Pour out pure waters, costly oil [offer him?].
The mourners are furthermore instructed to institute a formal lamentation. The Ukhâti,[1185] the priestesses of Ishtar, are to sing dirges; flutes are to accompany the song. The thought intended, apparently, to be conveyed is that if Allatu will not give up the dead, the surviving relatives should endeavor to secure the good grace of Ishtar and Tammuz, who succeeded in subduing Allatu.
The closing lines are rendered obscure by a reference to the goddess Belili, who appears to be the sister of Tammuz. The reference assumes the knowledge of a tale in which the goddess was represented as breaking a costly vessel adorned with precious stones, in sign of her grief for the lost Tammuz. Suitable mourning for Tammuz, therefore, will secure the sympathy of Belili also. The story thus ends with a warning to all who mourn for their dead to remember Tammuz, to observe the rites set aside for the festival celebrated in his honor.
Bearing in mind the tentative character of any interpretation for the closing lines, we may mention Jeremias'[1186] supposition that it is a deceased sister who addresses her sorrowing brother at the end of the story.
My only brother, let me not perish.
On the day of Tammuz, play for me on the flute of lapis lazuli, together with the lyre[1187] of pearl play for me.
Together let the professional dirge singers, male and female, play for me,
That the dead may arise and inhale the incense of offerings.
The lines impress one as snatches from a dirge, sung or recited in memory of the dead, and introduced here as an appropriate illustration of the conclusion to be drawn from the tale. At all events, the consolation that the mourner receives lies in this thought,—the dead can hear the lamentation. The survivors are called upon not to forget the dead. When the festival of Tammuz comes, let them combine with the weeping for the god, a dirge in memory of the dead. Let them pray to Ishtar and Tammuz. If remembered by the living, the dead will at least enjoy the offerings made to them, regain, as it were, a temporary sense of life; but more cannot with certainty be hoped for.
The outlook for the dead, it will be seen, is not hopeful. Their condition is at best a tolerable one. What we may glean from other sources but confirms the general impression, conveyed by the opening and closing lines of the Ishtar story, or makes the picture a still gloomier one. The day of death is a day of sorrow, 'the day without mercy.' The word for corpse conveys the idea that things have 'come to an end.' Whenever death is referred to in the literature, it is described as an unmitigated evil. A dirge introduced into an impressive hymn to Nergal[1188] laments the fate of him who