Position in chronology
A prayer to An for Rim-Sin (Rim-Sin C)
Translation · reference
High confidenceShepherd, called by name, for whom holy An has determined in heaven a great destiny! Rim-Sîn, called by name, for whom holy An has determined in heaven a great destiny! Prince who achieved kingship when still in the true womb, you grandly exercise lordship over the numerous people. In Larsa, the ...... mountain befitting the princely divine powers, you are truly called to be shepherd of Sumer and Akkad. Great An, august in heaven and earth, lord who is wise in everything, father of the gods, has determined to fix the destinies for that place, never interrupting the uttering of weighty commands, ...... in the pure interior of heaven.
Source: ETCSL c.2.6.9.3: A prayer to An for Rim-Sin (Rim-Sin C). 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.2.6.9.3
Why it matters
Transliteration
Scholarly note
Composition c.2.6.9.3 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.2.6.9.3: A prayer to An for Rim-Sin (Rim-Sin C). 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.2.6.9.3.
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.