Ishtar, the passionate goddess of love and war from ancient Mesopotamia has had a long life, historically speaking, and she continues to be a popular object of fascination for historians and of reverance for pagan revivalists. Today our focus is on Ishtar as she was worshipped in the ancient world. Less here about myth and far more about the ideas that Ishtar worshippers kept in their minds about their goddess. We are going to read a lot of hymns and praise poems, which do lose a bit in the transition from Akkadian into English, but still often have powerful imagery and are interesting as both examples of ancient literature and as windows into ancient religion.