Cloud wolf- Meslamtea..
 |
| Naramsin. |
Originally known as Lugalirra and worshipped at Kisiga (Tell el-Lahm).
Lugalirra was known as the 'Enlil of the Otherworld', his queen (in the northern pantheon) Ninlil.
Ninlil becomes Ereshkigal.
No abduction by the Kur..
but a story a little more like the Persephone tale.
ETCSL.
Lugalirra was Imported to the south by Naramsin and conflated with Meslamtea, whose temple, the e.Meslam became the temple at Cutha (Tell Ibrahim).
Possibly.
One deity is now two similar but different twins: Meslamtea and Lugalirra.
Lugal (Lord or perhaps Baron) Erra.
At this point Naramsin begins to validate his own divinity (I'm a God doncha know!) by using myth as a political and spiritual device.
The story of Ur-Nammu (1889-1900 BC) sheds more light on this, how a king is treated differently in the Underworld based on the myth of Gilgamesh...and over a thousand years latter King Hiram does exactly the same thing, and with the same deity, now called Melqart.
But Sumerian Meslamtea and Tyrian Melqart don't really fit the martial, man of action profile, the Greek counter part Heracles, presents.
There is something wet and sappy
Shiney and hot
About Meslamtea...
The boat...
This is how Ur-Nammu arrives in the Underworld.
In the festival at Tyre Melqart was the burning man, placed in a raft and sent out over the sea...
The boat recalls the sensation of entering the Netherworld.
The poet describes Ur-Nammu seeing the funeral procession and experiencing the disintegration of the boat.
...Well there is much to sort out about Nergal/Erra, many long words to read, many time frames to put into order. I'm fortunate, it is relativity easy to follow the development of Lugalirra and Meslamtea. much easier than Persephone..
But me personally
... reading about Meslamtea made me think of The Path.
And the cloud-Wolf.
