The myth of Inana and Ebih shows Inana in warrior mode. It starts with a hymn to the goddess as ‘lady of battle’ (1—24). Then Inana describes how the mountains of Ebih refused to bow down to her, and the revenge she wants to take (25—52). She recounts the incident and her desires to An, the supreme deity, and asks for his assistance (53—111). An doubts her ability to overcome Ebih (112-30), so Inana storms out and attacks it in a furious rage (131-59). She then triumphantly recounts what she has done (160—81). The composition ends with praise for both Inana—and for Nisaba in her role as scribal deity (see Group I): she has nothing at all to do with the narrative.
The poem focuses on the idea of the destruction of the ‘rebel lands’: the mountainous region to the north-east of the Land, tentatively identified with the Jebel Hamrin range in modern Iraq. The rebel lands were home to the nomadic, barbaric tribes who loom large in Sumerian literature as forces of destruction and chaos, sometimes let loose on the land by the gods (see The cursing of Agade, Group C, and The lament for Sumer and Urim, Group D) and sometimes as here needing to be brought under divine control themselves. No doubt nomadic incursions, particularly at times of economic stress, were as terrifying and destabilizing as the literature depicts, but mountains could also be portrayed as areas of safety or beauty (121—6, and see Lugalbanda in the mountain cave, Group A). There is also a vast amount of documentary evidence to show that in times of stability the sedentary and nomadic populations of the Land and its neighbours were economically interdependent and peacefully coexistent.
World History
