Position in chronology
A balbale to Nanna (Nanna B)
Translation · reference
High confidence(Ningal speaks:) "I ...... for the ....... approx. 19 lines missing The embrace of my spouse ....... The young man ....... Among his cows ....... My beloved who ....... I shall go ......! There with the lord ......." (Nanna addresses Ningal:) "My spouse, ......, Ningal who ......, ...... butter from the holy cows. Pure hands and ...... feet ....... My lovely ....... "......, the reed-beds, the playground ....... I shall ...... sharp knives to the ...... and pointed reeds. I shall ...... to the beautiful young reeds. Mistress, ...... the treasures (?) of the ubi birds. I will gather their eggs for you, and I shall ...... the nest. High priestess of Nanna, ...... the ubi birds.
Source: ETCSL c.4.13.02: A balbale to Nanna (Nanna B). Black, J.A., Cunningham, G., Robson, E. & Zólyomi, G. (eds.), The Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature, Faculty of Oriental Studies, University of Oxford. https://etcsl.orinst.ox.ac.uk/cgi-bin/etcsl.cgi?text=c.4.13.02
Why it matters
Transliteration
Scholarly note
Composition c.4.13.02 in the ETCSL catalogue. Sumerian literary text reconstructed from multiple cuneiform manuscripts, the great majority Old Babylonian (c. 1900–1600 BCE). Translation reproduced from the ETCSL edition.
Attribution
Image: .
Translation excerpted from ETCSL c.4.13.02: A balbale to Nanna (Nanna B). Black, J.A., Cunningham, G., Robson, E. & Zólyomi, G. (eds.), The Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature, Faculty of Oriental Studies, University of Oxford. https://etcsl.orinst.ox.ac.uk/cgi-bin/etcsl.cgi?text=c.4.13.02.
Related tablets
Related sources
The single most important literary discovery of the 19th century. It rewired the understanding of the Bible's literary context and proved that the Mesopotamian flood tradition is older. It is the oldest surviving epic poetry in human history.
The literary tradition is no longer anonymous from this point. Authorship — the idea that a specific human voice composes a specific work — enters the historical record with her.
The single most influential Mesopotamian king list — the model for every later attempt to chronicle the deep history of the region. It transmits the political theology of divinely granted kingship, an idea that would echo through Babylon, Assyria, and into the Hebrew Bible. The Weld-Blundell prism (WB 444) at the Ashmolean is the most complete surviving copy.