Ishum
Mesopotamian · deity · mythic · deity
Ishum is the fire that stays where it is put. He walks the streets at night as a watchman, and he is the herald and companion of Erra — plague and violence personified, carried in this registry on the Nergal record. The Epic of Erra is essentially a long argument between them: Erra wants slaughter, Ishum walks beside him through it, and it is Ishum's speech at the end that talks him down and gets the destruction stopped. A restraining god, which the Mesopotamian pantheon has few of.
Domains
- fire
- protection
Relations
- subordinate to: Nergal
Sources
- Reference treatment of Ishum as god of fire and as Erra's companion.