Mr. Langdon also translates a hymn (Tammuz III) which appears to contain the narrative on which the Assyrian version was founded.  The goddess who descends to Hades, however, is not Ishtar, but the “sister”, Belit-sheri.  She is accompanied by various demons—­the “gallu-demon”, the “slayer”, &c.—­and holds a conversation with Tammuz which, however, is “unintelligible and badly broken”.  Apparently, however, he promises to return to earth.

...  I will go up, as for me I will depart with thee ...
...  I will return, unto my mother let us go back.

Probably two goddesses originally lamented for Tammuz, as the Egyptian sisters, Isis and Nepthys, lamented for Osiris, their brother.  Ishtar is referred to as “my mother”.  Isis figures alternately in the Egyptian chants as mother, wife, sister, and daughter of Osiris.  She cries, “Come thou to thy wife in peace; her heart fluttereth for thy love”, ...  “I am thy wife, made as thou art, the elder sister, soul of her brother"....  “Come thou to us as a babe"....  “Lo, thou art as the Bull of the two goddesses—­come thou, child growing in peace, our lord!"...  “Lo! the Bull, begotten of the two cows, Isis and Nepthys"....  “Come thou to the two widowed goddesses"....  “Oh child, lord, first maker of the body"....  “Father Osiris."[126]

As Ishtar and Belit-sheri weep for Tammuz, so do Isis and Nepthys weep for Osiris.

    Calling upon thee with weeping—­yet thou art prostrate upon thy
      bed! 
    Gods and men ... are weeping for thee at the same time, when
      they behold me (Isis). 
    Lo!  I invoke thee with wailing that reacheth high as heaven.

Isis is also identified with Hathor (Ishtar) the Cow....  “The cow weepeth for thee with her voice."[127]

There is another phase, however, to the character of the mother goddess which explains the references to the desertion and slaying of Tammuz by Ishtar.  “She is”, says Jastrow, “the goddess of the human instinct, or passion which accompanies human love.  Gilgamesh ... reproaches her with abandoning the objects of her passion after a brief period of union.”  At Ishtar’s temple “public maidens accepted temporary partners, assigned to them by Ishtar".[128] The worship of all mother goddesses in ancient times was accompanied by revolting unmoral rites which are referred to in condemnatory terms in various passages in the Old Testament, especially in connection with the worship of Ashtoreth, who was identical with Ishtar and the Egyptian Hathor.

Ishtar in the process of time overshadowed all the other female deities of Babylonia, as did Isis in Egypt.  Her name, indeed, which is Semitic, became in the plural, Ishtarate, a designation for goddesses in general.  But although she was referred to as the daughter of the sky, Anu, or the daughter of the moon, Sin or Nannar, she still retained traces of her ancient character.  Originally she was a great mother goddess, who was worshipped by those who believed