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On the curricular setting of Sumerian Literature

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 August 2014

Steve Tinney
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Extract

A series of important studies and observations over the last few decades has resulted in an increasingly clear understanding of the nature and composition of the Sumerian school curriculum in the Old Babylonian period, especially at Nippur. The sequence of lexical texts has been subject to extensive study, Lipit-Eštar hymn B has been identified as probably the first literary text to be read in the schools, and a further ten texts almost certainly followed Li B in the same sequence as they are given in the curricular catalogues.

The purpose of this interim presentation is twofold. Firstly, to attempt to demonstrate that in addition to Li B there are three other core compositions, namely Iddin-Dagan hymn B, Enlilbani hymn A, and Nisaba hymn A, which are read early in schools and do not appear in the curricular catalogues. Secondly, to present an additional piece of evidence which bears directly on the observation that at least the first ten entries of the curricular catalogues give, in sequence, the next ten texts read in schools after the four elementary hymns.

Type
Research Article
Information
IRAQ , Volume 61 , 1999 , pp. 159 - 172
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute for the Study of Iraq 1999

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References

1 Studies with specific relevance to the present paper include Civil, M., “Lexicography”, pp. 123–57Google Scholar in Sumerological Studies in Honor of Thorkild Jacobsen, ed. S. J. Lieberman (AS 20); Vanstiphout, H. L. J., “How Did They Learn Sumerian?”, JCS 31 (1979): 118–26Google Scholar; Hallo, W. W., “Notes from the Babylonian Collection, II: Old Babylonian HAR-ra”, JCS 34 (1982): 81–93Google Scholar. Also of interest are Sjöberg, Å. W., “The Old Babylonian Eduba”, pp. 159–79 in Sumerological Studies JacobsenGoogle Scholar; Vanstiphout, H. L. J., “On the Old Babylonian Eduba Curriculum”, pp. 3–16Google Scholar in Centres of Learning: Learning and Location in Pre-Modern Europe and the Near East, ed. J. W. Drijvers and A. A. MacDonald; Volk, K., “Methoden altmesopotamischer Erziehung nach Quellen der altbabylonischen Zeit”, Saeculum 47 (1996): 178–216CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Further bibliographical references may be found in Volk, “Erziehung”, nn. 1–12.

2 Most importantly in Veldhuis, N., Elementary Education at Nippur: the Lists of Trees and Wooden Objects, PhD dissertation, University of Groningen, 1997Google Scholar.

3 Abbreviated as Li B; edited in Vanstiphout, H. L. J., “Lipit-Eštar's Praise in the Edubba”, JCS 30 (1978): 33–61Google Scholar.

4 Vanstiphout, “How Did They Learn Sumerian?”.

5 At least Cat N2 (see below, n. 46), Cat L (n. 47) and Cat S1 (n. 48) should probably be considered curricular catalogues. See further Civil, “Lexicography”: 145 n. 36; Hallo, “Notes from the Babylonian Collection, II”: 83 f.; Wilcke, C., “Die Inschriftenfunde der 7. und 8. Kampagnen (1983 und 1984)”, pp. 83–120Google Scholar in Hrouda, B., ed., Isin-Išan Baḥrīyāt III. Die Ergebnisse der Ausgrabungen 1983–1984, esp. 85 ffGoogle Scholar.

6 Abbreviated as Id B; edited in Römer, W. H. Ph., Sumerische ‘Königshymnen’ der Isin-Zeit: 209 ffGoogle Scholar.

7 Abbreviated as Eb A; edited in Kapp, A., “Ein Lied auf Enlilbani von Isin”, ZA 51 (1955): 77–87Google Scholar.

8 Abbreviated as Nd A: edited in Hallo, W. W., “The Cultic Setting of Sumerian Poetry”, pp. 116–34 in CRRAI 17Google Scholar.

9 The descriptions are based on Civil, M., “Ancient Mesopotamian Lexicography”, pp. 2305–14Google Scholar in J. Sasson, ed., Civilizations of the Ancient Near East, from which all quotations in this section are taken.

10 The typology of the lentils was described by Edmund Gordon, though with specific focus on the proverbs, in Gordon, E. I., Sumerian Proverbs: Glimpses of Everyday Life in Ancient Mesopotamia (Museum Monographs 4), Philadelphia, 1959: 7–8CrossRefGoogle Scholar. A re-examination of this type of texts by reference to size, content and organization is overdue.

11 See my comments in OLZ 90 (1995): 15Google Scholar.

12 See OLZ 90 (1995): 9 fGoogle Scholar.

13 Note that this type is intended to apply to literary tablets with the same number of columns on each side. Database implementations of tablet catalogues will need to store the actual number of columns on each surface separately, and some objects may not be susceptible to shorthand description using this notation, though one might use, e.g., M2/3 as a notation for a text with two columns on obverse and three on reverse.

14 We reserve the term “face” to refer to the surfaces of prisms, indicating them with lower case letters. The term “column” is reserved for the subdivision of a surface into areas of writing.

15 Some prisms have more than one column per face, and the implementational notes mentioned in connection with multi-column tablets apply here also. For prisms, the notation P6/2 may be suggested for, e.g., a six-sided prism with two columns per face.

16 For further discussion of line-length and indentation see OLZ 90 (1995): 9 ffGoogle Scholar.

17 Vanstiphout, , “How Did They Learn?”: 126Google Scholar.

18 Cavigneaux, A., Uruk: Altbabylonische Texte aus dem Planquadrat Pe XVI-4/5 (AUWE 23). Philipp von Zabern, Mainz am Rhein, 1996Google Scholar.

19 In addition to the typologically structured discussion in the following sections, a summary list of sources known to the author for each member of the Tetrad is given in the appendices. A lengthier study of these texts is anticipated in the future, including revised editions of all texts and a more detailed and extensive discussion of their pedagogical and literary constructions, their relationship with the lexical and other curricular corpora (e.g., proverbs and Edubba texts), and a paleographic analysis of the principal groups of sources.

20 VAT 21639 (Cavigneaux, AUWE 23, No. 207), restoring [ibil] a ⌈kalag!⌉-ga / [nam-luga]l-l a me-en = Li A 21.

21 The following lentils from Uruk probably contain unidentified extracts of literary compositions: Cavigneaux, AUWE 23, Nos. 208–9, 210, 216, 220–1, 228–9, 232–9.

22 The lentils from Nippur have been thoroughly dealt with by Falkowitz, Robert S., “Round Old Babylonian School Tablets from Nippur”, AfO 29 (1983/1984): 18–45Google Scholar.

23 The scribe of these prisms writes the OA sign, for example, with a central vertical so heavy that the sign actually appears to be more like two components, a square followed by a gap (in which the tails of GA's horizontals are normally just visible), followed by a triangle.

24 All the prisms preserve traces of iti še-sag11-ku5; mu sa-am-su-i-lu-na ugnim e-mu-ut-ba-lumki, an abbreviation of Samsuiluna year 10. Alone among them, YBC 13523 may also preserve a day, i.e., ⌈u4⌉- [x-kam].

25 De Genouillac, TCL 16, p. 12; Langdon, OECT 1, pp. 11 f.

26 The large number of Larsa administrative texts in these collections is the topic of a forthcoming dissertation by Christian Dyckhoff, who kindly sent me the proofs of his forthcoming article in the Berlin RAI volume. If, as seems likely, a significant number of the literary texts in these collections also came from the same illicit excavations as did the administrative documents, then we possess — albeit unwittingly — substantial attestation of the literary corpus of one more Old Babylonian city. The pedigree, language and paleography of this putative Larsa literary corpus will be the subject of a further investigation.

27 The assignment of Ni 9942+ to this group is provisional.

28 CBS 14011 (SEM 71) is source C in Åke Sjöberg's edition of Father and Son (= Edubba B); see JCS 25 (1973): 105–69Google Scholar. In terms of the reconstructed line-numbering, the contents of CBS 14011 were as follows: i′= 1–26 (26 lines), i′ = 27–48 (22 lines), rev. i′ = 132–58 (27 lines), rev. i′ = 159–82 (24 lines). We may posit that the tablet originally had four columns per side — a reconstruction which fits the curvature of the preserved section — averaging 22.75 lines per column.

29 As discussed below, Schooldays (= Edubba A) occurs on at least one Type II tablet, and Nisaba A co-occurs on a fragmentary prism with Supervisor and Scribe (= Edubba C). The typology and co-occurrences of these texts both on collective tablets and in the catalogues warrants a separate investigation.

30 A full list of collective tablets will be given as one of the appendices in Civil and Tinney, An Index to the Corpus of Sumerian Literature (forthcoming).

31 See Vanstiphout, , “Lipit-Eštar's Praise”, 51Google Scholar and id., “How Did They Learn?”, 121–2.

32 All the citations below are based on revised manuscripts prepared by the author. Li B is cited according to the line numbering of Vanstiphout (I am grateful to Miguel Civil for drawing my attention to the important source BM 96970), and Id B according to that of Römer. In both cases, this line-numbering is based on long-line manuscripts which are not fully preserved, and one can make alternative suggestions for dividing the lines which would change the numbering. For Eb A, the only previously published manuscript is that of Kapp, but I am grateful to Piotr Michalowski, whose unpublished score was the basis for my own revised manuscript. This text is cited according to a reconstructed long-line system. For Nd A, the line-numbering is that of Hallo; I am again grateful for Michalowski's unpublished score, which formed the basis for my own revised manuscript. In all four cases it would be preferable to cite the Tetrad on the basis of short-line reconstructions, as these are the only fully preserved ancient orderings of the compositions. For the present purposes, however, it was felt to be more practical for the reader's sake to follow existing published practice and cite by long-line numberings.

33 The presence of lugal in the incipit of Id B is assured not only by the presence of šarrum in the bilingual text Ur1 but also by traces of lugal in the Me-Turan text. I am grateful to Antoine Cavigneaux for permission to consult his unpublished copy of the Me-Turan text.

34 Li B 53–4: ad-da-zu diš-me-dda-gan lugal kalam-ma-ke4gišgu-za-na suḫuš-bi mu-ra-an-ge-en; Id B 71–2: ad-da-zu dšu-i-lí-šu lugal kalam-ma-ke4gišgu-za-ni suḫuš-bi mu-ra-an-ge-en.

35 See also the notes on the structure of the text in Vanstiphout, , “Lipit-Eštar's Praise”: 50–1Google Scholar.

36 Li B 40–50 mentions Isin, Nippur, Keš, Ur, Eridu, Uruk and Isin in a DN/GN litany, whereas Id B mentions only Isin, once, in line 75. Besides frequent mention of Enlil, several mentions of Ninlil and the occasional formulaic mention of An, traits shared by both texts, Li B mentions Utu, Inanna, Enki and Ninurta in the opening passage, and Ninurta, Nuska, Nintur, Suen, Enki, Inanna and Ninisinna in the DN/GN litany. By contrast, Id B only mentions the following: Dagan twice (outside of the RN); Enki once (in the obscure 13–16); and Nisaba twice (64 and 68, a passage anticipating Iddin-Dagan's being remembered in the Edubba).

37 This relationship will be discussed in more detail in the introduction to my forthcoming edition of Enlildiriše.

38 As anticipated years before the present paper by Vanstiphout, H. L. J., “Some Thoughts on Genre in Mesopotamian Literature”, in Keilschriftliche Literaturen: ausgewählte Vorträge der XXXII. Rencontre assyriologique Internationale, Münster, 8.–12.7.1985 (BBVO 6): 4–5 n. 8Google Scholar.

39 The nature and scope of this pastiching will be more fully explored in my forthcoming discussion of Enlildiriše and related texts.

40 For lentils from Uruk probably containing unidentified extracts of literary compositions see above, n. 21.

41 See Veldhuis, , Elementary Education at Nippur: 65 fGoogle Scholar.

42 See for now Sauren, H., “e2-dub-ba-Literatur: Lehrbucher des Sumerischen”, Orientalia Lovaniensia Periodica 10 (1979): 97–107Google Scholar.

43 Note that UET 1 296 is the same tablet as UET 6/2 351.

44 For the sole Akkadian Type II text, a fictitious Sargon letter, see Veldhuis, , Elementary Education at Nippur. 66 n. 211Google Scholar.

45 Civil, “Lexicography”; Hallo, “Notes from the Babylonian Collection, II”; van Dijk, J., “Ein spätbabylonischer Katalog einer Sammlung sumerischer Briefe”, Or NS 58 (1989): 447 ffGoogle Scholar.

46 Cat N2 = Kramer, S. N., “The Oldest Literary Catalogue, a Sumerian List of Literary Compositions Compiled about 2000 BC”, BASOR 88 (1942): 14 ffGoogle Scholar.

47 Cat L = Kramer, , “Oldest Literary Catalogue”: 16 ffGoogle Scholar.

48 Cat S1 = van Dijk, , “Spätbabylonischer Katalog”: 447 fGoogle Scholar.

49 Cat Y2 = Hallo, “Notes from the Babylonian Collection, II”: 81 ff.

50 Cat B4 = Cohen, M. E., “Literary Texts from the Andrews University Archaeological Museum”, RA 70 (1976): 131 fGoogle Scholar.

51 Cat U2 =Kramer, , “New Literary Catalogue from Ur”, RA 55 (1961): 169 ffGoogle Scholar.

52 See Flückiger-Hawker, E., “Der ‘Louvre-Katalog’ TCL 15 28 und sumerische na-ru2- a Kompositionen”, NABU 1996/119Google Scholar.

53 See Klein, J., Three Šulgi Hymns: 169 with n. 264Google Scholar.

54 See Wilcke, , “Die Inschriftenfunde der 7. und 8. Kampagnen”: 85 ffGoogle Scholar.

55 A partial copy was given by Ferrara, A., JCS 28 (1976): 94 No. 91Google Scholar; the text was also utilized in Zgoll, A., Der Rechtsfall derEn-ḫedu-Ana im Lied nin-me-šara, esp. 203Google Scholar.

56 The preserved traces read: a′ 1′ […] ⌈x⌉ 2′ [ … ] ⌈me⌉-en, 3′ [ … -u]n-aka me-en, 4′ [ … ] mu-un-pàd-dè, 5′ [ … ]en-líl-lá me-en, 6′ [ … ]-àm. An additional ruling follows the end of the composition.

57 Zgoll, , Rechtsfall: 203Google Scholar.

58 Three angles are preserved and were measured by the author at 137°, 140° and 143°, indicating that, at least at the preserved point, we are not dealing with a precisely regular polygon. A regular octagon should have angles of 135°; a regular enneagon (or nonagon) angles of 140°; a regular decagon angles of 145°. Thus, an enneagonal prism gives the best fit given the preserved angles (for another nine-sided prism, this one containing Proto-Ea, see Civil, M., MSL 14: 18 source Ai = CBS 7846+)Google Scholar. I am grateful to Eleanor Robson for explaining some of the finer points of prism geometry to me.

59 See the discussion of Civil, M., “Feeding Dumuzi's Sheep”, in Language, Literature and History: Philological and Historical Studies presented to Erica Reiner (AOS 65): 7fGoogle Scholar.

60 I am grateful to Jeremy Black for drawing my attention to this piece, which will be published jointly by him and Nawala al-Mutawalli.

61 See Ludwig, M.-C., Untersuchungen zu den Hymnen des Išme-Dagan yon Isin (SANTAK 1): 41–65 with references to previous literatureGoogle Scholar.