Divine Encounters - Zecharia Sitchin-pages

Page 177 of 384

Page 177 of 384
Divine Encounters - Zecharia Sitchin-pages

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173 Figure 54 ancient artists as a naked beauty, taunting and inviting men to see her (Fig. 54). Between those bittersweet anniversaries, Ishtar spent her time roaming Earth's skies in her Skychamber (sec Fig. 42) and thus as often as not depictions showed her as a winged goddess. She was, as mentioned, the city goddess of Aratta in the Indus Valley, and paid there periodic flying visits. It was on one of her flights to the distant domain that Inanna/Ishtar had a sexual encounter in reverse: she was raped by a mortal; and, in such a reversal of roles, the man who did it lived to tell about it. He is known from historical records as Sargon of Aggade, the founder of a new dynasty that was installed in a new capital (usually called Akkad). In his autobiography, a text in the Akkadian language known by scholars as The Legend of Sargon, the king describes the circumstances of his birth in terms that remind us of the story of Moses: "My mother was a high priestess; I knew not my father. My mother, the high priestess who conceived me, in secret she bore me. She set me in a basket of reeds, its lid sealed with bitumen. She cast me into the river; it did not sink [with] me. The river bore me up, it carried me to Akki the irrigator. Akki the irrigator lifted me up when he drew water. Akki the irrigator as a son made me and reared me. Akki, the irrigator, ap- pointed me as his gardener." Encounters in the GIGUNU