Ancient Mesopotamian underworld
It was described as a dark, dreary cavern located deep below the ground,[1][2] where inhabitants were believed to continue "a transpositional version of life on earth".
In the Sumerian underworld, it was initially believed that there was no final judgement of the deceased and the dead were neither punished nor rewarded for their deeds in life.
The Sumerians had a large number of different names which they applied to the underworld, including Arali, Irkalla, Kukku, Kur, Kigal, and Ganzir.
[1] Unlike in the ancient Egyptian afterlife, there was no process of judgement or evaluation for the deceased;[3] they merely appeared before Ereshkigal, who would pronounce them dead,[3] and their names would be recorded by the scribal goddess Geshtinanna.
[12] For this reason, it was considered essential to have as many offspring as possible so that one's descendants could continue to provide libations for the dead person to drink for many years.
[3] Nonetheless, there are assumptions according to which treasures in wealthy graves had been intended as offerings for Utu and the Anunnaki, so that the deceased would receive special favors in the underworld.
[3] The underworld itself is usually located even deeper below ground than the Abzu, the body of freshwater which the ancient Mesopotamians believed lay deep beneath the earth.
[16] At night, the sun-god Utu was believed to travel through the underworld as he journeyed to the east in preparation for the sunrise.
[21] On his way through the underworld, Utu was believed to pass through the garden of the sun-god,[20] which contained trees that bore precious gems as fruit.
[16][24][23] During the Akkadian Period (c. 2334 – 2154 BC), Ereshkigal's role as the ruler of the underworld was assigned to Nergal, the god of death.
[1][17] The Akkadians attempted to harmonize this dual rulership of the underworld by making Nergal Ereshkigal's husband.
[28] He is the son of Ninazu and his name may be etymologically derived from a phrase meaning "Lord of the Good Tree".
[31] Dumuzid, later known by the corrupted form Tammuz, is the ancient Mesopotamian god of shepherds[32] and the primary consort of the goddess Inanna.
[40] In one story, she protects her brother when the galla demons come to drag him down to the underworld by hiding him successively in four different places.
[40] The galla eventually take Dumuzid away after he is betrayed by an unnamed "friend",[40] but Inanna decrees that he and Geshtinanna will alternate places every six months, each spending half the year in the underworld while the other stays in Heaven.
[40] Lugal-irra and Meslamta-ea are a set of twin gods who were worshipped in the village of Kisiga, located in northern Babylonia.
[43] During the Neo-Assyrian Period (911 BC–609 BC), small depictions of them would be buried at entrances,[42] with Lugal-irra always on the left and Meslamta-ea always on the right.
[3] One class of demons that were believed to reside in the underworld were known as galla;[48] their primary purpose appears to have been to drag unfortunate mortals back to Kur.
"[50] Lamashtu was a demonic goddess with the "head of a lion, the teeth of a donkey, naked breasts, a hairy body, hands stained (with blood?
"[51] She was believed to feed on the blood of human infants[51] and was widely blamed as the cause of miscarriages and cot deaths.
[51] Although Lamashtu has traditionally been identified as a demoness,[52] the fact that she could cause evil on her own without the permission of other deities strongly indicates that she was seen as a goddess in her own right.
[53] He is shown with "a rather canine face with abnormally bulging eyes, a scaly body, a snake-headed penis, the talons of a bird and usually wings.
[54] He was usually regarded as evil,[53] but he could also sometimes be a beneficent entity who protected against winds bearing pestilence[53] and he was thought to be able to force Lamashtu back to the underworld.
