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143 harsag. Our solution gives meaning to an otherwise enigmatic poem ex- alting Ninharsag as mistress of the "House With a Pointed Peak"—a pyramid: House bright and dark of Heaven and Earth, for the rocketships put together; E.KUR, House of the Gods with pointed peak; For Heaven-to-Earth it is greatly equipped. House whose interior glows with a reddish Light of Heaven. pulsating a beam which reaches far and wide; Its awesomeness touches the flesh. Awesome ziggurat, lofty mountain of mountains— Thy creation is great and lofty, men cannot understand it. The function of this "House of the Gods With Pointed Peak" is then made clear: it was a "House of Equipment" serving to "bring down to rest" the astronauts "who see and orbit," a "great land- mark for the lofty Shews" (the "sky chambers"): House of Equipment, lofty House of Eternity: Its foundation are stones [which reach] the water; Its great circumference is set in the clay. House whose parts are skillfully woven together; House, the tightness of whose howling the Great-Ones-Who-See-and-Orbit brings down to rest... House which is great landmark for the lofty Shew; Mountain by which Utu ascends. [House] whose deep insides men cannot penetrate . . . Anu has magnified it. The text then goes on to describe the various parts of the struc- ture: its foundation, "which is clad in awe"; its entrance, which opens and closes as a mouth, "glowing in a dim green light"; the threshold ("like a great dragon's mouth opened in wait"); the doorjambs ("like two edges of a dagger that keeps enemies away"). Its inner chamber is "like a vulva." guarded by "daggers which dash from dawn to dusk"; its "outpouring"—that which it emits—"is like a lion whom no one dares attack." When Earth Was Divided sure its neutrality, the Pyramid was put under the patronage of Nin- An ascending gallery is then described: "Its vault is like a rain-