Ninegal
When using the name Ninegal (also Ninegalla ; Sumerian d NIN.E 2 .GAL, Babylonian d Be-el-te-kal 2 -lim, / Belet-ekallim , Hurrian Wel-tigalli / Fel-digalli , Ugaritic Pen-digalli , but also Blt-bhtm ) it was initially an epithet that has been used in Sumerian tradition since around 2550 BC. Is occupied and means mistress of the great house / lady of the palace . As a functional title, Ninegal could be transferred to all female deities who were connected to a palace. There are therefore no cult temples of their own.
In the time before Sargon of Akkad , the female deity designated with the epithet was given its own festival and month name: iti Ezem-maḫ DINGIR Nin-E 2 -gala 8 -ka , which is the month of the great sublime festival for Ninegal den The high point of all sacrificial festivals was. In the later Ur-III period , Ninegal is used as a special form of Inanna and takes over the following genealogy: daughter of father Nanna and mother Ningal , sister of Utu , lover of Dumuzi and sister-in-law of Geštinanna . Her messenger was Ninsubur . In other regions, Ninegal is also worshiped with Nungal ( goddess of the prison ) and is considered the daughter of the sky god An and the underworld goddess Ereškigal .
As the morning star she was associated with the sun, which is why the male attributes were assigned to her in this role; as the evening star, because of the equation with the moon, the female characteristics Ninegal could appear in three genders: male, female and hermaphrodite .
literature
- Hermann Behrens: The Ninegalla hymn: Inanna's apartment in Nippur in ancient Babylonian times . Steiner, Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 3-515-06478-8
- Geeta de Clercq, Gernot Wilhelm : The goddess Ninegal / Belet-ekallim according to the ancient oriental sources of the 3rd and 2nd millennium BC Chr. , Julius Maximilians University, Würzburg 2004