The god Tammuz (probably) with grain growing from his shoulders A West Asian god Tammuz (or Dumuzi) was a West Asian god who personified growing food, like Persephone in Greece or Osiris in Egypt. [...]
The Mesopotamian god Ishtar or Inanna Who was Ishtar? Ishtar (also called Inanna) was an important god of West Asia. Beginning at least by 3000 BC the Sumerians, the Akkadians, the [...]
Epic of Gilgamesh: Gilgamesh and his friend Enkidu fight the monster Humbaba, on an Assyrian cylinder seal from the 600s BC The real king Gilgamesh The Epic of Gilgamesh is [...]
Bust of Plotinus (Ostia, ca. 250 AD) Around the time of Jesus, philosophers (and regular people) in West Asia and the Roman Empire started to think a lot about what happened to you after you died. [...]
Building at Gobekli Tepe (ca. 9000 BC) People have started a lot of different religions. Some of them are still practiced today; others are not. It is hard even to [...]
Wheel of Life (Konark Sun temple, Odisha, India, 1200s AD) About 300 BC, Hindu people in India began to feel that they didn't like the idea of being reincarnated over and over again forever. [...]
Hades and Persephone in the Greek underworld What happened when you died? Greek people didn't like to talk about what happened to you after you died. So we don't know [...]
Torchlight parade (this one is actually in India) Most Greek religious rituals were about sacrifice to the gods. But there was another form of religious activity also, which we call the mystery cults. [...]
A Viking religious sacrifice (ca. 900 AD, Sweden) Northern European religion From their first appearance in historical literature around 100 BC, the Germans were polytheistic. They believed in many gods, [...]
The Egyptian god Thoth (Old Kingdom tomb) What was Thoth the god of? Thoth was the Egyptian god of the mind - of intelligence, thinking, reason, and logic. He was [...]
