Sumerian·Book

Position in chronology

The lament for Sumer and Urim

~1800 BCE·Old Babylonian

Translation · reference

High confidence
To overturn the appointed times, to obliterate the divine plans, the storms gather to strike like a flood. An, Enlil, Enki and Ninhursaja (2 mss. have instead: Ninmah) have decided its fate -- to overturn the divine powers of Sumer, to lock up the favourable reign in its home, to destroy the city, to destroy the house, to destroy the cattle-pen, to level the sheepfold; that the cattle should not stand in the pen, that the sheep should not multiply in the fold, that watercourses should carry brackish water, that weeds should grow in the fertile fields, that mourning plants should grow in the open country,

Source: ETCSL c.2.2.3: The lament for Sumer and Urim. 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.2.2.3

Why it matters

Transliteration

Scholarly note

Composition c.2.2.3 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.2.2.3: The lament for Sumer and Urim. 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.2.2.3.

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