Ishtar Terra is one of two main highland regions on the planet

Planet

A planet is a celestial body orbiting a star or stellar remnant that is massive enough to be rounded by its own gravity, is not massive enough to cause thermonuclear fusion, and has cleared its neighbouring region of planetesimals.The term planet is ancient, with ties to history, science,...

 Venus

Venus

Venus is the second planet from the Sun, orbiting it every 224.7 Earth days. The planet is named after Venus, the Roman goddess of love and beauty. After the Moon, it is the brightest natural object in the night sky, reaching an apparent magnitude of −4.6, bright enough to cast shadows...

. It is the smaller of the two "continents", and is located near the north pole. It is named after the Akkad

Akkad

The Akkadian Empire was an empire centered in the city of Akkad and its surrounding region in Mesopotamia....

ian goddess

Goddess

A goddess is a female deity. In some cultures goddesses are associated with Earth, motherhood, love, and the household. In other cultures, goddesses also rule over war, death, and destruction as well as healing....

 Ishtar

Ishtar

Ishtar is the Assyrian and Babylonian goddess of fertility, love, war, and sex. She is the counterpart to the Sumerian Inanna and to the cognate north-west Semitic goddess Astarte.-Characteristics:...

.

The size of Ishtar Terra is roughly between the sizes of Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

 and the continental United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

. On its eastern edge lies the great mountain chain Maxwell Montes

Maxwell Montes

Maxwell Montes is a mountain massif on the planet Venus, part of which contains the highest point on the planet's surface.- General description :...

, which is 11 km high, compared to Mt. Everest at 8.8 km. On one side of the mountain chain is an impact crater

Impact crater

In the broadest sense, the term impact crater can be applied to any depression, natural or manmade, resulting from the high velocity impact of a projectile with a larger body...

 of 100 km in diameter filled with lava

Lava

Lava refers both to molten rock expelled by a volcano during an eruption and the resulting rock after solidification and cooling. This molten rock is formed in the interior of some planets, including Earth, and some of their satellites. When first erupted from a volcanic vent, lava is a liquid at...

.

Ishtar Terra contains the four main mountain ranges of Venus: Maxwell Montes

Maxwell Montes

Maxwell Montes is a mountain massif on the planet Venus, part of which contains the highest point on the planet's surface.- General description :...

 on the east coast, Frejya Montes in the north, Akna Montes

Akna Montes

Akna Montes are a mountain range on Venus centered at 68.9°N, 318.2°E and stretching 830 km long.The Akna range is a north-south trending ridge belt that forms the western border of the elevated smooth plateau of Lakshmi Planum. The Lakshmi plateau plains are formed by extensive volcanic eruptions...

 on the west coast, and Danu Montes in the southern region. These surround the lower plain of Ishtar Terra, which is named Lakshmi Planum

Lakshmi Planum

Lakshmi Planum is a plateau feature on the surface of Venus on the Western Ishtar Terra. It is named after Lakshmi, the Hindu goddess of wealth.It is roughly above the mean planetary radius...

 (named after the Hindu

Hindu

Hindu refers to an identity associated with the philosophical, religious and cultural systems that are indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. As used in the Constitution of India, the word "Hindu" is also attributed to all persons professing any Indian religion...

 goddess Lakshmi

Lakshmi

Lakshmi or Lakumi is the Hindu goddess of wealth, prosperity , light, wisdom, fortune, fertility, generosity and courage; and the embodiment of beauty, grace and charm. Representations of Lakshmi are also found in Jain monuments...

).

Ishtar Terra also contains volcanoes named after famous women: Sacajawea, Colette

Colette

Colette was the surname of the French novelist and performer Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette . She is best known for her novel Gigi, upon which Lerner and Loewe based the stage and film musical comedies of the same title.-Early life and marriage:Colette was born to retired military officer Jules-Joseph...

, and Cleopatra. Ishtar Terra is also the site of much tessera, which might provide evidence that the planet

Planet

A planet is a celestial body orbiting a star or stellar remnant that is massive enough to be rounded by its own gravity, is not massive enough to cause thermonuclear fusion, and has cleared its neighbouring region of planetesimals.The term planet is ancient, with ties to history, science,...

's surface is in motion.

External links

• IRISP Research Projects http://irsps.sci.unich.it/research/projects/venus/ishtar/
• WPT http://pds.jpl.nasa.gov/planets/captions/venus/perspect.htm
• Funky Science http://www.funkyscience.net/imagebank/channel_ishtar.html
• NASA Map of Venus: