes on Inanna—the eye of death.

Inanna is turned into a corpse. Her corpse is hung on a hook.

She is dead.

The Mourning

After three days and three nights, Ninshubur (Inanna's servant) begins to mourn. She goes to the gods for help.

Enlil (god of air) refuses to help. Nanna (moon god, Inanna's father) refuses to help.

But Enki (god of wisdom and water) agrees to help.

The Rescue

Enki creates two beings from the dirt under his fingernails—the kurgarra and the galatur. They are genderless, neither male nor female.

Enki gives them the food of life and the water of life. He instructs them to go to the underworld, to sympathize with Ereshkigal's pain, and to sprinkle the food and water of life on Inanna's corpse.

The kurgarra and galatur descend to the underworld. They find Ereshkigal in labor, moaning in pain (she is giving birth to the underworld itself, to death itself).

They echo her moans: "Oh, your inside! Oh, your outside!"

Ereshkigal, grateful to be heard, offers them a gift. They ask for Inanna's corpse.

They sprinkle the food and water of life on the corpse. Inanna is resurrected.

The Condition

But there is a condition. The laws of the underworld are absolute: No one ascends from the underworld unmarked.

Inanna must provide a substitute—someone to take her place in the underworld.

The Substitute

Inanna ascends, accompanied by demons (galla) who will seize her substitute.

She encounters Ninshubur, who is mourning, dressed in rags. Inanna refuses to give her up.

She encounters her sons, who are mourning. She refuses to give them up.

She encounters her husband, Dumuzi, who is sitting on his throne, dressed in royal robes, not mourning.

Inanna is enraged. She fixes the eye of death on him. The demons seize him.

Dumuzi flees, but he is caught. He is taken to the underworld in Inanna's place.

The Compromise

Dumuzi's sister, Geshtinanna, offers to take his place for half the year.

The compromise: Dumuzi will spend half the year in the underworld, and Geshtinanna will spend the other half.

This creates the cycle of the seasons—when Dumuzi is in the underworld, the earth is barren (summer in Mesopotamia, the dry season). When he returns, the earth blooms (winter, the rainy season).

The Meaning of the Descent

1. The Stripping Away

At each gate, Inanna is stripped of one of her powers, one of her identities.

This is the stripping away of the persona—the masks, the roles, the identities you wear in the upper world.

To descend, you must let go of:

Your crown (your status, your ego)
Your jewels (your adornments, your beauty)
Your weapons (your defenses, your power)
Your robes (your identity, your persona)

You arrive naked, powerless, vulnerable. This is the essential self—stripped of everything, reduced to essence.

2. The Death

Inanna dies. She is hung on a hook like a piece of meat.

This is the ego death—the death of who you thought you were, the death of the old self.

This death is necessary. You cannot be reborn without first dying.

3. The Dark Sister

Ereshkigal is Inanna's dark sister—her shadow, her opposite, her other half.

Inanna is the Queen of Heaven (light, life, love, power). Ereshkigal is the Queen of the Underworld (darkness, death, grief, powerlessness).

To descend is to face your shadow, to meet your dark sister, to integrate what you have rejected.

4. The Resurrection

Inanna is resurrected through empathy. The kurgarra and galatur do not fight Ereshkigal. They do not try to rescue Inanna by force. They witness Ereshkigal's pain.

This is the key: The shadow must be witnessed, not fought.

When Ereshkigal's pain is acknowledged, she releases Inanna.

5. The Substitute

Inanna must send a substitute. She chooses Dumuzi, who did not mourn her.

This is harsh. But it teaches: Something must be sacrificed. You cannot return unchanged.

What must you leave behind? What must die so that you can live?

The Psychological Meaning

The Descent as Depression

Inanna's descent is the descent into depression, into the dark night of the soul, into crisis.

You are stripped of your powers, your identities, your defenses. You are reduced to nothing. You die.

Ereshkigal as the Rejected Self

Ereshkigal is the rejected self—the grief, the rage, the pain, the powerlessness that you have exiled to the underworld.

She is in labor, moaning, suffering. She has been alone, unwitnessed, unloved.

To heal, you must descend. You must witness her pain. You must acknowledge what you have rejected.

The Resurrection as Integration

Inanna is resurrected when Ereshkigal's pain is witnessed. This is integration—bringing the shadow into consciousness, acknowledging the rejected self, making whole what was split.

The Return as Transformation

Inanna returns, but she is transformed. She has been to the underworld. She has died. She has been reborn.

She is no longer just the Queen of Heaven. She is also the one who has been to the underworld and returned. She is whole.

Inanna and Later Descent Myths

Inanna's descent is the template for all later descent myths:

Persephone (Greek)

Persephone descends to the underworld (abducted by Hades). She eats the pomegranate seeds and must return for part of each year. This creates the seasons.

The pattern is the same: descent, death, return, the cycle.

Ishtar (Babylonian)

Ishtar (the Babylonian version of Inanna) descends to the underworld to rescue her lover Tammuz (the Babylonian Dumuzi). The myth is nearly identical to Inanna's descent.

Psyche (Greek)

Psyche must descend to the underworld as one of her tasks to win back Eros. She must not open the box of beauty from Persephone (but she does, and falls into a death-like sleep).