Yshtar Earrings

Yshtar Earrings take their name from Ishtar — the Babylonian goddess of love, war, fertility, and the planet Venus, one of the most powerful and complex deities in all of ancient mythology.

Ishtar is the Babylonian form of the earlier Sumerian goddess Inanna, who was already the Queen of Heaven and Earth before the rise of Babylon: she is therefore among the oldest continuously worshiped deities in the history of the world, her cult maintained for over three thousand years across the great civilizations of the ancient Near East.

As a result, Ishtar accumulated the attributes of the world’s most important forces: the power of love and sexual attraction, the power of warfare and victory, and the heavenly body of Venus, which she governed in both its morning and evening appearances.

Furthermore, Ishtar’s primary symbol was the eight-pointed star — the rosette or starburst pattern that appeared on Babylonian boundary stones, cylinder seals, and temple facades as the mark of her divine presence.

The eight points described the planet Venus’s eight-year orbital cycle, during which it traces a perfect five-pointed star pattern against the background of the zodiac.

The Yshtar Earrings carry the geometry of that sacred star: the circular perforations as the radial geometry of Ishtar’s eight-pointed celestial mark, the negative space of the perforations describing the star by what is removed rather than what is added.

The Design of the Yshtar Earrings

The Yshtar Earrings translate the eight-pointed star of Ishtar into perforated geometric gold. Each piece is a drop whose surface carries circular perforations arranged in the radial pattern of the sacred starburst: negative spaces that describe the form of Ishtar’s symbol by removing rather than adding. The geometric arrangement of the perforations creates a surface of light and shadow that reads as both precise and alive. As a result, the Yshtar Earrings carry the essential quality of Ishtar’s star: the form that is defined by the light that passes through it.

The Eight-Pointed Star

The geometric perforations are the soul of this design. Specifically, the circular openings create a surface of negative space that reads as a sacred pattern: the eye fills in the star’s form from the arrangement of the voids, seeing the eight-pointed pattern as a result of what has been removed.

Worn as drops, the Yshtar Earrings allow light to pass through the perforations and cast patterns.

Furthermore, the interplay of solid gold and open void creates a surface of maximum contrast — the gold as the goddess’s authority, the void as the space through which her light passes.

In this way, the Yshtar Earrings carry Ishtar’s essential quality: the pattern that governs both love and war, both Venus and the battlefield.

Yshtar Earrings in 18k Gold

In rose gold the geometric perforations glow with warmth, the sacred star reading in the interplay of gold and void.

In white gold the Yshtar Earrings turn cool and precise, the perforations reading with the clarity of Ishtar’s own star in the Babylonian sky. In yellow gold they radiate with full golden intensity — the Queen of Heaven’s symbol at its most vivid, the eight-pointed star in the most solar of materials.

Whichever metal you choose, the perforations hold their pattern.

Craftsmanship and 3D Precision

Each Yshtar earring was developed in 3D modeling software and brought to life through precision 3D printing and meticulous hand-finishing.

The perforated geometric drop demands digital modeling: every circular opening must be placed at exactly the right position so the radial pattern reads as the sacred star form, and the two earrings of a pair must carry matching perforation patterns.

Hand-finishing polishes every surface. This is the precision that only the Friszman MD process can deliver reliably.

A Made-to-Order Piece

Like every Friszman MD creation, the Yshtar Earrings is made to order and hand-finished in 18k gold. Explore the full earrings collection to see how each design draws its form from the world’s great traditions. You can also explore the goddess Ishtar and the Queen of Heaven tradition in the ancient Near East collections of the Library of Congress.