One of the oldest tales ever recorded in history is the story of Inanna, which originated from Babylonian times on cuneiform clay tablets found around the southern half of modern Iraq.

This love story is now widely known to align with the Venus cycle; more specifically the synodic cycle of Venus and the Sun in their 584-day dance. In this article, I share my ideas about which part of the Inanna story relates to the Venus Retrograde phase….and it’s not the descent to the Underworld which I had formerly believed it to be.

Inanna’s descent to the Underworld – Superior Conjunction or Retrograde phase?

The Venus Retrograde period which commences at the last few weeks of a Venus cycle to the first few weeks of the new cycle is often referred to as the ‘Underworld’ phase. The connotations of being in the Underworld is one of a descent into the abyss where shadow emotions and corrupted notions of love, money and creativity overcome life.

Due to this recognition of the Underworld phase, the Venus Retrograde period is often linked to Inanna’s descent into the Underworld where she meets her dark sister Erishkigal.

While the symbology of the Venus Retrograde is fitting with Inanna’s Underworld journey, I’m now convinced that this is not the part of the story that’s connected to the Venus Retrograde period. 

On reading the translation and interpretation of the Inanna story by Samual Noah Kramer and Diane Wolkstein called Inanna: Queen of Heaven and Earth, it makes sense that Inanna’s descent is of the Morning Star Oriental phase, culminating with her entrance into the Underworld at the long invisibility phase at the Superior Conjunction which usually lasts around 60-90 days. 

So what then is the part of the story that symbolises the Venus Retrograde phase which is at the end of the Evening Star Occidental phase, just before the end of her entire cycle?

Replacing Inanna in the Underworld

When Inanna emerges from the Underworld, ready to ascend back to her throne (Evening Star Occidental phase), she’s unexpectedly confronted by the judges of the Underworld.

“No one ascends from the underworld unmarked.

If Inanna wishes to return from the underworld,

She must provide someone in her place.”

Inanna leaves the Underworld with a heavy heart, knowing that she will have to condemn someone to the Underworld in her place. When she finally returns to Sumer, she reviews all of her relationships with great anguish, deliberating over who to send. Is it Ninshubar her loyal servant? Is it her son Shara? Or her other son Lulal?

This long and careful process of painful contemplation, I believe, encapsulates the sentiments of the Venus Retrograde phase. Inanna is reviewing, revisiting and reconsidering all of her relationships, connections and feelings with those dearest to her heart.

“As Inanna ascended from the underworld,

The galla, the demons of the underworld, clung to her side

The galla were demons who know no food, who know no drink

Who eat no offerings, who drink no libations,

Who accept no gifts.

They enjoy no lovemaking.

They have no sweet children to kiss.

They tear the wife from the husband’s arms,

They tear the child from the father’s knees,

They steal the bride from her marriage home.”

The retrograde dilemmas

If we think of what the astrological texts say about the condition of Retrogradation – a reversal, a corruption, a return, a foreigner – and apply these concepts to the significations of Venus, then this paragraph in my opinion, really encapsulates the Venus Retrograde sentiments.

While she’s not physically going to the Underworld, Inanna is nevertheless haunted by the ‘demons of the underworld’ and thus returning to the memories of the Underworld. In modern context, this is like being in the virtual reality space of the abyss. I think we can all relate to being in this kind of psychological space when a significant Venus Retrograde beholds us.

These demons decline all indulgences, which is like the reversal of the Venusian desire nature – no food, no drinks, no gifts or lovemaking, etc. The ‘galla’ also corrupt all the important social and relational connections of Inanna, which can lead to a sense of isolation and foreignness. Again, these situations are all valid experiences while Venus is retrograde.

Ultimately, Inanna makes the painful decision to send her husband Dumuzi. 

“Inanna fastened on Dumuzi the eye of death.

She spoke against him the word of wrath.

She uttered against him the cry of guilt:

Take him! Take Dumuzi away!”

But what ensues is not a tale of misery, but one that resolves to the inevitable cyclical nature of the material world. This is shown in the Inanna story where Dumuzi spends half the year ruling over Sumer with Inanna, and the other half in the Underworld with Erishkigal, highlighting the eternally perpetual nature of generation and corruption, union and separation, and, light and dark.

⁠So even though Venus Retrograde periods may get bad publicity for being times of messy and confronting emotions, knowing that its function of disintegration can provide some solace. The Venus Retrograde period activating at the end of her 584-day cycle heralds the closing down of an old pattern to make way for a new one to emerge.

Resources

Inanna: Queen of Heaven and Earth, Her Stories and humans from Sumer, (Wolkstein, D. & Kramer, S.N), Harper & Row Publishers, New York, 1983

Solar Phase Cycles of Venus, (Yap, S.), Kepler College webinar, 2021

Venus Retrograde: Un-belonging, (Yap, S), December 2021