🌾 Dumuzi (Tammuz)

Attributes & Domains

The Dying and Rising God Cycle

Dumuzi's myth established the pattern of death, descent, lamentation, and resurrection that echoes through world mythology:

• Sacred Marriage: Dumuzi marries Inanna in the New Year festival. Their union brings fertility to land and people.
• Inanna's Return: When Inanna returns from the underworld, she must provide a substitute. She finds Dumuzi sitting on her throne, unconcerned with her suffering.
• Inanna's Rage: Furious at his indifference, she decrees: "Take him!" Ereshkigal's demons pursue Dumuzi to drag him to Kur.
• The Flight: Dumuzi flees, transforming into gazelle form, seeking refuge. But the demons catch him.
• Sister's Sacrifice: Geshtinanna, Dumuzi's sister, offers to share his fate. Each spends six months in the underworld alternately.
• Seasonal Cycle: When Dumuzi is in Kur, the land is barren (winter). When he returns, vegetation grows (spring/summer).

The Tammuz Lamentation

Annual mourning rituals were performed for Dumuzi (called Tammuz in Akkadian and Hebrew):

• Women's Lamentations: Women wept for the dying god, tearing clothes and wailing
• Summer Month: The month of Tammuz (June-July) was dedicated to mourning
• Biblical Reference: Ezekiel 8:14 condemns Israelite women "weeping for Tammuz" in Jerusalem
• Widespread Cult: Worship spread throughout ancient Near East

📜 Primary Sources - Cuneiform Texts

Dumuzi appears in ancient Sumerian cuneiform texts. Search the ORACC corpus to explore original texts in transliteration and translation.

Major texts include: "Inanna's Descent," "Dumuzi's Dream," lamentations for Dumuzi

Relationships

• Consort: Inanna (who condemned him but also mourned him)
• Sister: Geshtinanna (shared his underworld fate)
• Rival: Enkimdu (farmer god who competed for Inanna's love; Dumuzi won)