The Obituary
Ninhursag was the Sumerian mother goddess of the earth and fertility, also called Ninmah or Nintu, ranked among the chief deities of the pantheon. The divine midwife, she was credited with helping shape the first humans from clay alongside Enki, and in the Dilmun paradise myth she births eight healing deities to mend the gods’ wounded body parts. Worshipped across Sumer and Babylonia for nearly three thousand years, her cult faded under the later empires of Mesopotamia and ended in the early centuries CE, the mother of humankind herself forgotten by her children.
Worth remembering
- As the divine midwife she was said to have helped fashion the first humans from clay, shaping them alongside Enki.
- In the paradise myth of Dilmun, she curses Enki for eating her sacred plants, then relents and births eight healing deities to mend each part of his body that aches.
Sources
- Ninhursag was the Sumerian mother goddess of the earth and fertility, sometimes called Ninmah or Nintu, one of the chief deities of the pantheon. Wikipedia
- In the myth of Enki and Ninhursag, she creates plants and later eight deities to heal Enki's ailing body parts. World History Encyclopedia
A graveyard tradition: leave a stone to show you came, and remembered.