Inanna Tattoo Meaning

Descent and return, transformation, power, and the goddess who faced death and came back changed.

Inanna is one of the oldest named goddesses and the first to die and return — the Sumerian queen of heaven, love, war, and justice whose descent into the underworld and return is among the earliest resurrection stories ever written, the goddess who faced death and came back transformed. To carry Inanna is to carry descent and return, transformation, power, and the goddess who faced death and came back changed — one of the most ancient named goddesses, one of the earliest descent-and-return stories, the queen of heaven who became Ishtar and the star of Venus.

Inanna holds a place at the very dawn of recorded religion: Inanna is one of the oldest named goddesses in recorded human history — the Sumerian queen of heaven, love, war, and justice, whose descent to the underworld and return is among the earliest resurrection stories ever written down. The Sumerian Inanna, queen of heaven, goddess of love and war and justice, is one of the earliest deities whose names we know from the written record — a goddess worshipped at the very beginning of civilization, in the world's first cities.

Her greatest myth is her descent to the underworld: Inanna, the queen of heaven, descended into the realm of the dead, passing through its seven gates, stripped of her powers and adornments at each, until she came before her sister Ereshkigal, queen of the underworld, and was killed, her body hung upon a hook. But she was rescued and restored to life, and returned from the dead to the world above — though, by the law of the underworld, she had to send another in her place. This descent and return is among the earliest resurrection stories ever written down — the earliest recorded telling of a deity who died and rose again. The Sumerian Inanna is thus one of the oldest named goddesses and the first descent — the queen of heaven whose journey to the underworld and return is one of humanity's earliest resurrection stories. Inanna is one of the oldest named goddesses in history — the Sumerian queen of heaven whose descent to the underworld and return is among the earliest resurrection stories ever written. The Sumerian Inanna is one of the oldest named goddesses and the first descent — Inanna is one of the oldest named goddesses in recorded human history, the Sumerian queen of heaven, love, war, and justice, whose descent to the underworld and return is among the earliest resurrection stories ever written down; one of the earliest deities whose names we know from the written record, worshipped at the very beginning of civilization in the world's first cities — her greatest myth her descent to the underworld, where the queen of heaven descended into the realm of the dead, passing through its seven gates and being stripped of her powers and adornments at each, until she came before her sister Ereshkigal and was killed, her body hung upon a hook, but was rescued and restored to life and returned from the dead (though by the law of the underworld she had to send another in her place) — among the earliest resurrection stories ever written down, the earliest recorded telling of a deity who died and rose again.

Inanna is the supreme goddess of ancient Sumer — queen of heaven and earth, goddess of love and war, justice and desire, the planet Venus both rising and setting. The Descent of Inanna, written on clay tablets around 1900 BCE, is the oldest story of death and resurrection in recorded human history: Inanna voluntarily descends through the seven gates of the underworld, surrendering one piece of her divine regalia at each gate, arriving naked and powerless before her dark sister Ereshkigal, dying, and being resurrected through the intervention of her faithful servant. In tattoo symbolism, Inanna represents the willingness to descend completely — to give up every protection and status symbol — in order to understand what only the underworld can teach.

Inanna across cultures

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