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The Sumerians: Lost Gods, Alien Myths & the Origins of Civilization #mesopotamia · Matrix Wisdom, A Hidden History Podcast

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Known in classical times as Babylonia, Sumo comprises the
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lower part of Mesopotamia, essentially equivalent to
0:06
contemporary Iraq, from north of Baghdad to the Persian Gulf.
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Its area, roughly 10,000 square miles, is more than
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Massachusetts. Its climate is dry and useless.
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There are hardly any minerals or stones on the level river made
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ground. It lacked trees for lumber,
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except for the enormous reeds in the marshes.
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Therefore there was an area, the hand of God against it, an
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underdeveloped territory destined for poverty and
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destruction. But the Sumerians, as they came
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to be known by the third Millennium BC, were blessed with
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an extraordinarily inventive intelligence and a venture, some
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determined spirit. Notwithstanding the inherent
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shortcomings of the ground, they transformed Sumer into a real
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Garden of Eden and created what was most likely the first
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sophisticated civilization in human history.
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Zoomers people have a unique inventiveness in technology.
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Irrigation was even a concept known to the early colonists,
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allowing them to gather and direct the rich silt loaded
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overflow of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers and apply it to
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water and fructify their farms and gardens.
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They learned to bake the river clay and mud, the supply of
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which was essentially limitless, into sickles, pots, plates, and
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jars. To offset the lack of minerals
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and stones, rather than the limited building timber, they
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chopped and dried the vast and plentiful marsh reeds, bound
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them into bundles or platted mats, and fashioned them into
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cottages and buyers. With mud plastering, there were
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no more building material issues.
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Later, when the Sumerians developed the brick mold to
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shape and bake the ubiquitous river clay, they developed such
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practical instruments, equipment, talents and methods
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as the Potter's wheel, the wagon wheel, the plow, the sailboat,
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the arch, the vault, the Dome, casting in copper and bronze,
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riveting, brazing and soldering, sculpture in stone, engraving
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and inlay. About two millennia later, they
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developed a clay writing system that dispersed over the Near
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East. Nearly all that we know about
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the early history of Western Asia comes from the thousands of
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clay tablets etched in the kunai form alphabet created by the
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Sumerians and unearthed by archaeologists over the past 125
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years. The Sumerians had extraordinary
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thoughts, values, concepts, technical inventiveness and
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material development. Clear eyed and level headed,
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they saw reality pragmatically and within the constraints of
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their intellectual powers, seldom mistook fact for fiction,
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wished for fulfillment or enigma for mystification.
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The Sumerian sages developed a faith and creed over generations
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that gave unto the gods what was the gods, and acknowledged and
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accepted as inevitable mortal limits, notably powerlessness in
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the face of death and divine wrath.
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Material wise, they valued great wealth and belongings, abundant
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harvests, well stocked granaries, folds and stalls
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loaded with animals, successful plane hunts and fine sea
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fishing. Psychologically and spiritually,
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they emphasized honor and recognition, preeminence and
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reputation, and desire and success, that is, respect.
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Whether by his monarch, his subordinate, or his equal, the
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Sumerian was fiercely aware of his rights and objected to any
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infringement. The Sumerians were the first to
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gather laws and legal codes to arrange everything in black and
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white to prevent arbitrariness, misinterpretation and
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misunderstandings. While the Sumerians prized the
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individual and his success, one overriding cause possessed a
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strong spirit of collaboration among people and communities.
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Sumer's full dependency on irrigation for its well-being,
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indeed for its survival. Irrigation is a difficult
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procedure that requires both group effort and organization.
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Canals needed to be dug and maintained constantly in repair.
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Every one of the participants had to divide the water fairly.
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To guarantee this, a power more than that of the individual
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landowner or even the single community was required.
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Consequently, political institutions developed and the
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Sumerian state grew. As Sumer produced a great grain
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surplus but had essentially little metal and very little
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stone and timber. Due to the fertility of the
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irrigated soil, the state was compelled to acquire the
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material vital to its economy, either by military force or
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trade. Thus, by the third Millennium
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BC, Sumerian civilization and culture had reached at least
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somewhat as Far East as India, as far West as the
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Mediterranean, as far South as ancient Ethiopia, and as far
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north as the Caspian. The event happened 5000 years
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ago and would not affect our study of contemporary man and
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society. Still, the ground of Suma saw
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the beginning of more than one important characteristic of
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modern society. Modern man will find his ideal
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and equivalent in ancient Suma, the philosopher or teacher,
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historian or poet, lawyer or reformer, statesman or
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politician, architect or sculptor.
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Although the ways of cultural dissemination are many,
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sophisticated and complicated, their impact is subtle and
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transient. So we can no more clearly or
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directly determine the Sumerian source of the contemporary
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offspring. Still, we can see its impact in
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things like Mosaic law and a Solomonic proverb, in Job's
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tears and a Jerusalem lament, In the sad tale of a dying man God,
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in a hisiotic creation story, in a Hindu myth, In an asopic fable
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and a Euclidean theorem, In a Zodiac sign and a heraldic
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design. In the weight of a minor, the
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measure of an angle, and the way we write numbers.
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The next sections will graphically show the history,
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social organization, religious concepts, educational
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procedures, literary works, and value motivations of the
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civilization developed in ancient summer.
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First, we will summarize the Sumerian archaeological
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resurrection and their civilization together with a
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gloss on their writing and language.
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Amazingly, not only was nothing known about Sumerian
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civilization less than a century ago, but the actual existence of
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Sumerian people and language was unknown.
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Looking not for Sumerians but rather for Assyrians, the
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academics and archaeologists who started excavating in
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Mesopotamia were seeking the people about whom they had
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extensive, albeit quite inaccurate, knowledge from Greek
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and he. In the case of the Sumerians,
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however, there was no clear indication of the land or its
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people and language in the entire available biblical,
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classical and post classical literature, or at least so it
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was thought. See pages 297 to 99 for the
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possibility that Sumer is mentioned in the Bible under a
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somewhat variant form. For more than 2000 years the guy
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had deleted the very name Sumer from his memory and
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consciousness. The discovery of the Sumerians
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and their language was unlooked for and came quite unexpectedly.
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This rather irrelevant fact led to arguments responsible for the
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rather slow and disturbed advancement of sumerological
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research. Semitic Acadian, formerly known
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as a Syrian or Babylonian, deciphered Sumerian using
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cuneiform script. Just a Sumerian is written,
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though Iraq is the birth place of cuneiform writing.
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This trilingual inscription, roughly the equivalent of the
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Egyptian Rosetta Stone, did not originate in Iraq, but in Iran.
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This brings us to the narrative of the investigations and
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excavations that resulted in the rediscovery of Mesopotamian
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civilizations and the deciphering of the Kunaya form
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script. It has been told repeatedly and
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in great detail over the past decades.
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See bibliography for specific works.
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To give the reader at least a glimpse of the picture as a
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whole and at the same time to make a reverent and grateful bow
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to those long dead explorers. Excavators and armchair savages
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who unintentionally and unwittingly, and each in his own
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way, help to make the writing of a book on the Sumerians
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possible. It will be sketched here merely
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following their long burial under their barren mounds or
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tells. The resuscitation of the
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Assyrian, Babylonian, and Sumerian peoples is an
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expressive and amazing triumph of 19th century study and
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humanism. To be true.
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Rare accounts of prehistoric Mesopotamian ruins abound from
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past centuries, though his story was not recorded until the 16th
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century. A rabbi of Tudela in the Kingdom
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of Navarre by the name of Benjamin visited the Jews of
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Mosul and correctly identified the ruins in the vicinity of
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that city as those of ancient Nineveh as early as the 12th
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century. Conversely, Babylon was unknown
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until 16/16 when Roman Pietro de la Valle saw the mounds near
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Hilla. This sharp eyed visitor not only
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vividly described the remains of Babylon, but also brought back
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to Europe inscribed bricks he had discovered there and at the
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mound now known as Tal al Mukhayer, the Mound of Pitch
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which covers the ruins of ancient Ur.
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Thus, the first example of cuneiform writing came to
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Europe. Many visitors, each with a
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different concept of recognizing the many locales and ruins,
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travelled to Mesopotamia during the rest of the 17th and most of
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the 18th century, all trying to fit what they saw into the
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biblical frame of reference. One of the most important of
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these missions was that of Danish mathematician Karsten
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Niebuh, who, apart from copying at Persepolis the inscriptions
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that led to the decipherment of cuneiform, was the first to
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provide his contemporaries A realistic view of the ruins of
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Nineveh using sketches and drawings between 1761 and 1767.
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Not too long later, the French botanist Amy SHO sold the first
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valuable inscription to arrive in Europe to the Bibliotheque
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Nationale in Paris, a border stone discovered near
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Catasiphon, South of Baghdad. This simple phrase, which
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carries the traditional curse against anyone upsetting the
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border marker, was translated absurdly.
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One of them, for example, ran as follows.
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The army of heaven will water us with vinegar to lavish on us the
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right remedies to affect our healing.
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Abe Beauchamp, vicar general at Baghdad and Academy of Science
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correspondent, was meticulously and precisely observing what he
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saw around him, especially in the ruins of Babylon.
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In fact, he actually made the first known archaeological
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excavation in Mesopotamia using a few native workers under the
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direction of a master Mason in connection with a sculpture now
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generally known as the Lion of Babylon, which can still be seen
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there by today's visitor. He first notes discovering solid
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cylinders covered with minute lettering that he felt matched
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Persepolis's inscriptions. He also describes portions of
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the Ishtar Gate, a magnificent duplicate currently displayed in
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the Near Eastern section of the Berlin Museum.
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Published in 1790, his journey memoirs were translated almost
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immediately into English and German, generating quite a stir
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in the academic world. One effect of Abe Beauchamp's
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spark was the East India Company in London authorizing their
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agents in Baghdad to do some archaeological excavation and
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reconnoitring. And so in 1811 we have Claudius
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James Rich, an East India Company employee living in
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Baghdad, surveilling and even momentarily excavating bits of
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Babylon's ruins. Rich returned to Mosul some nine
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years later, sketching and researching the enormous mounds
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of ancient Nineveh. Among the many inscribed
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tablets, bricks, boundary stones and cylinders he gathered, among
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them the well known Nebuchadnezzar and Sennacherib
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cylinders. He meticulously copied his
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secretary Karl Belineau and sent the epigraphic Grotefend a copy
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for decipherment. Rich's collection was the core
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of the giant assortment of Mesopotamian relics in the
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British Museum. Rich passed at 34 in 1821, but
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his two memoirs about the ruins of Babylon, with their
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typographic and inscriptional material, survived and may be
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considered the founding point of Assyriology and the allied
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cuneiform studies. Robert Kerr Porter, who created
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exact artistic replicas of various Mesopotamian sites and a
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map of Babylon's whole area of destruction, followed him.
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Robert Mignon briefly excavated in the remains of Babylon, where
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Richard dug in 1811. He hired 30 men and cleared an
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area of 12 square feet, 1.11 square meters to a depth of 20
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feet. He was the first to dig an
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engraved cylinder. At last, in the 1830s, two
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Englishmen, J Bailey Fraser and William F Ainsworth, explored
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various sites in southern Mesopotamia.
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They had no clue these belonged to ancient Zuma.
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Beginning in 1842 with Paul Emil Botter, the French Consulate
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Mosul, and continuing with many intervals to this day, we now
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come to the sizable and essentially methodical
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excavations in Iraq. Thousands of Acadian written
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texts were produced from the earlier digs in northern
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Mesopotamia, especially from the Assyrian territory, but this was
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not known when they were initially unearthed.
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All that could be claimed was that the script matched that of
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the third class of the trilingual inscriptions
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discovered in Iran, mostly at Persepolis and its surrounds.
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At Persepolis, the remains of a great palace still stood, with
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several tall, exquisite columns still in situ and sculpted
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monuments strewn all around. Surrounding the city were
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exquisitely carved tombs chiseled out from rocks.
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Many Persipolitan monuments during the late 1700s possessed
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a script reminiscent of Babylon's brick inscriptions.
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Moreover, one of the inscriptions on the trilinguals
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had been deciphered by the middle of the 19th century and
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had supplied a stock of appropriate names that could be
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used to decipher the third of the inscriptions, so enabling
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reading of the Assyrian tablets unearthed in Iraq.
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To decipher Akadian this way, you must know how to decipher
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the first class of inscriptions on the Persipolitan trilingual
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and the information it provided. In the 16th century, the
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European world came to know the remains of Persepolis when J
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Ossifat Barbaros, the Venetian envoy to Persia, published his
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itinerary in Venice in 1543, in which he speaks of them with
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admiration. Antonio de Gueca, the first
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ambassador of Spain and Portugal to Persia, first noticed the
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writing on the monuments in his book published in Lisbon in
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1611, and characterized it as unlike that of the Persians,
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Arabs, Armenians and Jews, using the description of Diodorus
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Siculus in a book in Antwerp in 16/20.
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His successor, Don Garcia Silva Figueroa, was the first to
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recognize the ruins of Persepolis as the palace of the
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Acumenid king Darius. He says that the writing on the
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monuments is unlike Chaldean, Hebrew, Arabic and Greek, and he
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also describes it as long and triangular, shaped like a
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pyramid, and the characters are like each other except in their
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orientation. Pietro della Valley said in a
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letter dated October 21st, 1621 that he had visited Persepolis's
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remains and even produced a copy, though an inaccurate one,
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of five of the characters on the inscriptions, recommending that
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the inscriptions be read from left to right.
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The young French artist Andre Dolier Deslandes published the
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first accurate engraving of the palace of Persepolis in 1673.
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He copied just three of the characters on the inscriptions
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and arranged his engraving in a way that tended to give the
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impression that the writing was merely decorative.
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The theory generally accepted during the 18th century.
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Englishman Sir Thomas Herbert, who had been the British
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ambassador to Persia some 50 years previously, printed a
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pretty poor copy of what appeared to be a three line
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paragraph in 1677, which proved to be a compositi of lines from
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quite distinct inscriptions, though I rather inclined to the
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1st and that they comprehended words or syllables, as in
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brachiography or short writing we familiarly practice.
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His characterization of the script is not without historical
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interest. The characters are of a strange
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and unusual shape, neither like letters nor hieroglyphics.
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Yeah, so far from our deciphering them that we could
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not so much as make any positive judgement whether they were
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words or characters. Published in 1693, Samuel
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Flower, an East India Company agent, produced a replica of A2
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line Persepolis inscription totaling 20 characters.
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Although it consisted of 23 distinct signs chosen from other
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inscriptions, this was considered a real inscription,
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an error that caused little confusion and annoyance to those
18:45
trying to comprehend the script. From Thomas Hyde, who published
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a book on the history of the religion of the Old Persians, in
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which he copied flowers inscription and described the
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characters as cuneiform. The script first got its
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appellation in 1700. Sadly enough, he did not believe
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the signs were intended to convey meaningful speech, but
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rather to be decorations and ornaments Not published until
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1711. The first entire inscription
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from Persepolis was written by Jean Chardin, A naturalized
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English citizen who had visited 3 times during his youth.
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Camille LeBron produced exact replicas of three trilingual
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inscriptions. 3 years later still the Danish caste and
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Niebuhr cleared the path for Persian inscription decoding.
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He published meticulous and accurate copies of three
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trilingual inscriptions from Persepolis in 1778.
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He demonstrated that each of the three inscriptions included
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three different types of kunai form writing, which he labeled
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Class one, Class 2, and Class the three, and finally that
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class the 41 represented an alphabetic method of writing,
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since his tabulation indicated that it had just 42 indications.
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Unfortunately, he believed the three script classes were
20:11
employed to write the same language in three different
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ways, rather than 3 languages. Another Danish man, Friedrich
20:18
Munter, made the crucial discovery in 1798 that Niebuhr's
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Class 1 was an alphabetic script, while classes 2 and the
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three respectively were syllabic and ideographic, and that each
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class represented a different language as well as a different
20:33
style of writing. Thus, the basis for deciphering
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the inscriptions was ready exact copies of various texts, each
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displaying 3 forms of Kanai form script for three separate
20:46
languages. Moreover, the initial type in
20:49
each text was precisely designated as an alphabet.
20:53
Still, the decipherment itself took considerably more than half
20:56
a century. Had it not been for two scholars
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who made major, if inadvertent, contributions to the process by
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publishing works that, although not really concerned with the
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Persepolis cuneiform inscriptions, proved to be a
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basic aid to the decipherers, it would be impossible completely
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spending much time in India gathering manuscripts of the
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Avesta, the holy book of Zoroastrianism, and learning how
21:24
to read and understand Old Persian, the language in which
21:28
it was written. One of the academics was the
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Frenchman AH Ankoutil Duperon, published in 1768 and 1771.
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His significant writings gave people attempting to decipher
21:43
the Persepolis Q&A form inscriptions some insight into
21:47
Old Persian, which was quite helpful for determining class.
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One of the trilinguals after it was proposed because of its very
21:55
clear presence in the inscriptions.
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A second researcher was A. This pattern was X great king,
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king of kings, king of son of Y great king, king of which,
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although dating centuries later than the Persepolis cuneiform
22:12
inscriptions, revealed a more or less stereotyped pattern that
22:15
could be assumed to underlie the earlier monuments as well.
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Sylvestre de Sasse published a translation of the Pahlavi
22:22
inscriptions found in the environs of Persepolis in 1793.
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Returning now to the actual decoding of the Persepolis
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inscriptions, Olaf Gerhard Tuksen, who while studying the
22:35
first group correctly identified 4 of the characters, noted one
22:40
common sign as a word divider, which helped to ascertain where
22:45
each word started and ended, and made several other perceptive
22:49
observations. His interpretations were
22:53
primarily guesswork and inaccurate, though, since he
22:56
wrongly believed the inscriptions belonged to the
22:58
Parthian dynasty more than 500 years later than when they were
23:02
produced. His interpretations were just
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conjecture and error, though, and he mistakenly thought the
23:09
inscriptions belonged to the Parthian period more than half a
23:13
Millennium later than their actual era.
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Teixen turned forth his findings in 1798.
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Friedrich Munter of Copenhagen turned in two articles to the
23:24
Royal Danish Society of Sciences in the same year, proving of
23:28
great importance for the decipherment of the inscriptions
23:32
that the Persepolis records belong to the Achemenid dynasty.
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Munta himself, however, made little more development in his
23:39
deciphering attempts. The first of Niebuh's three
23:42
seminars was Gyorg Friedrich Grote Fend, a Greek teacher at
23:46
the Gottingen Gymnasium who succeeded where others had
23:49
failed, and became well known as the decipherer of the Persian
23:53
kunai form inscriptions. He started by noting those
23:56
characters most frequently occurring and reasoned that they
24:01
were vowels. He took to Saatchi's Pahlavi
24:05
inscriptional pattern and found the spots where it seemed most
24:08
likely that the names of the king who had the monument put up
24:11
and of his father would occur, as well as such words as king
24:16
and son. He then arranged the known names
24:19
of the Akimanid dynasty kings based on their length into the
24:23
right places and used important words from Ankutil Duperon's
24:27
studies of Old Persian to help read some other words on the
24:30
inscriptions. These procedures led him to
24:33
correctly identify 10 of the signs and three proper names,
24:38
and although his translation had many mistakes, it still provided
24:41
a good understanding of the text's meaning.
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Grotefind first presented an extract of his decipherment
24:47
effort in 18 O 2-3 years later he issued a more complete
24:52
report. Tixon Munter and especially
24:55
Rich, who kept on delivering copies of the cuneiform
24:59
documents he had acquired at the ruins of Babylon and Nineveh,
25:03
appreciated and approved of his efforts.
25:06
But Grotefend inflated his successes, saying that he had
25:10
deciphered many more signs than the truth and provided thorough
25:14
but unwarranted transliterations and translations, which could
25:18
only cause contempt among some of his colleagues.
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But Grotefend was on the correct Rd. with his decipherment.
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The efforts of many academics who persisted in adding,
25:29
deleting and changing directly and indirectly over the next few
25:34
decades confirmed this. Among the exceptional leaders
25:38
adjacent Marta Rasmus Rask, Eugene Bemouf and Christian
25:43
Lassen, a close friend and colleague.
25:47
The Persepolis inscriptions were too brief and lacked A
25:49
sufficient vocabulary for a real insight into the Old Persian
25:53
language and the characters final decipherment.
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This leads us to the eminent Englishman Henry Krezik
25:59
Rawlinson, who was smart, clever and tenacious, and the wonderful
26:04
fact that two persons interpreted a set of
26:07
inscriptions separately using essentially the same criteria.
26:10
In early cuneiform research H serving in the British troops, C
26:17
Rawlinson developed an interest in the kunae form inscriptions
26:20
dotted about Persia, particularly the Mount Alvand
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inscription close to Hamadan and the Behistan Rock inscription,
26:28
approximately 20 miles from Kermanshah.
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He duplicated some of the trilinguals.
26:35
The former consists of 2 short trilinguals which he proceeded
26:40
to copy in the year 1835 without prior knowledge of the work done
26:45
by Grotfend, der Sassi, SA, Martin, Rask, Bumuf and Lassen.
26:53
He succeeded in reading them by following essentially the same
26:56
method that Grotfend and his associates had used.
27:00
However, he understood that one would need numerous correct
27:03
names on hand to recognize all the indications on these
27:07
inscriptions and interpret them sufficiently.
27:10
These were discovered in the Behistun Rock inscription, A
27:14
trilingual language stretching into hundreds of lines etched on
27:18
a specifically prepared surface of more than 1200 square feet,
27:24
partially covered by a sculptured bas relief.
27:28
Sadly, this monument was perched on a rock over 300 feet above
27:31
ground, and there was no way to climb.
27:36
Rawlinson thus had to build a scaffold to reach the
27:39
inscription, and occasionally he had to be suspended by a rope
27:43
dangling in front of the rock. To acquire as full a copy as
27:47
possible, Rawlinson started copying the five Persian columns
27:51
of the Behiston trilinguals with 414 lines of text in 1835.
27:56
He kept transcribing the inscription on and off until in
27:59
1837 he had accomplished roughly half or about 200 lines.
28:04
With the aid of classical writers and medieval
28:06
geographers, he was able to interpret a number of the
28:09
several 100 geographical names this inscription included.
28:13
By 1839 he had become familiar with his European colleagues
28:17
writings and thanks to their fresh ideas, he translated the
28:21
1st 200 lines of the Old Persian trilingual.
28:25
His military obligations interfered with his attempts to
28:28
reproduce every bit of writing on the Behiston rock.
28:31
He could not resume his labor of love until 1844.
28:36
He returned to Behiston that year, completed the Old Persian
28:39
inscription of 414 lines, and copied all 263 lines of the
28:45
Second or Elamite variant, as it has since become known.
28:50
He sent his manuscript from Baghdad to the Royal Asiatic
28:52
Society in 1848, comprising copies, transliterations,
28:57
translations, commentary and notes.
28:59
He thus placed the decipherment of the Old Persian inscriptions
29:02
on an absolutely reliable basis. This fact was reinforced when in
29:07
the same year, the eminent Irish linguist Edward Hinks published
29:10
a paper he had read 2 years earlier.
29:12
Anticipating several important observations made by Rawlinson
29:16
independently. Only small adjustments,
29:18
additions and corrections could be done from here on.
29:22
Notably significant were those of Lassen's 1851 student Jules
29:27
Opet. Hinks, Rawlinson and Opet
29:29
Cuneiforms Holy triad not only grounded Old Persian, but also
29:34
started Acadian and Sumerian on the road to decipherment.
29:38
And so opened the dusty pages of the clay books buried all
29:41
throughout the ancient Near East.
29:44
We do return to the major systematic excavations in
29:47
Mesopotamia and the decipherment of the Acadian and Sumerian
29:51
languages to which they led. Paul Emile Botter was appointed
29:56
as the French consul in Mosul in 1842.
30:00
He started excavations at Kuyunjik and Nabi Yunus, 2
30:04
mounds over Nineveh's remains, as soon as he arrived, though
30:08
this was unknown to the excavators.
30:09
Of course, archaeologically speaking, the Coursabad ruins
30:14
covered the palace of the Great Sagon the Second, who ruled over
30:18
Assyria in the first quarter of the 8th century BC.
30:22
These proved fruitless, and he turned his attention to
30:26
Khorsabad, a short distance to the north of Kuyunjik, where he
30:30
struck it rich, archaeologically speaking.
30:34
Just three years later, Englishman Austin Henry Layard
30:38
started excavating, first at Nimrod, then at Nineveh, and
30:43
once more at Nimrod. Apart from the royal palaces
30:46
adorned with bas reliefs, he discovered in Nineveh the
30:50
library of King Ashurbanipal, the great grandson of Sargon the
30:54
Second, with thousands of tablets and pieces bearing the
30:58
ancient times lexical, religious and literary creations.
31:02
Europe thus had hundreds of kunai form inscriptions by the
31:06
middle of the 19th century, mostly from Assyrian ruins,
31:11
which required decipherment but faced challenges and hurdles
31:16
apparently insurmountable at the time.
31:19
Still, Hinks, Rawlinson, and Aupert's intelligence and
31:24
tenacity made the decipherment a reality in no more than a decade
31:28
or two. The would be decipherers did
31:31
have one advantage. To be sure, a small number of
31:34
inscriptions of one kind or another had been in Europe long
31:37
before Botter and Laird started their digs, particularly from
31:41
Babylonian ruins, and the writing on them had been
31:44
identified as reflecting Nibu's third class of the Persepolis
31:47
trilinguals. Sadly, this third class, which
31:52
would have been fairly expected to be a translation of the first
31:54
class, defied all efforts at decipherment.
31:58
First, the Persepolis inscriptions were far too short
32:00
for any language knowledge. While the first class of the
32:03
trilingual had only 42 characters, it was impossible to
32:07
mark off the names or words that would be assumed to be
32:10
identical. Even a brief examination of the
32:13
then existing Babylonian inscriptions revealed hundreds
32:16
of signs. At last, the same indicators
32:19
displayed very different shapes and forms in the Babylonian
32:22
records. Hence, it is unsurprising that
32:27
the first attempts to interpret the Babylonian script failed.
32:32
The first noteworthy contribution arrived in 1847.
32:37
Its author, not surprisingly, was Edward Hinks.
32:40
Though he successfully grasped the meaning of multiple
32:43
ideograms, Botter did not try to interpret a single word.
32:48
His most effective contribution focused on the variance.
32:52
Though clearly identical in reading and meaning, he revealed
32:56
from rigorous research and thorough documentation that
32:59
certain terms were written in distinct ways.
33:02
Hinks Work of 1850, in which he could explain the apparently
33:06
amazing fact that the Babylonian script had hundreds of signs and
33:10
the cause for the formation of so many variants, was made
33:15
possible by this minute analysis of variant texts.
33:20
The Babylonian, Assyrian, or as it is now known, Akkadian script
33:24
stated Hinx was not alphabetical but rather syllabic and
33:29
ideographic. That is, the signs might
33:32
represent syllables of consonant plus vowel, vowel plus
33:37
consonant, or consonant plus vowel plus consonant combined in
33:43
various ways to make a word, or each sign could express an
33:46
entire word. Deciphering may proceed quickly
33:50
with this fresh understanding of the Babylonian script.
33:54
Still to come, though, are two main language aids, the outcome
33:57
of the second of our triumvirate, Rawlinson's labor
34:00
and study. Rawlinson returned from Baghdad
34:03
to Behiston once more in 1847. At great risk of life and limb,
34:09
he succeeded in creating paper squeezes of the Babylonian
34:12
variant, producing a long text of 112 lines that could be
34:17
deciphered and translated using the already deciphered Old
34:21
Persian text on the same monument.
34:24
Rawlinson could now read about 150 signs correctly.
34:29
He knew the reading and meaning of roughly 200 words of the
34:32
language, which was now clearly shown to be a Semitic tongue.
34:35
He could even provide a grammatical sketch of Babylonian
34:38
writing which had polyphony whereby 1 sign could represent
34:42
multiple sounds or values. Rawlinson presented his
34:48
extraordinary work in 1850 and 1851.
34:52
Using Rawlinson's findings, Hinks added more than 100 fresh
34:56
values to the Babylonian Signs 1853 to identify close to 350
35:02
values or readings. It was difficult to believe that
35:06
the ancient people would create a system of writing in which one
35:09
and the same sign could have numerous values, since this
35:12
presumably would confuse the reader and make it useless.
35:17
The principle of polyphony which this identification involved
35:21
aroused doubt, suspicion and antagonism among scholars, some
35:25
of whom attacked the Hinks Rawlinson translations as
35:28
prejudice and useless. Third Triumvirate member Jules
35:34
Aupert stepped in the right at this pivotal point.
35:39
He examined the level of decipherment in 1855, achieved
35:42
that position, proved the accuracy of the Hinks Rawlinson
35:46
readings and added several new signals with more than one value
35:51
among the tablets recovered in the so-called Ashabanipul
35:54
library at Nineveh. He was the first to carefully
35:57
analyze syllabaries produced by the ancient scribes and to apply
36:02
them extensively in his translation, based on the fact
36:05
that the earliest excavations were carried out in northern
36:08
Iraq, the home of the Assyrian people.
36:11
His many treaties, text, editions, and polemics helped to
36:16
cement the new science now usually known as Assyriology and
36:21
endow it with respect and immense dignity. 1857 was a
36:25
turning point for Assyriology, and it negotiated difficult
36:29
circumstances. Instead of a trained
36:31
Assyriologist, a mathematician and innovator pushed the matter
36:35
to a critical juncture. Bleu stands for F Fox.
36:40
Talbot was also an amateur orientalist.
36:43
He had read Rawlinson's and Hink's publications and even
36:46
translated some Assyrian manuscripts, helping to
36:49
establish the groundwork for modern photography by
36:51
researching integral calculus. He translated a still
36:56
unpublished copy of an inscription of the Assyrian
37:00
monarch Tiglath Pilasa the 1st 1116 to 1076.
37:06
On March 17th, 1857, he sent its seal to the Royal Asiatic
37:11
Organization, implying that the organization called Hinks and
37:16
Rawlinson to produce independent translations of the same
37:19
material and send them sealed so the three independent
37:23
translations might be matched. The group did this and also
37:28
extended an invitation to Jewel Laupert, then living in London.
37:33
Three of them accepted the offer.
37:35
Two months later, a specially established committee of 5 Royal
37:39
Asiatic Society members burst the seals of the four envelopes
37:44
carrying the translations. A study said that Tolbert's
37:47
drawings were fairly unclear and inaccurate, that Rawlinson and
37:51
Hink's translations most nearly matched each other, and that
37:55
OPERT annotated his translations extensively and regularly
38:00
deviated from his English colleagues.
38:03
The decision benefited the seriology as practiced then, the
38:07
four translations were consistent, and the decipherment
38:10
received support. Two years later, in 1859, Aupert
38:15
produced one of his most significant scholarly works, De
38:19
Chieffermont de Inscription Cunhaeo Fortress.
38:22
It was so clear, thorough and authoritative a summary of a
38:26
seriology and its achievements to date that all criticism
38:30
stopped. Scholars by the score,
38:32
particularly in France, England and Germany, penned volumes on
38:35
all facets of the new discipline, language, history,
38:39
religion, culture, and so on. In the next decades, thousands
38:45
of texts were replicated and published.
38:48
Many extremely specialized papers on grammar, syntax and
38:51
etymology were produced, while sign lists, glossaries,
38:54
dictionaries and grammar were assembled.
38:57
And so the study of Assyrian, first called Babylonian and now
39:01
progressively becoming known as Acadian, a term deriving from
39:04
one used by the ancient Mesopotamians themselves,
39:08
developed and matured, so that now in 1963, two separate many
39:14
volume dictionaries are in the process of publication, one in
39:19
English by the Oriental Institute of the University of
39:21
Chicago and the other in German under international auspices.
39:26
A crowning achievement of more than 100 years of cumulative
39:29
scholarship. Babylonians.
39:33
Assyrians. Still, there has been no
39:36
reference to Sumer or the Sumerians thus far.
39:40
This book mostly addresses the Sumerians.
39:43
Sadly, hardly anyone recognized that Sumerian people and
39:46
language had ever existed until the middle of the last century.
39:50
We must thus go back to track the methodical procedures that
39:53
resulted in the shocking and unexpected knowledge that
39:55
Sumerians formerly lived in Mesopotamia.
39:58
Hinks voiced questions about the prevailing presumption that the
40:02
Semitic people of Assyria and Babylonia had devised the kunai
40:06
form writing system they used in a paper read before the British
40:09
Association for the Advancement of Science.
40:12
In 1850, the consonant is the constant element.
40:17
In Semitic languages. The vowel is somewhat erratic.
40:22
The Semites should create a syllabic spelling system wherein
40:25
the vowel appeared as fixed as the consonant felt odd.
40:29
A major characteristic of the Semitic languages is the
40:32
difference between soft and stiff palatals and dentals.
40:36
The cuneiform syllabary lacked sufficient expression of this
40:39
difference. Then it would have been able to
40:42
follow the syllabic values of the signals to Semitic words
40:46
should the Semites have developed cuneiform writing.
40:50
But this was hardly the case. Most syllabic values for the
40:55
cuneiform signs seem to revert to words or constituents for
41:00
which no Semitic equivalent could be discovered.
41:03
Hinx thus started to wonder whether some non Semitic group
41:06
who had preceded the Semites in Babylonia established the
41:08
cuneiform system of writing. Thus much for Hinx and his
41:13
doubts. 2 years later, in 1852, according to a note published by
41:18
Hinx, we learned that Rawlinson, after studying the syllabaries
41:22
excavated at Kuyunjik, had come to the conclusion that they were
41:25
bilingual and that the Semitic Babylonian words in them
41:29
explained corresponding words in an entirely new and hitherto
41:33
unknown language which he designated Akkadian and which he
41:37
considered Scythian or Turanian. Here then, we learned for the
41:41
first time the possibility that there had existed a non Semitic
41:44
people and a non Semitic language in Mesopotamia.
41:48
Two years later Rawlinson gave a lecture before the Royal Asiatic
41:51
Society in which he discussed in great detail the Kuyunjic
41:54
bilingual syllabaries, which were nothing more or less than
41:58
comparative alphabets, grammars, and vocabularies of the Assyrian
42:03
and Scythian dialects, Rawlinson said, building the primitive
42:10
temples and capitals of Babylonia, worshipping the same
42:14
gods, and inhabiting the same seats as the Semitic successors,
42:19
the Babylonian Scythes, whose ethnic name is Arkad, may be
42:23
presumed to have devised cuneiform writing.
42:26
As for the language of these Babylonian Scythes, the Kuyunjik
42:30
tablets, said Rawlinson, furnish volumes of comparative examples
42:35
and interlinear translations. He concludes from his study of
42:39
this new primitive language from the bilinguals, that it is
42:43
doubtful if any close linguistic affinities are to be traced
42:46
between the primitive tongue and any available dialect of modern
42:50
times. In short, Rawlinson had
42:53
discovered the Sumerians and their language, except that he
42:57
designated them quite erroneously as Babylonian
42:59
Scythes and then as Akkadians, the very term now used for the
43:04
Semites of the land. The pronominal system is closer
43:07
to the Mongol and Manchu type than any other branch of the
43:11
Turanian family, but the vocabulary is not very similar.
43:16
Jules Oppert's genius, whose contributions to all spheres of
43:20
Assyriology, particularly to the Kunai form script we owe, guides
43:25
the proper identification of the non Semitic people who developed
43:29
it. The study of the syllabaries was
43:32
truly outstanding. On January 17th, 1869, Oppert
43:38
delivered a lecture before the Ethnographic and Historical
43:40
section of the French Society of Numismatics and Archaeology in
43:45
which he declared that these people and their language should
43:47
be called Sumerian, basing his conclusions on the title King of
43:52
Sumer and Akkad found in the inscriptions of some of the
43:55
early rulers. For he argued, quite correctly,
43:59
it was the name Akkad that applied to the Semitic people of
44:03
Assyria and Babylonia, while the name Suma referred to the non
44:08
Semitic inhabitants. Alpert even went on to say in
44:12
this lecture that an analysis of the structure of the Sumerian
44:15
language had led him to conclude that it had close affinities
44:18
with Turkish, Finnish, and Hungarian, a brilliant insight
44:23
into the structure of a language that only 20 years earlier had
44:26
been nonexistent as far as world scholarship was concerned.
44:30
Most kunaiform scholars did not immediately adopt the
44:33
designation Sumerian, instead using the term Acadian for
44:38
several decades. In fact, one famous Orientalist,
44:41
Joseph Halavy, denied the very existence of the Sumerian people
44:46
and language, despite all the evidence to the contrary.
44:51
Beginning with the 1870s and for more than three decades
44:54
thereafter, he published article after article insisting that no
44:58
people apart from the Semites had ever had Babylonia and that
45:03
the so-called Sumerian language was merely an artificial
45:06
invention of the Semites themselves devised for hieratic
45:10
and esoteric purposes. For a very brief period he was
45:14
even supported by several eminent Assyriologists.
45:18
But all that is now only a matter of historical curiosity.
45:21
For not long after Aupert's perspicacious conclusions about
45:24
the non Semitic people of Babylonia and their language, 2
45:28
excavations were begun in southern Babylonia that put the
45:32
Sumerians on the map, as it were, with the discovery of
45:36
statues and steelys that revealed their physical features
45:40
and innumerable tablets and inscriptions significant for
45:44
their political history, religion, economy and
45:46
literature. The French began the first
45:48
significant excavation on a Sumerian site in 1877 at Teller,
45:53
the ruins of ancient Lagache, under the direction of Ernest
45:57
D'sarzek. Between the years 1877 and 1900,
46:01
D'sarzek conducted 11 campaigns and succeeded in excavating
46:06
numerous statues, primarily of Gudea stales.
46:11
The Staley of the vultures is one of the more important of
46:14
these, the Gudea cylinders and thousands of tablets, many of
46:19
which dated to the dynasty of Ur Nanche.
46:23
In 1884, Leon Husey's magnificent volume De Cuvert
46:27
Enchal de Pennsylvania, Ernest de Salzek, was published with
46:31
two outstanding epigraphists, Arthur Amiode and Francois Turo
46:38
Don Jane. All in all, the French conducted
46:42
20 campaigns in Lagache under Gaston Cruz's direction, from
46:47
1929 to 1931 under Henri de Genois Cativ and from 1931 to
46:54
1933 under Andre Parrot. The results are briefly
47:00
summarized in Andre Parrot's most valuable reference book,
47:03
Tel O 1948, which also provides A comprehensive and detailed
47:10
bibliography of all publications relating in one way or another
47:13
to these excavations. The second major excavation on a
47:17
Sumerian site was conducted by the University of Pennsylvania.
47:21
The first American expedition to excavate in Mesopotamia all
47:26
through the 80s of the 19th century.
47:27
Discussions had been going on in American University circles
47:32
about the feasibility of sending an American expedition to Iraq,
47:37
where the British and French had been making such extraordinary
47:40
archaeological finds. It was not until 1887, however,
47:46
that John P Peters, professor of Hebrew at the University of
47:49
Pennsylvania, obtained moral and financial support from various
47:53
individuals in and about the University to equip and maintain
47:58
an excavating expedition in Iraq.
48:00
Nippur, one of the largest and most important mounds in Iraq,
48:04
was chosen, and four campaigns, long and grueling, were
48:08
conducted there between the years 1889 and 1900, first under
48:12
the direction of Peters, then under JH Haynes, originally the
48:18
photographer of the expedition, and finally under the noted
48:21
Assyriologist HV Hilprecht, who had also been an epigraphist.
48:27
In the first campaign, hardships and handicaps were severe and
48:31
discouraging. One young archaeologist died in
48:34
the field, and one or more expedition members suffered from
48:38
serious illness almost every year.
48:41
Despite the obstacles, however, the excavating continued and the
48:45
expedition achieved magnificent and in some respects
48:49
unparalleled results, at least in the inscriptional field.
48:54
The Nippur expedition succeeded in excavating some 30,000
48:57
tablets and fragments in the course of its four campaigns,
49:01
the larger number of which are inscribed in the Sumerian
49:04
language and range over more than two millenniums, from the
49:07
second-half of the 3rd to the last centuries of the first
49:10
Millennium. See of this material began as
49:16
early as 1893 with a far sighted and long range plan conceived by
49:21
Hilprecht in which numerous scholars were to participate in
49:24
addition to himself. Not all planned volumes have
49:29
been published. Like most grandiose plans,
49:33
unforeseen obstacles and difficulties prevented full
49:36
execution. However, several volumes have
49:39
appeared, proving to be of the highest value to cuneiform
49:43
scholars. This issue brings us back to
49:46
sumarology and its progress following the days of its three
49:49
great pioneers, Hinx, Rawlinson, and Opit.
49:53
Before the digs at Lagash and Nipah, most of what we knew
49:55
about the Sumerians and their language came from bilingual
49:58
lists and notes found in the Ashabanipal Library in Nineveh,
50:03
which were published in five large books called Kunai Form
50:07
Inscriptions of Western Asia, edited by Rawlinson.
50:12
But this material dates from the 7th century BC, more than a
50:16
Millennium after the disappearance of the Sumerian
50:19
people as a political entity and of the Sumerian language as a
50:23
living tongue. To be sure, there were some
50:26
inscriptions from Sumerian sites available in Europe, but these
50:30
consisted primarily of a small group of bricks, tablets and
50:33
cylinders from the Sumerian and post Sumerian periods that had
50:37
found their way into the British Museum from which little
50:40
significant data could be gleaned.
50:43
The digging at Lagashe and Nippur provided scholars with
50:46
thousands of Sumerian writings in just one language, which they
50:50
could now attempt to translate and understand using the grammar
50:52
rules and vocabulary they had learned from the Kuyunjik
50:55
bilingual syllabaries and interlineas.
50:58
The vast majority of the inscriptions from Lagashe and
51:01
Nippur were administrative, economic, and legal in
51:06
character, consisting of inventories of all types and
51:10
sizes, promissory notes and receipts, deeds of sales,
51:15
marriage contracts, wills, and court decisions.
51:19
Therefore, these documents provided insights into the
51:22
Sumerian social and economic structure.
51:26
These documents also contained hundreds of names of
51:29
individuals, deities, and places of some value for learning about
51:32
the Sumerian religion. Even more important, with the
51:36
hundreds of votive inscriptions on statues, Stales Cone
51:40
especially. From Nippur, came numerous
51:41
lexical and grammatical texts, the Sumerian forerunners of the
51:45
later Kuyunjic bilinguals, which proved invaluable for studying
51:49
the Sumerian language. Finally, in Nippur they were
51:53
found thousands of tablets and fragments inscribed with
51:55
Sumerian literary works, and although these remained rather
51:59
unintelligible for many, a decade after their discovery,
52:03
Hilprecht, who handled and cataloged many of them, realized
52:07
their significance for the history of religion and
52:09
literature. It is not too much to state that
52:13
it was as a direct result of the Lagache and Nippur excavations
52:16
that Francois Turodan Jean could publish in 1905, his Epoch
52:22
making Les inscription de Sumer re Arcade and Arno Poe Bell, his
52:30
equally epoch making Gontzuga de Zumiris and Dramatic in 1923.
52:35
These are scholars built on their predecessors and
52:38
contemporaries, efforts and contributions.
52:41
There is no other way to progress productive scholarship.
52:45
To name only some of the more outstanding figures, the
52:48
Englishman AH Saei Si, who in 1871 edited the first unilingual
52:55
Sumerian document, a Shulgi inscription of 12 lines and
53:00
sketched in a detailed philological commentary a number
53:04
of important characteristics of the Sumerian language.
53:08
Fran always Leno non and his mono mental etudes.
53:14
Arcadians. Begun in 1873.
53:18
Paul helped who copied a large number of Sumerian bilinguals
53:22
and unilinguals in the British Museum, and who made some
53:25
notable contributions to Sumerian grammar and
53:28
lexicography. RE Bruno, who compiled a list of
53:34
Sumerian signs and readings and an exhaustive glossary of
53:38
Sumerian words from the bilinguals known in his day,
53:42
which proved of fundamental importance to all lexicographers
53:45
from the time it was first published. 19 O five to seven to
53:49
the present, although it took a number of supplementary
53:52
glossaries prepared by other scholars to keep it up to date.
53:56
JD Prince, who published the first important Sumerian lexicon
54:02
in 19 O 5, and Friedrich Delich, who compiled both a Sumerian
54:09
grammar and a Sumerian glossary based on word roots rather than
54:14
signs and their readings. But it was Turo Dungan's Les
54:17
inscription de Sumer ET Akad of 19 O 5, appearing only two years
54:22
later in a German translation under the title Dai Sumerishen
54:26
on Dakadishen Koenigsen, Schriften that proved a
54:30
milestone in the progress of Sumerian studies.
54:34
It is an excellent collection of clear translations and brief
54:37
notes that show a profound understanding of the Sumerian
54:39
knowledge of that time, much of which comes from Turo Dungan's
54:43
own work. Even after 50 years of studying
54:47
kunai form, it is still very relevant and may never be
54:50
replaced. In some ways, Pobel's Grunsugi
54:53
de Sumerician Grammatic did for Sumerian grammar what Thurro
54:56
Dung Jin's book did for political history and religion.
55:00
Pobel's Grunsuga, through meticulous research on Sumerian
55:03
inscriptions from various eras, provided a clear explanation of
55:07
the fundamental rules of Sumerian grammar, supplemented
55:10
by relevant examples and numerous illustrations.
55:13
Where feasible. Subsequent grammatical studies
55:17
prepared by Poebel himself, as well as by other scholars,
55:21
especially Adam Falkenstein and Thorchild Jakobsen, have
55:25
resulted in several editions and corrections, and future studies
55:28
will no doubt result in further modification of some of the
55:31
grammatical details sketched in the Grunzuga.
55:34
But by and large, Poebel's work has stood the test of time, and
55:39
despite the current passion for changes in terminology and
55:42
nomenclature, profound and otherwise, it will long remain
55:46
the cornerstone of all constructive Sumerian
55:49
grammatical efforts. However, Pobel's grammar lacks
55:53
pedagogical organization and instead follows logic, making it
55:57
difficult for novices to independently learn Sumerian.
56:01
A little book quite useful in this respect is CJ Gadd's A
56:04
Sumerian Reading Book, first published in 1924, but a revised
56:09
and up to date version is urgently needed.
56:12
Another useful grammar, pedagogically speaking, is Anton
56:16
Daimel's Schumerische, Grammatic, Second Edition, 1939,
56:22
although it suffers a little from a rather superficial
56:26
treatment of the problems involved in translating Sumerian
56:30
texts in the field of lexicography.
56:34
The same authors. Schumerische's Lexicon, based
56:38
largely on the compilations by Bruno and others, is
56:41
indispensable to the scholar, although it has to be used with
56:45
considerable critical caution and discrimination.
56:48
The most far reaching and fundamental lexicographical
56:51
works in preparation are the materialian sum, Sumerian
56:56
lexicon, vocabulary and formula. Bieja of Benno Lansberger, the
57:02
Dean of a seriologist. 8 volumes containing the latest
57:07
collections of later syllabaries, vocabularies and
57:11
bilingual dictionaries, along with their earlier Sumerian
57:14
versions, have already been published by the Pontifical
57:17
Biblical Institute in Rome, which has greatly supported
57:20
Sumerian studies for the last 50 years.
57:23
Let us leave Sumerian linguistic research and return to
57:26
archaeology to sketch briefly the results of some of the more
57:29
important excavations on Sumerian sites which had begun
57:33
so auspiciously with Lagash and Nepour.
57:36
In 19-O2 to 3A, German expedition under the direction
57:41
of Robert Coldaway worked at Fara ancient Shurupak, the home
57:46
city of the flood hero Ziosudra, and unearthed a large number of
57:50
administrative, economic, and lexical texts dating from the
57:55
25th century BC. Older, therefore, than the
57:59
inscriptions of the Urnanshi dynasty found at Lagash, the
58:02
economic texts included sales of houses and fields indicating
58:07
that private ownership existed in Sumer, a feature of Sumerian
58:11
life that has long been controversial among
58:13
Orientalists. The Fara lexical texts, too,
58:18
were of rather extraordinary importance for the history of
58:20
civilization, since they pointed to the existence of Sumerian
58:25
schools as far back as the 25th century BC and perhaps even
58:30
earlier. The excavators also unearthed
58:33
several private and public buildings and tombs, stone,
58:38
metal, terracotta vases, and many cylinder seals.
58:42
In 1930, a University of Pennsylvania expedition under
58:46
the direction of Eric Schmidt returned to Farah, but the new
58:50
finds did not differ materially from those made almost 30 years
58:53
earlier. Despite my youth and
58:57
inexperience, I was fortunate to serve as the epigraphist for
59:02
this expedition. Most of the Farah tablets have
59:06
been studied and published by Anton Daimal and the French
59:09
sumarologist R Justin. In 19 O3.
59:14
An expedition of the University of Chicago conducted by EJ Banks
59:17
excavated at Bismaya, the site of Lugalanamundu's capital Ada.
59:22
Several archaic tablets resembling Fara's form and
59:25
content were also discovered here.
59:27
Banks also unearthed the remains of several temples and palaces,
59:31
numerous votive inscriptions, and a statue of Lugaldalu from
59:34
about 2400 BC. The major publication resulting
59:38
from this expedition is an Oriental Institute volume of
59:42
texts copied by DD Luckenbill, which is of particular value for
59:47
the history of Sargonic and Pre Sargonic Suma.
59:50
From 1912 to 1914 a French expedition under the direction
59:55
of the eminent cuneiformist Henri de Genuiac carried on
59:58
excavations at Kish, the first city to which kingship had
1:00:01
descended after the flood. The First World War ended these
1:00:06
excavations, but in 1928 an Anglo American expedition
1:00:09
returned to Kish under the direction of another eminent
1:00:12
kuniformist, Stephen Langdon, and worked there for 10
1:00:16
consecutive seasons. They unearthed several
1:00:20
monumental buildings, ziggurats, cemeteries and many tablets.
1:00:25
The Field Museum has issued several publications on the
1:00:28
archaeological material, while Oxford University has published
1:00:32
on the epigraphic material. A small contingent of this Kish
1:00:37
expedition also worked briefly in nearby jammed at NASA, a
1:00:41
mound covering the ruins of a town whose ancient name is still
1:00:44
unknown. This relatively minor excavation
1:00:48
at a rather small site was fortunate enough to uncover
1:00:51
several 100 tablets and fragments inscribed with semi
1:00:54
pictographic signs dated back to about 2800 BC.
1:01:00
It was thus the earliest Sumerian inscription of any
1:01:03
sizable quantity known one. These tablets, copied and
1:01:10
published by Stephen Langdon, marked a milestone in Sumerian
1:01:13
epigraphic studies. We now come to a place called
1:01:17
Warker by modern Arabs, Uruk by the ancient Sumerians and
1:01:21
Akkadians, and Eric in the Bible, where to this very day a
1:01:26
most systematic and scientific excavation is being conducted,
1:01:29
one that has proved fundamental for what might be termed the
1:01:32
stratigraphic study of Sumerian history and culture.
1:01:35
Systematic excavations were first begun there by a German
1:01:38
expedition under the direction of Julius Jordan.
1:01:41
Following the inevitable interruption caused by the First
1:01:44
World War, the expedition returned in 1928 and continued
1:01:49
its excavations until stopped by the Second World War in 1939.
1:01:55
Throughout the years years, the expedition has had several
1:02:00
outstanding epigraphists on staff, including Adam
1:02:04
Fulkenstein, who has been a prolific and outstanding
1:02:07
contributor to Sumerian studies over the past three decades.
1:02:10
The Erek Expedition established a method of relative dating for
1:02:14
Sumerian finds by excavating a large test pit through
1:02:17
approximately 20 meters of stratified layers down to virgin
1:02:20
soil. They meticulously studied and
1:02:23
categorized artifacts from various levels, starting with
1:02:27
the earliest settlers and concluding in the mid third
1:02:30
Millennium BC. It revealed the earliest known
1:02:33
monumental buildings in Suma, which date back to approximately
1:02:36
3000 BC. Among its innumerable smaller
1:02:40
finds, there was an alabaster vase close to a meter in height
1:02:44
that was decorated with cultic scenes, highly revealing for
1:02:47
early Sumerian rites and rituals.
1:02:50
There was also a life sized marble head of a woman dating
1:02:53
from about 2800 BC, which indicates that early Sumerian
1:02:58
sculpture in the round had reached unsuspected creative
1:03:01
heights. In one of the early monumental
1:03:03
temples more than 1000 pictographic tablets were
1:03:06
unearthed which made it possible to trace the cuneiform system of
1:03:09
writing back to its earliest stages.
1:03:12
Many of these tablets were published in a superb volume,
1:03:15
prepared with extreme care and after much study by Adam
1:03:19
Falkenstein. In 1954, the German expedition
1:03:24
returned to Eric under a new director, H Lenzen, and is
1:03:29
carrying on its careful and methodical excavations, which
1:03:33
will no doubt make Eric the city of Suma's legendary heroes, the
1:03:38
keystone of Mesopotamian archaeology in all its aspects,
1:03:42
architecture, art, history, religion and epigraphy.
1:03:47
From biblical Eric we turn to Biblical ER, or Urim as it was
1:03:52
known to the Sumerians. The city was excavated from 1922
1:03:57
to 1934 with skill, care and imagination by the late Sir
1:04:01
Leonard Woolley. Well, he has repeatedly
1:04:03
described his discoveries at ER, both for the scholar and for the
1:04:06
layman. We need to mention here only his
1:04:09
latest work, Excavations at ER 1954.
1:04:13
Through his writings, its royal tombs, ziggurat and flood pit
1:04:17
have almost become household words.
1:04:20
Less well known but equally significant contributions have
1:04:23
been made by the epigraphists on the expedition, CJ Gad, Leon
1:04:27
LaGrange and E Burroughs, who have copied, studied and
1:04:29
published a large part of the written documents discovered at
1:04:32
ER, documents that have shed new light on the history, economy
1:04:36
and culture not only of ER, but of summer as a whole.
1:04:40
Close to ER, some 4 miles to the north, lies a small, low mound
1:04:44
known as Al Ubaid, which despite its size has played a large role
1:04:49
in Mesopotamian archaeology. HR Hall of the British Museum
1:04:53
first explored it in 1919, and Leonard Woolley later excavated
1:04:57
it methodically, discovering that it was in part a
1:05:01
prehistoric mound containing evidence of the earliest
1:05:04
immigrants into the land. These people, who have come to
1:05:09
be known as Ubaidians, produced and used a special type of
1:05:14
monochrome painted wear and tools of Flint and Obsidian,
1:05:18
which were later found in the lowest layers of several
1:05:21
Mesopotamian sites. Woolly revealed a small temple
1:05:25
dedicated to the goddess Ninhursag at this site.
1:05:30
This discovery not only gave us a clear depiction of the
1:05:33
appearance of one of the smaller provincial temples in the middle
1:05:36
of the third Millennium, but also unequivocally confirmed the
1:05:40
existence of the so-called First Dynasty of Ur, a concept
1:05:45
scholars had previously dismissed as mythical.
1:05:48
Consequently, this discovery helped shift the prevailing
1:05:51
skepticism toward the King list, enhancing our understanding of
1:05:55
Sumerian political history. In the extreme northeast of
1:05:59
Sumer, east of the Tigris and somewhat off the beaten path,
1:06:04
Sumerologically speaking, lay a series of mounds that attracted
1:06:08
the attention of Henri Frankfurt, one of the world's
1:06:12
foremost archaeologists, A perceptive art historian and a
1:06:18
philosophically oriented scholar whose untimely death was an
1:06:21
irretrievable loss to Oriental studies.
1:06:24
Between the years 1930 and 1936, he conducted careful and
1:06:29
methodical excavations at the Tells Asma, Kafaij and Agrab,
1:06:36
and unearthed temples, palaces and private houses, tablets,
1:06:41
cylinder seals and a most exciting series of sculptures in
1:06:45
the round, some of which reach back to about 2700 BC, only a
1:06:51
century or so later than the famous head from Eric.
1:06:55
Among Frankfurt's fellow workers were Pinhurst Delugas, an
1:06:59
archaeologist of long experience who is now director of the
1:07:01
Museum of the Oriental Institute, Seton Lloyd, who
1:07:08
became an advisor to the Iraqi Directorate of Antiquities and
1:07:13
who has probably participated in the excavation of more Sumerian
1:07:16
sites than any other living archaeologist, and Thorchild
1:07:21
Jacobsen, the rare scholar who is at home both in archaeology
1:07:27
and in epigraphy. The results of these excavations
1:07:31
appear in a series of magnificent Oriental Institute
1:07:34
publications that are outstanding for their detailed
1:07:37
and profusely illustrated treatment of architecture,
1:07:40
artifacts and inscriptions from 1933 to 1956, interrupted only
1:07:46
by the Second World War. A Louvre expedition under the
1:07:50
direction of Andre Parrott, the archaeologist who in a sense
1:07:54
closed the book on Lagache, excavated at Mari, a city
1:07:59
situated on the Middle Euphrates, considerably to the
1:08:02
West of what is usually considered Suma proper, and the
1:08:06
results were both extraordinary and unexpected.
1:08:11
Here is a city whose inhabitants were probably Semites from very
1:08:15
early times. To date, practically all the
1:08:18
inscriptions discovered at Mari have been in Acadian, and yet,
1:08:24
culturally speaking, it can hardly be differentiated from a
1:08:27
Sumerian city with the same types of temples, A ziggurat
1:08:31
sculpture inlay, and even a statuette of a singer inscribed
1:08:36
with the beneficial Sumerian name Ur Nanche, the very name
1:08:42
borne by the founder of the earliest known Lagashe dynasty.
1:08:47
The leading epigraphist with the Louvre expedition was the
1:08:50
Belgian cuneiformist Georges Dorsen, who, with Parrot, is
1:08:55
jointly editing a most important series of volumes on the Mari
1:08:58
inscriptional material, in which several French and Belgian
1:09:01
scholars are participating with Lagashe and Mari.
1:09:06
To their credit, the French again ranked in Mesopotamian
1:09:10
archaeology and scholarship. During the war years, when it
1:09:13
was not possible to send teams abroad, the Iraqi Directorate of
1:09:17
Antiquities, which has grown from a small group to a skilled
1:09:20
team of archaeologists, epigraphists, registrars and
1:09:23
restorers and is keeping Mesopotamian archaeology
1:09:26
scientifically sound, took the initiative and conducted 3
1:09:30
important excavations for Sumerian studies in a site
1:09:34
called Ukaya, where the ancient name of the town is still
1:09:37
unknown. A-Team led by Fouad Safar
1:09:41
discovered in 1940 and 1941 the first known Sumerian painted
1:09:48
temple featuring colorful frescoes on the walls and altar.
1:09:53
It also uncovered some Ubaid houses and several ancient
1:09:57
tablets. The expedition also revealed
1:09:59
several Ubaid houses and several Archaic tablets.
1:10:03
Intel Hanel, a small mound some 6 miles due east of Baghdad.
1:10:07
Taha Bakir, then director of the Iraq Museum, conducted
1:10:12
excavations from 1945 to 1949 and to the surprise of scholars
1:10:18
the world over, uncovered well over 2000 tablets, among which
1:10:23
were some excellently preserved lexical and mathematical
1:10:26
textbooks and a temple. And down at the southern tip of
1:10:31
summer in ancient Eridu, the seat of Enki, the Sumerian God
1:10:35
of wisdom. Fouad Safar conducted
1:10:38
excavations in the years 1946 to 49, uncovering the earliest
1:10:43
Ubaid pottery, the Ubaid cemetery, and two palaces from
1:10:48
the middle of the third Millennium BC.
1:10:52
Fouad Safar followed Enki's temple to its first building
1:10:55
phase approximately 4000 BC. Regrettably, the city of Eridu,
1:11:01
whose tutelary deity is the God of wisdom, found not a single
1:11:06
tablet. Following the war years, there
1:11:09
have been only two major foreign expeditions excavating in Summa.
1:11:13
The Germans have returned to Erek and the Americans,
1:11:17
primarily as a result of Thorchiel Jacobson's efforts,
1:11:20
have returned to Nepour and in alternate seasons have cleared
1:11:25
the Enlil Temple, unearthed over 1000 tablets and fragments,
1:11:31
about 500 of which are literary, and begun to lay bare a temple
1:11:35
to the goddess Inanna. The future of Sumerian digs in
1:11:40
Iraq is up to the Iraqis, and we can only hope they don't
1:11:44
abandoned their ancestors who did so much for Iraq and
1:11:48
humanity, not to mention lower Mesopotamia, where the margin of
1:11:53
error allowed is too substantial for comfort.
1:11:57
Neither has the Carbon 14 method of dating remedied this problem.
1:12:02
Its results have often proved vague and deceptive due to
1:12:05
purely physical and mechanical considerations.
1:12:09
In general, the dates assigned in the past to Sumerian rulers
1:12:12
and monuments were far too high. This was due to the very
1:12:16
understandable inclination of archaeologists to claim high
1:12:19
antiquity for their particular discoveries.
1:12:23
But mainly it was because of the source material available,
1:12:29
especially the dynastic lists made by ancient Sumerian and
1:12:32
Babylonian scribes, which often treated different dynasties of
1:12:37
rulers as if they came one after the other, even though other
1:12:39
documents show they actually existed at the same time in some
1:12:42
cases. While there is still no
1:12:44
unanimity of opinion, the Sumerian dates have now been
1:12:48
considerably lowered from those found in earlier histories and
1:12:51
handbooks, in some cases by half a Millennium.
1:12:55
The end of the Third Dynasty of Ur, when the Sumerians lost
1:12:59
their dominant political position in Mesopotamia, and the
1:13:03
beginning of Hammurabi's reign in Babylon, when the Sumerians
1:13:07
effectively cease to exist as a political, ethnic, and
1:13:10
linguistic entity, are the two key dates for Sumerian
1:13:14
chronology. The latter date generally agreed
1:13:18
is approximately 1750 BC ±50 years.
1:13:23
For the period between this date and the end of the Third Dynasty
1:13:28
of ER, there is enough inscriptional material available
1:13:31
to show by dead reckoning that it was approximately 195 years
1:13:36
in length. The end of the Third Dynasty of
1:13:40
ER may therefore be placed at 1945 BC ±50 years from this date
1:13:46
backward. There are enough historical
1:13:48
inscriptions, date formulas, and synchronisms of various sorts to
1:13:51
carry us back to approximately 2500 BC.
1:13:57
There was also a ruler known as a Muslim.
1:13:59
Beyond this, all dating depends entirely on archaeological,
1:14:03
stratigraphic and epigraphic inferences and surmises of one
1:14:06
sort or another, and the results of Carbon 14 tests, which, as I
1:14:11
mentioned previously, have not proved as decisive and
1:14:14
conclusive as anticipated. NC kings and heroes.
1:14:19
Now that we have clarified, at least somewhat, the method and
1:14:23
techniques by which modern archaeologists and scholars have
1:14:26
resurrected the long dead Sumerians and rebuilt their long
1:14:29
forgotten culture, we are ready to turn to the history of Sumer
1:14:34
and those political, military, and sociological events that
1:14:38
brought about Sumer's rise and fall.
1:14:42
I am not nearly ready, though. The precarious, elusive, sparse
1:14:46
and fragmentary character of the relevant source material is 1
1:14:51
unsettling feature of the reconstruction of the Sumerian
1:14:54
past of which the reader must be alerted.
1:14:57
From roughly 4500 BC, when the first towns were founded in
1:15:01
Suma, to roughly 1750 BC when the Sumerians vanished as a
1:15:07
people, is a span of almost 3000 years.
1:15:11
The reader can wonder where we find our historical material and
1:15:14
its reliability. Let us begin with the dark,
1:15:18
negative and unpromising side of the picture, the fact that the
1:15:22
Sumerians themselves wrote no history detailing developing
1:15:25
processes and underlying principles in the usually
1:15:28
accepted definition of the word. The Sumerian intellectuals and
1:15:32
writers lacked the evolutionary approach basic to historical
1:15:35
interpretation and appraisal, and the necessary intellectual
1:15:39
tools of definition and generalization restricted by the
1:15:43
world view current in their day. Accepted as axiomatic truth that
1:15:48
cultural events and historical events came ready, made full
1:15:52
grown on the world, seen since they were planned and brought
1:15:55
about by the all powerful gods. It probably never occurred, even
1:16:01
the most thoughtful and learned of the Sumerian sages that Suma
1:16:05
had once been desolate marshland.
1:16:08
Still a few scattered villages had only gradually become a
1:16:12
bustling, vibrant and sophisticated community after
1:16:17
many generations of effort and toil in which human will and
1:16:20
determination man laid plans and experiments and artificial
1:16:25
discoveries and inventions dominated.
1:16:28
At most, the Sumerian man of letters could become an archive
1:16:32
rather than a historian, A chronicler and an analyst rather
1:16:35
than an interpreter and expositor of historical
1:16:37
realities, intellectually frozen by this sterile and stationary
1:16:41
attitude to the history of man. Still, somewhere someone had to
1:16:47
initially create the archive chronicle type of history to
1:16:50
meet some need to be judged important for one reason or
1:16:52
another. The Sumerian's passion for
1:16:55
documenting events was not natural, but rather a religious
1:16:59
conviction that by building, repairing and furnishing the
1:17:03
temples believed to be the residences of their gods, the
1:17:07
city, state rulers or Ensis could guarantee their own long
1:17:10
life and the prosperity of their subjects.
1:17:14
Though accompanied surely by magnificent rites and symbolic
1:17:17
rituals, these royal and princely building operations
1:17:20
were not documented for posterity before the development
1:17:23
of writing. Once the cuneiform system of
1:17:26
writing had evolved from its earlier pictographic form,
1:17:30
however, it must have occurred to one or another of the temple
1:17:34
priests and scribes to write down the rulers, building
1:17:37
activities and votive offerings, and so record them for all to
1:17:41
see and remember in distant days there and then.
1:17:45
Based on our current knowledge, this idea first emerged in the
1:17:48
second quarter of the third Millennium BC.
1:17:51
Written history can be claimed to have started.
1:17:54
The initial buildings and votive inscriptions were short
1:17:57
deditions of little historical significance, but the scribes
1:18:01
grew more confident, creative and expressive throughout time.
1:18:06
By the 24th century BC, we discover rather complex and
1:18:11
varied historical narratives, such as the contract between
1:18:16
Lagash and Uma etched on the Staley of the vultures, Ayana
1:18:23
TNN's military reports. Enter Mena's account of the
1:18:26
annual civil war between Lagash and Uma, the priceless Urukagina
1:18:30
records of man's first social reforms based on a sense of
1:18:34
freedom, equality and justice, and Lugo Zagasi's lyric
1:18:38
glorification and exaltation of the peace, prosperity, happiness
1:18:43
and security that prevailed during his reign.
1:18:46
In summer, our ancient historians used fairly different
1:18:50
and various writing materials, stone and clay tablets, bricks,
1:18:56
stones and door sockets, bowls and vases, clay nails and cones,
1:19:02
mortars and Mace heads, steelys and plaques and statues and
1:19:07
statuettes of stone and metal. These votive and dedicatory
1:19:11
inscriptions count around 1000, but sadly most are too brief and
1:19:18
laconic. In any case, this collection of
1:19:21
inscriptions, contemporaneous more or less with the events
1:19:24
they document, has proved to be a main source for the political
1:19:28
history of Suma, incomplete and difficult as it is.
1:19:33
Actually, it is doubtful that the Sumerian historians of
1:19:36
antiquity often consulted these sources to assist in the
1:19:40
preparation of their own literary and historical records,
1:19:45
usually known as date formulae. Another fundamental and
1:19:48
significant modern historical source comes, rather
1:19:51
unexpectedly, from administrative and commercial
1:19:53
records. From approximately 2500 BC, the
1:19:58
most creative scribes started to create useful dating systems.
1:20:03
The transactions and dealings noted in these records had to be
1:20:06
corrected in time for pragmatic reasons.
1:20:10
Fortunately for us, after some experimentation, they decided
1:20:14
upon the method of naming the years by remarkable religious
1:20:17
and political events, rather than choosing to date them
1:20:20
simply by the number of years from some generally accepted
1:20:23
starting point, such as the beginning of a new reign or
1:20:26
dynasty. This dating technique offers us
1:20:32
historical data of main importance.
1:20:35
The scribes assembled lists of all the year names used during a
1:20:38
particular rain or series of rains, and these ancient lists
1:20:43
help the modern researcher to arrange the events recorded in
1:20:45
the date formulas in their correct chronological order, so
1:20:49
identifying the years in which events happened more precisely.
1:20:53
One of the most important Sumerian historical records, the
1:20:56
so-called King List, is based on these date formulas and date
1:21:00
lists, starting from what the Sumerians believed to be the
1:21:03
beginning of history, the distant past when kingship first
1:21:10
descended from heaven, and including a portion of the Isin
1:21:14
dynasty, which began its rule about 1950.
1:21:17
BBC. It records the names of most
1:21:20
Sumerian kings and the length of their reigns, so combining fact
1:21:25
with fantasy and making it difficult to know where one ends
1:21:30
and the other begins. Though most, if not all of the
1:21:33
mentioned dynasties were contemporaneous to varied
1:21:36
degrees, the author seemed to be operating under the belief that
1:21:40
all the dynasties listed were sequential.
1:21:44
Furthermore, he gives many of the kings of the past dynasties
1:21:48
reigns of legendary and amazing length.
1:21:51
Thus, he generates a total of almost a quarter of a million
1:21:55
years for the 8 kings before the Flood and more than 2025
1:21:59
thousand years for the first two dynasties following the flood.
1:22:03
Notwithstanding all its flaws and faults, the King List offers
1:22:07
us a historical framework of inestimable worth if used with
1:22:10
discrimination and understanding first.
1:22:14
Another very interesting historical source is what could
1:22:16
be called royal correspondence, the letters exchanged between
1:22:20
the kings and their officials. These first show up early in the
1:22:25
24th century BC, but the group of letters of particular
1:22:30
historical importance is that of the third dynasty of ERS rulers.
1:22:34
These letters reveal underlying impulses, temptations, rivalries
1:22:39
and intrigues, augmenting the somewhat brief and lifeless
1:22:42
votive inscriptions and date formulations with a vibrant, not
1:22:46
magical human touch. Interestingly enough, several
1:22:51
centuries later, a strong indicator of the value and
1:22:54
importance accorded to them even in ancient times, these royal
1:22:59
letters did not come down to us in their original form, but in
1:23:02
duplicates produced by the professors and students of the
1:23:04
Sumerian academies or Edubas. A basic historical record, the
1:23:11
Tamil inscription might be crucial for comprehending early
1:23:14
Sumerian chronology and events. It mostly addresses the building
1:23:18
of several sections of Enlil's temple in the same city and
1:23:21
rehabilitating the tumal, the shrine of the goddess Ninlil in
1:23:25
Nippur. Although some of this material
1:23:28
has been known for about 50 years, the missing opening lines
1:23:32
have only lately been located, and this freshly unearthed
1:23:36
section has turned out to be really important for history.
1:23:40
Although part of this book has been known for almost half a
1:23:42
century, it's missing opening lines have only now become
1:23:45
accessible. This undiscovered section of the
1:23:49
book has turned out to be unexpectedly and historically
1:23:52
significant. 2 quite lyrical works can also be categorized as
1:23:56
historiographic. Both revolve around one of the
1:23:59
most catastrophic events in Zuma's history, the terrible and
1:24:03
demoralizing invasion of the nation by the merciless and
1:24:06
savage wandering tribes from the mountains to the east.
1:24:10
In the 1st and longer of the two may be titled The Curse of a
1:24:14
God. A Sumerian poet in sage
1:24:17
describes the calamity resulting from the impious and
1:24:20
sacrilegious deeds of Naram Sin, the 4th king of the dynasty of
1:24:25
Arkad. The second poem documents the
1:24:27
great triumph of Eric's king, Utu Hegel over Tyrigon, the last
1:24:31
Gutian monarch, and the happy return of the kingship to Sumer.
1:24:36
9 Sumerian epic stories spanning a little over 100 to more than
1:24:40
600 lines are now known entirely or in Part 5 are of little
1:24:46
significance, particularly for the very early periods of
1:24:49
Sumerian history for which there are practically no modern
1:24:52
written records. Four of the five focus on the
1:24:56
heroic heroes in Mercar and Lugalbanda.
1:25:00
Their writings are notable for the light they throw on the
1:25:02
strong interaction between Sumer and an otherwise unidentified
1:25:06
and unlocated city state in northern Iran named Arata.
1:25:12
The fifth of the historiographic epic tales, Gilgamesh and Agha
1:25:16
of Kish, is of great importance for the history of political
1:25:20
institutions. It not only helps to illuminate
1:25:24
the obscure period of Sumerian history in which the early
1:25:28
struggle between the Sumerian city states took place, but also
1:25:33
records the convening of man's first political assembly, a
1:25:38
bicameral Congress which met over 4500 years to decide on the
1:25:43
agonizing question of war or peace from the perspective of
1:25:48
political history. 1 Somewhat disappointing literary genre is
1:25:53
lamentation, a type of poetic composition that bemoans the
1:25:57
sorry plight of Suma and its cities in times of misfortune
1:26:00
and defeat. The earliest known prototype of
1:26:04
the lamentation, which provides important historical
1:26:06
information, is found inscribed on a clay tablet from Lagash.
1:26:11
It describes in some detail the terrible destruction Lagash
1:26:14
suffered at the hands of its relentless enemy, Uma. 6 But the
1:26:20
later and much longer compositions, such as the
1:26:23
Lamentation over Ur and the Lamentation over Nippur,
1:26:27
restrict themselves primarily to the harrowing depiction of the
1:26:30
destruction of the Sumerian cities and the suffering of
1:26:33
their inhabitants, and pay little heed to the historical
1:26:36
events that brought about this melancholy state of affairs.
1:26:40
Finally, literary genres like myths, hymns, and wisdom
1:26:44
literature can provide a modicum of historical information.
1:26:47
None of these are historically oriented, but here and there
1:26:51
they may disclose, unintentionally and
1:26:53
incidentally, a bit of historical information not
1:26:57
otherwise known. Thus, from the royal hymns we
1:27:00
learn that Zuma's most dreaded enemy, the Gutians, was still
1:27:05
troublesome and formidable in the days of the Third Dynasty of
1:27:09
Ur, despite Utu Hegel's vaunted victory.
1:27:14
We may learn about Sumeh's global relations from a myth or
1:27:18
a proverb that mentions A ruler's name, but votive
1:27:22
inscriptions and date formulas, royal epistles and lists of
1:27:25
rulers and dynasties, epic songs of victory, and bitter laments
1:27:29
of defeat hardly add to history as we like.
1:27:33
Moreover, for approximately the 1st 2 millenniums of Sumeh's
1:27:36
existence, we have practically no written historical documents
1:27:39
at all, and the votive inscriptions that we have from
1:27:43
the later periods come from only a few Sumerian sites and
1:27:47
therefore tend to give A1 sided picture of the events they
1:27:49
record. The poetic compositions,
1:27:53
particularly the epic tales, only contain a sliver of
1:27:56
historical truth at best, and modern scholars often struggle
1:28:00
to distinguish between the real and the imagined, thus isolating
1:28:05
the historically significant remnants.
1:28:08
Today's Sumerologists can only study and explain the incomplete
1:28:12
and unclear information they have, trying to piece together
1:28:15
some important political events and historical changes using
1:28:19
their reasoning and understanding, which often
1:28:23
results in a more personal and biased interpretation than is
1:28:28
ideal or acceptable. Because of this, there are
1:28:32
significant differences in opinions even among experts in
1:28:36
the field. Under these circumstances,
1:28:40
there's a considerable difference of views even among
1:28:43
the specialists in the field. The sketch of Sumerian history
1:28:47
presented here suffers no doubt from the author's particular
1:28:50
prejudices, conceits and shortcomings.
1:28:53
But this is the best he can do with the data available in the
1:28:56
year 1963. And if his errors of Commission
1:29:01
as well as a mission are many and dire, may the future
1:29:04
generations and the Sumerian gods take account of the
1:29:07
mitigating circumstances and judge him with mercy and
1:29:12
compassion. In telling what little he knows
1:29:15
or thinks he knows about Sumerian history, he only
1:29:18
follows the dictate of the ancient Sumerian proverb.
1:29:21
He who knows why should he keep it hidden?
1:29:29
Sumer, or rather the land that came to be known as Sumer during
1:29:33
the third Millennium BC, was probably first settled sometime
1:29:36
between 4504 thousand BC. At least this was the consensus
1:29:42
of Near Eastern archaeologists until quite recently.
1:29:47
We arrived at this figure beginning with 2500 BCA date.
1:29:52
We approximated and reasonably assured using written documents,
1:29:56
the range was added from 1500 to 2000 years, a period large
1:30:01
enough to account for the stratigraphic accumulation of
1:30:04
all the earlier cultural remains down to virgin soil, right down
1:30:09
to the beginning of human habitation in Suma.
1:30:11
At that time, it was generally assumed Suma was a vast swampy
1:30:16
marsh broken up here and there by low islands of alluvial land
1:30:21
built up by the gradual deposit of silt carried by the Tigris,
1:30:25
Euphrates and Karun rivers. Before that, most of Zuma was
1:30:31
presumably covered by the waters of the Persian Gulf, which
1:30:34
extended much farther than they do today, and human habitation
1:30:38
was therefore impossible. All this was accepted theory in
1:30:43
archaeological circles until 1952, when the two geologists,
1:30:48
Lees and Falcon, published a paper that carried revolutionary
1:30:51
implications for the date of Sumer's first settlement.
1:30:55
In this study, entitled The Geographical History of the
1:31:00
Mesopotamian Plains, they adduced geological evidence to
1:31:04
show that Sumer had been above water long before 4500 to 4000
1:31:09
BC, which was not at all impossible.
1:31:14
Therefore, they concluded that man had settled in Sumer
1:31:16
considerably earlier than commonly believed.
1:31:20
The traces of these earliest settlements in summer have not
1:31:23
yet been unearthed because the land has been sinking slowly
1:31:28
while the water table has been rising.
1:31:31
The very lowest level of cultural remains in summer may
1:31:34
therefore now be underwater and may never have been reached by
1:31:38
archaeologists, since they would have been misled by the higher
1:31:41
water level into believing they had touched virgin soil.
1:31:45
If that is true, Suma's oldest cultural remains are still
1:31:50
buried and untapped, and the date of Suma's very first
1:31:53
settlements may have to be pushed back a Millennium.
1:31:57
Aryans linguistics provides pertinent evidence, not
1:32:01
ambiguous and inconclusive archaeological or
1:32:04
anthropological sources. The names of Sumeras 2 life
1:32:08
giving rivers, the Tigris and Euphrates, or Digit and Buranan
1:32:13
as they read in cuneiform, are not Sumerian words, Nor are the
1:32:18
names of Sumeria's most important urban centers, Eridu,
1:32:22
ER Larsa, Isin, Adab, Kulab, Lagash, Nippur, and Kish, words
1:32:27
that have a satisfactory Sumerian etymology.
1:32:30
Both the rivers and the cities, or rather the villages that
1:32:33
later became cities, must have been named by a people that did
1:32:37
not speak the Sumerian language. Just As, for example, such names
1:32:43
as Mississippi, Connecticut, Massachusetts and Dakota
1:32:47
indicate that the first inhabitants of the United States
1:32:50
did not speak the English language.
1:32:53
The name of these pre Sumerian settlers of Sumer is of course
1:32:57
unknown. They lived long before the
1:33:00
invention of writing and left no telltale records.
1:33:04
Later Sumerian documents don't mention them, but the third
1:33:07
Millennium may have referred to them as Suberians.
1:33:13
But this we do know with a fair degree of certainty.
1:33:17
They were the first important civilizing force in ancient
1:33:20
Suma, its first farmers, cultivators, cattle raisers and
1:33:24
fishermen, its first weavers, leather workers, carpenters,
1:33:28
Smiths, Potters and Masons. Once again, linguistic analysis
1:33:33
provided the proof. In a paper published in 1944 in
1:33:37
a journal sponsored by the University of Ankara, Beno
1:33:42
Landsberger, one of the keenest minds in cuneiform research,
1:33:49
analyzed several culturally significant Sumerian words, that
1:33:54
is, words known from Sumerian documents of the third
1:33:57
Millennium BC and therefore generally assumed to be
1:34:00
Sumerian, and showed that there is ample reason to believe that
1:34:04
they are not Sumerian at all. All of these words consisted of
1:34:08
two or more syllables. In Sumerian the majority of
1:34:12
routes are monosyllabic and in general showed the same pattern
1:34:15
as the words for Tigris, Euphrates and the non Sumerian
1:34:19
city names. Landsberger concluded that they
1:34:22
must therefore belong to the language spoken by the same pre
1:34:25
Sumerian people that had named Sumer's two rivers and most of
1:34:30
its cities. Among these words were those for
1:34:32
farmer Engar, herdsman Udol and fisherman Shuhardak, plough apin
1:34:39
and furrow Absin, palm Nimba and date Sulumb, metalworker Tibera
1:34:46
and Smith Simug, Carpenter Nagar and basket maker added Weaver
1:34:52
Isobar and leatherworker Ashkabat, Potter Pahar, Mason
1:34:58
Shithim and perhaps even merchant DeMar.
1:35:02
A word that has almost universally been taken to be a
1:35:04
Semitic hallmark. It follows that the basic
1:35:08
agricultural techniques and industrial skills were first
1:35:11
introduced in Suma not by the Sumerians but by their nameless
1:35:16
predecessors. Landsberger called these people
1:35:19
Proto Euphratians, a somewhat awkward name that is
1:35:24
nevertheless both appropriate and useful from the linguistic
1:35:26
perspective. In archaeology, the Proto
1:35:29
Euphratians are known as the obeyed People, that is, the
1:35:34
people responsible for the cultural remains were first
1:35:36
unearthed in the tell known as Al Ubaid, not far from Ur, and
1:35:41
later in the very lowest levels of several tells throughout
1:35:44
ancient Summa. These remains consisted of stone
1:35:48
implements such as hoes, adzes, querns, pounders, and knives,
1:35:54
and of clay artifacts such as sickles, bricks, loom weights,
1:35:57
spindle whirls, and figurines, as well as a distinctive and
1:36:02
characteristic type of painted pottery.
1:36:05
As already gathered from the linguistic evidence, the Proto
1:36:09
Euphratians or Ubadians were enterprising agriculturists who
1:36:14
founded several villages and towns throughout the land and
1:36:19
developed a rural economy of considerable wealth and
1:36:21
stability. The Ubaidians, however, did not
1:36:24
long remain the sole and dominant power in ancient
1:36:26
Sumeria. Immediately West of Samar are
1:36:29
the Syrian Desert and the Arabian Peninsula, the home of
1:36:33
the Semitic nomads. From time immemorial, as the
1:36:37
Ubaidian settlers thrived and prospered, some of these Semitic
1:36:41
hordes began to infiltrate their settlements, both as peaceful
1:36:44
immigrants and as warlike conquerors.
1:36:47
To be sure, we have as yet no direct and conclusive evidence
1:36:51
for this crucial inference. Firstly, we can postulate it a
1:36:56
priori based on our understanding of Sumer's later
1:36:59
history. Again and again over the
1:37:03
millennia, the barbaric Semitic nomads infiltrated and conquered
1:37:07
the settled centers of Sumer, and there is no reason to assume
1:37:11
that such an event did not happen in the fourth Millennium
1:37:13
BC as well. Then again, even the oldest
1:37:17
Sumerian inscriptions contain several Semitic loanwords, and
1:37:21
the Sumerian pantheon contains few deities of Semitic origin.
1:37:27
Some of these borrowings may reach back to very early days.
1:37:31
Finally, the First Dynasty of Summer, whose existence can be
1:37:33
historically attested, at least to some extent, is the so-called
1:37:37
First Dynasty of Kish, which, according to the ancients
1:37:42
themselves, followed immediately upon the subsidence of the Flood
1:37:46
and begins with a whole group of rulers bearing Semitic names.
1:37:51
The Semites likely followed the proto Euphratians into Suma,
1:37:55
where their cultures cross fertilized to create the first
1:37:57
high civilization in Suma, with the Semitic element likely
1:38:00
dominant. The Sumerians probably did not
1:38:04
arrive in Suma until sometime in the second-half of the fourth
1:38:07
Millennium. BBC, their original home is
1:38:10
still quite uncertain to judge from a cycle of epic tales
1:38:14
revolving around Emekar and Lugal Banda.
1:38:18
The early Sumerian rulers had an unusually close and intimate
1:38:22
relationship with the city state known as Arata, probably
1:38:25
situated somewhere in the region of the Caspian Sea.
1:38:29
The Sumerian language is an agglutinative tongue,
1:38:32
reminiscent to some extent of the Ural Altaic languages, and
1:38:37
this fact may also point to the same general area as Arata.
1:38:41
But wherever the Sumerians came from, and whatever type of
1:38:45
culture they brought with them, this is certain.
1:38:49
Their arrival led to an extraordinarily fruitful fusion,
1:38:53
both ethnic and cultural, with the native population.
1:38:58
It brought about a creative spurt fraught with little
1:39:01
significance for the history of civilization.
1:39:04
In the following centuries, summer reached new heights of
1:39:07
political power and economic wealth and witnessed some of its
1:39:10
most significant achievements in the arts and crafts, monumental
1:39:14
architecture, religious and ethical thought, and oral myth,
1:39:17
epic and hymn. Above all, the Sumerians, whose
1:39:21
language gradually became the lands prevailing speech, devised
1:39:25
a writing system, developed it into an effective communication
1:39:29
tool, and took the first steps toward introducing formal
1:39:33
education. The first ruler of Sumer, whose
1:39:36
deeds are recorded, even if only briefly, is a king named Itana
1:39:40
of Kish, who may have come to the throne quite early in the
1:39:43
third Millennium BC. The king list describes him as
1:39:48
he who stabilized all the lands. On the assumption that this
1:39:54
statement, found in a document dated a Millennium or so later
1:39:58
than the reign of Itana, embodies a trustworthy
1:40:01
tradition, it may be inferred that he held sway not only over
1:40:04
Sumair. But over some of the neighboring
1:40:08
lands as well. In short, that he may have been
1:40:12
man's first known empire builder.
1:40:15
That Itano was a notable and outstanding figure in the early
1:40:18
history of Sumer is shown by the purely legendary note in the
1:40:22
very same king list that he was a man who ascended to heaven,
1:40:26
and by a Semitic Acadian poem current early in the second
1:40:29
Millennium BC that centers about this same mythical motif.
1:40:34
According to this legend, for which a Sumerian prototype may
1:40:38
turn up someday, Itana was a pious, God fearing king who had
1:40:43
practiced the divine cult faithfully and assiduously, but
1:40:47
was cursed with childlessness and thus had no one to carry on
1:40:51
his name. His fervent desire, therefore,
1:40:55
was to obtain the plant of birth, which, however, was
1:40:58
located in heaven far from mortal reach.
1:41:02
To get to heaven, Itana procured the aid of an eagle whom he had
1:41:06
rescued from a pit, where it had been cast by a serpent whose
1:41:11
friendship it had betrayed and whose young it had devoured.
1:41:16
This legend was quite popular among the seal cutters, as
1:41:19
evidenced by several seals that depict a mortal climbing
1:41:22
heavenward on the wings of an eagle.
1:41:26
Indeed, Itana did not remain in heaven.
1:41:31
According to a recently translated funeral dirge on a
1:41:34
tablet in the Pushkin Museum and the well known 7th tablet of the
1:41:38
Acadian Epic of Gilgamesh, Itana resides in the Nether World,
1:41:43
where all mortals, regardless of their achievements, except of
1:41:47
course the flood hero Ziyosudra, must ultimately descend.
1:41:52
But all these legendary traditions only helped to
1:41:54
demonstrate that Itana had been a powerful and impressive figure
1:41:59
whose life and deeds had caught the imagination of the ancient.
1:42:02
But according to the King List, Itana is followed by 7 rulers,
1:42:07
several of whom, to judge from their names, were Semites rather
1:42:10
than Sumerians. The 8th was King Enmerbura
1:42:14
Jesse, about whom we have some historical or at least saga like
1:42:19
information from the King List and other late Sumerian literary
1:42:22
works. Moreover, a young sumarologist
1:42:26
working in Baghdad only recently discovered a precious three word
1:42:29
contemporary inscription on a small fragment of an alabaster
1:42:33
vase, proving beyond doubt that he was not a mythical king but a
1:42:39
real 19. By the time Enma Barajisi came
1:42:44
to the throne of Kish, another Sumerian city state far to the
1:42:48
South of Kish had come to the fore and was challenging Kish's
1:42:52
supremacy for not long after the reign of Itana.
1:42:56
It would seem that a king by the name of Mesquiagashir, described
1:43:01
in King List as the son of Utu, the Sumerian sun God, founded an
1:43:07
ambitious and powerful dynasty in the city of Erich, which in
1:43:11
his days was still known by the older name Iyana, House of Anne,
1:43:15
the heaven God, to judge from a rather ambiguous and obscure
1:43:19
note attached to his name in King List, which reads He
1:43:22
entered the seas and ascended the mountains.
1:43:26
He may have tried to extend his sway over the lands all around
1:43:29
Suma and far beyond. However, his son and Merka, who
1:43:33
succeeded him on the throne according to the King List, was
1:43:37
one of Suma's most notable figures.
1:43:40
The epic poems refer to him as the son of Utu, just as his
1:43:46
father did in the King List. According to the King List, he
1:43:51
built the city of Erik, and according to the epic tales, he
1:43:55
led a campaign against Errata somewhere in the neighborhood of
1:43:59
the Caspian Sea and subjugated it to Erik.
1:44:03
One of in Merkar's heroic heralds and companions in arms
1:44:06
in his struggle with Errata was Lugal Banda, who succeeded in
1:44:11
Merkar to the throne of Erik. Since he is the major
1:44:14
protagonist of at least two epic tales, he too must have been a
1:44:18
venerable and impressive ruler, and it is not surprising to find
1:44:22
that by 2400 BC and perhaps even earlier, he had been deified by
1:44:27
the Sumerian theologians and given a place in the Sumerian
1:44:30
pantheon. Unfortunately, neither the King
1:44:33
List nor the Epic Tales provide any information about his
1:44:37
political and military achievements, except that he
1:44:41
accompanied N Mercar on his errata campaign.
1:44:44
Lugalbanda, according to the King List, is followed by
1:44:47
Dumuzi, A ruler who became the major figure in a Sumerian holy
1:44:51
marriage rite and dying God myth, which left a deep
1:44:55
impression on the ancient world. In fact, the women of Jerusalem,
1:45:01
to the horror of the prophet Ezekiel, was still lamenting his
1:45:05
death in the 6th century BC. Ezekiel 814, one of the months
1:45:11
of the Jewish calendar, bears his name to this day and the
1:45:14
fasting and lamentation that mark its 17th day, no doubt
1:45:18
harking back to the Sumerian days of the distant past.
1:45:22
It remains unknown why the latest Sumerian theologians
1:45:25
singled out Dumuzi as the protagonist of this particular
1:45:29
rite and myth. This view is likely due to
1:45:33
Dumuzi's lasting impact as a man and ruler, but no historical
1:45:38
data supports it. Gilgamesh, a king whose acts
1:45:43
garnered him so great fame that he became the supreme hero of
1:45:46
Sumerian myth and legend, follows Demuzzi, according to
1:45:50
the king list in Sumerian and most of the other more
1:45:54
significant languages of Western Asia, poems praising Gilgamesh
1:45:59
and his accomplishments were composed and reworked over the
1:46:03
millennia. Gilgamesh became the ideal hero
1:46:06
of the ancient world, a character of adventure, bravery
1:46:11
and tragedy who stood for the vain yet limitless search for
1:46:15
renowned glory and immortality. Sometimes modern academics
1:46:19
confuse him with a legendary person instead of a real man and
1:46:22
king. Though there is some chance the
1:46:25
excavations are now, we still lack modern recordings of him.
1:46:29
Eric's actions might find some, but in 1955 Gilgamesh and his
1:46:35
contemporaries were illuminated by the 1st 10 lines of a well
1:46:38
known turn mile inscription that came to light.
1:46:42
This little passage greatly and unexpectedly illuminates the
1:46:45
political environment in those early days of Sumerian history,
1:46:48
guiding one to enter the topic in great depth.
1:46:52
The King list places Kish, Erek and URS first 3 Sumerian
1:46:56
dynasties following the flood in that sequence from Sumerian epic
1:47:00
and hymnal law. It had been known for some time
1:47:03
that the last two kings of the Kish dynasty, Enmebra Jesi, of
1:47:08
whom, as was noted above, we now have a contemporary inscription,
1:47:14
and his son Agha, were contemporaries of Gilgamesh, the
1:47:18
5th ruler of Eric, with whom they carried on a bitter
1:47:22
struggle for supremacy over Sumer. 10 Cuneiformists usually
1:47:27
agreed that the first dynasty of Kish and the first dynasty of
1:47:30
Erek overlapped extensively. Regarding the first dynasty of
1:47:34
UR, from which we now have several modern inscriptions, its
1:47:38
founder, Mesana Pada, was taken by almost all scholars to have
1:47:44
lived quite later than Gilgamesh of Erek, the proposed period
1:47:48
between these two rulers varying from as little as 40 to as many
1:47:53
as 400 years. It therefore came somewhat as a
1:48:00
shock to realize, as a result of the new evidence, based on a
1:48:04
hitherto unknown passage of no more than 10 lines, that
1:48:08
Masanapada was actually an older contemporary of Gilgamesh, that
1:48:13
even Masanapada's son Mesquiagnuna was a contemporary
1:48:18
of Gilgamesh, and that it was Masanapada of Ur who brought the
1:48:22
first dynasty of Kish to an end, not Gilgamesh or for that matter
1:48:27
any other ruler of the first dynasty of Eric.
1:48:30
Despite the statement in the king list reading, Kish was
1:48:33
smitten with weapons. Its kingship was carried to
1:48:37
Iana. The 34 line historiographic
1:48:40
tablet cited above, known as the Tamil Inscription, is the source
1:48:44
of this fresh evidence. Tamil is the name of a Nippur
1:48:48
area dedicated to the goddess Ninliel, most surely including
1:48:52
her most significant shrine. Except for the 1st 10 lines, the
1:48:57
Tamil text has been known almost since 1914, when Arno Pobel
1:49:01
published 2 tablets bearing the composition in his book
1:49:05
Historical Texts. Starting with line 11, this
1:49:08
sentence flows as follows. The tumail collapsed once more a
1:49:13
second time. Dusra Gilgamesh constructed the
1:49:16
Enlil House of Newmanbura from Gilgamesh's son UR Lugal created
1:49:22
the Tamil preeminent, transported Nilil to the tunnel.
1:49:27
The tumal sank into ruin three times.
1:49:29
Now for the House of Enlil, Nana constructed the lofty park
1:49:35
Mesquiag Nana, the son of Nana made the tunnel preeminent,
1:49:40
brought Nilil before the tunnel. The tumal sank into ruin four
1:49:44
Times Now UR Namu erected the echo.
1:49:49
Shulgi is the son of Ur. Namu created the Tamil
1:49:53
preeminent and brought Nilil to the tunnel.
1:49:57
The Tamil collapsed into ruin five times already from
1:50:01
Amarsin's year of birth until the year the monarch Ibisin
1:50:06
dies. Enam Galana was the N of Inana
1:50:11
of Eric Chosen. Ninlil arrived at the tunnel.
1:50:16
Word of Lou Inana claims that the Ashgab gal in Enlil Ishbi
1:50:21
era constructed the Ekurai Giglala, Enlil's warehouse.
1:50:26
From this book it was evident that its author, who lived in
1:50:29
the time of Ishbi era, the founder of the first dynasty of
1:50:32
Isin, intended to provide a brief historical summary of the
1:50:36
several buildings in the Enlil temple complex at Nipur, and in
1:50:40
particular of the restorations of Ninlil's tumal, even with the
1:50:45
initial passage missing. Moreover, the very remarkable
1:50:49
stylistic pattern used by the author allowed one to determine
1:50:53
the general character of the contents of the missing 5 lines
1:50:57
immediately before, even though not the names of the individuals
1:51:01
involved. Therefore, since the given
1:51:04
material started with the five line phrase, the tumul sank once
1:51:09
more a second time. The Neumann Bora of the House of
1:51:12
Enlil was constructed by Gilgamesh, son of Gilgamesh, UR
1:51:15
Lugal. I took Nilil to the tunnel and
1:51:19
made it top pre eminent. It appeared logical to assume
1:51:23
that the five lines that preceded had read the first time
1:51:27
the tunnel collapsed. X erected the Y building for the
1:51:30
House of Enlil. ZX's son.
1:51:33
I brought Nilil to the tunnel and made the pre eminent. 1.
1:51:38
Regarding the section at the beginning of the record, one
1:51:40
could not deduce its contents, even if it appeared logical to
1:51:43
suppose that this should have indicated who erected the House
1:51:46
of Endlil and the Tamil first. Fortunately, the whole missing
1:51:51
10 line passage is found on 2 tablets in the Hilprecht
1:51:54
Collection of the Friedrich Schiller University, which I
1:51:58
first studied in the course of a 10 week stay in Jena in the
1:52:02
autumn of 1955, and which Inez Bernhardt, the assistant curator
1:52:09
of the Hilprecht Collection, has copied for a volume of literary
1:52:12
texts that appeared in 1961. There is now no need for
1:52:18
guesses, inferences or restorations, though both are
1:52:23
partial. Fortunately they complement one
1:52:25
another so that the first ten line portion of the text does
1:52:28
not have one missing sign. These lines suggest the
1:52:32
following. Enma.
1:52:34
Barragesi King This exact city Nepur was the site of building
1:52:40
the House of Enlil. Agar, the en Mebaragazi son made
1:52:46
the Tamil top preeminent brought into the tunnel.
1:52:50
The tunnel collapsed into ruin for the first time building the
1:52:54
Bershushwa of the House of Enlil.
1:52:56
Mesanipada, son of Mesanipada Meskyagnuna made the Tamil first
1:53:03
brought Ninlil to the tumul. The work then continues.
1:53:07
The tumul collapsed into ruin once more.
1:53:10
Gilgamesh and others. Thus, it is clear that
1:53:14
Gilgamesh, Messanipada and his son Meskyagnunna ruled Nipur
1:53:17
before, unless the Tamil record is historically dubious.
1:53:22
But it is abundantly evident that they were also
1:53:25
contemporaries of Gilgamesh since they followed Aga, a
1:53:29
modern of Gilgamesh, based on the previously shown Gilgamesh
1:53:32
Aga synchronism. Consequently, the historical
1:53:35
events reported and hinted at in the recently recovered Tumul
1:53:39
passage should be rebuilt as follows.
1:53:41
Messanipada, the first dynasty of ER's founder, battled Aga,
1:53:45
the final king of the first dynasty of Kish to seize
1:53:48
authority over Nipa. Messanipada was indeed termed
1:53:51
King of Kish rather than King of ER on his seal inscription,
1:53:56
since the title King of Kish had time on a dignity and he most
1:54:01
certainly attacked Kish itself and was directly responsible for
1:54:05
AGA's downfall. But Masanapada only had time to
1:54:09
construct the Bashushwa, a new structure in the Enlil temple
1:54:12
complex. He must have been an older man
1:54:15
by the time Nippur came into his hands.
1:54:18
Meski Agnuna, his son, left it to make the tunnel for Ninlil
1:54:22
whole again. Then Gilgamesh, a young man who
1:54:26
had clearly struggled with the Aga of Kish and his father and
1:54:29
Mabarajisi, destroyed Meski Agnuna's rule over Nepur.
1:54:34
By this time, Gilgamesh must also have been far along in
1:54:37
years. In any case, his son UR Lugal
1:54:41
rebuilt the tunnel. Messanipada, the founder of the
1:54:45
first dynasty of UR, was an older contemporary of Gilgamesh
1:54:49
who most likely reigned sometime around 2600 BC.
1:54:53
He had already been deified by about 2500 BC.
1:54:59
The date of his reign is about a century or so earlier than
1:55:01
scholars had usually assigned it on the available, but far from
1:55:05
conclusive epigraphic evidence. This condition still brings
1:55:09
another chronological issue that should be considered even if it
1:55:13
cannot be addressed in the present.
1:55:15
The King List does not mention either of these kings, thus it
1:55:19
isn't easy to ascertain whether they came before or after
1:55:22
Messanipada. Excavating the famous royal
1:55:26
cemetery at ER revealed a white shell cylinder seal bearing the
1:55:30
words Mescalamdug king and another with the words
1:55:34
Akalamdug, King of UR. Sir Leonard Woolley, The
1:55:38
excavator, argues that these two kings must have been earlier in
1:55:42
date than Mesanapada, since several seal impressions bearing
1:55:46
the name of Mesanapada were unearthed from a mass of trash
1:55:50
scattered over the area of the royal cemetery where the
1:55:53
Mescalamdug and Akalamdug seals were located.
1:55:58
This may be so, but the likelihood that Messanipada
1:56:00
predates the other two monarchs is not to be discounted.
1:56:04
The interpretation of archaeological and stratigraphic
1:56:07
evidence leaves room for error. Through their terrible 3
1:56:11
cornered struggle for dominance, Kish, Eric and UR kings must
1:56:16
have severely undermined Suma and compromised its military
1:56:19
prowess. The King List claims that
1:56:21
following the First Dynasty of UR, the kingship of Sumer was
1:56:26
taken off to the ellamitic city state of Arwan, some distance
1:56:31
from Susa. Just how and when Sumer healed
1:56:34
from this blow is quite unknown. Although King List notes that
1:56:39
Arwan was smitten by weapons, its kingship was carried off to
1:56:44
Kish. No inscriptions from the Second
1:56:48
Dynasty of Kish have been discovered, and the fact that
1:56:52
the elimtic dynasty of Hamas followed points to the Sumerians
1:56:55
not yet recovering their former power.
1:56:59
The king list indicates that Hamas's dynasty was preceded by
1:57:02
a second dynasty of Eric, for which no inscriptional evidence
1:57:06
has yet come to light. Following this dynasty, we come
1:57:09
to a king who might have saved Sumer.
1:57:12
The King List credits the remarkably lengthy 90 year reign
1:57:17
of Lugal Anamundu, a king of Adab.
1:57:22
He left a record proving he was a strong conqueror and military
1:57:25
commander over the Fertile Crescent, from the Mediterranean
1:57:28
to the Zagros Mountains. This inscription has arrived as
1:57:32
a copy, created almost a Millennium following the events
1:57:35
it documents, but its contents ring true and trustworthy.
1:57:39
Meticulously, minutely and convincingly documented,
1:57:45
Lugalane Mundu, according to this document, is king of the
1:57:49
four quarters of the universe. A ruler who made all the foreign
1:57:55
lands pay steady tribute to him, who brought peace to literally
1:58:00
made lie in the pastures, the peoples of all the lands, who
1:58:05
built the temples of all the great gods, who restored summer
1:58:09
to its former glory, who exercised kingship over the
1:58:12
entire world. Seeds, to name 13 Ensis with the
1:58:16
city states over which they wielded power, who banded
1:58:20
together in rebellion against him, and whom he defeated.
1:58:23
It is not uninteresting to find that most of these Ensis,
1:58:26
including those of Elamite kingdoms, have Semitic names,
1:58:31
though the narrative is rather fragmented.
1:58:33
Lugalanamundu next grabbed Gutium, whose people are known
1:58:36
from later inscriptions as Summer's most hated enemy, and
1:58:40
several other territories named Enamzu.
1:58:43
Dedicated to the chief deity of the city, the mother Goddess
1:58:46
Nintu, the temple was particularly noteworthy for its
1:58:50
seven gates and seven doors, each of which had a special
1:58:54
name, such as Lofty Gate, Great Gate, Gate of Divine Decrees,
1:59:02
Lofty Door, Door of Refreshing Shade, and so on.
1:59:07
When the temple was completed, the document states that
1:59:10
Lugalana Mandu dedicated it to the goddess with sacrifices of 7
1:59:14
* 7 fatted oxen and fatted sheep and the viziers or Sukal Maths
1:59:21
of Cedar Mountain Land. Elam, Mahashi, Gautium, Subir,
1:59:26
Martu, Sutium and Iyana, the old name for the Kingdom of Eric,
1:59:31
came with sacrifices to the Adar Temple to participate in the
1:59:34
celebration. This rather extraordinary
1:59:37
dedicatory inscription then closes with the exhortation that
1:59:40
the goddess Nintu should grant long life to the enses of these
1:59:43
7 lands if they continue to bring offerings and sacrifices
1:59:47
to the enamzu of Ada. Lugala.
1:59:49
Nemundu, It is clear from this inscription, was therefore one
1:59:54
of the more powerful and dynamic rulers of Summa to judge from
1:59:58
the list and location of lands he controlled.
2:00:01
Cedar Mountain. Land, Elam, Mahashi and Gutium
2:00:07
in the east, Subir in the north, Matu in the West and Sutium.
2:00:13
And. Iana in the center and South.
2:00:15
He might well call himself a ruler of the four quarters of
2:00:18
the universe. Lugalanamundu's rule may date
2:00:22
back to the 26th century BC, at least half a century before the
2:00:26
Sumerian rulers, whose dates can be closely calculated using the
2:00:29
Lagash documents. These rulers followed each other
2:00:33
in close succession, leaving no room for a figure as powerful
2:00:38
and dominant as Lugalanemundu, starting with about 2500 and
2:00:44
ending with about. 2000. 350 BC We have a series of dedicatory
2:00:50
inscriptions that enable us to reconstruct.
2:00:53
A more. Or less continuous and unbroken
2:00:57
history of Suma, at least as far as the major figures and events
2:01:02
are concerned. These derive primarily from
2:01:06
Lagash, a city state. In the southeastern.
2:01:09
Part of Suma which for some as yet unknown reason is not
2:01:16
mentioned in the King list, but which played a very important
2:01:19
role in the political history of Suma between.
2:01:21
About 2000. 450 and 2300 BC. To be sure, Lagash was only one
2:01:30
of the kingdoms that constituted the land of Sumer.
2:01:33
Throughout this stretch of 150 years, more than half a dozen
2:01:37
others existed alongside each other, for example, Mari, Adab,
2:01:41
Erik ER Kish and Akshak. Unfortunately, we know little.
2:01:48
Of what actually transpired in them since.
2:01:50
Practically nothing but. The names of the rulers has come
2:01:53
down to us. Only rarely is a document found
2:01:56
that records a significant political and military event.
2:02:01
We have hundreds of dedicatory inscriptions from Lagash.
2:02:04
Which are the most repetitive? But valuable for this period's
2:02:07
history. This means, of course, that we
2:02:11
see the events through Lagashite's eyes.
2:02:14
Still, to judge from those cases that can be verified by other
2:02:17
sources, the Lagashite historians seem to have
2:02:20
respected the truth and recorded the facts as they took place,
2:02:24
although the pious and religious character of the historical
2:02:26
style they developed is sometimes obscure and confusing.
2:02:31
It is then primarily from these Lagashe inscriptions.
2:02:35
That the course of historical. Events about to be sketched can
2:02:37
be reconstructed not much later than about 2500 BC.
2:02:43
They came on the. Sumerian scene A ruler named
2:02:46
Mesalim who took the. Title King of.
2:02:48
Kish and seemed to be in control of the entire land.
2:02:52
His inscribed Mace head was found in Lagashe.
2:02:56
Several of his inscribed objects were found in a dab and most.
2:03:00
Important of all. He was the responsible
2:03:02
arbitrator in a bitter boundary dispute between the kingdoms of
2:03:05
Lagashe and Uma, a generation or so following the Selim's reign,
2:03:11
2004. 150. BC or thereabouts, a man named
2:03:15
Urnanche established himself as king of Lagashe and founded a
2:03:19
dynasty to endure for five generations.
2:03:22
We do not know. Where UN Nanshi came from or how
2:03:27
he rose to power, there is even a bare possibility that he was
2:03:32
originally not a Sumerian. But a semite.
2:03:35
From a land known as Tydnam to the West of Suma.
2:03:39
Be that as it may, he has left behind him some 50 inscriptions
2:03:43
on tablets, plaques, door sockets, bricks and nails, which
2:03:51
record primarily the building of temples and digging of canals.
2:03:55
He also fashioned divine statues. 13 One of the sentences
2:04:01
occurring repeatedly in these inscriptions, however, carries
2:04:07
political and economic implications of a rather
2:04:10
startling character, although it is to be noted that the
2:04:14
translation here offered is not yet fully.
2:04:16
Assured. The statement reads the ships of
2:04:21
Dilman brought. Him.
2:04:22
Ornanche. Wood as a.
2:04:25
Tribute from foreign lands, which implies that Ornanche was
2:04:29
powerful enough to control several foreign lands beyond the
2:04:32
Persian Gulf. 14 To date, however, there is no other
2:04:37
evidence to verify so far reaching a claim, and it may be
2:04:41
advisable to let the matter rest as uncertain for the present. 1
2:04:45
of Ornanche's sons, a Kurgal, succeeded him on the throne of
2:04:49
Lagash. Early in his reign he
2:04:51
encountered difficulties with the Umatis, and his rule was
2:04:55
short lived. He was succeeded by his son
2:04:58
Ianatum, whose military conquests made him the most
2:05:01
powerful figure of his day, so much so that he dared assume, at
2:05:05
least for a few brief years, the title King of Kish, which
2:05:09
carried with it the claim to supremacy over all Sumer.
2:05:13
He started his reign by rebuilding the parts of his
2:05:15
Kingdom that the Ummates destroyed in a Kurgel's time,
2:05:19
but he lately embarked on a series of victorious military
2:05:22
enterprises conducted against Elam to the east, Uma to the
2:05:26
north, and Eric and ER to the West, not to mention several
2:05:31
cities whose location is still unknown.
2:05:34
The immediate causes for these wars are unknown, except in.
2:05:38
The case of Uma. For an account of this struggle,
2:05:43
we have the rather. Detailed document prepared.
2:05:45
By one of the archivists. Of Ianatom's.
2:05:47
Nephew and Tamena, and from it we may reconstruct the
2:05:51
background and drama of the conflict between Lagash and Uma
2:05:55
and the Anatom's temporarily successful role in it, as
2:05:58
follows. In the days when Mesalim was
2:06:00
king of Kish and at least the nominal suzerain of Sumer, a
2:06:05
border dispute developed between the cities of Lagash and Uma,
2:06:08
both of which clearly acknowledged Mesalim as their
2:06:11
overlord. The latter proceeded to
2:06:14
arbitrate the controversy by measuring off.
2:06:16
A boundary line. Between the two cities,
2:06:19
according to an Oracle of Saturn, a deity in charge of
2:06:23
settling complaints. Moreover, he erected and
2:06:26
inscribed Staley to mark the spot and.
2:06:29
Prevent future disputes. Not long afterward, Ush, an NC
2:06:33
of Ummah, broke the terms of the decision.
2:06:36
The time is not stated, but there are indications that this
2:06:39
violation took place not long before Urnanshi founded his
2:06:43
dynasty at Lagash. Ush tore at Messilim's stale.
2:06:49
Demonstrating his. Contempt for its terms.
2:06:53
Then he crossed the border and seized the northernmost
2:06:56
territory. Belonging to Lagash.
2:06:58
Known as the Guadina, this land remained in the hands of the
2:07:03
Umites until the days of Iannatum.
2:07:05
The grandson of. Urnansh, who attacked and
2:07:08
defeated the Ometes and made a new border treaty with NL Khale,
2:07:12
then the Enzi of Uma. He dug a ditch in line.
2:07:16
With the new boundary, which would.
2:07:17
Help ensure the fertility of the Kwedina.
2:07:20
Erected. The old Mesilim stele there for
2:07:22
future record purposes, along with several styles of his own,
2:07:26
and constructed several buildings and shrines to several
2:07:29
of the more important Sumerian deities.
2:07:33
Moreover, to help minimize the possible source of future
2:07:36
conflict between Uma and Lagash, he set aside a strip of fallow
2:07:40
land on the Uma side of the boundary ditch.
2:07:43
As a kind of. No man's Land Finally, Ianatum
2:07:47
agreed to let the ummaites farm the fields in the.
2:07:50
Gwedina and further. South likely to ease their
2:07:53
discontent while he focused on expanding his conquests
2:07:55
elsewhere, but he granted this only under the condition that
2:07:59
they pay the Lagache rulers. A share of the crops.
2:08:02
For the use of the land, thus assuring himself and his
2:08:06
successors A considerable revenue, Iyanatam followed up
2:08:10
his victories over Elam and the more southerly cities.
2:08:13
Of Suma such as? Uma, Erik and Ur with military
2:08:16
triumphs over northern Suma, which was under the control of
2:08:20
the city of Kish, and the neighboring AK Shark, the defeat
2:08:24
to N Shakushana, who referred to himself as N of Sumer.
2:08:27
And king of the land. Weakened Kish Zuzu, king of
2:08:32
Akshak, LED an invasion of the northern forces.
2:08:34
In Lagash. Ayanatum routed the invading
2:08:38
forces and pursued them from. The Antasura.
2:08:42
The northern boundary of Lagash to Akshak itself inflicting
2:08:47
heavy losses on them. Now at the height of his
2:08:50
ability, Ayanatam even felt strong enough to.
2:08:53
Claim suzerainte over. Suma as a whole, or as the
2:08:56
ancient source puts it to Ayanatam, the NC of Lagash.
2:09:02
Inanna, the tutelary deity of Kish, because she loved him,
2:09:08
gave the kingship of Kish in addition to the entire ship of
2:09:10
Lagash. At this time he must have
2:09:14
erected and dedicated the Staley of the.
2:09:16
Vultures to. Commemorate his well earned
2:09:18
victories. It appears that a brief period
2:09:21
of peace now followed for Suma and we.
2:09:24
Find the Anatom. Taking time out to dig a new
2:09:26
canal which he named exultantly Luma Gimduk.
2:09:30
Good like luma Luma being a anatom's.
2:09:35
Titnam name. That is.
2:09:36
Presumably the name given in by the Semitic.
2:09:38
Matu people to the West of Suma, where Titnam is known to have
2:09:42
been located. However, before he could
2:09:44
complete the canal and construct its walls with bricks, Ianatom
2:09:48
found himself embroiled in another war.
2:09:51
This time he remained defensive, barely keeping his enemies at
2:09:54
Bay. And.
2:09:55
Avoiding defeat. 1st the Elamites attacked him from the
2:10:00
east. And though he threw them.
2:10:02
Back to their homeland, he could not follow up on his success and
2:10:06
invade Alam. By this time his old enemies
2:10:10
from the north, Kish and Akshak, had invaded Lagash.
2:10:14
No sooner did he drive them back from Lagashe territory than the
2:10:17
Elamites returned with new allies, to be followed again by
2:10:21
the troops of Kish and Akshak, supported this time by a new
2:10:25
enemy, the Kingdom of Mari, far to the West in pitched battles.
2:10:32
Fought at the. Asura Lagashe's eastern boundary
2:10:35
and the Antasura, its northern boundary.
2:10:37
A Anatom won a decisive victory over his enemies.
2:10:42
Once again, there was a brief respite from wars, and A Anatom
2:10:45
could renew his building activities, reinforcing the
2:10:48
walls of the Loomagimdug Canal and constructing a giant
2:10:52
reservoir for its waters. A Anatom's brother, Ananatom,
2:10:56
not one of his sons, succeeded. Him.
2:10:59
Suggesting a sad end for Anatom, who was called prostrator of all
2:11:04
the lands for Ningirsu. This points to the probability
2:11:08
that he did not die a natural death.
2:11:10
But fell in a battle that. Must have been catastrophic for
2:11:13
Lagashe, a battle from which it never fully recovered in Anatom
2:11:18
upon succeeding his brother to the rule of Lagashe soon.
2:11:21
Found himself in serious. Difficulties with the Umatis,
2:11:25
for despite their defeat at the hands of Anatom, it took them
2:11:29
less than a. Generation to.
2:11:30
Recover their confidence, if not their former strength.
2:11:35
In any case, Uluma, the son of the unfortunate Nakala,
2:11:38
repudiated the. Bitterly.
2:11:40
Rankling agreement with Lagash and refused to pay a nanoturn
2:11:43
the revenue imposed upon Uma. Moreover, he proceeded to drain
2:11:49
the boundary ditches. RIP out and put to fire.
2:11:51
Both asylums and the Anatom steles with their irritating
2:11:54
inscriptions and destroy the buildings and shrines that the
2:11:58
Anatom had constructed along the boundary ditch to warn the
2:12:01
Umetes that they must not trespass on Lagashe territory.
2:12:05
He was now set to cross the border and enter the Gwadina.
2:12:09
To further assure himself of victory, he sought and obtained
2:12:13
the military aid of the foreigners north of Summa UR
2:12:17
Luma commanded the Umaitas and their allies.
2:12:20
The lagasheets were led by. Entremena, since his father and
2:12:23
Anatom must have been quite. An older man at the.
2:12:25
Time UR Lama fled, fiercely pursued by Entremena.
2:12:31
And many of. His troops were waylaid and
2:12:33
killed the two forces. Met in the Ghana.
2:12:36
Ugiga of the Gwedina not. Far South of the border.
2:12:41
But Enter Mena's victory was ephemeral upon UR.
2:12:45
Luma's defeat and. Probable death.
2:12:46
A new enemy appeared on the scene. 11 The temple head of a
2:12:50
city named Halab, situated not far from Uma to the north.
2:12:55
I had evidently been shrewd enough to wait it out while.
2:12:58
Entemena and Urluma were. Struggling for a decision, but
2:13:03
as soon as the battle ended, he attacked the victorious
2:13:05
Entemena. Met with initial.
2:13:07
Success and penetrated lagash territory to be sure, he could
2:13:13
not hold on to his gains South of the uma Lagash border, but he
2:13:17
succeeded in making himself NC of uma 11 now deprived the
2:13:22
boundary ditches of the water essential to irrigate the.
2:13:24
Nearby fields and farms. And refused to pay all but a
2:13:27
fraction of the revenue imposed upon Uma by the old Ianatum
2:13:31
Treaty. And when Entomena sent envoys to
2:13:34
him demanding an explanation for his unfriendly acts, he answered
2:13:38
by angrily claiming the entire Gwadinna as his territory and
2:13:42
domain. He showed his contempt for the
2:13:45
Lagashe claims, almost like his predecessor.
2:13:48
Oosh. However, the war did not settle
2:13:51
the dispute between 11 and Entomena.
2:13:54
Instead. A third party, likely the
2:13:56
northern non Sumerian ruler who once again claimed lordship over
2:14:00
Sumer, forced them into a compromise.
2:14:04
The decision favored Lagashe retaining the old.
2:14:08
Masilim Ianatom line. As the fixed boundary between
2:14:11
Uma and Lagashe, on the other hand, nothing was said about
2:14:16
compensation. By the ummmates for the.
2:14:18
Revenue they had withheld, nor do they seem to have been held
2:14:22
responsible any longer for ensuring the water supply of the
2:14:25
Gwedina. This task was now left to the
2:14:29
Lagashites themselves. Entemena was the.
2:14:32
Last of the powerful Ensis of the Urnanche dynasty.
2:14:36
His son Ananatam, the second, reigned only briefly and.
2:14:40
Achieved but little. To judge from the fact that only
2:14:43
one of his inscriptions has been recovered to date, a door socket
2:14:48
dedicated to the restoration of Ningir SU's beer brewery.
2:14:54
He was followed as NC of Lagashe by Anatazi who was.
2:14:58
Probably a usurper. Since his rule, we have had
2:15:01
many. Administrative.
2:15:02
Documents. But no dedicatory.
2:15:05
Inscriptions. However, a letter has been
2:15:09
recovered that is addressed to Anatazi by Luena, the Sanga
2:15:13
Temple head of Ninmar, reporting the defeat of a band of 600
2:15:17
Elamites who had raided and plundered Lagashe Chexa.
2:15:23
Anatarsia is followed as NC of Lagashe by.
2:15:25
Lugalanda, who like his. Predecessor has left us only
2:15:28
administrative documents and no dedicatory inscriptions.
2:15:32
We know practically nothing about his reign.
2:15:36
Rukagina, the first pacifist, is known for his early social and
2:15:39
ethical. Reforms.
2:15:41
Unfortunately, his reign was brief and came to a sad.
2:15:45
End when? Lugalzajesi.
2:15:46
An ambitious and military minded NC from neighboring Uranana
2:15:50
burned, looted and destroyed practically all the holy places
2:15:54
of Lagash. These vicious deeds of
2:15:57
Lugalzagjesi are carefully recorded in a rather remarkable
2:16:00
document written by a Lagashite scribe and theologian, no doubt
2:16:04
at the behest of Urugagna, who there is reason to believe
2:16:09
survived the catastrophe. The closing passage of this
2:16:13
document reveals a faith in the justice of the gods on the.
2:16:15
Part of Urukagana. Which, although quite touching,
2:16:19
may well have brought about his undoing.
2:16:22
It reads because the omate destroyed.
2:16:26
The bricks. Of Lagash, he committed a sin
2:16:29
against the God Ningirsu. He, Ningirsu will cut off the
2:16:34
hands lifted against him. Not the fault of Urukagina the
2:16:39
Girsu King is this. May.
2:16:42
Nidaba, the personal goddess of Lugal Zagasi, the NC of Ummah,
2:16:47
make him Lugal Zagasi bear all these sins. 17 All of which
2:16:55
leaves the impression that. Urukagina had, in fact.
2:16:57
Offered No. Resistance to his aggressive
2:16:59
fellow Sumerians. From Ummah, so confident was he
2:17:02
and the justice of the gods and the retribution they would wreak
2:17:05
on the evildoer. Although just what good that
2:17:07
would do the victim is not clear.
2:17:10
In any case, Lugal Zagassi's career.
2:17:14
Began with the. Conquest of Lagash and was for a
2:17:18
time crowned with phenomenal success he came to an
2:17:22
ignominious end lugal zagassi has.
2:17:25
Left US1. Important inscription, the text
2:17:27
of which was pieced. Together by Hermann.
2:17:29
Hilprecht more than half a century ago, from hundreds of
2:17:33
vast fragments. 18 In it Lugal Zagasi describes himself proudly
2:17:40
as king of Eric and king of the land, as one who had made all
2:17:47
the foreign lands subservient to him, so that there was nothing
2:17:51
but peace, happiness, and prosperity throughout his realm,
2:17:55
which extended from the Lower sea along the Tigris and
2:18:00
Euphrates rivers to the Upper sea.
2:18:04
But as was said earlier, all his glory did not long endure after
2:18:09
some 2 decades of military successes and triumphs.
2:18:13
He was brought in a next. Dock to the Gate of Nepour, to
2:18:16
be reviled and spat upon by all who passed by.
2:18:20
His conqueror was a Semite named Sargon, the founder of the.
2:18:24
Powerful dynasty of. Akkad, which began, consciously
2:18:27
or not, the semitization of Sumer that finally brought about
2:18:31
the end of the Sumerian people, at least as an identifiable
2:18:35
political and ethnic entity from Egypt to India.
2:18:39
Sargon the Great was one of the most amazing political leaders
2:18:43
of the ancient Near East, a military leader of genius and an
2:18:47
imaginative administrator and builder with a sense of the
2:18:51
historical significance of his deeds and achievements.
2:18:56
His influence was felt throughout the ancient world
2:18:59
from later centuries, when Sargon became legendary, around
2:19:04
which the poets and bards would weave sagas and wonder tales,
2:19:08
generally based on a kernel of truth, as he has come to be
2:19:12
known to the modern historian. Fortunately, in the case of
2:19:16
Sargon, we have no need. To consult these.
2:19:20
Later chronicles and stories for our historical facts, since we
2:19:24
have his inscriptions recording his more significant military
2:19:27
conquests. And achievements for.
2:19:29
Sargon, as well as his two sons, Rimash and Manish Tushu,
2:19:33
commemorated their. Victories by erecting.
2:19:35
An Enlil's temple at Nipper inscribed.
2:19:37
Statues of themselves. And also Staley's depicting
2:19:42
their prostrated enemies. Except for a sporadic diorite
2:19:46
fragment of an original, none of these statues and Staley's have
2:19:51
been found to date even. The latest nipper?
2:19:54
Excavations have shown unsatisfactory results.
2:19:57
In this regard. And may have been destroyed in
2:19:59
ancient times, but luck? In the 1700s, an anonymous
2:20:05
scholar and researcher copied all the inscriptions on the
2:20:08
statues and steelys in the Enlil Temple with the care and
2:20:12
fidelity that would do honor to any modern archaeologist and
2:20:15
epigrapher, even noting whether the copied inscriptions came
2:20:19
from the statue itself or from the pedestal with such phrases
2:20:23
as This is the inscription on the.
2:20:26
Statue. Or this is the inscription on
2:20:29
the pedestal? Or the pedestal is uninscribed.
2:20:36
The reason for making these copies is unknown.
2:20:39
Perhaps the? Temple and its monuments.
2:20:41
Were in danger of being destroyed and his purpose was to
2:20:44
save them for posterity. If so, he achieved almost
2:20:49
exactly as expected, as the old Nepur expedition recovered
2:20:54
almost all of his valuable tablet, and the two academics,
2:20:58
Arno Pobel and Leon Legrain, made its contents available for
2:21:03
posterity, though Semite Sagon started his career as a
2:21:07
prominent official. The Cupbearer.
2:21:10
To a Sumerian ruler of Kish called URS Ababa, Sagun's first
2:21:15
aim was to remove Lugal Zagisi from the political scene.
2:21:19
Ultimately, he smote it and attacked Erik, the capital of
2:21:25
Lugal Zagisi, unexpectedly demolishing its walls.
2:21:30
According to the inscription the Eric the.
2:21:34
Defenders seem to have. Left the city after gaining
2:21:37
significant. Reinforcements. 50 warriors from
2:21:41
the provinces came to their aid. They took their stand against
2:21:46
the pursuing Sargon, the. Latter routed.
2:21:50
The Eric Army in a fierce fight. It was only.
2:21:53
Then it seems that lugolzagessi, presumably on a.
2:21:57
Far off campaign. Arrived on the scene with his
2:22:00
army from Erik. This time, too, Sargon was
2:22:04
Victor so massively. That he could transport.
2:22:07
Lugal Zagessi in chains, or rather in a neck stock to the
2:22:11
gates of Nippur. Sargon returned to Suma's more
2:22:15
southerly section after Lugalzargesi.
2:22:17
'S captivity. Where Lugalzargesi's ends still
2:22:21
held expectations of monitoring his progress, he initially
2:22:25
assaulted UR in the extreme southwest, then the area.
2:22:28
Of Enimar. Which spanned from the city of
2:22:31
Lagashe to the coast of the Persian Gulf, where he cleaned
2:22:34
his weapons in a custom honoring his successes.
2:22:38
Way back from the sea. He assaulted A Lugal Zagessi
2:22:41
stronghold called Ummah. He destroyed its walls,
2:22:45
finishing his conquest of southern Suma.
2:22:48
Turning West and N, he subjugated the territory of
2:22:51
Mari. Januti and Ibla.
2:22:53
Up to the Cedar Forest and the Silver Mountain, the Amanus and
2:22:58
the Taurus Mountains. He then is seen attacking Elam
2:23:03
and adjacent Barashi. Carting off their.
2:23:05
Belongings east of Summa. This led to the end of the
2:23:09
nipper copies of the inscriptions on Sargon's
2:23:11
statues. And Staley's.
2:23:13
Which span barely a portion of his rule.
2:23:16
Sargon's conquests stretched far and wide in the much later
2:23:20
stories and. Chronicles.
2:23:22
He might even have dispatched his troops to Egypt, Ethiopia
2:23:26
and India. He placed armed garrisons at
2:23:29
several strategic points to oversee such a.
2:23:31
Large empire. In summer, where rebellion was
2:23:36
rampant, he assigned fellow. Semites to the highest.
2:23:39
Administrative positions and garrisoned the cities with all
2:23:42
Acadian soldiers not far from Kish, the place where he had
2:23:46
started his amazing career as CUP.
2:23:48
Bearer of the. Reigning URS Ababa, he erected
2:23:51
the city of Agade for himself and his great court of officials
2:23:55
and troops, boasting that 5400 men ate bread daily before him.
2:24:02
Agade became the most brilliant city in the ancient world in a
2:24:06
short. Period.
2:24:08
Gifts and tributes were brought from the four corners of
2:24:10
Sargon's realm, and at its keys ships docked from far off
2:24:16
Dilman. Margon and.
2:24:17
Meluha, that is, perhaps India, Egypt, and Ethiopia.
2:24:22
Most of Agarde's residents were surely Semites, connected to
2:24:25
Sargon by blood and language from Agardo, or more precisely
2:24:30
from its biblical equivalent, Arkad.
2:24:33
Genesis 1010. The adjective Arkadian has come
2:24:37
to define the Mesopotamian Semites generally.
2:24:40
Rimush, his son, followed Sargon, who saw upheavals and
2:24:43
revolutions tear. Apart his Kingdom.
2:24:47
In brutal conflicts involving 10s of thousands of men, he
2:24:49
captured or more. Precisely reconquered.
2:24:52
The towns of UR Uma, Ada, Lagash der Kazalu and the nations of
2:24:59
Elam and Barashi. He ruled, but only for nine
2:25:03
years. His elder brother, maybe his
2:25:06
twin Manish Tushu carried on in the same.
2:25:09
Military and. Political style.
2:25:12
Like his father Sargon, he carried his triumphant armies to
2:25:15
far off. Countries.
2:25:17
Or at least so it would seem from a passage in one of his
2:25:20
inscriptions which reads When he Manishtushu, had crossed the
2:25:26
lower sea, that is, the Persian Gulf in ships, 32 kings gathered
2:25:34
against him, but he. Defeated them and smote.
2:25:37
Their cities and prostrated their Lords.
2:25:40
And destroyed the. Whole the Sumerian city,
2:25:42
Sumerian civilization was urban in character, although it rested
2:25:47
on an agricultural rather than an industrial base.
2:25:50
In the third Millennium BC, the land of Suma consisted of a
2:25:54
dozen or so city states, each having a large and usually
2:25:57
walled city surrounded by suburban villages and Hamlets.
2:26:02
The outstanding feature of each city was the main temple on a
2:26:05
high terrace, which was often built as a massive staged tower
2:26:09
called a ziggurat. Suma's most characteristic
2:26:12
contribution to religious architecture.
2:26:14
The temple usually consisted of a rectangular central shrine or
2:26:18
cellar, surrounded on its long sides by several rooms for the
2:26:21
use of the priests. In the cellar there was a niche
2:26:25
for the God's statue, which was fronted by an offering table
2:26:29
made of mud brick. The temple was built largely of
2:26:33
mud bricks, and since this material is.
2:26:35
Unattractive in texture and. Color.
2:26:37
The Sumerian architects beautified the walls using
2:26:40
regularly spaced buttresses and recesses.
2:26:43
They also introduced the mud brick column and Hah column.
2:26:47
Which they covered with. Patterns of zigzags, lozenges
2:26:50
and triangles by inserting thousands of painted clay cones
2:26:54
into the thick mud plaster frescoes of human and animal
2:27:00
figures, along with a varied assortment of geometrical motifs
2:27:05
occasionally adorned the inner walls of the shrine.
2:27:09
The temple was the largest, tallest and most important
2:27:13
building. In the city.
2:27:15
According to the theory accepted by the Sumerian religious
2:27:17
leaders. And going back, no.
2:27:20
Doubt to very early times that the entire city belonged to its
2:27:23
main God, to whom it had been assigned on the day the world
2:27:27
was created in practice. However.
2:27:30
The Temple Corporation owned only some of the land which it
2:27:34
rented out to sharecroppers. The remainder was the private
2:27:37
property of individual citizens. During the early.
2:27:41
Days, these free citizens held political power with a city
2:27:44
governor, known as an NCA peer among peers in decisions vital
2:27:49
to the city. These free citizens met in a
2:27:52
bicameral. Assembly.
2:27:53
Consisting of an upper House of elders and a lower House of men.
2:27:58
As the struggle between the city states grew more violent and
2:28:00
bitter, and as the pressures from the barbaric peoples to the
2:28:03
east and West of Suma increased, military leadership became a
2:28:08
pressing need, and the king, or as he's known in Sumerian, the
2:28:13
big man, came to hold a superior place.
2:28:17
At first, the assembly probably selected and appointed him at a
2:28:20
critical moment for a specific military task.
2:28:25
But kingship with Ji, its privileges and prerogatives,
2:28:29
gradually became a hereditary institution and was considered
2:28:33
the hallmark of civilization. The kings established a regular
2:28:38
army with the chariot. The.
2:28:40
Ancient tank as the main offensive weapon and a heavily
2:28:47
armored infantry that. Attacked in Phalanx's formation.
2:28:50
Suma's victories and conquests were due largely to the
2:28:53
superiority in military, weapons, tactics, organization,
2:28:58
and leadership. Therefore, the palace began to
2:29:02
rival the temple in terms of wealth and influence over time,
2:29:06
but priests, Princess and soldiers constituted only a
2:29:10
small. Fraction of the city's.
2:29:11
Population. Most were farmers and cattle
2:29:15
breeders, boatmen and fishermen, merchants and scribes, doctors
2:29:20
and architects, Masons and carpenters, Smiths, Jewelers and
2:29:26
Potters. Of course, several rich and
2:29:29
powerful families owned large estates.
2:29:32
But even the. Poor managed to own farms and
2:29:34
gardens, houses and cattle. The more industrious artisans
2:29:39
and Craftsman sold their handmade.
2:29:41
Products in the Freetown. Market receiving payment either
2:29:45
in kind or in money, normally a disc or ring of silver of
2:29:49
standard weight, travelling merchants carried on a thriving
2:29:53
trade from city to city. And with surrounding.
2:29:56
States by land and sea, and not a few of these merchants were
2:30:01
probably private individuals rather than temple or palace
2:30:04
representatives. The view that the Sumerian
2:30:07
economy was relatively free and the private property was the
2:30:10
rule rather than the exception runs counter to the claim of
2:30:14
several Asian scholars that the Sumerian city state was a
2:30:19
totalitarian theocracy. Dominated.
2:30:21
By the temple which owned all the land and was in absolute
2:30:25
control of the entire economy. Most of the tablets from Pre
2:30:29
Sargonic Sumair around 2400 BC are records from the temples of
2:30:35
Lagashe that only discuss temple land and workers, which has
2:30:39
caused some scholars to wrongly believe that all the land in
2:30:42
Lagashe and likely in other city states belong to the temple.
2:30:47
It is also true, however, that several documents from Lagashe
2:30:51
and other sites indicate that the city state's citizens could
2:30:55
buy and sell their fields and houses, not to mention all kinds
2:30:59
of movable property. Thus, for example, several
2:31:02
documents from about 2500 BC have been unearthed in Farah and
2:31:07
Bismaya that record real estate sales by private individuals,
2:31:12
and they are no doubt but a small fraction of those still
2:31:14
underground. From Lagash comes a stone tablet
2:31:18
recording a sale of land to Enhergal, a king of Lagash and a
2:31:23
predecessor of Urnanshu, which shows that even a king could not
2:31:27
merely confiscate property whenever he wished, but had to
2:31:30
pay for it. We have found another stone
2:31:33
document where Lumatur, a son of Enanatum the First, purchases
2:31:39
land from various individuals and families.
2:31:43
The Urukagina reform text finds that even the poor and lowly
2:31:47
owned houses, gardens and fishery ponds.
2:31:51
However, many important scholars strongly believed in a temple
2:31:54
government that. Completely controlled the.
2:31:56
City and to change this belief, it was critical to carefully
2:32:00
review the many economic documents, especially those from
2:32:04
Lagash. This goal has now been achieved
2:32:07
by IM Diakonov, a Russian scholar who has devoted much
2:32:13
time and labor to the task. And whose?
2:32:16
Detailed study appeared in 19592.
2:32:21
Following, then, is a sketch of the economic structure of the
2:32:24
Sumerian city state, based primarily on Dirkanov's
2:32:28
illuminating analysis. The fundamental error that led
2:32:31
to the assumption that the temple of each city state owned
2:32:34
all its land was made by the late Anton Daimal, a highly
2:32:39
productive scholar who devoted many years to the study of the
2:32:42
Lagashe documents and contributed significantly to
2:32:46
cuneiform studies as a whole by adding together all the parcels
2:32:50
of land mentioned in them. He estimated that the total area
2:32:53
of the temple estates in Lagashe was between 2 and 300 square
2:32:57
kilometers, a quite justifiable figure which, if anything, is
2:33:03
too. Low.
2:33:05
But he then goes on to assume that this was the total area of
2:33:09
the city. State of Lagashe.
2:33:11
A claim that is quite unwarranted by the data.
2:33:15
In studying all. The available Lagash documents
2:33:17
more carefully Diakonov. Estimates that the territory.
2:33:20
Of Lagash probably comprised some 3000 square kilometers, of
2:33:25
which about 2000 consisted of naturally irrigated land.
2:33:28
The total area of the temple estates, even if Daimal's
2:33:32
estimate were doubled, as there is some reason to believe it
2:33:35
should be, would comprise A considerable fraction of the
2:33:39
City States territory, but only a fraction.
2:33:42
This temple land, which could not be bought, sold or alienated
2:33:45
in any way, was divided into 3 categories. 1.
2:33:50
Vienna land that was reserved for the maintenance of the
2:33:53
temple, 2. Kurta land allotted to the
2:33:57
farmers working the Nijena land and also.
2:34:00
To. Artisans and some of the
2:34:02
administrative personnel of the temple in payment for their
2:34:05
services. This land could not be inherited
2:34:09
and could be exchanged or taken. Away altogether by the.
2:34:12
Temple administration whenever it decided to do so for one
2:34:15
reason or another, and three Urulal land.
2:34:21
Allotted in exchange for. A share of the crop to
2:34:23
different. Individuals.
2:34:25
But especially to personnel of the temple to supplement their
2:34:28
income. The documents show.
2:34:30
That the nobility, the ruling Princess, their families, palace
2:34:34
administrators and important priests.
2:34:36
Owned most of. The land not part of the temple
2:34:40
and comprised most of the city states territory.
2:34:44
These noble families often possessed giant estates.
2:34:47
Measuring hundreds of acres. Much of which they obtained by
2:34:52
purchase from the less fortunate citizens.
2:34:55
The labor on these estates was performed by clients or
2:34:58
dependents whose status resembled that of the temple's
2:35:02
dependents, who were clients of the more prosperous temple
2:35:06
officials and administrators. The remaining land is owned by
2:35:10
the community's commoners, who comprise.
2:35:13
Over half the. Population these free citizens
2:35:18
or commoners were. Organized in large patriarchal.
2:35:21
Families, clans and town communities from their earliest
2:35:26
days, patriarchal families could alienate and.
2:35:29
Sell the hereditary. Land they possessed, however,
2:35:33
only a member or member of the family.
2:35:36
Not. Necessarily, the head could act
2:35:39
as the chosen representative of the family community.
2:35:43
Ordinarily, other family members participated in the transaction.
2:35:47
As witnesses. Thus indicating their agreement
2:35:51
and consent. These witnesses.
2:35:54
Received a payment just as the sellers did.
2:35:58
Although it. Was usually more or less
2:35:59
nominal. The buyer's side often recorded
2:36:03
unpaid witnesses and. Government representatives.
2:36:06
Occasionally participated in the transactions.
2:36:09
Overall, as a result of Diakonos detailed and imaginative
2:36:13
investigations, we get a picture of the socio economic structure
2:36:18
of the Sumerian city state that is quite different from that
2:36:21
currently in vogue among Asian scholars.
2:36:24
The population comprised 4 categories, Nobles.
2:36:29
Commoners. Clients and enslaved people.
2:36:33
The nobility owned large estates, partly as private.
2:36:37
Individuals and partly in. The form of family possessions
2:36:40
which were worked by free clients or dependents and
2:36:43
enslaved people. The nobility too controlled the
2:36:47
temple land. Although this.
2:36:49
Land gradually came. Under the domination of the
2:36:51
ruler and later even became his property, the upper House of the
2:36:55
assembly or town meeting probably consisted of the
2:37:01
members of the nobility, the. Commoner owned.
2:37:04
His own plot of land in the city state.
2:37:07
But as a family. Member rather than as an
2:37:09
individual. The commoners.
2:37:12
Probably constituted the lower House of the assembly. 3
2:37:16
categories comprised the clients one.
2:37:20
The wealthy dependents of the. Temple including administrators
2:37:23
and important artisans. 2 The majority of the temple
2:37:28
personnel, and three, the dependence of the nobility.
2:37:33
Most clients in the first two categories got small plots of
2:37:35
temple land, but only as temporary possessions, although
2:37:39
some got rations of food and wool.
2:37:42
The clients of the nobles who worked their estates were no
2:37:45
doubt also paid by similar arrangements.
2:37:47
Slavery was a recognized institution, and temples,
2:37:51
palaces, and rich estates enslaved people and exploited
2:37:55
them for their benefit. Many enslaved people were
2:37:58
prisoners of war, but not all of them.
2:38:01
Were. Foreigners, since they could be
2:38:04
fellow Sumerians from a neighboring city, defeated.
2:38:06
In battle. Sumerian enslaved people were
2:38:10
recruited in other ways. Certain offenses might.
2:38:13
Reduce freeman to slavery as a punishment in times of need
2:38:18
parents could sell their children as.
2:38:20
Enslaved people. Or a man could turn over his
2:38:23
entire family to creditors as payment for a debt, but only for
2:38:28
a maximum of three years. The.
2:38:31
Enslaved person was the. Property of his master like any
2:38:34
other. Chattel.
2:38:37
If he attempted to escape, his master could brand flog.
2:38:40
And punish him severely. On the other hand, it was to his
2:38:44
master's advantage that his slave stay strong and.
2:38:46
Healthy. And enslaved people are
2:38:49
therefore usually well treated. They even had certain legal
2:38:53
rights. They could engage in business,
2:38:56
borrow money and buy their freedom.
2:39:00
If a slave, male or female, married a free purse free, The
2:39:05
sale price of an enslaved person varied with the market and the
2:39:09
individual. Involved.
2:39:11
An average price for a grown man was 20 shekels, which was at
2:39:15
times less than the price for an ass.
2:39:18
Like us, the family. Formed the basic unit of
2:39:21
Sumerian society, with its members closely knit together by
2:39:25
love, respect, and mutual obligations.
2:39:30
The parents arranged the marriage, and the father
2:39:33
recognized the betrothal legally as soon as the groom presented a
2:39:37
bridal gift. The betrothal was often
2:39:40
consummated with a contract inscribed on a tablet.
2:39:44
Despite the reduction of marriage to a practical
2:39:46
arrangement, some evidence suggests the existence of
2:39:51
surreptitious premarital lovemaking.
2:39:54
A woman in Summa had certain important legal rights.
2:39:57
She could hold property, engage in business and qualify as a
2:40:01
witness. But her husband could divorce
2:40:04
her on relatively light grounds, and if she had no children, he
2:40:07
could marry a second wife. Children were under the absolute
2:40:11
authority of their parents who could.
2:40:14
Disinherit them or even sell. Them into slavery in the normal
2:40:18
course of events. Their parents dearly loved and
2:40:22
cherish them, and upon their death they inherited all their
2:40:27
property. Adopted children were not
2:40:30
uncommon, and they too were. Treated with utmost care.
2:40:34
And consideration written law significantly contributed to the
2:40:38
social and economic organization.
2:40:40
Of the Sumerian. City as previously mentioned,
2:40:44
beginning about 2700 BC, we find.
2:40:47
Actual sales deeds. Including sales of fields,
2:40:51
houses and enslaved people. One of the most precious and
2:40:56
revealing documents in the history of man's perennial and.
2:40:59
Unrelenting. Struggle for freedom from
2:41:01
tyranny and oppression dates back to about 2350 BC, during
2:41:06
the reign of Uruka Gina of Lagash.
2:41:10
This document records a sweeping reform of a whole series of
2:41:13
prevalent abuses, most of which could be traced to a ubiquitous
2:41:17
and obnoxious bureaucracy consisting of the ruler and his
2:41:21
palace coterie. At the same time, it provides A
2:41:24
grim and ominous picture of man's cruelty toward man on all
2:41:27
levels, social, economic, political, and psychological.
2:41:34
Reading between its lines, we also glimpse A bitter struggle
2:41:38
for power between the temple and the palace, the church and the
2:41:43
state, the citizens of Lagash. Are taking the.
2:41:46
Side of the Temple. Adam Falkenstein.
2:41:49
Recently noted. That this document uses freedom
2:41:51
as a margin, meaning return to the mother.
2:41:54
However, we remain uncertain why this figure of speech became
2:41:57
associated with freedom. There is no trace in the text of
2:42:01
the events that led to the corrupt, lawless and oppressive
2:42:03
state of affairs in Lagash as depicted in the Urukagina reform
2:42:08
document. But they were the direct result
2:42:10
of the political and economic forces unleashed by the drive
2:42:14
for power that characterized the ruling dynasty founded by O
2:42:18
Ananshi around 2500 BC. Smitten with grandiose ambitions
2:42:24
for themselves and their state, some rulers resorted to
2:42:28
imperialistic wars and bloody conquests.
2:42:33
In a few cases they met with considerable success.
2:42:37
And for a brief period. One of them, the Anatom,
2:42:40
extended the sway of Lagash over Sumer as a whole and even
2:42:43
several of the neighboring states.
2:42:46
However, the earlier victories proved ephemeral.
2:42:50
And in less than a. Century Lagash was reduced to
2:42:53
its earlier boundaries and former status.
2:42:57
By the time Urukagana came to power, Lagash had been so.
2:43:01
Weakened that it was. Easy prey for its unrelenting
2:43:04
enemy to the north, the city state of Ummah, it was in the
2:43:08
course of these cruel wars and their tragic aftermath.
2:43:12
That the citizens. Of Lagashe found themselves
2:43:14
deprived of their political and economic freedom for to raise
2:43:18
armies and supply them with arms and equipment.
2:43:21
The rulers. Found it necessary to infringe
2:43:24
on the personal rights of the. Individual citizen.
2:43:27
To tax his wealth and property to the limit and to appropriate
2:43:32
as well property belonging to the temple.
2:43:36
Under the impact of war, they met with a little opposition.
2:43:41
Once introduced, the palace coterie was most unwilling to
2:43:44
relinquish. The domestic controls even.
2:43:46
During peace, for they had proved highly profitable indeed,
2:43:51
our ancient bureaucrats devised a variety of revenue and income
2:43:57
sources, taxes and imposts that in some ways.
2:44:01
Could. Rival those of their modern
2:44:02
counterparts, citizens were thrown in jail on the slightest
2:44:06
pretext for debt, non payment of taxes or trumped up charges of
2:44:12
theft and murder. But let the historian who lived
2:44:16
in Lagashe more than 4200 years. Ago and who was there?
2:44:19
For a contemporary of the events he reports tell it more or less
2:44:23
in his words. 3 copies of his text were found in Lagashe,
2:44:27
suggesting that Arukagina and his fellow reformers were
2:44:30
justifiably proud of the social and moral revolution they had
2:44:33
caused. Ettavde in the days preceding
2:44:37
Orukagaina, or as the author puts it rather pompously,
2:44:41
formerly from days of yore, from the day the seed of man came.
2:44:45
Forth. Palace appointees practiced such
2:44:48
abuses as seizing, presumably without right or warrant,
2:44:51
property belonging to the citizens of Lagash, their
2:44:54
donkeys, sheep, and fisheries. Other citizens were malted more
2:44:58
or less indirectly of their goods and possessions by being
2:45:01
compelled to have their rations measured out in the palace, much
2:45:05
to their disadvantage, or to bring their sheep to the palace
2:45:08
for shearing, and to pay in cold cash for the service, at least
2:45:13
in certain specified cases. If a man.
2:45:16
Divorced his wife. The NC got 5 shekels and his
2:45:19
vizier got one shekel. If a perfumer made an oil
2:45:23
preparation, the NC got 5. Shekels the vizier got 1 shekel.
2:45:27
And the Abgal Palace steward got another.
2:45:31
As for the temple and its property, the NC took it over as
2:45:34
his own. To quote our ancient narrator
2:45:37
literally the oxen of the. Gods plowed the NC.
2:45:41
'S onion patches. The onion and cucumber.
2:45:44
Patches of the NC were located in the God's Best fields.
2:45:48
In addition, the more important temple officials, particularly
2:45:51
the Sangus, were. Deprived in one.
2:45:53
Way or another of their donkeys and oxen, and of much of their
2:45:56
grain and wearing apparel. Even death brought no relief
2:46:00
from levies and taxes. When a dead man was brought to
2:46:04
the cemetery for burial, there were two grades of.
2:46:06
Cemeteries. An ordinary one and another
2:46:09
called the reeds of Enki. Quite several officials and
2:46:12
parasites made it their business to be on hand to.
2:46:15
Relieve the. Bereaved family of quantities of
2:46:18
barley bread, date wine and various furnishings from one end
2:46:24
of the state to the other, our venerable reporter observes
2:46:28
bitterly. There were the tax collectors.
2:46:34
No wonder then that the palace waxed fat and prosperous.
2:46:38
It's lands and properties formed one vast continuous estate, in
2:46:43
the literal words of our Sumerian commentator.
2:46:47
The houses of the. NC and the fields of the NC.
2:46:51
The houses of the palace. Harem and the fields of the
2:46:54
Palace Harem, The houses of the palace nursery and the fields of
2:46:57
the palace nursery crowded each other side to side.
2:47:02
Also prevalent were other abuses, seemingly not directly
2:47:05
attributable to the palace bureaucracy, but resulting no
2:47:09
doubt from the general state of injustice.
2:47:11
Cynicism. And self.
2:47:12
Aggrandizement induced by its corrupt and oppressive actions.
2:47:17
Artisans and apprentices were reduced to abject.
2:47:21
Poverty and had to beg for. Their food Blind men, presumably
2:47:27
prisoners of war and enslaved. People blinded to prevent.
2:47:29
Escape were seized, put to watering the fields like
2:47:33
animals, and given only enough food to keep them alive.
2:47:37
The rich, the big men, and the supervisors were getting richer
2:47:42
and richer at the expense of the less fortunate citizens, such as
2:47:45
the shab lugafs, perhaps originally King's retainers, by
2:47:51
forcing them to sell their donkeys and houses at low prices
2:47:56
and against their will. The indigent, the poor, the
2:48:01
orphaned and the widowed were mistreated and deprived in one
2:48:06
way or another of what little they had by men of power and
2:48:10
influence. At this low point in the
2:48:12
political and social affairs of Leg Ash, our Sumerian historian
2:48:16
tells us the new and God fearing ruler, Urukagina was chosen by
2:48:21
Ningirsu, the tutelary deity of the city, out of the whole
2:48:26
multitude of Lagashe citizens and enjoined to reestablish the
2:48:30
divine laws that had been abandoned and neglected by his
2:48:33
predecessors. Urukagina followed Ningirsu's
2:48:36
instructions and faithfully executed the gods directives.
2:48:41
He outlawed confiscating citizens, donkeys, sheep and
2:48:44
fisheries, and the palace's collection of fees for rationing
2:48:48
and shearing. When a man divorces his wife,
2:48:52
neither the NC nor his. Vizier gets anything.
2:48:56
When a perfumer prepared oil, neither the ensai the.
2:49:00
Vizier. Nor the AB Gal got anything when
2:49:04
a dead man was brought to the cemetery for burial, the various
2:49:07
officials received. Considerably less.
2:49:09
Of the dead man's goods than formerly, in some cases a good
2:49:13
deal less than half, Uru Kagina returned the temple property
2:49:18
that the NC had taken for himself to the gods, and the
2:49:22
temple administrators now oversee the NC's palace and
2:49:25
those of his wife and children. From one end of the land to the
2:49:29
other, our contemporary historian observes, there were
2:49:33
no tax collectors. But removing the ubiquitous
2:49:37
bailiffs, tax collectors and other parasitic officials was
2:49:41
not Urukagina's only achievement.
2:49:44
He also stopped the injustice and exploitation suffered by the
2:49:48
poor at. The hands of the rich.
2:49:49
And mighty the guilds of artisans, certain blind
2:49:55
laborers. And other workers.
2:49:56
And various gala priests, probably temple singers,
2:49:59
received permanent food and drink rations.
2:50:03
Artisans and apprentices no longer had to beg for their
2:50:06
food. To prevent the.
2:50:08
Supervisors and big men from taking advantage of less
2:50:11
fortunate. Citizens.
2:50:13
Such as the Shab Lugafs, He promulgated 2 ordinances
2:50:17
forbidding them to force their more lowly brethren.
2:50:20
To sell their. Donkeys or houses against their
2:50:23
will, he amnestied and set free the citizens of Lagashe who had
2:50:28
been imprisoned for. Debt or failure to pay?
2:50:30
Taxes or on trumped up, presumably charges of theft or
2:50:35
murder. As for the orphan and the widow,
2:50:39
ready and helpless. Victims of the rich.
2:50:41
And powerful Urukagina made a covenant with the God Ningirsu.
2:50:47
That a man of power must. Not commit an injustice against
2:50:50
them. Finally, in one version of the
2:50:54
Urukagaina document. See pages 800.
2:50:57
And 21 to 22 there are rules that, if translated and
2:51:02
understood correctly, could be very important for the history
2:51:07
of law. They show that Sumerian.
2:51:10
Courts emphasize the need to clearly show everyone.
2:51:13
Through writing. The reasons for punishing the
2:51:15
accused thus the thief and the woman who marries 2 husbands
2:51:20
must be stoned with. Stones on which their.
2:51:22
Evil intent has been inscribed and the woman who has sinned by
2:51:26
saying something to a man that she should not have said, the
2:51:30
text giving her words is unfortunately unintelligible,
2:51:34
must have her teeth crushed with burnt bricks, upon which
2:51:38
presumably her guilty deed has been inscribed.
2:51:42
As is apparent from the Urukagina reform text, the
2:51:45
promulgation of laws and legal regulations by the rulers of the
2:51:48
Sumerian states was a common phenomenon by 2400 BC, and
2:51:54
probably even considerably earlier.
2:51:58
Therefore. It is not unreasonable to infer
2:52:01
that in the three centuries. That followed.
2:52:03
More than one official judge, palace archivist or professor of
2:52:07
the Aduba must have come upon the idea of writing down the
2:52:10
current and passed laws or precedents for reference or
2:52:16
teaching, but as of today, no such compilations have been
2:52:20
recovered between the days. Of Urukagina.
2:52:23
And those of UR Namu, the founder of the Third Dynasty of
2:52:26
UR, who began his reign about 2050 BC.
2:52:31
The Urnamu Law Code was originally inscribed, no doubt
2:52:34
on a stone. Staley.
2:52:36
Like that on which the Acadian Law Code of Hammurabi was
2:52:39
inscribed some 3 centuries later.
2:52:41
But what has been unearthed to date is not this original,
2:52:45
steely, nor even a contemporary copy of it, but a poorly
2:52:49
preserved clay tablet prepared. Several 100 years.
2:52:52
Later, this tablet was divided by the ancient Scribe into 8
2:52:56
columns. 4:00 on. The obverse and four on the
2:53:01
reverse. Each column contained about 45
2:53:05
small ruled spaces. Fewer.
2:53:07
Than half are now legible. The obverse contains a long
2:53:12
prologue that is only partially. Intelligible because of the.
2:53:15
Numerous breaks in the text briefly summarized.
2:53:19
Its contents may be reconstructed in.
2:53:21
Part as follows. After the world had been created
2:53:25
and the fate of the land, suma and the.
2:53:27
City ER, had been. Decided Anne and Enlil, the two
2:53:30
leading deities of the Sumerian pantheon.
2:53:33
Appointed the moon God Nana as the king of ER.
2:53:38
One day the God chose ER Namu as his earthly representative.
2:53:42
To rule over Sumer. And, ER, the new King's first
2:53:46
acts concerned the political and military safety of.
2:53:49
ER and Sumer. In particular, he found it
2:53:52
necessary to battle with the bordering city.
2:53:55
State. Of Lagashe, which was expanding
2:53:58
at ERS expense, he defeated and put to death its ruler, Namhani
2:54:04
and then. With the power of.
2:54:05
Nana, the king of the city, he re established ERS former
2:54:09
boundaries. Now came the time to turn to
2:54:12
internal affairs and institute social and.
2:54:15
Moral reforms? He removed the chiselers and
2:54:18
grafters or as the code describes them, the.
2:54:21
Grabbers. Of the citizens, oxen, sheep,
2:54:23
and donkeys. He then established and
2:54:26
regulated honest and unchangeable weights and
2:54:28
measures. He saw to it that the orphan did
2:54:32
not fall prey to the wealthy, the widow did not fall a prey to
2:54:36
the powerful and the man. Of 1 Shekellel.
2:54:40
Did not fall a prey to the. Man of 1.
2:54:43
Miner 60 shekels and although the relevant passage is
2:54:48
destroyed, this side of the tablet no doubt contained a
2:54:52
statement that UR Namu promulgated the laws that
2:54:55
followed to ensure justice in the land and promote the welfare
2:54:59
of its citizens. The tablet's back had the laws,
2:55:03
but only 5 can be restored due to damage.
2:55:07
One of them deals with an accusation of witchcraft and
2:55:09
involves a trial by the water. Ordeal.
2:55:12
Another treats the return of an enslaved person to his master,
2:55:17
but it is the other three laws, fragmentry and difficult as
2:55:21
their contents. Are.
2:55:22
That are of exceptional importance for the history of
2:55:25
man's social and spiritual growth for they show that even
2:55:29
before 2000 BC, the. Law of eye.
2:55:33
For eye and tooth for tooth had already given way to the far
2:55:38
more humane approach in which a money fine was substituted as a
2:55:42
punishment. These three laws read as
2:55:45
follows. If a man has cut.
2:55:48
Off another man's. Foot with an instrument, he
2:55:50
shall pay 10. Shekels of silver.
2:55:53
A man has severed with a weapon the bones of another man whose.
2:55:57
He shall pay 1. MENA of silver, a man has cut
2:56:01
off with a gouged instrument the nose.
2:56:04
Of another. Man, he shall pay percent of a
2:56:07
MENA of silver. Ur Namu, the founder of the
2:56:11
Third Dynasty of Ur, left no. Law codes behind.
2:56:16
But for the 38 year period, beginning with the 32nd year of
2:56:19
Shulgi or Namu's son and successor, and ending with the
2:56:24
third year of the tragic and pathetic Ibi sin, we have.
2:56:28
A group of over. 300 court records that are highly
2:56:30
revealing for the legal practices and court procedures
2:56:33
of the Sumerian city states, as well As for their social and
2:56:36
economic organization. These records all stem from when
2:56:41
the Sumerians were approaching the end of their history, but
2:56:45
there is little doubt that they reflect the customs and modes of
2:56:48
earlier days to some degree. Most of these court archives
2:56:52
were excavated in Lagache and have been copied.
2:56:55
Published and. Partly translated by French
2:56:57
scholars, especially Charles Violo and Henri de Genuiac.
2:57:02
In 1956, Adam Falkenstein published new transliterations
2:57:06
and translations of all these court documents, together with a
2:57:10
detailed commentary and discussion, thus adding another
2:57:13
to his significant series of contributions to sumerology.
2:57:17
The following sketch of the legal procedures current in the
2:57:20
Sumerian city state is based almost entirely on Folsenstein's
2:57:24
publication. The ancient scribes designated
2:57:27
the court records as Detilus, meaning completed lawsuits.
2:57:32
At least thirteen of these are not lawsuits, but merely court
2:57:34
notarizations of. Agreements or contracts?
2:57:37
Involving marriage, divorce, wife support, gifts, sales, and
2:57:44
the appointment of various individuals to temple offices.
2:57:47
The remainder, which are all records of actual lawsuits,
2:57:51
concern marriage contracts, divorces, inheritance, enslaved
2:57:55
people, hiring of boats, claims of all sorts, pledges, and such
2:58:01
miscellaneous items as pretrial investigations, subpoenas,
2:58:05
theft, damage to property, and malfeasance in office.
2:58:10
Theoretically at least, by the time of the Third Dynasty of Ur,
2:58:15
the king of the whole of Summa was responsible for law and
2:58:17
justice. But in practice.
2:58:20
The administration of law was in the hands of the NSIS, the local
2:58:24
rulers of the various city states in the.
2:58:28
Earlier court. Documents only the NSI's name
2:58:31
appears. As a kind of official.
2:58:33
Signature Later, the NSI's name appears together with the names
2:58:38
of the judges who. Decided the.
2:58:39
Case and later the judges names appear without the NCI's name.
2:58:45
However, in the inscription on the tablet containers where
2:58:49
these documents were stored and filed in chronological order,
2:58:52
the name of the NC is usually given along with those of the
2:58:55
judges. According to the available
2:58:58
material, the temple primarily served as a.
2:59:01
Location for administering. Oaths and played no other role
2:59:04
in the administration of justice there.
2:59:08
In one instance, however, an individual is described.
2:59:11
As the judge of the House. Of Nana, the main temple at Ur,
2:59:17
which might indicate that special judges were.
2:59:19
Appointed by the. Temple for one reason or?
2:59:21
Another. The courts usually consisted of
2:59:24
three or four judges, although there.
2:59:27
Were only one. Or two, In some cases there were
2:59:30
no. Judges by.
2:59:31
Profession of the 36 men. Listed in the documents.
2:59:36
Most were important temple administrators, sea merchants,
2:59:40
couriers, scribes, constables, inspectors, augurs, prefects,
2:59:47
archivists, city elders, and even Ensis.
2:59:51
There are, however, several individuals designated as royal
2:59:54
judges. And one of.
2:59:56
The documents ends with the words The Distillate of the
2:59:59
Seven Royal Judges of Nippur. Which points to the existence of
3:00:03
a special court at Nippur, perhaps a kind of court of last.
3:00:06
Appeal. Nothing is known of the methods
3:00:09
or criteria governing the appointment of the judges, the
3:00:12
length of their service, or how much, if any, remuneration they
3:00:17
received. The Mashkeem, a court clerk and
3:00:20
bailiff who prepared the case and handled court procedure
3:00:23
details, usually appears before the judges names in the court
3:00:26
archives. Well over 100 Mashkeems are
3:00:30
listed in the distillates. And they all come from the same.
3:00:33
Social stratum as the judges. The role of Mashkeem, therefore,
3:00:38
was also not a regular and permanent profession.
3:00:42
There is some indication that the Mashkeem was paid for his
3:00:44
services. Thus.
3:00:47
There is a statement in one of the documents that reads.
3:00:50
One shekel of. Silver and 1 lamb were payment.
3:00:54
For what the. Mashkeem did.
3:00:57
In some of the Datillas, the names of the judges and Mashkeem
3:01:00
are followed by a. List of individuals described.
3:01:02
As witnesses of one type or another who represent not the
3:01:06
litigants but the public at the court trials in a lawsuit, the
3:01:11
Sumerian court procedure was as follows.
3:01:14
One of the parties or the state administration, if the state's
3:01:18
interests were involved, initiated the lawsuit.
3:01:22
The testimony before the court might consist of statements made
3:01:26
by witnesses, usually underoath, or by one of the parties
3:01:31
underoath. It might also be in the form of
3:01:35
written documents or statements made.
3:01:37
By experts. Or important officials.
3:01:41
The verdict was conditional and became operative.
3:01:45
Only after an oath had been administered.
3:01:46
In the temple to the party of whom the court demanded it as
3:01:49
proof of their claim. Witnesses, not litigants,
3:01:53
usually took this oath unless the litigant.
3:01:55
Denied the witnesses. Testimony No oath was necessary
3:02:00
if a written document was available to one of.
3:02:02
The parties. At times, the Mashkeem, who had
3:02:06
participated in an earlier court action relevant.
3:02:08
To the issue took an oath. The verdict was usually
3:02:12
expressed quite tersely with such phrases.
3:02:14
As it. That is, the object or slave
3:02:17
involved in the litigation was confirmed as belonging to X the
3:02:21
winning party or X the winning party has taken it the object or
3:02:26
slave. As his due.
3:02:29
Or even why the losing party must pay.
3:02:35
The document sometimes, but not always, stated the reason for
3:02:39
the verdict. Following the verdict, the
3:02:42
document occasionally contained a clause of renunciation.
3:02:45
And. Abjuration some 200 years after
3:02:49
UR Namu, A ruler from the dynasty of Isin named Lipit
3:02:54
Ishtar. Promulgated.
3:02:56
A law code which has been unearthed in the form of
3:02:59
fragments of one large 20 column tablet originally containing the
3:03:03
entire text and four excerpt tablets used for school
3:03:08
practice. Like the Akkadian code of
3:03:10
Hammurabi, it consists of three sections, A prologue, the laws
3:03:16
themselves, and an epilogue. The prologue begins with a
3:03:20
statement put in the mouth of the king Lipid Ishtar, that
3:03:23
after Anne and Enlil had given Nin and Sinner, the goddess who
3:03:26
was the tutelary deity of Isin, the kingship of Suma and Akkad,
3:03:31
and after they had called him Lipid Ishtar to the to the to
3:03:36
the Princess of the land to bring well-being to the
3:03:41
Sumerians and the Acadians, he promulgated a code of justice in
3:03:45
Sumer and Akkad. He then cites some of his
3:03:49
achievements regarding the welfare of his subjects.
3:03:52
He freed the sons and daughters of Sumer and Akkad from slavery
3:03:55
imposed upon them and re established several equitable
3:03:59
family practices. Unfortunately, the end of the
3:04:02
prologue is destroyed. As for the laws themselves, the
3:04:07
available text permits the. Restoration.
3:04:10
Holy or in part of some 38 practically.
3:04:14
All of which. Belong to the second-half of the
3:04:16
code. The first hall is almost
3:04:19
entirely destroyed. The subject matter in these laws
3:04:23
includes hiring boats, real estate, particularly orchards,
3:04:28
enslaved people and perhaps servants, defaulting on taxes,
3:04:32
inheritance and marriage, and rental of oxen.
3:04:36
The epilogue follows the Last Law, but it's hard to read due
3:04:40
to the many. Text breaks.
3:04:42
It begins with a reiteration by Lipid Ishtar that he
3:04:45
established. Justice in the land?
3:04:47
And brought well-being to its people.
3:04:50
He then states that he set up this steely.
3:04:55
The code was therefore as might have been expected.
3:04:59
Inscribed on a steely of. Which the tablets were copies
3:05:03
and proceeds to pronounce a blessing on those who will not
3:05:05
damage it in any way and a curse against those who will.
3:05:10
Nangawadu, we can estimate the Sumerian city's population.
3:05:14
By looking at its material aspects rather than its.
3:05:17
Socio economic structure However, this is hardly possible
3:05:22
since there was no official. Census we have found.
3:05:24
No traces of 1. At least with a reasonable.
3:05:27
Degree of accuracy for Lagash Diakonov, see above page 75.
3:05:35
After studying the rather incomplete and indirect data
3:05:38
provided by the economic texts. Estimates of free population of
3:05:42
about 100,000 and for ER at about 2000 BC when it was the
3:05:49
capital of Suma for the third time.
3:05:51
CL Woolley in his recent article The Urbanization of Society, 11.
3:05:57
Estimates of population of some 360,000 souls.
3:06:01
His figure is based on tenuous comparisons and dubious
3:06:05
assumptions, and it might be wise to cut it by about half,
3:06:10
which would still give her a population of close to 200,000.
3:06:15
Except. For the Temenos, the sacred area
3:06:18
of the city with its main temples and ziggurat, the
3:06:21
Sumerian city was hardly an attractive sight, to quote
3:06:25
woolly if the residential quarters excavated at ER.
3:06:29
Give as. Presumably, hey do a fair sample
3:06:32
of the city as a whole, we see something that has grown out of
3:06:35
the conditions of the primitive village.
3:06:38
Not laid out. On any system of town planning
3:06:41
the unpaved streets were narrow and winding, sometimes mere
3:06:45
blind alleys leading to houses hidden away in the middle of a
3:06:48
great block of haphazard buildings.
3:06:51
Large houses and small are tumbled together, a few of them.
3:06:55
Flat roof tenements 1. Story High, most of them two
3:06:59
stories and a few apparently, of three lanes sheltered by awnings
3:07:07
and lined with open booths, correspond to the bazaars.
3:07:10
Of the modern. Middle Eastern town
3:07:12
nevertheless, to judge from passages in lamentation over the
3:07:16
destruction of UR, it had its attractions, lofty gates and
3:07:21
avenues for promenading and boulevards where feasts were
3:07:24
celebrated from a scribe and his perverse son.
3:07:28
And love finds a way. We learned that the city had a
3:07:31
public square that was not devoid of appeal to the young
3:07:35
and the pleasure seeking. The average Sumerian house was a
3:07:38
small, one story mud brick structure with several rooms,
3:07:42
usually grouped around an open court.
3:07:44
On the other hand, the well to do Sumerian probably lived in a
3:07:47
two-story House of about a dozen rooms, built of brick and
3:07:51
plastered and whitewashed inside and out.
3:07:55
The ground floor of the two-story house consisted of a
3:07:57
reception room, kitchen, lavatory, servants quarters, and
3:08:02
sometimes even a private Chapel. There were low tables, high
3:08:06
backed chairs and beds with wooden.
3:08:08
Frames for. Furniture Household vessels were
3:08:12
made of clay, stone, copper and bronze.
3:08:15
Baskets and. Chests were made of reeds and
3:08:18
wood floors and walls were covered with Reed mats, skin
3:08:22
rugs. And woolen.
3:08:24
Hangings below the house was often a family mausoleum where
3:08:28
the dead were buried. Although they're according to
3:08:31
the king list, Itana is followed by 7 rulers, several of whom, to
3:08:36
judge from their names, were Semites rather than Sumerians.
3:08:41
The 8th was King Enmerbura. Jesse about.
3:08:45
Whom we have some historical. Or at least saga like
3:08:47
information from the king. List and other late.
3:08:49
Sumerian literary works. Moreover, a young sumarologist
3:08:54
working in Baghdad only recently.
3:08:56
Discovered a precious. Three word contemporary
3:08:58
inscription on a small fragment of an alabaster vase, proving
3:09:03
beyond doubt that he was not a mythical king but a real 19.
3:09:11
By the time Enma Barajisi came to the throne of Kish, another
3:09:15
Sumerian city state far to the South of Kish had come to the
3:09:18
fore and was challenging Kish's supremacy for not long after the
3:09:23
reign of Itana. It would seem that a king by the
3:09:26
name of Mesquiagashir, described in King List as the son of Utu,
3:09:33
the Sumerian sun God, founded an ambitious and powerful dynasty
3:09:37
in the city of Eric, which in his days was still known by the
3:09:40
older name Iyana House. Of Anne the.
3:09:44
Heaven God, to judge from a rather ambiguous and obscure
3:09:48
note attached to his name in King List, which reads He
3:09:51
entered the seas and ascended the mountains.
3:09:54
He may have tried to extend his sway over the lands all around
3:09:57
Suma and far beyond. However, his son and Merka, who
3:10:02
succeeded him on the throne according to the King List, was
3:10:05
one of Suma's most notable figures.
3:10:08
The epic poems refer to him as the.
3:10:12
Son of Utu. Just as his father did in the
3:10:15
King list. According to the king list, he
3:10:19
built the city of Erik. And according to the.
3:10:22
Epic Tales. He led a campaign against Errata
3:10:26
somewhere in the neighborhood of the Caspian Sea and subjugated
3:10:30
it to Erik. One of in Merkar's heroic
3:10:33
heralds and companions in arms in his struggle with Errata was
3:10:37
Lugalbanda, who succeeded in Merkar to the throne of Erik,
3:10:42
since he is the major protagonist of at least two Epic
3:10:45
Tales. He too must have.
3:10:47
Been a venerable and impressive ruler and it is not surprising
3:10:50
to find that by 2400 BC and perhaps even.
3:10:53
Earlier. He had been deified by the
3:10:56
Sumerian theologians and given a place in the Sumerian pantheon.
3:11:00
Unfortunately, neither the King List nor the epic tales provide
3:11:04
any information about his political and military
3:11:07
achievements, except that he accompanied N Mercar on his
3:11:11
errata campaign. Lugalbanda, according to the
3:11:14
King List, is followed by Dumuzi, A ruler who became the
3:11:18
major figure in a Sumerian holy marriage rite and dying God
3:11:22
myth, which left a deep impression on the ancient world.
3:11:26
In fact, the. Women of.
3:11:28
Jerusalem, to the horror of the prophet Ezekiel, was still
3:11:33
lamenting his death in the 6th century BC.
3:11:37
Ezekiel 814, one of the months of the Jewish calendar, bears
3:11:41
his name to this day and the fasting and lamentation that
3:11:44
mark its 17th day, no doubt harking back to the Sumerian
3:11:48
days of the distant past. It remains unknown why the
3:11:52
latest Sumerian theologians singled out Dumuzi as the
3:11:56
protagonist of this particular rite and myth.
3:12:00
This view is likely due to Dumuzi's lasting impact as.
3:12:04
A man and ruler. But no historical data supports
3:12:08
it. Gilgamesh, a king whose acts
3:12:11
garnered him so great fame. That he became the supreme.
3:12:14
Hero of Sumerian myth and legend follows Demuzzi according to the
3:12:18
king list in Sumerian and most of the other more significant
3:12:23
languages of Western. Asia.
3:12:26
Poems praising Gilgamesh and his accomplishments were composed
3:12:30
and reworked over the millennia. Gilgamesh became the ideal hero
3:12:35
of the ancient world, a character of adventure, bravery
3:12:40
and tragedy who stood for the vain yet limitless search for
3:12:43
renowned glory and immortality. Sometimes modern academics
3:12:48
confuse him with a legendary person instead of a real man and
3:12:51
king. Though there is some chance the
3:12:53
excavations are now, we still lack modern recordings of him.
3:12:58
Eric's actions might find some, but in 1955, Gilgamesh and his
3:13:04
contemporaries were. Illuminated by the 1st. 10 lines
3:13:07
of a well known turn mile inscription that came to light.
3:13:10
This little passage greatly and unexpectedly illuminates the
3:13:14
political environment. In those early.
3:13:15
Days of sumerian history guiding one to enter the topic in great
3:13:19
depth. The king list places Kish, Erek
3:13:23
and URS first 3 Sumerian. Dynasties following the.
3:13:26
Flood in that sequence from Sumerian epic and hymnal law.
3:13:31
It had been known for some time that the last two kings of the
3:13:34
Kish dynasty, Enmebra Jesi, of whom, as was noted above, we now
3:13:40
have a contemporary. Inscription and.
3:13:43
His son Agha were contemporaries of Gilgamesh, the 5th ruler of
3:13:48
Eric, with whom they carried on a bitter struggle for supremacy
3:13:52
over Sumer. 10 Cuneiformists usually agreed that the first
3:13:56
dynasty of Kish and the first dynasty of Eric overlapped
3:14:00
extensively regarding the first dynasty of UR, from which we now
3:14:04
have several modern inscriptions.
3:14:07
Its founder, Mesana Pada, was taken by almost all scholars to
3:14:12
have lived quite later than Gilgamesh.
3:14:14
Of Erek. The proposed period between
3:14:18
these two rulers varying. From as little as. 40 to as many
3:14:22
as 400 years. It therefore came somewhat as a.
3:14:28
Shock to realize. As a result of the new evidence,
3:14:32
based on a hitherto unknown passage of no more than 10
3:14:35
lines, that Messanapada was actually an older contemporary
3:14:40
of Gilgamesh. That.
3:14:42
Even Messanapada's son Mesquiagnuna was a contemporary
3:14:47
of Gilgamesh and that it was Messanapada of Ur who brought
3:14:51
the first dynasty of Kish. To an end.
3:14:54
Not Gilgamesh, or for that matter any other ruler of the
3:14:57
first dynasty of Eric, despite the statement in the king list
3:15:01
reading Kish was smitten with. Weapons.
3:15:04
Its kingship was carried to IANA, the 34 line
3:15:08
historiographic tablet cited above, known as the Tummel.
3:15:11
Inscription. Is the source of this fresh
3:15:13
evidence. Tummel is the name of a Nippur
3:15:17
area dedicated to the goddess Ninlil, most surely including
3:15:21
her most significant shrine. Except for the 1st 10 lines, the
3:15:25
Tummel text has been known almost since 1914, when Arno
3:15:30
Pobel published 2 tablets bearing the composition in his
3:15:33
book. Historical.
3:15:34
Texts starting with line 11. This sentence flows as follows.
3:15:40
The tumal. Collapsed once more a second
3:15:42
time. Dusra Gilgamesh constructed the
3:15:45
Enlil House of Newmanbura. From.
3:15:48
Gilgamesh's son Urlu Gal created the Tamil pre eminent
3:15:53
transported Ninlil to the Tamil. The Tamil sank into ruin three
3:15:57
Times Now. For the House of Enlil.
3:16:01
Nana constructed the lofty park Mesquiag.
3:16:05
Nana, the son of Nana, made the tunnel preeminent, brought nilil
3:16:10
before the tunnel. The tumal sank into ruin.
3:16:13
Four times. Now.
3:16:15
Urnamu erected. The Echo Shulgi is the son of.
3:16:19
Urnamu. Created the tunnel.
3:16:22
Preeminent. And brought Nilil to the tunnel.
3:16:26
The Tamil collapsed into ruin five times already.
3:16:30
From Amarsin's year. Of birth until the year the
3:16:35
monarch Ibisin dies. Enam Galana was the N of Inana
3:16:40
of Eric Chosen. Ninlil arrived at the tunnel.
3:16:46
Word of Lu Inana. Claims that the.
3:16:48
Ashgab Gal in Enlil Ishbiera constructed the Ekurai Giglala
3:16:54
Enlil's warehouse. From this book it was evident
3:16:57
that its. Author who lived in the time.
3:16:59
Of Ishbi era. The founder of the 1st.
3:17:01
Dynasty of Isin intended to provide a brief historical
3:17:04
summary of the several buildings in the Enlil temple complex at
3:17:08
Nipur, and in particular of the restorations of Nin Lil's tumal,
3:17:14
even with the initial passage missing.
3:17:17
Moreover, the very remarkable stylistic pattern used by the
3:17:20
author allowed one to determine the general character of the
3:17:25
contents of the missing 5 lines immediately before, even though
3:17:29
not the names of the individuals involved.
3:17:32
Therefore, since the given material started with the five
3:17:36
line phrase, the tumul sank once more a second time.
3:17:40
The Numenbora of the. House of.
3:17:42
Enlil was constructed by Gilgamesh, son of Gilgamesh UR
3:17:45
Lugal. I took Ninlil to the tumul and
3:17:48
made it top pre eminent. It appeared.
3:17:51
Logical to assume that the five lines that preceded had read the
3:17:56
first time the tunnel collapsed X erected the Y.
3:17:59
Building for the House of Enlil. ZX's son I brought Ninlil to the
3:18:04
tunnel and made the pre eminent one.
3:18:07
Regarding the section at the beginning of the record, one
3:18:10
could not deduce its. Contents even if it appeared.
3:18:12
Logical to suppose that this should have indicated who
3:18:15
erected the House of Endlil and the tunnel first.
3:18:19
Fortunately, the whole missing 10 line passage is found on 2.
3:18:22
Tablets in the Hilprecht. Collection of the Friedrich
3:18:25
Schiller University, which I first studied in the course of a
3:18:29
10 week stay in Jena in the autumn.
3:18:32
Of. 1955 and which Inez Bernhardt, the assistant curator
3:18:39
of the Hilprecht Collection, has copied for a volume of literary
3:18:42
texts that appeared in 1961. There is now no need for
3:18:47
guesses, inferences or restorations, though both are
3:18:53
partial. Fortunately, they complement one
3:18:55
another so that the first. Ten line portion of the.
3:18:57
Text does not have one missing sign.
3:19:01
These lines suggest the following enmebaragesi.
3:19:05
King. This exact city, Nepur was the
3:19:09
site of building the House of Enlil Agar.
3:19:13
The Enmebaragesi Sun made the Tamil top.
3:19:16
Preeminent. Brought into the tunnel, the
3:19:20
tunnel collapsed into ruin for the first time building the
3:19:24
Bershua of the House of Enlil Messanipada, son of Messanipada
3:19:29
Meskyagnuna made the Tamil first brought Nin Lil to the tumul.
3:19:35
The work then continues. The tumul collapsed into ruin
3:19:39
once more. Gilgamesh and others.
3:19:43
Thus, it is clear that Gilgamesh Messanipada and his son
3:19:46
Mesquiagnunda. Ruled Nipur.
3:19:48
Before, unless the Tamil record is historically dubious, but it
3:19:52
is abundantly evident that they were also contemporaries of
3:19:56
Gilgamesh. Since.
3:19:57
They followed Aga, a modern of Gilgamesh based on the
3:20:01
previously shown Gilgamesh Aga synchronism.
3:20:04
Consequently, the historical events reported and hinted at in
3:20:07
the recently recovered Tumal Passage should be rebuilt as
3:20:10
follows. Messanipada, the first dynasty
3:20:13
of ER's founder battled Aga, the final king of the first dynasty
3:20:17
of Kish to seize authority over Nipa.
3:20:19
Messanipada was indeed termed King of Kish rather than King of
3:20:24
ER on his seal inscription since the title king of Kish had time
3:20:29
on a dignity and he most certainly attacked Kish itself
3:20:34
and was directly. Responsible for AGA's.
3:20:35
Downfall, but Mesanapada only had time to construct the
3:20:40
Bashushwa a new. Structure in the enlil.
3:20:42
Temple complex. He must have been an older man
3:20:45
by the time Nippur came into his hands.
3:20:48
Meski Agnuna, his son, left it to make the tunnel for nin Lil
3:20:52
whole again. Then Gilgamesh, a young man who
3:20:56
had clearly struggled with the Agar of Kish and his father and
3:20:59
Mbarrajisi, destroyed Meski Agnuna's rule over Nippur.
3:21:04
By this time, Gilgamesh must also have been far along in
3:21:07
years. In any case, his son UR Lugal
3:21:11
rebuilt the tunnel Messanapada, the founder of the first dynasty
3:21:16
of UR. Was an older contemporary of.
3:21:18
Gilgamesh, who most likely reigned sometime around 2600 BC.
3:21:23
He had already been deified by about 2500 BC.
3:21:29
The date of his reign is about a century or so earlier than
3:21:31
scholars had usually assigned it.
3:21:33
On the available. But far from conclusive
3:21:36
epigraphic evidence, this condition still brings another
3:21:39
chronological issue that should be considered even if it cannot
3:21:43
be addressed in the present. The King list does not mention
3:21:47
either of these kings, thus it isn't easy to ascertain whether
3:21:51
they came before or after Messanipada.
3:21:54
Excavating the famous royal cemetery at UR revealed a white
3:21:58
shell. Cylinder.
3:21:59
Seal bearing the words Mescalamdug king and another
3:22:03
with the words Akalamdug king of Ur.
3:22:07
Sir Leonard Woolley, The excavator, argues that these two
3:22:10
kings. Must have been earlier.
3:22:12
In date than Mesanapada since several seal impressions bearing
3:22:17
the name of Mesanapada were unearthed from a mass of trash
3:22:21
scattered over the area of the royal cemetery where the
3:22:24
Mescalamdug and Akalamdug seals were located.
3:22:28
This may be so, but the likelihood that Messanipada
3:22:31
predates the other two. Monarchs is not to be
3:22:32
discounted. The interpretation of
3:22:36
archaeological and stratigraphic evidence leaves room for.
3:22:38
Error. Through their terrible 3
3:22:41
cornered struggle for dominance, Kish.
3:22:44
Eric and UR Kings. Must have severely undermined
3:22:47
Suma and compromised its military prowess.
3:22:50
The King List claims that following the first dynasty of
3:22:53
UR, the kingship of Sumer was taken off to the ellamitic city
3:22:58
state of Arwan, some distance from Susa.
3:23:03
Just how and when Sumer healed from this blow is quite unknown.
3:23:07
Although King List notes that Arwan was smitten by weapons,
3:23:12
its kingship was carried off to Kish.
3:23:17
No. Inscriptions from the second
3:23:18
dynasty of Kish have been discovered, and the fact that
3:23:22
the elimtic dynasty of Hamas followed points to the
3:23:25
Sumerians, not the king list indicates that Hamas dynasty was
3:23:29
preceded by a second dynasty of Eric, for which no inscriptional
3:23:33
evidence has yet come to light. Following.
3:23:36
This dynasty. We come to a king who might have
3:23:38
saved Suma. The King.
3:23:40
List credits the remarkably lengthy. 90 year reign.
3:23:45
Of Lugal Anamundu, a king of Adab, he left a record proving
3:23:51
he was a strong. Conqueror and.
3:23:52
Military commander over the fertile.
3:23:53
Crescent. From the Mediterranean to the
3:23:55
Zagros Mountains, this inscription has arrived as a
3:24:00
copy created almost a Millennium.
3:24:02
Following the events it. Documents.
3:24:04
But its contents ring true and trustworthy, meticulously,
3:24:09
minutely and convincingly documented.
3:24:13
Lugalane Mundu, according to this document, is king of the
3:24:17
four quarters of the universe, a ruler who made all the foreign
3:24:22
lands pay steady tribute to him, who brought peace to literally
3:24:28
made lie in the pastures, the peoples of all the lands, who
3:24:33
built the temples of all the great gods, who restored summer
3:24:36
to its former glory, who exercised kingship over the
3:24:40
entire world. The text then proceeds to name
3:24:44
13 Ensis with the city. States over which they.
3:24:47
Wielded power, who banded together in rebellion against
3:24:51
him, and whom he defeated. It is not.
3:24:53
Uninteresting to find that most of these Ensis, including those
3:24:57
of Elamite kingdoms, have Semitic names, though the
3:25:01
narrative is rather fragmented. Lugalanimundu next grabbed
3:25:04
Gutium. Whose people are?
3:25:06
Known from later inscriptions as Suma's most Hated enemy and
3:25:09
several other territories, the main part of the document is
3:25:13
devoted to the building in Arda of a temple named.
3:25:15
Enamzu. Dedicated to the chief deity of
3:25:18
the city, the Mother Goddess Nintu, the temple was
3:25:22
particularly noteworthy for its seven gates and seven doors,
3:25:26
each of which had a special name, such as Lofty Gate, Great
3:25:32
Gate, Gate of Divine Decrees, Lofty Door, Door of Refreshing
3:25:39
Shade, and so on. When the temple was completed,
3:25:43
the document states that Lugalana Mandu dedicated it to
3:25:46
the goddess with sacrifices of 7 * 7 fatted oxen and fatted sheep
3:25:52
and the viziers or Sukal Maths of Cedar Mountain Land.
3:25:58
Elam, Mahashi, Gautium, Subir, Martu, Sutium and Iyana, the old
3:26:03
name for the Kingdom of Eric, came with sacrifices to the Adar
3:26:07
Temple to participate in the celebration.
3:26:10
This rather extraordinary dedicatory inscription then
3:26:13
closes with the exhortation that the goddess Nintu should grant
3:26:16
long life to the enses of these 7 lands if they continue to
3:26:19
bring offerings and sacrifices to the enamzu of Ada.
3:26:23
Lugala. Nemundu, It is clear from this
3:26:26
inscription, was therefore one of the more powerful and dynamic
3:26:29
rulers of Summa to judge from the list and location of lands
3:26:34
he controlled. Cedar Mountain land.
3:26:37
Elam, Mahashi and Gutium in the east, Subir in the north, Matu
3:26:45
in the West, and Sutium and Iana in the center and South.
3:26:49
He might well call himself a ruler of the four quarters of
3:26:53
the universe. Lugalanamundu's rule may date
3:26:56
back to the 26th century BC, at least half a century before the
3:27:00
Sumerian rulers, whose dates can be closely calculated using the
3:27:04
Lagash documents. These rulers followed each other
3:27:07
in close succession, leaving no room for a figure as powerful
3:27:12
and dominant as Lugalanamundu, starting with about 2500 and
3:27:18
ending with about two. 1003. 150 BC We have a series of
3:27:24
dedicatory inscriptions that enable us to reconstruct.
3:27:27
A more. Or less continuous and unbroken
3:27:31
history of Suma, at least as far as the major figures and events
3:27:37
are concerned. These derive primarily from
3:27:40
Lagash, a city state in the. Southeastern part of.
3:27:43
Suma, which for some as yet unknown reason is not mentioned
3:27:50
in the King list, but which played a very important role in
3:27:54
the political history of Suma between about 2450 and 2300 BC.
3:28:02
To be sure, Lagash was only one of the kingdoms that constituted
3:28:06
the land of Sumer. Throughout this stretch of 150
3:28:09
years, more than half a dozen others existed alongside each
3:28:13
other. For example, Mari.
3:28:15
Adab. Erik ER Kish and Akshak.
3:28:21
Unfortunately, we know little of what actually transpired in them
3:28:24
since practically. Nothing but the names.
3:28:26
Of the rulers has come down to us only rarely is a document
3:28:30
found that records a significant political and military.
3:28:33
Event. We have hundreds of dedicatory
3:28:36
inscriptions from Lagash. Which are the most repetitive
3:28:40
but. Valuable for this period's
3:28:41
history. This means, of course, that we
3:28:45
see the events through Lagashite.
3:28:47
'S eyes. Still, to judge from those cases
3:28:50
that can be verified by other sources, the Lagashite
3:28:53
historians seem to have respected the truth and recorded
3:28:56
the facts as they took place, although the pious and religious
3:28:59
character of the historical style they developed is
3:29:02
sometimes obscure and confusing. It is then primarily from these
3:29:07
Lagashe inscriptions that the. Course of historical events.
3:29:10
About to be sketched. Can be reconstructed not much
3:29:14
later than about 2500 BC. They came on the Sumerian.
3:29:19
Scene A ruler named Mesalim who took the title.
3:29:22
King of Kish. And seemed to be in control of
3:29:24
the entire land. His inscribed Mace head was
3:29:28
found in Lagashe, several of his inscribed objects were found in
3:29:32
a dab and most important. Of all.
3:29:35
He was the responsible arbitrator in a bitter boundary
3:29:37
dispute between the kingdoms of Lagashe and Uma, a generation or
3:29:43
so following the Selim's reign, 2400. 50 BC OR.
3:29:47
Thereabouts, a man named Urnanche established himself as
3:29:51
King of Lagashe and founded a dynasty to endure for five
3:29:55
generations. We do not know where Unanshi
3:29:58
came from or how he rose to power.
3:30:05
There is even a bare possibility that he was originally not a
3:30:08
Sumerian. But a semite from a.
3:30:09
Land known as Tydnam to the West of Sumer.
3:30:13
Be that as it may, he has left behind him some 50 inscriptions.
3:30:18
On. Tablets, plaques, door sockets,
3:30:22
bricks and nails, which record primarily the building of
3:30:26
temples and digging of canals. He also fashioned divine
3:30:31
statues. 13 One of the sentences occurring repeatedly in these
3:30:37
inscriptions, however, carries political and economic
3:30:43
implications of a rather startling character, although it
3:30:48
is to be noted that the translation here offered is not
3:30:50
yet fully assured. The statement reads, the ships
3:30:55
of Dilman brought him Ornanche wood as a tribute from foreign
3:31:00
lands, which implies that Ornanche was powerful enough to
3:31:04
control several foreign lands beyond the Persian Gulf. 14 To
3:31:09
date, however, there is no other evidence to verify so far
3:31:13
reaching a claim, and it may be advisable to let the matter rest
3:31:17
as uncertain for the present. 1 of Ornanche's sons, a Kurgal
3:31:22
succeeded him on the throne of Lagashe.
3:31:24
Early in his reign he encountered difficulties with
3:31:27
the Umatis, and his rule was short lived.
3:31:30
He was succeeded by his son Iannatum, whose military
3:31:33
conquests made him the most powerful figure of his day, so
3:31:37
much so that he dared assume, at least for a few brief years, the
3:31:41
title King of Kish, which carried with it the claim to
3:31:44
supremacy over all Sumer. He started his reign by
3:31:48
rebuilding the parts of his Kingdom that the Ummates
3:31:50
destroyed in a Kurgel's. Time.
3:31:53
But he lately embarked on a series of victorious military
3:31:56
enterprises. Conducted against.
3:31:58
Elam to the east, Uma to the north, and Eric and URR to the
3:32:02
West, not to mention several cities whose location is still
3:32:07
unknown. The immediate causes for these
3:32:10
wars are unknown, except in the case of Uma.
3:32:14
For an account of this struggle, we have the rather detailed.
3:32:18
Document prepared by. One of the archivists of.
3:32:21
Ianatom's nephew. And Tamena.
3:32:23
And from it we may reconstruct the background and drama of the
3:32:27
conflict between Lagash and Uma, and the Anatom's temporarily
3:32:31
successful role in it, as follows.
3:32:34
In the days when Mesalim was king of Kish and at least the
3:32:37
nominal suzerain of Sumer, a border dispute developed between
3:32:41
the cities of Lagash and Uma, both of which clearly
3:32:44
acknowledged Mesalim as their overlord.
3:32:47
The latter proceeded to arbitrate the controversy by
3:32:50
measuring off. A boundary line.
3:32:52
Between the two cities, according to an Oracle of
3:32:55
Saturn, a deity in charge of settling complaints.
3:33:00
Moreover, he erected and inscribed Staley to mark the
3:33:03
spot and. Prevent future disputes.
3:33:06
Not long afterward, Ush an NC of Ummah broke the terms of the
3:33:09
decision. The time is not stated, but
3:33:12
there are indications that this violation took place not long
3:33:15
before Urnanche founded his dynasty at Lagache.
3:33:20
UCH tore at Mesilim's stale. Demonstrating his.
3:33:25
Contempt for its terms. Then he crossed the border and
3:33:30
seized the northernmost territory.
3:33:32
Belonging to Lagache. Known as the Guadina, this land
3:33:36
remained in the hands of the Umites until the days of
3:33:39
Iyanatum, the grandson of Urnanch, who attacked and
3:33:42
defeated the Ometes and made a new border treaty with NL Khale,
3:33:47
then the Enzi of Uma. He dug a ditch in line.
3:33:51
With the new boundary, which would.
3:33:52
Help ensure the fertility of the Kwedina.
3:33:54
Erected the old Mesilim Stelle there for future record
3:33:57
purposes, along with several styles of his own, and
3:34:01
constructed several buildings and shrines to several of the
3:34:04
more important Sumerian deities. Moreover, to help minimize the
3:34:09
possible source of future conflict between Uma and Lagash,
3:34:13
he set aside a strip of fallow land on the Uma side of the
3:34:16
boundary ditch. As a kind of.
3:34:18
No man's Land Finally, Iyanatam agreed to let the umaites farm
3:34:24
the fields in the. Gwedina and further.
3:34:25
South likely to ease their discontent while he focused on
3:34:29
expanding his conquests elsewhere, but he granted this
3:34:33
only under the condition that they pay the Lagache rulers.
3:34:36
A share of the crops. For the use of the land, thus
3:34:39
assuring himself and his successors A considerable
3:34:42
revenue, Iyanatam followed up his victories over Elam and the
3:34:46
more southerly cities of. Suma such as?
3:34:49
Uma, Erik and Ur with military triumphs over northern Suma,
3:34:53
which was under the control of the city of Kish, and the
3:34:56
neighboring AK Shark. The defeat to N Shakushana, who
3:35:00
referred to himself as N of Summer.
3:35:02
And king of the land. Weakened Kish Zuzu, king of
3:35:06
Akshak, LED an invasion of the northern.
3:35:09
Forces in Lagash. Iyanatam routed the invading
3:35:13
forces and pursued them from. The Antasura.
3:35:17
The northern boundary of Lagash to Akshak itself inflicting
3:35:21
heavy losses on them. Now at the height of his
3:35:25
ability, Ayanatam even felt strong enough to.
3:35:27
Claim Souza Reinti over. Suma as a whole, or as the
3:35:31
ancient source puts it to Ayanatam, the NCE of Lagash,
3:35:37
Inanna, the tutelary deity of Kish, because she loved him,
3:35:42
gave the kingship of Kish in addition to the entire ship of
3:35:45
Lagash. At this time he must have
3:35:49
erected and dedicated the Staley of the Vultures to commemorate
3:35:52
his well earned victories. It appears that a brief period
3:35:56
of peace now followed for Suma and we.
3:35:58
Find the Anatom. Taking time out to dig a new
3:36:01
canal, which he named exultantly Luma Gimduk.
3:36:05
Good. Like Luma.
3:36:08
Luma being a Anatom's Tiddenham name, that is presumably.
3:36:12
The name given him by the Semitic.
3:36:13
Matu people to the West of Suma, where Tiddenham is known to have
3:36:16
been located. However, before he could
3:36:19
complete the canal and construct its walls with bricks, Iannatom
3:36:23
found himself embroiled in another war.
3:36:26
This time he remained defensive, barely keeping his enemies at
3:36:29
Bay. And.
3:36:30
Avoiding defeat. 1st The Elamites attacked him from the
3:36:34
east, and though he threw them back to their homeland, he could
3:36:39
not follow up on his success and invade Alam.
3:36:43
By this time his old enemies from the north, Kish and Akshak,
3:36:47
had invaded Lagash. No sooner did he drive them back
3:36:50
from Lagash territory than the Elamites returned with new
3:36:53
allies, to be followed again by the troops of Kish and Akshak,
3:36:58
supported this time by a new enemy, the Kingdom of Mari, far
3:37:03
to the West. In pitched battles fought at the
3:37:07
Asura Lagash's eastern boundary and the Antasura, its northern
3:37:11
boundary, A Anatom won a decisive victory over his
3:37:15
enemies once again. There was a brief.
3:37:18
Respite from wars and Ayanatum could renew his building
3:37:21
activities, reinforcing the walls of the Lumagimdug Canal
3:37:25
and constructing a giant reservoir for its waters.
3:37:28
Ayanatum's brother Ananatum, not one of his sons, succeeded.
3:37:33
Him. Suggesting a sad end for Anatum,
3:37:36
who was called prostrator of all the lands for Ningirsu.
3:37:41
This points to the probability that he did not die a natural
3:37:44
death. But fell in a battle that.
3:37:46
Must have been catastrophic for Lagash, a battle from which it
3:37:50
never fully recovered in. Anatom upon succeeding.
3:37:54
His brother to the rule of Lagashe soon.
3:37:56
Found himself in serious. Difficulties with the Umatis,
3:38:00
for despite their defeat at the hands of Anatom, it took them
3:38:03
less than a generation to recover their confidence, if not
3:38:07
their former strength. In any case, Uluma, the son of
3:38:11
the unfortunate Anacale, repudiated.
3:38:14
The bitterly. Rankling agreement with Lagashe
3:38:17
and refused to pay a nanoturn the revenue imposed upon Uma.
3:38:21
Moreover, he proceeded to drain the boundary ditches.
3:38:25
RIP out and put to. Fire both Mesolim's and the
3:38:27
Anatom steles with their irritating inscriptions, and
3:38:31
destroy the buildings and shrines that the Anatom had
3:38:33
constructed along the boundary ditch to warn the Umetes that
3:38:37
they must not trespass on Lagash territory.
3:38:40
He was now set to cross the border and enter the Gwedina.
3:38:44
To further assure. Himself of victory, he sought
3:38:47
and obtained the military aid of the foreigners north of Summa UR
3:38:52
Luma commanded the Umaites and their allies.
3:38:55
The Lagashites were led by. Entomena, since his father and
3:38:58
anatom must have been quite an. Older man at the.
3:39:00
Time UR Lama fled, fiercely pursued by entomena.
3:39:06
And many of his. Troops were waylaid and killed.
3:39:10
The two forces met in the Ghana Ugiga of the Gwedina.
3:39:13
Not far South of the border. But enter Mena's victory was
3:39:17
ephemeral upon. UR Luma's defeat and.
3:39:21
Probable death. A new enemy appeared on the
3:39:23
scene. 11 the temple head of a city named Halab, situated not
3:39:27
far from Uma to the north. I had evidently been shrewd
3:39:31
enough to wait it out while enter.
3:39:34
MENA and UR luma was. Struggling for a decision, but
3:39:38
as soon as the battle ended, he attacked the victorious Enter
3:39:41
MENA. Met with initial.
3:39:42
Success and penetrated lagash territory to be sure, he could
3:39:48
not hold on to his gains South of the ummah lagash border, but
3:39:52
he succeeded in making himself NC of ummah 11 now deprived the
3:39:57
boundary ditches of the water essential to irrigate the.
3:39:59
Nearby fields and. Farms and refused to pay all but
3:40:02
a fraction of the revenue imposed upon Ummah by the old
3:40:05
Ianatum Treaty. And when Entremena sent envoys
3:40:08
to him demanding an explanation for his unfriendly acts, he
3:40:13
answered by angrily claiming the entire Gwadinna as his territory
3:40:17
and domain. He showed his contempt for the
3:40:20
Lagash claims, almost like his predecessor.
3:40:23
Ush. However, the war did not settle
3:40:26
the dispute between 11 and Entremena.
3:40:29
Instead a. Third party, likely the northern
3:40:32
non Sumerian ruler who once again claimed lordship over
3:40:35
Sumer, forced them into a compromise.
3:40:39
The decision favored Lagashe retaining the old.
3:40:43
Masilim Ianatom line. As the fixed boundary between.
3:40:46
Ummah and lagashe. On the other hand, nothing was
3:40:51
said about compensation. By the ummmates for the.
3:40:53
Revenue they had withheld, nor did they seem to have been held
3:40:57
responsible any longer for ensuring the water supply of the
3:41:00
Gwadina. This task was now left to the
3:41:04
Lagashites themselves. Entemena was the.
3:41:07
Last of the powerful Ensis of the Ur Nanche dynasty, his son
3:41:12
Enanatam the Second reigned only briefly.
3:41:15
And achieved but little. To judge from the fact that only
3:41:18
one of his inscriptions has been recovered to date, a door socket
3:41:23
dedicated to the restoration of Ningir SU's beer brewery.
3:41:29
He was followed as NC of Lagashe by Anatarsi who was.
3:41:33
Probably a usurper. Since his rule, we have had many
3:41:37
administrative documents but no dedicatory inscriptions.
3:41:42
However, a letter has been recovered that is addressed to
3:41:45
Anatazi. By Luena the Sanga.
3:41:48
Temple head of Myanmar reporting the defeat of a band of 600
3:41:52
Elamites who had raided and plundered.
3:41:55
Lagache. Chexer Anatarsi is followed as
3:41:59
NC of Lagashe by Lugalander, who, like his predecessor, has
3:42:02
left us only administrative documents and no dedicatory
3:42:05
inscriptions. We know practically nothing
3:42:08
about his reign. Rukagina the first.
3:42:12
Pacifist is known for his early social and ethical.
3:42:14
Reforms. Unfortunately, his reign was
3:42:18
brief and came to a sad. End when Lugalzo Jesi.
3:42:21
An ambitious and military minded NC from neighboring Or Anana
3:42:25
burned, looted and destroyed practically all the holy places
3:42:29
of Lagash. These vicious deeds of Lugalzar
3:42:32
Jesi are carefully recorded in a rather remarkable document
3:42:35
written by a Lagashite scribe and theologian, no doubt at the
3:42:40
behest of Urukaguna, who, there is reason to believe, survived
3:42:45
the catastrophe. The closing passage of this
3:42:48
document reveals a faith in the justice of the gods on the part
3:42:51
of Urukaguna which, although quite touching, may well have
3:42:54
brought about his undoing. It reads because the Umete
3:43:00
destroyed the bricks of Lagash, he committed a sin against the
3:43:05
God Ningirsu. He, Ningirsu, will cut off the
3:43:09
hands lifted against him. Not the fault of Urukagina the
3:43:14
Girsu King is this. May.
3:43:17
Niduba, the personal goddess of Lugalzugaisi, the NC of Ummah,
3:43:22
make him Lugalzugaisi bear all these sins. 17 All of which
3:43:30
leaves the impression that. Urukagina had in.
3:43:32
Fact offered No. Resistance to his aggressive
3:43:34
fellow Sumerians. From Ummah, so confident was he
3:43:37
and the justice of the gods and the retribution they would wreak
3:43:40
on the evildoer. Although just what good that
3:43:42
would do the victim is not clear.
3:43:45
In any case, Lugal Zagasi's career.
3:43:49
Began with the. Conquest of Lagashe and was for
3:43:53
a time crowned with phenomenal success.
3:43:56
He came to an ignominious end. Lugal Zagasi.
3:44:00
Has left US1. Important inscription, the text
3:44:02
of which was pieced. Together by Hermann.
3:44:04
Hilprecht more than half a century ago from hundreds of
3:44:08
vast fragments. 18 In it, Lugal Zagasi describes himself proudly
3:44:15
as King of Eric and king of the land, as one who had made all
3:44:22
the foreign lands subservient to him, so that there was.
3:44:25
Nothing but peace. Happiness and prosperity
3:44:28
throughout his realm, which extended from the Lower sea
3:44:33
along the Tigris and Euphrates rivers to the Upper sea.
3:44:39
But as was said earlier, all his glory did not long endure after
3:44:44
some 2 decades of military successes and triumphs.
3:44:48
He was brought in a neck. Stock to the gate of Nepur, to
3:44:51
be reviled and spat upon by all who passed by his conqueror was
3:44:56
a Semite named Sargon, the founder of the.
3:44:59
Powerful dynasty. Of Akkad, which began,
3:45:02
consciously or not, the semitization of Suma that
3:45:05
finally brought about the end of the Sumerian people, at least as
3:45:09
an identifiable political and ethnic entity from Egypt to
3:45:13
India. Sargon the Great was one of the
3:45:16
most amazing political leaders of the ancient Near East, a
3:45:20
military leader of genius and an imaginative administrator and
3:45:24
builder with a sense of the historical significance of his
3:45:28
deeds and achievements. His influence was felt
3:45:32
throughout the ancient world from later centuries when Sargon
3:45:37
became legendary, around which the poets and bards would weave
3:45:41
sagas and wonder tales, generally based on a kernel of
3:45:45
truth, as he has come to be known to the modern historian.
3:45:50
Fortunately, in the case of Sargon, we have no need to
3:45:54
consult these later chronicles and stories for our historical
3:45:57
facts, since we have his inscriptions recording his more
3:46:01
significant military conquests. And achievements for.
3:46:04
Sargon, as well as his two sons, Rimash and Manish Tushu,
3:46:09
commemorated their. Victories by erecting.
3:46:10
An Enlil's temple at Nipper inscribed.
3:46:13
Statues of themselves. And also Staley's depicting
3:46:17
their prostrated enemies. Except for a sporadic diorite
3:46:21
fragment of an original, none of these statues and Staley's have
3:46:26
been found to date even. The latest nipper?
3:46:29
Excavations have shown unsatisfactory results.
3:46:32
In this regard. And may have been destroyed in
3:46:34
ancient times, but luck In the 1700s, an anonymous scholar and
3:46:41
researcher copied all the inscriptions on the statues and
3:46:44
steelys in the Enlil temple with the care and fidelity that would
3:46:48
do honor to any modern archaeologist and epigrapher.
3:46:52
Even noting whether the copied inscriptions came from the
3:46:55
statue itself or from the pedestal.
3:46:58
With such phrases as this is the inscription on the statue, or
3:47:03
this is the inscription on the pedestal, or the pedestal is
3:47:09
uninscribed, the reason for making these copies is unknown.
3:47:14
Perhaps the? Temple and its monuments.
3:47:16
Were in danger of being destroyed and his purpose was to
3:47:19
save them for posterity. If so, he achieved almost
3:47:24
exactly as expected, as the old Nepur expedition recovered
3:47:29
almost all of his valuable tablet, and the two academics,
3:47:33
Arno Pobl and Leon Legrain, made its contents available for
3:47:38
posterity, though Semite Sagon started his career as a
3:47:43
prominent official. The cup bearer.
3:47:45
To a Sumerian ruler of Kish called URS Ababa, Sagun's first
3:47:50
aim was to remove Lugal Zagisi from the political scene.
3:47:54
Ultimately, he smote it and. Attacked Erik.
3:48:00
The capital of Lugal Zagisi, unexpectedly demolishing its
3:48:04
walls. According to the inscription the
3:48:07
Eric the. Defenders seem to have.
3:48:10
Left the city after gaining significant reinforcements. 50
3:48:15
warriors from the provinces came to their aid.
3:48:20
They took their stand against the pursuing Sargon.
3:48:24
The latter routed. The Eric Army in a fierce fight.
3:48:28
It was only. Then it seems that lugolzagessi,
3:48:31
presumably on a. Far off campaign.
3:48:34
Arrived on the scene with his army from Erik.
3:48:38
This time, too, Sargon was Victor so massively.
3:48:42
That he could transport. Lugal zagessi in chains, or
3:48:45
rather. In a neck.
3:48:46
Stock to the gates of Nippur, Sargon returned to Suma's more
3:48:51
southerly section after Lugalzargesi.
3:48:53
'S captivity. Where Lugalzargesi's end still
3:48:56
held expectations of monitoring his progress, he initially
3:49:00
assaulted UR in the extreme southwest, then the area of
3:49:04
Enimar, which spanned from the city of Lagashe to the coast of
3:49:07
the Persian Gulf, where he cleaned his weapons in a custom
3:49:11
honoring his successes. Way back from the.
3:49:14
Sea he assaulted A Lugal Zagessi stronghold called Ummah.
3:49:19
He destroyed its walls, finishing his conquest of
3:49:21
southern Suma. Turning West and N, he
3:49:25
subjugated the territory of Mari.
3:49:27
Januti and Ibla. Up to the cedar forest and the
3:49:31
Silver Mountain, the Amanus and the Taurus Mountains.
3:49:36
He then is. Seen attacking.
3:49:37
Elam and adjacent barashi. Carting off their.
3:49:40
Belongings east of Summa. This led to the end of the
3:49:44
nipper copies of the inscriptions on Sargon's
3:49:47
statues. And Staley's.
3:49:48
Which span barely a portion of his rule.
3:49:52
Sargon's conquests stretched far and wide in the much later
3:49:55
stories and. Chronicles.
3:49:57
He might even have dispatched his troops to Egypt, Ethiopia
3:50:01
and India. He placed armed garrisons at
3:50:05
several strategic points to oversee such a large empire.
3:50:09
In summer, where rebellion was rampant, he assigned.
3:50:12
Fellow Semites to the highest. Administrative positions and
3:50:16
garrisoned the cities with all Acadian soldiers.
3:50:19
Not far from Kish, the place where he had started his amazing
3:50:23
career as cup bearer of the reigning URS Ababa, he erected
3:50:27
the city of Agade for himself and his great court of officials
3:50:30
and troops. Boasting that 5400 men ate bread
3:50:35
daily before him. Agade became the most brilliant
3:50:39
city in the ancient world in a short.
3:50:41
Period. Gifts and tributes were brought
3:50:45
from the four corners of Sargon's realm, and at its keys
3:50:49
ships docked from far off Dilman.
3:50:52
Margan and. Meluha, that is perhaps India,
3:50:55
Egypt and Ethiopia. Most of Agarde's residents were
3:50:59
surely Semites connected to Sargon by.
3:51:01
Blood and. Language from Agardo, or more
3:51:05
precisely from its biblical equivalent, Arkad, Genesis 1010.
3:51:10
The adjective Arkadian has come to define the Mesopotamian
3:51:13
Semites generally. Rimush, his son, followed
3:51:17
Sargon, who saw upheavals and revolutions tear.
3:51:20
Apart his Kingdom. In brutal conflicts involving
3:51:24
10s of thousands of men, he captured or more.
3:51:26
Precisely reconquered. The towns of UR Uma, Ada, Lagash
3:51:32
der Kazalu. And the nations of.
3:51:34
Elam and Barashi he ruled, but only for nine years.
3:51:40
His elder brother, maybe his twin Manish Tushu, carried on in
3:51:44
the same military and political style.
3:51:47
Like his father Sargon, he carried his triumphant armies to
3:51:51
far off. Countries.
3:51:52
Or at least so it would seem from a passage in one of his
3:51:55
inscriptions which reads When he manished, Tushu had crossed the
3:52:01
lower. Sea, that is.
3:52:03
The Persian Gulf in ships 32 kings gathered against him, but
3:52:11
he. Defeated them and.
3:52:12
Smote their cities and prostrated their Lords.
3:52:15
And destroyed the.