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Sumerian Questions and Answers
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1. Hebrew and Sumerian
2. Permission to Use Cuneiform Writing Sample
3. Timeline of Mesopotamian History
4. Sumerian Version, Biblical Story of Job
5. Sumerian True Type Font
6. "pukku" and "mekku" in Gilgamesh
7. Sumerian Language ba- Prefix
8. Sumerian Eden?
9. Hungarian and Sumerian
10. Enable Sumerian True Type Font
11. Development of Cuneiform From Pictographs
12. Sumerian Word for Venus
13. Sumerian Alphabet?
14. Sumerian "mashkim" as Demons?
15. Zecharia Sitchen; Sumerian Language Suppressed?
16. Hebrew ELOHIM
17. Sumerian Proverbs Page
18. Sumerian Audio File?
19. "The Sumerian Problem"
20. The Deity Ningishzida
21. Organization of the Sumerian Lexicon
22. Cuneiform Symbols in Sumerian Lexicon?
23. Poetry to Woo a Sumerian Girl?
24. Translate Sumerian Alphabet?
25. Letters of Sumerian Alphabet?
26. Importance of Sumerian Invention of Cuneiform Writing
27. Sumer, Not Sumeria
28. Could Sumerian "ur" Mean Ox or Cow?
29. Pronunciation and Meaning of Sumerian Words
30. Is Sumerian the Earliest Written Language?
31. Preflood Mythology - Ziusudra, the Sumerian Noah
32. How to Interpret "dirig-...-she"?
33. The Planet Nibiru
34. Zechariah Sitchin and Extraterrestrials
35. Name of Sumerian Religion?
36. The Sumerian People
37. Meaning of Sumer?
38. Sumerian Speech from Buffy the Vampire Slayer
39. Sumerian Planet Names
40. Who Were the Sumerians?
41. Annotated Version of Lexicon?
42. Origin of Picture of Counting Tokens
43. Another Translation into Sumerian
44. Vowels in Sumerian Writing?
45. Did Sumerian Have Vowel Harmony?
46. Sumerians Live During or Before the Time of Biblical Moses?
47. Different Dialects? - Text Partially in Sumerian
48. Where Does One Learn Sumerian?
49. What is the Relation of Sumerian to Other Language Families?
50. Sumerian Money
51. The Greatest Sumerian Ruler?
52. Vinca Culture Writing - Tartaria Tablets in Romania
53. Sumerian Determinatives
54. Sumerian Vocabulary from a Woman's Viewpoint
55. Sumerian Words in CAPITAL Letters
56. English to Sumerian Dictionary?
57. Sumerian Origins
58. Out-of-Print Jacobsen Book
59. 'I Love You' in Sumerian
60. Determinative Before Month Names
61. Sumerian Words in Akkadian and Hebrew
62. Teachings of Suruppak to His Son Ziusudra
63. Sumerian Freedom Tattoo
64. Age/Location of Sumerian Vocabulary
65. Hungarian Roots
66. Dilmun, Lemuria, and Sumer
67. Need Background for Novel that I Am Writing
68. Disputing the Etymology of the Sumerian Word for 'Breast'
69. Symbols for Mesopotamian Gods?
70. Sumerian and Babylonian Holy Days
71. Yet Another Translation into Sumerian
72. Permission to Use Tokens Picture
73. How Did Writing Start?
74. Books to Study Day-to-Day Life of Sumerians?
75. Necronomicon; Learning Sumerian
76. Sumerian Tenses?
77. Cuneiform Words?
78. Letters or Sounds Missing from Sumerian
79. Sumerian Pictographic Writing
80. History of Bookkeeping and Sumerian Term "shubati"
81. Sumerian "danna" and Akkadian "beru"
82. Dilmun, Paradise, Bahrain, Eridu, Enki
83. How Reliable Is John M. Allegro?
84. Definite Article in Sumerian?
85. Which Style of Cuneiform to Learn?
Copyright Notice
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1. Hebrew and Sumerian
>Is Hebrew a daughter language of Sumerian?
No. Hebrew belongs to the Afro-Asiatic language family. Sumerian is a
different language family.
>How different are the following languages. Akkadian, Phoenician,
Egyptian
>It is believed that Jesus (on the cross) said, Eli eli lama shabatani
( I
>think this to be Aramaic) in Hebrew it would be Eli Eli lama
azaftani,
>consequently could I assume that Hebrew is a branch of Aramaic.?
The languages mentioned are all sister languages, spoken
simultaneously in different places. Egyptian is related to Semitic
languages such as Akkadian, Aramaic, Hebrew, and Phoenician.
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2. Permission to Use Cuneiform Writing Sample
>i am working on an old testament commentary & i would like to include
a
>sample illustration of cuneiform script. i was wondering if i might
be able
>to use the sample sumerian proverb at url
>http://www.sumerian.org/proverbs.htm
Sure, that is just a scan of a page in Gordon's book on Sumerian
Proverbs, and it did not have a copyright notice on it.
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3. Timeline of Mesopotamian History
> I am a student who studies at [snip]. I've recently been given
>a task to research for a timeline based on Mesopotamia in my history
>class. Since I am new to the net, I need some help from u. Could u
pls
>suggest me good sites for timelines based on Mespotamia?
Look at the bottom of the Mesopotamia links on my links page, for a
site called A Chronology of the Ancient Near East.
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4. Sumerian Version, Biblical Story of Job
>Any idea where I might find a copy of the story, legend of the
>Sumerian Job? thanks.
Samuel Noah Kramer translated a text that he described as a Sumerian
Job text starting on page 127 of his book The Sumerians, Their
History, Culture, and Character, 1963.
I do not know where the cuneiform text or its transliteration was
published or even its museum number.
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5. Sumerian True Type Font
>I love your Sumerian page. By chance do you have a Sumerian True Type
Font?
>If so, where did you acquire it?
I don't think that you got to the bottom of the overview page, where
it says that the downloadable Winword file archive includes a Sumerian
TrueType Font, which I created deliberately with no copyright notice.
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6. "pukku" and "mekku" in Gilgamesh
>I have read a Swedish translation of the Gilgamesh epos published in
>1965. In the 12th tablet Gilgamesh makes and loses a tambukku and a
>mikkû (the diacritic sign of the last letter should be turned upside
>down, but I cannot get it correct). The translator remarks that it is
>unknown what these things are; they are probably instruments or
weapons.
>Do you know whether scholars have been able to establish the meaning
of
>these words?
I read the Sumerian version of Gilgamesh and Enkidu going down to the
underworld at UCLA last spring with Dr. Englund. We understood the
terms to be pukku and mekku and, while it is not completely certain,
that they involve a stick and ball or stick and hoop, with which the
young men played in a game in the central street, at which it was
rather important to win, for some ritualistic or other social reason.
It sounded as if at sunset they left the ball or hoop in position, and
resumed the next day.
Wolfram von Soden's Akkadisches Handworterbuch has a different point
of view from that of Benno Landsberger, who is primarily responsible
for the view above. He translates pukku(m) as 'drum' and mekku as
'clapper' or 'drumstick'.
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7. Sumerian Language ba- Prefix
>I am trying to study the Sumerian language.
>So far I know about two main views about the prefix ba-: 1.
reflexive,
>medial or passive ("used when there is no transitive subject", as you
>have written in the LSL) and 2. like bi- , expressing a simultaneous,
>logically connected or finished "perfektivisch" process (if I have
got
>Victor Christian, Bertraege zur Sumerische Grammatik correctly). But
>this is an old book (from the 1950's, the only one available in
>Bulgaria). I've got the impression that Thomsen's The Sumerian
Language
>is "currently the standard text" , expressing the most modern views
>about Sumerian. However, I don't have the book and can't get it for
now.
>So could you please tell me which one of these two views is defended
in
>Thomsen's and if neither of them - what?
Thomsen, page 179:
"/mu-/ is preferred with animate and agentive subjects, that means
that /mu-/ occurs mostly in transitive forms.
"/ba-/ is preferred when the subject is inanimate and/or non-agentive,
i.e. most often in intransitive/one-participant verbal forms."
/bi-/ has been claimed to have locative-terminative force as opposed
to purely locative force for /ba-/, but Thomsen says on p. 184, that
it "is most probably not automatically employed for the reason of
concord with a loc.-term. or loc. noun, but it rather serves the
semantic differentiation of the verb. It seems to be used with certain
verbs or in a specific sense of the verb...."
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8. Sumerian Eden?
>I was wondering if you could answer a question for me. I have read
somewhere
>that the name "Eden" was a Sumerian word. I would have thought it was
a
>Hebrew word, but then again, I don't know the relationship of the
Sumerian
>language and the Hebrew language.
>
>At any rate, if Eden, Adam, and/or Eve are Sumerian words, would you
>please tell me if they have a translation/meaning?
EDIN is a Sumerian word, but it refers to the steppe land between the
two rivers, where the herd animals grazed.
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9. Hungarian and Sumerian
>I am trying to identify the modern and archaic Hungarian words which
>have their alleged origin from the Sumerian logograms on your site.
>
>I would like to publish (a set of) web page(s) of my comparisons. I
>cannot claim to be a professional linguist so my work will have
faults
>and mistakes. The pages will simply have the logogram and its meaning
>together with the Hungarian words which I believe 'evolved' out of
the
>Sumerian.
>
>I have already examined a few hundred of the logograms and the
results
>are interesting. I would like permission to use your information
>concerning the Sumerian logograms on my personal web pages at
>[snip]
Please e-mail to me in advance your proposed use of my material.
Have you seen the similar work by Fred Hamori? There is a link to his
Ural-Altaic comparison pages in my links page.
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10. Enable Sumerian True Type Font
>"When you open the SUMERIAN.DOC file, ensure that at File,
>Templates, there is a valid path to the enclosed
>SUMERIAN.DOT template file."
>
>I did all that and added the Sumerian true font file, but it
>seems to make no difference, am I doing something wrong.
>What should it look like?
It should have the tilde over some of the letters g, and it should
have the dish under the letter h. Those characters in particular make
the special font necessary.
Did you go to Start, Settings, Control Panel, Fonts, and select File
and Add New Font?
When you scroll down in the Fonts listbox, does it show you the
Sumerian font?
>How kind of you to care.
>
>I have it working now, thank you.
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11. Development of Cuneiform From Pictographs
>Is there another author like Labat that shows
>the early development of cuneiform from pictographs and have
>his identifications been universally accepted?
Labat was a good scholar who worked in the mainstream of Assyriology.
His book is not controversial.
Other books that you could check out:
M.W. Green and H.J. Nissen, Zeichenliste der Archaischen Texte aus
Uruk [ZATU] (Ausgrabungen der Deutschen Forschungsgemeinschaft in
Uruk-Warka, 11; Archaische Texte aus Uruk, 2); Berlin 1987.
P. Steinkeller, review of M.W. Green and H.J. Nissen, Bibliotheca
Orientalis 52 (1995), pp. 689-713.
R. K. Englund & J.-P. Grégoire, The Proto-Cuneiform Texts from Jemdet
Nasr, Gebr. Mann Verlag, Berlin, 1991.
A. Deimel, Die Inschriften von Fara I: Liste der archaischen
Keilschriftzeichen, WVDOG 40, Leipzig 1922.
Y. Rosengarten, Répertoire commenté des signes présargoniques
sumériens de Lagas, Éditions E. de Boccard, Paris, 1967.
K. Volk, A Sumerian Reader, vol. 18 in Studia Pohl: Series Maior; Rome
1997 (this practical, inexpensive book includes a nice, though
incomplete, sign-list).
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12. Sumerian Word for Venus
>What is the sumerian word for venus?
Most often, Venus as a planet is called Ninanna, the lady of heaven.
But Inanna, Sumer's most popular goddess, who had many functions, was
identified with the planet Venus, both as the war-like morning star
and as the love goddess evening star.
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13. Sumerian Alphabet?
> I am trying to find a Sumerian alphabet. Does one exist? Or is it
all
>symbols meaning whole words. If you can help me or direct me to a web
site
>that can help I would greatly appreciate it. Thanking you in advance,
When the Sumerians invented their writing system around 5400 years
ago, it was a pictographic and ideographic system like the Chinese,
and as you know, the Chinese have over a thousand characters to their
writing, so it is not alphabetic.
At my web site you can order the book, A Manual of Sumerian Grammar
and Texts, by John L. Hayes which will introduce you to the Sumerian
writing.
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14. Sumerian "mashkim" as Demons?
>Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't the Sumerian word "Maskim" mean
one of
>seven demons that were said to devour blood at night. If or if not,
could you
>possibly tell me a little about these demons?
Possibly the later Babylonians used the word in this way, by which
time Sumerian had been dead as a spoken language for centuries. When
the language was spoken, mashkim meant "inspector, monitor, sheriff,
commissioner".
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15. Zecharia Sitchen; Sumerian Language Suppressed?
>Zecharia Sitchen translates Sumerian and writes extreme thought
provoking ideas.
>I have read all his works, and have read others opinions of his
>translations and conclusions, but not another scholar on Sumerian
>language. What do you make of his translations and conclusions, I am
too
>old to learn Sumerian as I am still learning English.
You know the saying, a little knowledge is a dangerous thing?
When looking at early materials, it really helps if you know what
their writings meant in the context of their culture, which Sitchen
neither knows nor cares about.
>One more question.
>How could Sumerian not be related to any other language? It was my
>understanding that there was a commonality with all spoken languages.
What is the source of your information? And whatever your source is,
how could he or she know that?
>Sitchen's books answer a lot of
>questions, and of course, raise many others. Still, looking at the
>Sumerian religious beliefs, and knowing how civilized they were, why
>wouldn't their religion be the most mainstream? I read that there are
>many untranslated Sumerian texts, and that there are many hundreds
still
>in museums unnoticed in basements, how was this knowledge suppressed?
>Why are we now just reading about the Sumerians? The Church takes
some
>blame, but what of the scientist and linguist? How was it so long
ignored?
Not everything is a conspiracy. The Sumerian language was actually
remembered in Mesopotamia for 2,000 years after it stopped being
spoken. But the Greeks did not know about it, so the existence of the
Sumerians was forgotten. The latest cuneiform clay tablet to be dated
astronomically was written in the late 1st century A.D. Scholars have
been trying to figure out the Sumerian language for about 140 years
now. You can find some good introductory books by Samuel Noah Kramer
at an on-line bookseller.
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16. Hebrew ELOHIM
>Does the hebrew word ELOHIM have sumerian origins?
There is an Afro-Asiatic root `ilay, which means 'to be high'. In
Semitic and Hebrew, it manifests as elow, which is probably the origin
of elohim, 'gods'.
So the answer is no, the word does not have Sumerian origins.
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17. Sumerian Proverbs Page
>I was very pleased to see your page on Sumerian. I'm currently
building
>proverb pages at http://cogweb.english.ucsb.edu/Discourse and
wondered if
>you had trouble uploading the proverb page at
>http://www.sumerian.org/proverbs.htm or if it is simply
>under construction.
>Your page of Sumerian proverbs at
http://www.sumerian.org/proverbs.htm is
>unfortunately truncated; it looks like the upload process was
interrupted.
>Your readers would very much appreciate a full version!
Sorry there aren't more proverbs there, but it is intended more as an
illustration of Sumerian writing and language than as a list of
proverbs.
To understand why it ends the way that it does, you have to try
clicking on some of the signs in the graphic - different parts of the
graphic are mapped to hidden labels for each Sumerian word on its own
line.
The page was in the nature of an exercise for me to demonstrate a
sample of cuneiform writing and Sumerian sentences to a curious
public. If you are interested in Sumerian proverbs, Bendt Alster has
published a comprehensive, authoritative book in 2 volumes, Proverbs
of Ancient Sumer, 1997, available from Eisenbraun's, to which there is
a link at my links page.
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18. Sumerian Audio File?
>Dear sirs, navigating I came about your pages in the net. Actually
what
>I need to find is an audio file for sumerian and ancient egyptian
languages,
>are there any?
>could you give your advise.
Order the CMAA audio tape of the Joan Goodnick Westenholz lecture,
Enheduanna: Princess, Priestess, Poetess, from May 10, 1999 in which
the lecturer read quite a bit of Sumerian, tape WAW99-2 in the
California Museum of Ancient Art audiotape catalog.
There is also a link at my links page of brief Sumerian and possibly
Egyptian greetings from the Voyager spacecraft record.
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19. "The Sumerian Problem"
>I was just wondering what your take on "the Sumerian problem" was. I
am in a
>class at NC State on Civilizations of the Ancient near East and I
have been
>trying to gather opinions on the so-called Sumerian problem. I have
read
>through Tom Jones' book the Sumerian problem and am frankly stumped.
There is
>evidence to suggest that they were indigenous to the area and there
is also
>evidence to suggest some outside influence...even a migration,
perhaps from
>the Indus Valley.
I think that the Sumerian 'problem' is an illusion. The Sumerian
lexicon indicates continuity within Mesopotamia and then coexistence
with the Akkadians. The map at my web site shows you what I think
about the origin of the Sumerians.
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20. The Deity Ningishzida
>Isn't the word Ningishzida a sumerian word for the serpent-god???
>Please enlighten me.
Ningishzida was a guardian of the door to the underworld who has a
horned snake as his symbol.
He appears to have been associated with trees, fertility, and snakes.
Thorkild Jacobsen wrote that the roots of the tree draw nourishment
from deep underground and have the appearance of entwining snakes.
>I do appreciate the information. Is Ningishzida a Sumerian word??
Yes, it means lord of the good tree (or faithful tool). Sometimes
there is some interplay between the word for tree and the word for
penis, so he could be a god of fertility also.
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21. Organization of the Sumerian Lexicon
>A very basic question/complaint: why not give the Akkadian
translations as
>well? I realize of course that not every student of Sumerian knows
Akkadian;
>and that your emphasis is on Sumerian; and rightly so. Nonetheless,
in my
>opinion a strong case for including the Akkadian translations would
be that
>one can gain access to a much wider range of meaning, and therefore a
>more precise understanding of the Sumerian word's specific
meaning(s),
>by looking up the Akkadian translations in AHw or CAD.
I would be unnecessarily duplicating the information that is now
available at the ISL/Pennsylvania Sumerian Dictionary web site, which
recently added complete cross references to the AHw. There is a link
at my web site. Give that a try. You will see that there can be 20
Akkadian words that correspond to a single Sumerian word. There is not
a one-to-one mapping between the two languages. What you want is a
Sumerian-Akkadian lexicon, equal in size to the Sumerian-English
lexicon.
>And, finally, it might be helpful, in the introduction, to explain
how the
>CVC words are alphabetized. I think I have it figured out, but I
don't
>understand the reasoning behind it.
Since the lexical material is presented in a single document that can
be scanned, instead of via a look-up database, the method of sorting
by the final consonants allows words with related meanings and forms
to often be listed adjacently, e.g., gub3, hab, and hub2 are related
words that are listed next to one another.
>But, with these remarks, I don't intend to criticize. You've
presented an
>impressive piece of work and an admirable way of 'publishing' it. I
will be
>using it and, though silently, thanking you for it!
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22. Cuneiform Symbols in Sumerian Lexicon?
>I have downloaded you Sumerian Lexicon as a Word for Windows 6.0
version. I
>am able to view the document, but cannot see cuneiform symbols. The
symbols
>seem to appear as our regular alphabet but with various accent marks
etc.
>
>I was able to load the TrueType Sumerian font into windows and I made
sure
>that the template had a correct path to the Sumerian.dot file.
The Sumerian true type font is needed for specialized transliteration
symbols, such as the g with the tilde over it and the h with the dish
under it.
It would take many more than the 256 spaces available in a true type
font to display cuneiform.
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23. Poetry to Woo a Sumerian Girl?
> Dear John, What a beginning, eh? Without great ignorance, I've just
>begun a relationship with a beautiful, young Sumerian girl and would
love
>to show some devotion to her heritage. I wished to make a prose in
her
>native language (I, obviously have no idea of the Sumerian tongue)
and
>ventured into your site. I (honestly) was looking for a quick fix,
but am
>willing to make the grade. Without getting into ancient texts, is
there
>any such poetry I may find upon the net or in the local library,
which
>will include beautiful prose? I ask this in all humble nature.
She is putting you on.
There have been no Sumerians for almost 4,000 years.
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24. Translate Sumerian Alphabet?
>hello, i need to translate the sumerian
>alphabet to english alphabet letter please help me .
The Greeks invented the alphabet long after Sumerian had ceased to be
a living language. Sumerian writing did not use an alphabet. Sumerian
writing started with pictographs and progressed to ideographs and
logographs.
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25. Letters of Sumerian Alphabet?
> Can you give me the main letters of the alphabet? Thanks, this is
for a
>project.
The Sumerians did not have an alphabet. They wrote with pictograms in
a manner similar to the Chinese.
At my links page you will find a link to the Signs of Old Sumerian.
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26. Importance of Sumerian Invention of Cuneiform Writing
>1. Do you think the invention of Sumerian Cuneiform was a major
turning point
>in history? Why?
Yes, for the same reasons that A&E Biography put Gutenberg at the top
of its list of the most important 100 people of the last millenium.
>2. How was Sumerian cuneiform a big influence and building block for
the written
>language over time?
Writing on clay was an inexpensive yet permanent way of recording
transactions. The fact that the Sumerians shared their land with
Semitic-speaking Akkadians was important because the Akkadians had to
turn the Sumerian logographic writing into phonetic syllabic writing
in order to use cuneiform to represent phonetically the spoken words
of the Akkadian language.
>3. How was Sumerian cuneiform tracked through other cultures as they
developed
>their own written language?
The cultural influence of the Sumerians upon later Mesopotamian
peoples was enormous. Cuneiform writing has been found at Amarna in
Egypt, in the form of an alphabet at Ugarit, and among the Hittites
who used it to render their own Indo-European language.
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27. Sumer, Not Sumeria
>Thank you for the proverbs and the cuneiform writing. I teach 6th
grade
>social studies and we are presently doing Sumeria. This was
interesting to
>read and I will share the site with my students.
Thank you. You will help your students by teaching them that the
country is called Sumer, not Sumeria.
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28. Could Sumerian "ur" Mean Ox or Cow?
>I'm very much interested in things Sumerian and enjoying your
Sumerian
>Language page.
>Your page suggests that the word Ur means dog or other carnivorous
>animal.The other day, I enjoyed talking with Mr. [snip],who is a
>friendly acquaintance of mine and also a writer, He insisted that the
>Sumerian word Ur means ox or cow according to his own source. I
insisted
>the word definitely denotes dog !! So, I would appreciate it if you
>would give me a kind explanation which is right. Is there any
>possibility that the word means ox or cow ? He is now planning to
write
>on Sumer and other ancient civilizations, and he also would like to
know
>the true meaning of the word. Please help him !! Thank you very much
for
>your kind advice in advance.
There is no possibility that ur means ox or cow.
Previously, there was no complete modern lexicon of Sumerian
available, so it was possible for proponents of different theories
relating Sumerian to this or that language family to quote mangled
definitions of Sumerian words and no one would know any better.
Return to questions list.
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29. Pronunciation and Meaning of Sumerian Words
>I have a question for you; I am a student of languages interested in
>Sumerian. How do people who translate Sumerian cuneiform know how the
>words were pronounced?
Certain Sumerian cuneiform signs began to be used to represent
phonetic syllables in order to write the unrelated Akkadian language,
whose pronunciation is known from being a member of the Semitic
language family. We have a lot of phonetically written Akkadian
starting from the time of Sargon the Great (2300 B.C.). These phonetic
syllable signs also occur as glosses indicating the pronunciation of
Sumerian words in the lexical lists from the Old Babylonian period.
This gives us the pronunciation of most Sumerian words. Admittedly the
20th century saw scholars revise their initial pronunciation of some
signs and names, a situation that was not helped by the polyphony of
many Sumerian ideographs. To the extent that Sumerian uses the same
sounds as Semitic Akkadian, then, we know how Sumerian was pronounced.
Some texts use syllabic spelling, instead of logograms, for Sumerian
words. Words and names with unusual sounds that were in Sumerian but
not in the Semitic Akkadian language can have variant spellings both
in Akkadian texts and in texts written in other languages; these
variants have given us clues to the nature of the non-Semitic sounds
in Sumerian.
>For that matter, how do you know what the words
>mean besides referring to Sumerian/Assyrian bilingual dictionaries?
In fact, bilingual Sumerian-Akkadian dictionaries and bilingual
religious hymns are the most important source for arriving at the
meaning of Sumerian words. But sometimes the scholar who studies
enough tablets, such as the accounting tablets, learns in a more
precise way to what a particular term refers, since the corresponding
term in Akkadian may be very general.
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30. Is Sumerian the Earliest Written Language?
>i am doing some research, and was wondering if you knew of the
earliest known
>written language. is there anything known to exist before the
egyptians,
>sumerians, or mesopotamians?
The Sumerians were the first to write spoken language.
The report that writing in Egypt is older than in Sumer is based on
archaeologists in Egypt who use calibrated Carbon-14 dating, whereas
Sumerologists are a conservative lot who keep quoting the conventional
3100 B.C. date for the invention of writing, when it should be 3400
B.C. according to calibrated C-14 dates.
The last major overview dealing with Mesopotamia as a whole that I
know of which collected the various calibrated C-14 dates was that by
Mellaart in Antiquity 53 (1979), with important comments in Antiquity
54 (1980) - these comments acknowledged that the extremely high
Mesopotamian chronology that resulted should be reduced by an average
100 years due to calibrated dates for wood/timber being too high by
that average. The end result was still to support a high chronology
rather than a middle chronology, especially for the transition between
Uruk IV and Uruk III (AKA Jemdet Nasr). This transition appears to
have occurred around 3300 BC using calibrated dates with the 100 year
reduction.
You will also find pictures and discussion of a repertoire of symbols
in Marija Gimbutas' publications on 'Old Europe', predating Sumerian.
But the Vinca culture 'writing' appears more to have been tribal or
family heraldic emblems like tatoos, found engraved on pots, with no
indication that it represented the words of spoken language.
For so-called writing before the Sumerians, check out works by
Alexander Marshack on calendar type markings (Stone Age Europe) and
Marija Gimbutas on the Vinca culture writing (Neolithic Europe).
Despite such precursors though, it is clear that Sumerian writing was
the first in which there was a correspondence between the words of the
spoken language and the written symbols.
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31. Preflood Mythology - Ziusudra, the Sumerian Noah
>Could you give me any information on sumerian mythology relating to
preflood
>times on the earth. This would be of great help to me. Thank you very
much.
A search at http://www.google.com for Ziusudra turns up 1,420
documents.
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32. How to Interpret "dirig-...-she"?
>i am very interested about the sumerian language, i
>have been reading the Sumerian Lexicon and much other sumerian
>related-topics. Now, i was wondering if you could fill a doubt of
mine. In
>the lexicon i read the sumerian word for "beyond" is "dirig-...-se" ,
and i
>do not understand what the middle space with
>the 3 points means. If it isn't much trouble could you explain me why
is
>that or give me another sumerian word for "beyond".
The dots substitute for the noun that is there in actual speech. So if
you say, dirig-kur-s^e, you are saying 'beyond those mountains'. The
kur-s^e in this case indicates 'those mountains there within view', so
the speaker says 'exceeding or greater than those mountains there'.
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33. The Planet Nibiru
>I am writing a paper on God, for a philosophy class. I am trying to
prove
>that the creation story is a story about the birth of an individual,
each and
>every one of us are our own God. I have read all of Zecharia
Sitchin's books
>and believe that what he wrote could be true, but I believe that the
physical
>world is only a reflection of our collective inner or spiritual
world. I am
>curious of how you would translate - Nibiru. I have used your
dictionary and
>some other ones and Sitchin translates it as "The Planet of
crossing". I get
>the planet or body part but not the crossing. I think that maybe it
has
>something to do with a lessening of the physical to equal the
spiritual.
>Could that be plausible?
The Sumerians were smart about ethical and practical concerns, but I
don't think that they were as abstract as you are being. Neberu is an
Akkadian word, not a Sumerian word. It referred to a river crossing,
ford, or a ferry (boat). The city of Nippur was probably located at
such a spot. The planet Jupiter, which we know was later called
Neberu, belonged to the chief deity in the Babylonian pantheon,
Marduk. We don't have proof, but earlier it may have belonged to the
Sumerian Enlil, the temple god of Nippur and chief deity in the
Sumerian pantheon. There is a possibility that Neberu also referred to
the North Star. The Sumerians tended to project what they knew on
earth onto the heavens.
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34. Zechariah Sitchin and Extraterrestrials
>I am attempting to find an expert in the Sumerian language who can
>verify or debunk Zechariah Sitchin's claims of Sumerian translation.
As
>far as I can tell, no one with a scholarly and reputable background
has
>ever verified or denied his claims.
>His eight books on the subject of the Annunaki have gone unchallenged
>for years. If you are unfamiliar with his works, it is his contention
>that sumerian texts verify that the human race was genetically
altered
>to service a superior extraterrestrial race called the annunaki.
>Can you verify or refute these claims?
>Thank you for your attention to this matter.
I am very familiar with the Sumerian language and culture. There is
nothing extraterrestrial about it.
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35. Name of Sumerian Religion?
>what was the name of the sumerian religion
You mean, like Southern Baptists or Roman Catholics?
The Sumerians did not have a word for religion, because worshipping
the gods at their temples was basic to their existence.
As you can imagine, it is difficult to have a name for their religion,
when they don't even have a word for religion.
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36. The Sumerian People
>I would like to ask you a question concerning the sumerian people.
First , were
>they indoeuropeen
I believe that the proto-Sumerian language predates the
proto-Indoeuropean language.
> and second, were they blonde people with nordic white skin.
Probably not. They described themselves as the black-headed people and
the book by Cavalli-Sforza et al., The History and Geography of Human
Genes, suggests that their modern day descendants are the people of
Kuwait.
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37. Meaning of Sumer?
>I just wanted to know what the word Sumer itself means
>in the Sumerian language. Could you kindly let me know ?
It is not known why the Akkadians called the southern land Shumeru.
The Sumerians called it ki-en-gir15 ('place of the civilized lords').
The etymology of the Akkadian term is unknown. It could possibly be a
dialectal pronunciation of the Sumerian word kiengir. This possibility
is suggested by the Emesal dialect form 'dimmer' for the word
'dingir'.
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38. Sumerian Speech from Buffy the Vampire Slayer
>This is probably going to sound really strange to you, but ...
>I was watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer on TV and they said something
>in Sumerian. I wanted to know what they said so I hopped onto the net
to
>see what I could find.
>I found someone else who was trying to find out what it meant and I
found
>your dictionary site. I looked through your site, but wasn't too
successful as
>I have no knowledge of the language at all. I was hoping you might be
able
>to translate it for me.
>The other person who was trying to get a translation wrote the
Sumerian
>as follows:
>Sha me-en-den
'we are heart'
>Gesh-toog me-en-den
'we are mind'
>Zee me-en-den
'we are spirit'
>Oo-kush-ta me-ool-lee-a ba-ab-tum-mu-de-en
'from the raging storm we bring the power of the primeval one'
>Im-a sheg-ab.
'heat/boil the wind'
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39. Sumerian Planet Names
>Yesterday, I came across the following words which are supposed to
>be the Sumerian names of the planets:
>Udu-idim-gu-ud = Mercury
>Nin-si4-an-na = Venus
'lady of the rosy dawn'
>Si-mu-ud = Mars
'dark or bloody horns/rays' is the probable translation, but unlike
the others, I don't recall actually seeing this term used. Can you
tell me where this term occurs?
>Mul-sag-me-gar = Jupiter
sag-me = mesu II = 'cult, rites' and gar = 'to establish', but it is
usually written SAG-ME-GAR to show that we are not sure of the
pronunciation, because it was also a logogram for Neberu, which calls
to mind Nippur, the Sumerian's cult center.
>Udu-idim-sag-us = Saturn
>Of these 'gu-ud' means of course 'gu4-ud' (=bull of sun) and 'sag-us'
is
>of course 'sag-us2' (=steady star), 'mul' is 'star' but I'm not sure
about the rest.
>Would you be so kind as to point out the correct rendering of the
five words?
udu-idim is 'wild sheep'. We have no textual gloss or actual evidence
that the signs were read this way, instead of udu-bad, which, meaning
'dead sheep', would refer to the planets as omens, but Benno
Landsberger with his extensive knowledge of Sumerian deduced that this
is the most probable reading.
From the other meanings of gu4-ud I would infer that the Sumerians
themselves knew the planet Mercury, and I may have seen nin-si4-an-na
in a Sumerian textual context, but the other names only occur in later
contexts, so I don't know how early they were invented and applied.
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40. Who Were the Sumerians?
>Is it possible that you could give more details concerning the
Sumerians? Who
>are they? Where did they come from?
>I must admit that I have never heard of this race and I am eager to
learn more.
There are some excellent books out there. My favorite introduction is
by Samuel Noah Kramer, called History Begins at Sumer: Thirty-Nine
Firsts in Man's Recorded History.
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41. Annotated Version of Lexicon?
> I've just had a look at your site. It's a very impressive
compilation.
>I'm wondering whether you have produced an annotated version of your
>lexicon, with references to the source-bibliography you list on your
page?
>Such a version would be a very useful tool for scholarship. I'd be
very
>interested to know whether one is in development or currently
available.
No, that would have taken twice as long. If you look at Santag 5, A
Concise Dictionary of Akkadian, it doesn't have such references
either.
The searchable PSD index has most of the source references. And it is
very helpful how it now indexes all of the Sumerian references in the
AHw. After you trace down all the PSD index references for a word,
though, don't be surprised if you end up with basically the same range
of meanings that are given in my version 3 lexicon.
Return to questions list.
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42. Origin of Picture of Counting Tokens
>I would like to use the pictures of the counting tokens that you used
in your
>site (http://www.sumerian.org/tokens.htm) in a piece that I'm working
on.
>
>Since I need to print what I'm designing, I need higher resolution
pictures.
>Could you please do me the favor of telling me where you got the
originals?
>Do you own them or high res. versions of them?
I paid the Louvre museum for black and white photographs back in the
1980s. I am not sure where the package with that photograph is right
now.
I went through a library department at UC Berkeley that obtains things
like that - you could do the same.
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43. Another Translation into Sumerian
>I've been doing this project where I've been translating the song
Twiggy
>Twiggy into any language I can. I was trying to use your dictionary
to make a
>Sumerian version but I'm not finding all the words I need and I think
there
>may be tricks to it that I'm not aware of. The first 2 lines came out
"ñe za
>es dana/ni ñe gul-lum" (I waited three hours/along with my cat) and
then the
>next line I couldn't do because there doesn't seem to be a word that
means
>'wearing'. If you're interested in helping with a translation, the
song goes:
>
>I waited for three hours along with my cat
es danna-am3 su-a-gu10-da mu-da-tush
Return to questions list.
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44. Vowels in Sumerian Writing?
>Did the sumerians have vowels in their writings?
Yes. Some of the Sumerian ideograms gradually became used as
syllabograms, which included the vowel indications.
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45. Did Sumerian Have Vowel Harmony?
> In your opinion, is that possible that the sumerians had vowel
harmony
>in their language?
Very definitely the Sumerians had vowel harmony.
Here is the entry for zabar, the Sumerian word for the metal bronze.
zabar[UD.KA.BAR]: bronze (zil; zi; zé, 'to pare, cut', + bar6,
'bright, white'; Akk. siparrum, 'bronze' borrowed before vowel harmony
changed Sumerian word; cf., barzil, 'iron') [ZABAR archaic frequency:
1].
It shows the transformation zilbar > zibar > zabar.
According to David Crystal's Dictionary of Language and Languages,
Turkish and Hungarian are examples of languages that display harmony
as a systematic feature of their sound system.
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46. Sumerians Live During or Before the Time of Biblical Moses?
>I am interested to know if Sumerian were exist as a people either
during the
>time of Moses or before?
The Sumerians flourished before the time of Moses, who lived in the
middle of the second millenium B.C.E.
The Sumerian language ceased to be spoken before the time of Moses.
In the book of Genesis 11:2, the Bible sets the story of the tower of
Babel in the land of Shinar, which is how the Hebrews wrote Sumer.
Shinar is also briefly mentioned in the Bible at Genesis 14:1, Isaiah
11:11, Zechariah 5:11, and Daniel 1:2.
In Genesis 11:28-31, the Bible describes how Abraham, the putative
ancestor of Moses and all Hebrews, was a native of the Sumerian city
of Ur.
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47. Different Dialects? - Text Partially in Sumerian
>I was wondering whether or not there were different dialects to
Sumerian?
>I have read what I thought to be some Sumerian text and a lot of the
words that
>I was interested in translating into English are not found in your
lexicon and others.
>"DINGIR UD KALAMA SINIKU"
The first three words are Sumerian ideograms, and the fourth word is
Akkadian. So it is Akkadian and the reader would have substituted the
Akkadian words for the Sumerian ideograms, such as elu shamash matu,
god sun land. I don't know Akkadian that well, but sanaku means 'to
come near, approach'. The Sun god approached the land ?
There is the EME-SAL dialect, or women's dialect, which has some
vocabulary that is different from the standard EME-GIR dialect that is
in my lexicon. Thomsen includes a list of eme-sal vocabulary in her
Sumerian Language book.
Return to questions list.
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48. Where Does One Learn Sumerian?
>How's it going? I know this is a long shot, but do you know of any
school or
>place that teaches one how to speak Sumerian? Thanks for your time.
Where do you live?
You can search the e-mail addresses of Assyriologists - I have a link
to them at my links page. See at what universities they teach.
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49. What is the Relation of Sumerian to Other Language Families?
>I have a question: is Sumerian related with the Ural Altaic
languages,
>or with the Indo European languages?
>
>Doesn't there exist any relation between Sumerian and the semitic
>language family?
There appears to be some slight relation between Sumerian and both
Ural-Altaic and Indo-European. This may just be due to having evolved
in the same northeast Fertile Crescent linguistic area.
I don't see any connection at all between Sumerian and Semitic.
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50. Sumerian Money
>During my rather cursory examination of your impressive
>work, I ran across several terms which could be construed
>as economic units of measure; gur, a unit of volume roughly
>equal to 26 bushels, kug or ku, silver or money, and gin or
>gig, a small axe head used as money roughly equal to a shekel.
>Did the Sumerians have a common unit of economic exchange
> at 2400 to 2300 BC and, if so, what was it?
Our documentation is much better for the Ur III period starting 2100
BC than for the Old Sumerian Ur II, Girsu/Lagash/Adab period that you
mention. From the Ur III period we have tablets from different places
and times that give the silver equivalents of different quantities of
different commodities. For the period that you mention, I know that
there were standardized weights and measures, although they were
slightly different from the later period.
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51. The Greatest Sumerian Ruler?
>i am a current student in 9th grade. i am doing an in depth research
paper.
>and i was wondering if u knew who the greatest ruler was of the
sumerians?????
That would probably be King Shulgi of the Third Dynasty of Ur. He
reigned for 47 years during a time of great prosperity, from 2094 to
2047 B.C.
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52. Vinca Culture Writing - Tartaria Tablets in Romania
>What explanation can be given to the fact that three clay tablets
>containing sumerian pictographs made with local clay , but 1000 years
>older than the oldest tablets found in Mesopotamia , are found in a
region
>where the surrounding cities have sumerian names , URASTIE ,
>SIMERIA ; KUGIR ? Is it possible that sumerian groups have migrated
>as far north as the western Rumania ?
It probably was the case that some early Sumerian-speakers from the
Samarra culture made their way north instead of south.
The words that you quote do use the same combination of consonants and
vowels as Sumerian, but I would also see if you can derive them from
simpler Sumerian words, as is possible with the actual Sumerian
lexicon.
Have you visited Fred Hamori's web site which makes many comparisons
of Sumerian to Uralic and Altaic vocabulary? There is a link to it
near the bottom of my mesopotamian links.
Do dictionaries of Romanian include scholarly etymologies for the
words, as dictionaries of English do?
I am familiar with the Vinca culture 'writing', discussed by Marija
Gimbutas in her books and the subject of a 1973 UCLA doctoral
dissertation by Milton McChesney Winn. There were about 200 symbols
used by the Southeast Europe Chalcolithic civilization. But just like
the Indus culture script, they mainly occur on pottery. Personally, I
believe that they are heraldic family emblems, and not attempts to
render speech in written signs. They are not the same as Sumerian
writing.
> Yes , the Tartaria tablets are included in the "Vinca" culture , and
I
>am familiar with Maria Gimbutas remarkable work , but I have to
disagree
>with your conclusion that those three clay tablets "are not sumerian
writing" .
> I cannot explain the similarities , but the facts are that they
contain
>pictograms absolutely identical with those found in Djemet-Nasr ,
they
>are carbon dated 1000 years before , and are made of local clay . And
>they definitely are clay tablets , no doubt about it , found in a
burial place ,
>and very distinct from the more common pottery symbols found
>throughout southeastern Europe , both in function and in form .
> The problem is that the inclusion of just these three tablets in the
>"Vinca" culture seems , graphically , forced by the
>lack of a better explanation , yet another problem being the evident
>isolation and distant placement of the tablets from
>the rest ( if they indeed belong to a proto-mediterranean culture ,
>more widespread than it is ascertained today ) .
I wrote to an expert on the Jemdet Nasr script. He responded regarding
the Tartaria tablets, "There are some graphic similarities, but not so
many really, so a discussion of these tablets is not time well spent."
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53. Sumerian Determinatives
> Hello, Mr Halloran. I am in the process of comparing Egyptian and
>Sumerian determinatives. I found an Internet source for Egyptian
>determinatives. Could you please inform me of any Internet (or
otherwise)
>source for Sumerian determinatives?
There is actually a decent list of determinatives at the Akkadian web
site that is at the top of my links list.
However, the most complete list that I know of is on pages 152-153 of
an inexpensive paperback book from Eisenbrauns by Douglas B. Miller
and R. Mark Shipp, An Akkadian Handbook.
See also 60. Determinative Before Month Names
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54. Sumerian Vocabulary from a Woman's Viewpoint
>BTW also, I had a little trouble with your definition of the "l"
sound. You
>stated "tireless producers of abundance, males". (?) That confuses
me. I
>thought the producers were always the females, and the supervisors
were the
>males.
You have to look at what are the actual Sumerian words that have just
this one consonant. E.g.,
la: abundance, luxury, wealth; youthful freshness and beauty; bliss,
happiness; wish, desire [LA archaic frequency: 20; concatenates 4 sign
variants].
lá: to penetrate, pierce, force a way into (in order to see); to know;
to look after; to have a beard (cf. also, lal) [LA2 archaic frequency:
57].
lu: n., many, much; man, men, people; sheep.
v., to be/make numerous, abundant; to multiply; to mix; to graze,
pasture (reduplication class [?]) (cf., lug).
lú: grown man; male; human being; someone, anyone, no one; gentleman
[LU2 archaic frequency: 85].
lù: to disturb, agitate, trouble; to fluster, embarrass; to stir,
blend.
Males are associated with providing abundance and wealth from the
woman's point of view. Don't these associations appear to be from a
woman's point of view?
I think that a group of women were the original inventors of the
Sumerian language. Although it seems like a big deal to us now, when
they started it probably seemed to them like they were just playing an
exciting new game, assigning different vowels and consonants as an
abstract shorthand for things in their world.
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55. Sumerian Words in CAPITAL Letters
>BTW, what's the difference between the word you give a definition to,
and the
>words that are in brackets with capital letters and periods between
syllables
>after the word?
That's a reasonable question. The names in capital letters refer to
the particular cuneiform sign, without prejudging how the sign is
pronounced. That is the name that Assyriologists have given to the
inscribed sign - usually its most common pronunciation.
One sign may have several lower-case pronunciations, each of which is
a separate word in the spoken language lexicon.
The periods separate different signs. Sometimes one word in the spoken
language is represented by multiple written signs.
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56. English to Sumerian Dictionary?
>I am presently studying Sumerian, and have been using the lexicon on
your
>website. Do you have, or know where I can find a complete
>English-to-Sumerian/Akkadian dictionary, the opposite way around from
yours?
Just download the lexicon in Word for Windows form and use Word's find
function to find a particular English word. Or get the Adobe Acrobat
Reader with Search and use that with the PDF file.
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57. Sumerian Origins
>Do you think Sumerians are native of Southern Iraq ?
>I dont think so, I think they colonized the UBAIDIAN people.
Why do you think that?
Archaeologists are now saying that Choga Mami ware is transitional
between Samarra pottery and Ubaid pottery. This agrees with my belief
that mastery of irrigation agriculture is what marked the Sumerians,
that they moved down from the middle of Mesopotamia, site of the
Samarra culture. The simplest words of Sumerian include words for
dikes and channels.
>What do you think of their look ? they looked like mongols ?
Is that the main reason for your opinion about the Sumerians as late
colonizers? What do you think, that the Sumerians came in on
horseback? Their language is farming-oriented, not warfare-oriented.
The History and Geography of Human Genes by Cavalli-Sforza et al.
finds distinctive genes in Kuwait and speculates that Kuwaitis are the
genetic descendants of the Sumerians.
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58. Out-of-Print Jacobsen Book
>I am looking for an out of print book by Jacobsen. Title: Toward an
Image
>of Tammuz and other Essays.
>Do you have any information on how to buy a copy.
I have only seen that out-of-print book in libraries. I don't own a
copy. It is an excellent book, full of Thorkild Jacobsen's scholarly
articles.
If your local university library does not have it, I would visit the
Interlibrary Loan Department of your local public library. They can
get it for you and then you can photocopy what interests you. This
advice applies to getting any out-of-print book.
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59. 'I Love You' in Sumerian
>I am trying to find out how to spell "I Love You" as a man would say
to a
>woman in the following languages but I'm having great difficulty with
it.
>
>Sumerian
In Sumerian, you would say, za.e ki-ag2-gu10, which translates as "you
are my beloved"
It would be pronounced, ze ki angu, where ang is as in English bong or
dong.
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60. Determinative Before Month Names
>You have worked with this and the notations extensively. They are
familiar
>to you, but I need a little clarification.
>
>One entry was as follows ...
>
>iti(superscripted)BARA-ZA-GAR -- calendar month 1 at Nippur during Ur
III.
>Note that the example you provided above also included the "iti".
>
>I was scanning for the word 'month' in the document and each instance
>(at least up to the B's) contained the above superscript. What is its
>significance? Is it a reference to an article word (such as 'the')
that
>separates or indicates that the word following is to mean a 'month'
and not
>one of the other possible meanings?
itud, itid, itu, iti, id8; it4, id4: moon; month; moonlight (te, 'to
approach, meet', + ud, 'sun').
Yes, certain Sumerian words are written before the noun or name as a
'determinative', such as dingir being written before divine names or
lu2 being written before male profession names. iti is the
determinative written before month names, so that the reader will know
that the sign(s) that follow refer to a month. It is thought that
determinatives were not pronounced in speech, but only appear in
writing.
>The definitional references to the month number and city location and
>historic time period I understand. Is the purpose for providing the
reference
>locations and timings to identify 'where' the particular word for the
month
>has been encountered written down on a clay tablet?
No. As you may notice in the example, the same month name can refer to
a different month depending on the city and period. So this
information is provided so that the translator who knows where his
tablet is from will know which number of month is referenced.
>In your studies, have any of the months seemed to be numbered, or the
>words that appear to be names of months intimate a numbering
sequence?
> Example: the language root for the name of month X is the same as
>number X (numbers 1 through 12 or 13 only) even though the complete
>spellings end up as different.
No, I have not seen numerical Sumerian month names. They are usually
the names of seasonal festivals that took place in that month.
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61. Sumerian Words in Akkadian and Hebrew
>As a linguist, a translator with a excellent background in Hebrew, I
found
>your monograph utterly fascinating! I can see myself among those
people,
>beginning to see things differently that they seem, trying to express
my feeling,
>and pronouncing some vowels and consonants .... Like in a dream, you
are
>trying to speak and words don't come out, or you speak a language,
which
>you think is, say, German, but it is not ....
>
>Several words, or sounds, as you are certainly aware, have lived
through the
>millenia and entered into Semitic languages, like "uz", a goat, the
same as in
>Hebrew, or even "ga" milk, "khalav" in Hebrew, and "gala" in Greek. I
was
>surprised, though, that "ur," does not appear to mean "city" or
"town,"
>as in Chaldean and old Hebrew.
That would be:
uru(2)(ki), iri, ri2; iri11: city, town, village, district [URU
archaic frequency: 101; concatenation of 5 sign variants; UNUG archaic
frequency: 206; concatenates 3 sign variants].
which relates to:
uru3(-m)[E]: n., watch fire; light; glowing, luminous object.
v., to watch, guard; to protect.
As for broad-based connections between Sumerian and Afro-Asiatic, I
don't see them.
I can see how the Sumerians created their vocabulary, and in M.L.
Foster's article referenced in the footnotes to my Proto-Sumerian
paper she appears to show how the Indo-Europeans created their
vocabulary, but I don't know if anyone has determined the logic or
pattern according to which the first Afro-Asiatic speakers created the
words of their vocabulary.
Return to questions list.
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62. Teachings of Suruppak to His Son Ziusudra
>Sir, according to the book "ATRA-HASIS: The Babylonian
>Story of the Flood by lambert & Millard, pg 19...
>"A literary work, of which copies contemporary with
>those of the King List are extant, professes to be the
>teaching of Suruppak to his son Ziusudra. It consists
>of admonitions of a quite general kind..."
>I'd like to find this record. Do you have any idea of
>where this came from. I found no references in the
>book to locate this.
The bibliography for the Sumerian lexicon at my web site includes the
following:
B. Alster, The Instructions of Suruppak: A Sumerian Proverb Collection
(Mesopotamia: Copenhagen Studies in Assyriology, Vol. 2); Copenhagen
1974.
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63. Sumerian Freedom Tattoo
>I recently got the following tattoo on my left shoulder (see the
attachment).
>According to a company in the USA called Liberty Fund. Inc. This sign
was a
>Sumarian design motif for the word "freedom" (ama-gi).
>
>Do you know anything about these motifs and if it actually is
Sumarian?
>Would it be correct to say it was carved in a wall about 2000 BC?
Your information is correct. The term ama(-ar)-gi4 meaning 'freedom'
is in my on-line lexicon. The jpg shows the transcribed signs ama and
gi4 and yes they are in a form appropriate to 2000 B.C.
>Do you have any idea where this motif was found? If you don't know,
maybe
>you known somebody who does.
It is not a motif. It is a word that the Sumerians used both in speech
and in writing.
The jpg that you sent shows a transcription by a modern scholar. It
does not show the actual ancient tablet or inscription that the
scholar was looking at. The scholar used an ink pen to make that
transcription. The Sumerians used reed styluses to make impressions in
clay, so their tablets actually look quite different and are not as
easy to read as is a modern scholar's transcription.
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64. Age/Location of Sumerian Vocabulary
>In relation to your Sumerian Lexicon 3.0, I'd need to
>know of what age/location is it.
It would be nice if the lexicon indicated the provenance for which
particular words and meanings are attested, but I am just one person
and did not have the time to do that. The majority of our texts are
from the Ur III and Old Babylonian periods.
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65. Hungarian Roots
> after examining your site of Sumerian expressions, would like to ask
>you a question: ever heard of Dr Sándor Nagy? Specifically referring
to
>his publication of "The Forgotten Cradle of the Hungarian Culture";
>(translated by László and Margaret Botos); Patria Publishing Co.
Ltd.,
>Toronto, Canada 1973.
>
> In that book he promotes the idea that Hungarian language is a
>'descendant' of the Sumerian folks who populated the Danube basin
prior
>to the Magyar conquest in the 9th century. Would appreciate your
>opinion.
>
> I'm supporting a genealogy list of Magyar descendants who are
>searching for their roots (speak, read and write Hungarian) and one
of
>the list member sent me samples of Dr. Nagy's book, which I did not
read
>- except a few pages - so far.
If you look at the map at my web site, you will see that trade routes
head north from the Samarra culture sites. Hungarian does appear to
share some simple vocabulary, but not the more complex words. Check
out Fred Hamori's web page on Ural-Altaic language connections, on my
links page, towards the bottom of the Mesopotamia links.
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66. Dilmun, Lemuria, and Sumer
> I have recently purchased the book, "Looking for Dilmun"
Is that by Geoffrey Bibby? If so, that's a great book. I read that a
long time ago.
> and while reading it I came across info. on Sumeria
A lot of people who should know better call it that. The correct name
is Sumer.
>....it brought back a book I read
>as a young girl...I can't recall the name of it but it intrigued me
even
>back then...I'm sure it was already out of print, I borrowed it and
its
>owner was adamant about its return...the book was about an ancient
>civilization, I think Sumeria....although also went by another name
as I
>recall...people could communicate by thought and wrote tablets...I
think I
>recall people thought it was the lost Atlantis at one time...
You are probably thinking about books regarding the hypothetical
civilization of Mu or Lemuria, by Col. James Churchward. I read those
books too when I was a kid. Of course, there is no place in actual
human history for such a civilization. The only recent discovery that
could possibly support the disappearance of such a civilization would
be the discovery of the caldera volcano of Toba which erupted around
70,000 B.C.
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67. Need Background for Novel that I Am Writing
>Thank you very much for answering me. Well, the thing is that my
novel
>starts in the first part of the summerian civilization, I mean even
before
>Sargon I and the other ones.
>
>I speak about several aspects about religion. I already know that
they
>didn't believe in a life after death, or inclusive that this "life"
was
>really dark when dead. I want to know the name of the ancient gods,
and
>specific aspects about their believings in how was suppose to be the
life
>after death.
>
>Also if it possible to know some things about the first important
cities in
>summerian civilization, how were suppose to be the houses, the
palaces, the
>FOOD, or ANY domestic aspect, I will be VERY VERY pleassed.
I am sorry. I am used to answering more specific questions than this.
I cannot do the job of educating you.
I suggest that you order and study a 1998 novel, Between the Rivers,
by Harry Turtledove. This author already did the background research
that you describe and it fills his book.
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68. Disputing the Etymology of the Sumerian Word for 'Breast'
> Hi: I have looked at your Proto-Sumerian Language Invention Process
>web-site again to see what elements would comprise compound words.
The
>first word in the list is gaba 'breast' (ga 'milk' + ba 'to give').
It is
>not my intention to dispute the phonetic form and its meaning because
>'milk' can be semantically connected with women's breast and ga + ba
seems
>to be a convincing combination at first glance. But it isn't so
evident if
>one looks at the cuneiform signs of ga, ba and gaba. Neither ga or ba
can
>be detected in the cuneiform sign of gaba which appears to be a
unique
>individual sign by itself.
The spoken words were invented long before the written signs. The
inventors of the written signs had learned the spoken words as
unbroken phonemic sequences which were no longer analyzed into
components.
> Could it possibly be that gaba was a neutral
>word used both for men and women?
Yes, that is what the word became.
> In that case milk would have nothing to
>do with the appellation, it simply meant part of the human body we
call
>'chest'. This would be confirmed by the Hungarian kebel 'chest' and
old
>Turkish gogoz 'chest'. Each o in the Turkish word is marked with
dieresis.
>A possible common source for the roots gab, keb and gog may not be
too
>difficult to find. The Sumerian gab is present in the Hungarian male
>forenames Gabi and Gabor, also in the surname Kabos (old form Kaba),
which
>denote barrel-chested individuals. Thus the -a in the Sumerian gaba
may be
>a suffix that forms adjectives. (Both -a and -os are adjectival
suffixes in
>the Hungarian language).
Are there regular sound-change rules that connect Hungarian 'kebel'
with Turkish 'gogoz'? For the root of the Hungarian words, note the
root 'kopa II' meaning 'lungs' in Gyula Decsy's book The Uralic
Protolanguage: A Comprehensive Reconstruction, Eurolingua,
Bloomington, 1990. Turkish belongs to the Altaic language family.
The suffix -a forms nouns or participial phrases in Sumerian, so
applying your logic, the breast or chest would be the thing that gabs,
although Sumerian has no such verb, having hab, 'to stink', and gub,
'to stand'.
Personally, I think that the vocabulary of Sumerian is older and more
conservative than the vocabulary of Hungarian or Turkish. This would
mean that some Hungarian vocabulary could have evolved from an early
form of Sumerian. Studies of the rates of lexical change have found
that the vocabulary of farming cultures is especially conservative and
resistant to change.
> It would be interesting to find out if the
>'milk' + 'to give' logic was applied by the Sumerians for 'udder'.
They
>were engaged in animal husbandry, therefore, must have had a word for
it.
ubur: female breast, teat (ub4, 'cavity', + ir(2), 'liquid
secretion').
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69. Symbols for Mesopotamian Gods?
>I have been trying to find all the symbols for the different gods in
>Mesopotamia. I have only found one version of Anu, and I am not sure
if
>it is correct. Do you know of anywhere I might be able to get this
>information?
I suggest the paperback book:
Gods, Demons, and Symbols of Ancient Mesopotamia by Black and Green.
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70. Sumerian and Babylonian Holy Days
>I am a Pastor seeking information on Sumerian and Babylonian
>worship and ceremonies. - Do we have any knowledge of the
>actual ceremonies, the sights and sounds that would meet a visitor to
an
>ancient temple in Sumer and Babylon?
>
>Especially I am trying to find information on the Shapatu, the holy
day
>in the middle of every month in the Sumerian and/or Babylonian lunar
>calendar. According to my lexicon, it is the origin of the Hebrew
Sabbath.
>I would like to find out as much as I can about what deity was
attached to
>this date, and what cermonies and rituals were performed.
>
>I do not expect you to send me a lenghty thesis on this. But a hip
shot
>answer from whatever knowledge you may possess would be of great
help.
>Plus of course a possible reference to written sources on the
subject.
Here is an entry in the recent book, A Concise Dictionary of Akkadian.
shapattu(m), shabattu "15th day of month" OAkk, Bab., OA [UD.15.KAM];
also "period of 15 days, fortnight"
The books that you might examine include:
Babylonian Menologies and the Semitic Calendar, by Stephen Langdon
Cultic Calendars of the Ancient Near East, by Mark E. Cohen
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71. Yet Another Translation into Sumerian
>The reason I'm emailing is with a somewhat lighthearted
>research question. I was assigned to write a story about a cat's
>travels through various underworlds and afterlifes. In the story, the
>cat is cast out of each underworld and into the next by being told,
>"Go to hell!"
>
>He makes a visit to a Sumerian netherworld, and is told (after
>wreaking some typically feline destruction), "Go to hell!" So my
>question is...how can we represent that statement in Sumerian?
>
>A quick troll through your paper "The Proto-Sumerian Language
>Invention Process" yields "urugal" (the netherworld) and a couple of
>verb possibilities (éd, è; i and èd, e11), but I am completely
stumped
>as to conjugations and declensions, and whether there are any
>prepositional equivalents.
You could use:
urugal-ce3 ba-ra-ed3
where c can be transcribed as sh and you can drop the logogram
numbers.
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72. Permission to Use Tokens Picture
> Hello John:
> I would like to use your picture of sumerian tokens for an article
that I
>am submitting to [snip]. I am not getting any money for it, and
>plan to put your copyright notice on the figure caption along with
your
>name. Sound OK?
The Louvre museum sold me permission to use that photograph about 15
years ago. I think that they retain the rights to it.
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73. How Did Writing Start?
>Intuitively, I imagine that the first kind of written language was
>pictographic, and that at some point there was a breakthrough in the
>discovery of a way of notating the sounds of words. This must sound
crude
>and laughable to you, given the depth and specialty of your work,
however I
>am genuinely interested in this, and I want to start with an overview
of
>written language development worldwide before digging in deeper
>Can you help?
At an on-line bookseller look either for a book by Denise
Schmandt-Besserat or for a book by Robert Englund and Hans Nissen.
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74. Books to Study Day-to-Day Life of Sumerians?
>For the past 6 months I have gathered internet
>resources, as far as the Sumerian language is
>concerned, and wish to know what books you would
>suggest for further reading. Due to circumstances, I
>do not have the resources to study at college, but
>wish to know more about the field of anthropology -
>primarily linguistic and cultural. I know of a few
>books that would be helpful, but would like to know
>more about the grammatical structure and day to day
>lives of these people. I would sincerely appreciate
>any information you would have to offer.
You need to get the Thomsen and Hayes books on Sumerian that I sell -
and would need those textbooks even if you did study Sumerian at a
university.
As far as daily life is concerned, the best books, listed in order of
detailed information, are:
D.T. Potts, Mesopotamian Civilization: The Material Foundations;
Ithaca, New York 1997.
D.C. Snell, Ledgers and Prices: Early Mesopotamian Merchant Accounts;
New Haven and London 1982.
D.C. Snell, Life in the Ancient Near East: 3100-332 B.C.E.; New Haven
and London 1997.
Thorkild Jacobsen's writings contain much insightful cultural and
linguistic speculation about the Sumerians.
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75. Necronomicon; Learning Sumerian
>Hello. I'm merely 15 but I'm greatly intrigued with the Assyrians and
Sumerians.
>This is concerning some Sumerian words from the Lexicon that I'd like
to
>know about. You stated that Alal means water.....but in Necronomicon
it
>says Alal means Destroyer. It confused me. Do you know much of
anything
>about Necronomicon? It was written by Abdul Alhazred (The Mad Arab)
in
>about the 8th century A.D. Anyway I'd like to know for sure if it had
to do
>with the Sumerians or not and I figured you may know the answer to
that
>as well. Is there any way I could buy tapes or books for learning all
or
>a majority of the Sumerian language? Thanks for your time and
patience.
>I hope to recieve a reply. Until then.....Farewell and Blessed
Be.....
My lexicon has alal as 'pipe for making libation offerings to the
deceased'. In this way it is associated with death.
Are you sure that the Necronomicon is not a modern invention?
I would go to http://www.google.com and put in the search words
Necronomicon and Author.
All I know about it is that it has attracted a number of people with
an occult bent to learn Sumerian who would not otherwise. I don't
personally own a copy of it.
A number of students of Sumerian are starting by ordering the John
Hayes book that I sell from my web site.
>Alright I understand the whole thing about Alal being associated with
Death now.
>
>I'm pretty sure that Necronomicon isn't a more common invention but
I'll
>do a little more research to make sure. It says on the back cover
that it was
>written in the 8th Century A.D. around the area of Damascus by Abdul
Alhazred.
>
>Alhazred was known as a hermit who was very well learned for the
times
>and bragged about knowing so many languages. He was a philosopher of
sorts
>as well as an Astronomer.
>
>That's how I got into Sumerian.....was from Necronomicon. It started
out
>that I decided I didn't entirely believe in Christianity and somehow
I heard
>about Necronomicon and decided to buy it and check it out. It seemed
to make
>more sense to me and I follow the beliefs but I haven't done any of
the rituals
>or anything because I can't get the items needed. I still read on
more religions
>though.
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76. Sumerian Tenses?
>saw the site--does sumerian have tenses and if so are they past
present
>future or something else
Sumerian had two sets of verbal forms, which the Akkadians called
hamtu and maru, "quick, sudden" and "fat, slow".
Quoting from the Manual by John L. Hayes, "The difference in function
between the two has been interpreted in various ways. It has been
argued that the difference was one of tense (past ~ present/future);
one of aspect (perfect ~ imperfect); one of Aktionsart (punctual ~
durative, and so on). An explanation in terms of aspect seems to fit
the evidence best, and they will be called aspects here." p. 46.
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77. Cuneiform Words?
>Does Your Website have any words in Cuneiform?
Only what you see on the Proverbs page.
Cuneiform refers to a type of writing, not to a language. In the
Ancient Near East, different, unrelated languages such as Akkadian,
Sumerian, Hittite, and Elamite were written in cuneiform writing.
Return to questions list.
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78. Letters or Sounds Missing from Sumerian
>In studying your list of Sumerian words, the following letters
>seem to not be in their alphabet:
>c,f,j,o,q,v,w,x,y (although the "x" is there in a different font).
>Am I correct?
The Sumerians had a syllabary, not an alphabet. They may have had the
o sound, but the Akkadians from whom we have our knowledge of Sumerian
did not and represented it with the u sound.
You are basically correct about the Sumerians not using those sounds.
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79. Sumerian Pictographic Writing
>I am looking for any information
>on the full Sumerian picture
>writing that they used around
>3000 bc. If you know of any
>websites or books that would
>help I'd appreciate it.
For information on proto-cuneiform pictographic writing, at my links
page, click on Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative.
Also, if you have the patience for the pages to load or you are on a
fast connection, check out the link to Old Sumerian Signs copied from
Labat.
See also 11. Development of Cuneiform From Pictographs
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80. History of Bookkeeping and Sumerian Term "shubati"
>Looking for information about the history of money resp.
>the history of bookkeeping, I discovered the interesting
>babylonian word "shubati", mentioned in a publication of
>'The Banking Law Journal'; What is money? by A. Mitchell
>Innes 1913 (*) . Innes translated 'shubati' as "received"
>It seems, that this expression 'shubati' appeared very often
>on babylonian clay tablets, used as records of economic
>transactions.
>
>I would kindly ask you: Could You let me know Your opinion
>resp. Your translation regarding the exact meaning of the word
>'shubati'?
This Sumerian term is well understood. You will find the verb in
question in my Sumerian Lexicon in the compound words section under
shu...ti, 'to receive'. shu means 'hand' and ti means 'to approach',
so the compound means 'to receive'.
ba- is the simplest of the verbal prefixes, used when the subject is
inanimate and/or non-agentive (intransitive).
Return to questions list.
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81. Sumerian "danna" and Akkadian "beru"
>Why can't I find the word beru? Can the word ever signify a "day" or
a
>"double-day"?
That is an Akkadian word. Look in the Sumerian Lexicon under danna in
the DAN section. beru is the Akkadian equivalent, translated
'double-hour; league'. Never 'day' or 'double-day'.
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82. Dilmun, Paradise, Bahrain, Eridu, Enki
> Thank you for your informative reply. My question pertains to
>Dilmun's location. Some records which you certainly know affirm that
Dilmun
>is "30 beru away" from Mesopotamia itself. I have found reasons for
>believing that Dilmun was located in the East Indies, as Dr.
Kalyanaraman
>argues in some detail in his Sarasvati site.
I had responded, "I know of no reason to doubt the traditional
Sumerological identification of Dilmun as the island of Bahrain. You
will find Dilmun, Magan, and Meluhha all referenced in my lexicon."
> You may be right, after all. But it is hard to believe that anyone
would
>ever equate this region with Paradise.
If you want to research this further, the one thing that comes to mind
is the Sumerian tradition of the antiquity of the city of Eridu
(etymologically, 'city' + 'sweet, good; beautiful; favorable;
pleasing; fresh (water)'). The god of Eridu, Enki, was the lord of the
sweet underground waters for which Dilmun was reknowned, according to
Geoffrey Bibby in The Search for Dilmun. That tradition of Eridu's
antiquity combines with the reputation of Enki as having been the
Sumerian Prometheus, bringer of the arts of civilization to Sumer.
Perhaps the Sumerians saw Bahrain as Enki's natural home and hence as
the mother land for Sumerian civilization.
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83. How Reliable Is John M. Allegro?
>I've read John M. Allegro's Book "The sacred mushroom and the cross"
>and I want to proove his theses for my interpretation of his book.
>
>Hence I'm not a scientiest for early languages it is quite difficult
to
>me to proove his interpretation of sumerian words (which are his
points of
>start for several causally determinations).
>
>I tried to find equivalents between Allegros sumerian words in your
sumerian
>lexicon - some fit other not - but maybe I'm not familiar enough to
proove
>it this way.
>
>So - if you have a position to John M. Allegro it would be very
interest in it.
Allegro was not a Sumerologist.
Read:
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/10583
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84. Definite Article in Sumerian?
>I thought Sumerian did not have the definite article. You have "a" as
the
>article. Can you tell me your source.
On page 241, Thomsen calls /-a/ the subordination suffix, explaining
that this is her preference and that most Sumerologists since
Falkenstein have called it the nominalization suffix. John Hayes uses
the term 'nominalizer' for .a or /a/ throughout versions 1 and 2 of
his book.
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85. Which Style of Cuneiform to Learn?
>I wonder if you could help me out here. I am trying to find a kind of
>cuneiform to learn. There seems to be more than one. Which one is the
most
>common, and which one is the best? Is it Ugaritic, Old Persian,
Sumerian
>etc.? I am a little confused about why they are different from each
other.
Cuneiform refers to using reed styluses to render the sounds of the
language. They are all descended from Sumerian pictographs.
Which signs and styles of writing to learn depend on which spoken
language you want to learn.
The standard cuneiform signs are usually considered to be those of the
late Assyrians, which are good mainly for reading Akkadian language
tablets from the first millenium B.C. The library of Assurbanipal,
king of Assyria, was the first huge library to be discovered, so that
is why those are the standard signs. But also the Assyrians were to
the Babylonians what the practical-minded Romans were to the Greeks,
they organized and standardized the Babylonian signs. The Assyrian
signs are the style of cuneiform signs that you will learn from Daniel
C. Snell, A Workbook of Cuneiform Signs, available on my Undena
Publications order form.
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_________________________________________________________________
Copyright © 2002-2004 John Alan Halloran, Los Angeles, California. All
Rights Reserved.
Last modified on March 7, 2004.
http://www.sumerian.org/sumerfaq.htm