Bowareyeh Mound at Warka (Erech), site of the Temple of Istar.
The struggle with a bull on the part of Izdubar and Hea-bani, represented on the Babylonian cylinder figured on the next page, and numerous similar representations, refer to the struggle with the bull created by Anu to avenge the slight offered to Istar.
It would appear from the broken fragments of Column IV. that Hea-bani laid hold of the bull by the head and tail while Izdubar killed it, and Hea-bani in the engraving is represented holding the bull by its head and tail.
At the close of the sixth tablet the story is again lost, only portions of the third and fourth columns of the next tablet being preserved, but light is thrown on this portion of the narrative by the remarkable tablet describing the descent of Istar into Hades. It is possible that this tablet formed an episode in the sixth tablet of the Izdubar legends.
Izdubar and Hea-bani in Conflict with the Lion and Bull.
This tablet containing the descent of Istar into Hades was first noticed by Mr. Fox Talbot in the “Transactions of the Royal Society of Literature,” but his attempt at a translation was a failure. Mr. Smith subsequently published a short notice of it in the “North British Review,” and afterwards a translation of it in the “Daily Telegraph.” Prof. Schrader brought out a monograph upon it in 1874, and both M. Lenormant and Dr. Oppert have worked at it. The most recent translation is one made into Italian by M. Lenormant in a publication entitled “Il mito di Adone-Tammuz,” 1879, upon the basis of the one made by Dr. Oppert.
The story of the descent of Istar into Hades is one of the most beautiful myths in the Assyrian inscriptions; it has, however, received so much attention, and been so fully commented upon by various scholars, that little need be said on the subject here.
It is evident that we are dealing with the same goddess as the Istar, daughter of Anu, in the Izdubar legends, although she is here called daughter of Sin (the moon-god).