Ishara

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Ishara (išḫara, ishkhara) is the Hittite word for "treaty, binding promise", also personified as a goddess of the oath. The word is attested as a loanword in the Assyrian Kültepe texts from the 19th century BC, and is as such the earliest attestation of a word of any Indo-European language.

The name is from a PIE root *sh₂ei "to bind (also magically)", also in Greek himas "strap" and Old Norse / Old High German seil "rope". Possibly also cognate is soul, and Welsh Gwen-hwyfar (Irish Find-abair, from Proto-Celtic *vindo-siabraid "white phantom", from a meaning "enchanted" of the extended root *sh₂ei-bh-).

As a goddess, Ishara could inflict severe bodily penalties to oathbreakers, in particular ascites (see Hittite military oath). In this context, she came to be seen as a "goddess of medicine" whose pity was invoked in case of illness. There was even a verb, isharis- "to be afflicted by the illness of Ishara".

Ishara's main Mesopotamian cult centre was the Babylonian town of Kisurra, but she is also thought to have been worshipped across a wide area amongst Syrians, Canaanites, and Hittites.

ishar (or eshar), oblique ishan-, the Hittite for "blood" is probably derived from the same root, maybe from a notion of "bond" between blood-relations (c.f. Sanskrit bandhu). The verb ishiya "to bind, fetter", "to oblige" is directly cognate to Sanskrit syati or Russian shyot with similar meanings.