The Sumerians believed that, for the highly privileged, music could alleviate the bleak conditions of the underworld. Conditions Дetail of the 'Peace' panel of the Standard of Ur from the Royal Cemetery at Ur, showing a man playing a lyre. The most common name for the earth and the underworld in Akkadian is erб№Јetu, but other names for the underworld include: ammatu, arali / arallГ», bД«t ddumuzi ('House of Dumuzi'), danninu, erб№Јetu la tГўri ('Earth of No Return'), ganzer / kanisurra, бё«aЕЎtu, irkalla, kiЕ«ru, kukkГ» ('Darkness'), kurnugГ» ('Earth of No Return'), lammu, mДЃtu ЕЎaplД«tu, and qaqqaru. Sometimes the underworld is called the 'land of no return', the 'desert', or the 'lower world'. The cuneiform sign for Kur was written ideographically with the cuneiform sign р’†і, a pictograph of a mountain. When used in reference to the underworld, the word Kur usually means 'ground', but sometimes this meaning is conflated with another possible meaning of the word Kur as 'mountain'. The rest of the time, the underworld was simply known by words meaning 'earth' or 'ground', including the terms Kur and Ki in Sumerian and the word erб№Јetu in Akkadian. All of these terms were later borrowed into Akkadian.

The Sumerians had a large number of different names which they applied to the underworld, including Arali, Irkalla, Kukku, Ekur, Kigal, and Ganzir. The underworld was also the abode of various demons, including the hideous child-devourer Lamashtu, the fearsome wind demon and protector god Pazuzu, and galla, who dragged mortals to the underworld.

The dying god Dumuzid spends half the year in the underworld, while, during the other half, his place is taken by his sister, the scribal goddess Geshtinanna, who records the names of the deceased. The god Namtar acts as Ereshkigal's sukkal, or divine attendant. The seven gates of the underworld are guarded by a gatekeeper, who is named Neti in Sumerian. After the Akkadian Period ( c.вЂ‰2334вЂ“2154 BC), Nergal sometimes took over the role as ruler of the underworld. Her husband was either Gugalanna, the 'canal-inspector of Anu', or, especially in later stories, Nergal, the god of war. The ruler of the underworld was the goddess Ereshkigal, who lived in the palace Ganzir, sometimes used as a name for the underworld itself. A person's quality of existence in the underworld was determined by their conditions of burial. Unlike many other afterlives of the ancient world, in the Sumerian underworld, there was no final judgement of the deceased and the dead were neither punished nor rewarded for their deeds in life. The only food or drink was dry dust, but family members of the deceased would pour libations for them to drink. The ancient Mesopotamian underworld, most often known in Sumerian as Kur, Irkalla, Kukku, Arali, or Kigal and in Akkadian as Erб№Јetu, although it had many names in both languages, was a dark, dreary cavern located deep below the ground, where inhabitants were believed to continue 'a shadowy version of life on earth'. Ancient Sumerian cylinder seal impression showing the god Dumuzid being tortured in the underworld by galla demons

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