[12] Marten Stol argues that in Sumerian texts the term nugig, literally "untouchable",[2] which is well attested as an epithet of deities such as Ninmah, Aruru, Inanna and Ninisina, similarly can be understood as a designation of midwives.
[10] Fumi Karahashi notes that this proposal is supported by a passage from the code of Ur-Nammu published in 2011, which explicitly places the nugig among women professionally taking care of children of other people and states that they were responsible for both help with preparations for birth and delivery and for nursing.
[2] Zgoll argues that the use of nugig as one of the epithets of Inanna was the reason why it could be alternatively translated in Akkadian as ištarītu,[15] "she who belongs to Ishtar".
[4] One of the sections of the code of Hammurabi (§181) deals with the procedure of dedicating one's daughter to a deity to make her a qadištu (or alternatively nadītu or kulmašītu).
[4] It is possible that a mythological justification for the childlessness of qadištu, as well as nadītu and kulmašītu, was provided in Atrahasis, but the relevant passage cannot be restored fully.
[24] However, this proposal depends on the assumption that school texts found in one of the houses excavated in Sippar which belonged to a qadištu and her brother were copied by her, which remains unproven.
[27] Furthermore, lexical lists treat qadištu as interchangeable with multiple other terms, including nadītu, but also šamuḫtu ("strumpet") which according to Marten Stol indicates the original meaning of many cultic and professional titles was forgotten and they came to be devalued.
[28] However, Irene Sibbing-Plantholt notes that it is implausible midwifery ceased to be practiced altogether, as sometimes argued based on the decline of references to qadištu and other relevant groups.
[10] One of the economic texts discovered during excavations in Emar deals with the purchase of a field by a woman designated as qadištu, but it is not known how this term was understood in this city.