Beautiful Image
Nov. 6th, 2009 09:21 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
qosOne of the interesting things about Ereshkigal is that there are no surviving images of Her from ancient times -- and very few modern ones, come to think of it. There are a few descriptive lines in the texts which have come down to us, but they are contradictory. In The Descent of Inanna Ereshkigal is frightening sight; in The Marriage of Nergal and Ereshkigal She is so alluringly beautiful that Nergal forgets all the wise advice he's been given and spends six nights in bed with Her.
I've created a couple of collages of images that I've placed over my personal shrines, trying to convey the complexity of Her character and the different facets of my relationship to Her, but no one image captures it all. Which, on reflection, is probably true of most deities -- or any individual.
Yesterday, however, I turned one of the last pages in the Neil Gaiman collection Death, The High Cost of Living, .
Click twice for full size
In literal terms, this is actually closer to Hel than to Ereshkigal, since Ereshkigal has never been described as being half a corpse -- but there is definitely a truthfulness to the image in the combination of living beauty and death.
I've created a couple of collages of images that I've placed over my personal shrines, trying to convey the complexity of Her character and the different facets of my relationship to Her, but no one image captures it all. Which, on reflection, is probably true of most deities -- or any individual.
Yesterday, however, I turned one of the last pages in the Neil Gaiman collection Death, The High Cost of Living, .
Click twice for full size
In literal terms, this is actually closer to Hel than to Ereshkigal, since Ereshkigal has never been described as being half a corpse -- but there is definitely a truthfulness to the image in the combination of living beauty and death.
