Astarte

Astarte, Queen of Heav’n, with crescent Horns. ~ John Milton

Astarte’s bediamonded crescent. ~ Edgar Allan Poe

Astarte is the Hellenized form of the Ancient Near Eastern goddess ʿAṯtart, the Northwest Semitic equivalent of the East Semitic goddess Ishtar.

• And moonèd Ashtaroth,
  Heav’ns Queen and Mother both,
  Now sits not girt with Tapers holy shine,
  • John Milton, "On the Morning of Christs Nativity" (1645)

• [...] With these in troop
  Came Astoreth, whom the Phoenicians call’d
  Astarte, Queen of Heav’n, with crescent Horns;
  To whose bright Image nightly by the Moon
  Sidonian Virgins paid their Vows and Songs,
  In Sion also not unsung, where stood
  Her Temple on th’ offensive Mountain, built
  By that uxorious King, whose heart though large,
  Beguil’d by fair Idolatresses, fell
  To Idols foul. [...]
  • John Milton, Paradise Lost, Book I

• We bid those spectre-shapes avaunt,
  Ashtaroth and Termagaunt!
  • Thomas Warton the Younger, "The Crusade"

• And now, as the night was senescent
    And star-dials pointed to morn—
    As the star-dials hinted of morn—
  At the end of our path a liquescent
    And nebulous lustre was born,
  Out of which a miraculous crescent
    Arose with a duplicate horn—
  Astarte’s bediamonded crescent
    Distinct with its duplicate horn.
  • Edgar Allan Poe, "Ulalume: A Ballad", The American Review (1847)

• Where are they, Cotytto or Venus,
    Astarte or Ashtaroth, where?
  Do their hands as we touch come between us?
    Is the breath of them hot in thy hair?
  From their lips have thy lips taken fever,
    With the blood of their bodies grown red?
  Hast thou left upon earth a believer
    If these men are dead?
  • Algernon Charles Swinburne, "Dolores / Notre-Dame des Sept Douleurs"

• Or that young god, the Tyrian, who was more amorous than the dove
  Of Ashtaroth?
  • Oscar Wilde, "The Sphinx" (1894)

• When in a Syrian treasure-house she pours,
  From caskets rich and amethystine urns,
  Dull fires of dusty jewels that have bound
  The brows of naked Ashtaroth around.
  • George Sterling, "A Wine of Wizardry", Cosmopolitan (September 1907);
    A Wine of Wizardry, and Other Poems (1909)