Position in chronology
Anonymous Ur 17 (FAOS 05/2, AnUr 17)
Written in modern English
He built it to surpass something — the surface is too damaged to read what — and surpass the temple of his father.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — scholar edition
ETCSRI(1') He made it exceed ...., he made it exceed the temple of his father.
Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Royal Inscriptions — scholar edition (Vienna).
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Why it matters
A fragmentary Early Dynastic royal inscription from the Lagash-Ur-Uruk orbit, attesting the competitive temple-building rhetoric by which Sumerian rulers legitimised dynastic succession ca. 2450 BCE.
Scholarly note
Sumerian royal inscription, published in the Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Royal Inscriptions (ETCSRI) by Gábor Zólyomi and collaborators. Translation reproduced from the ETCSRI edition. ORACC text Q001355.
Attribution
Image: CBS 16682 (University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA) — from Ur (mod. Tell Muqayyar) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.earth/artifacts, P222863). source
Translation excerpted from Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Royal Inscriptions (ETCSRI), University of Vienna, edited by Gábor Zólyomi et al. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/etcsri/Q001355/.
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