This work presents for the first time in its entirety the long Sumerian poem describing the destruction and suffering in Babylonia during the final days of the Third Dynasty of Ur. The text is both an important work of native historiography and a moving literary composition. The author's introduction places the work within the Sumerian literary tradition, and evaluates it as a historical source. Indexes and copies of unpublished texts are included.
The goal of this book is to present a revised edition of the Sumerian Lamentation over the Destruction of Ur, a lament bewailing the fall of the glorious Ur III kingdom in 2004 B.C.E. Lamentation is a well-known genre in world literature. Laments of various types are part of the cultural legacy and literary corpus of many societies, from ancient to modern times, and Sumerian literature is no exception. However, Mesopotamian lamentation literature includes a significant body of laments belonging to a unique and almost unparalleled genre—the genre of lamentations over the destruction of cities and temples. This genre has no known ancient parallel outside the ancient Near East; more specifically, it is almost exclusively attested in Sumerian and biblical literature. The Lamentation over the Destruction of Ur is the most famous and important exemplar of the city-laments. In this updated and revised publication of the Lamentation over the Destruction of Ur, Samet provides an introductory discussion of Sumerian city-laments in general; a full presentation of the text of the Ur Lament, including transliteration, translation, and an extensive philological commentary; and an accounting of the extant textual witness in score format. Plates with color photos of many texts are included.
In Weapons of Words: Intertextual Competition in Babylonian Poetry Selena Wisnom offers an in-depth literary study of three poems central to Babylonian culture: Anzû, Enūma eliš, and Erra and Išum. Fundamentally interconnected, each poem strives to out-do its predecessors and competes to establish its protagonist, its ideals, and its poetics as superior to those that came before them. The first of its kind in Assyriology, Weapons of Words explores the rich nuances of these poems by unravelling complex networks of allusion. Through a sophisticated analysis of literary techniques, Selena Wisnom traces developments in the Akkadian poetic tradition and demonstrates that intertextual readings are essential for a deeper understanding of Mesopotamian literature.
“A readable and up-to-date introduction to a most fascinating culture” from a world-renowned Sumerian scholar (American Journal of Archaeology). The Sumerians, the pragmatic and gifted people who preceded the Semites in the land first known as Sumer and later as Babylonia, created what was probably the first high civilization in the history of man, spanning the fifth to the second millenniums B.C. This book is an unparalleled compendium of what is known about them. Professor Kramer communicates his enthusiasm for his subject as he outlines the history of the Sumerian civilization and describes their cities, religion, literature, education, scientific achievements, social structure, and psychology. Finally, he considers the legacy of Sumer to the ancient and modern world. “An uncontested authority on the civilization of Sumer, Professor Kramer writes with grace and urbanity.” —Library Journal
The single most comprehensive study of elegy, this Handbook offers groundbreaking scholarship, historical breadth, and responds to recent exciting developments in elegy studies: the explosion in interest in elegies about AIDS, cancer, and war; the reconsideration of the role of women; and elegy's relation to ethics, philosophy, and theory.
This book demonstrates Girsu is a primary locale for re-analyzing, through an interdisciplinary approach combining archaeological and textual evidence, the origins of the Sumerian city-state.
Sumerian, the oldest language known, is represented by hundreds of thousands of clay tablets inscribed in the cuneiform writing system. Most of the tablets are devoted to mundane matters- ration lists, annual accounts, deeds, contracts- but a substantial number contain examples of perhaps the earliest poetry extant. In this volume, the eminent Assyriologist Thorkild Jacobsen presents translations of some of these ancient poems, including a number of compositions that have never before been published in translation. "What a wonderful bouquet; a gift to us all from a master Sumeriologist, a singer of human achievement, and a lover of words. Jacobsen needs no introduction and this work is special, and should be found in the home of all human and literate persons. It gives access to the mind of ancient Mesopotamia in a manner rarely duplicated heretofore ... Jacobsen has chosen widely from Sumer's rich literature- myth, epics, hymns, boasts, epithalamia, love songs, lamentations, fables- nad has presented us with perspective renderings". Jack M. Sasson, Religious Studies Review.
