Position in chronology
The song of the ploughing oxen
Translation · reference
High confidenceellu mallu! Go, oxen, go, put your necks under the yoke! Go, ...... oxen, go, put your necks under the yoke! I am ...... of the country. I am ...... of Enlil. I am ...... of the Land. ellu mallu! 6 lines fragmentary or missing And now, may the mother ...... with me; and now, may Nance ...... with me. May she put bread in my leather bag, may she pour water into my waterskin. May she stand by for me ....... May she say to me, "Farmer, eat the bread!", may she say to me, "Farmer, drink the water!" ellu mallu! In the temple he lay down to dream with Nance. He said good night (?) to Nance. He had…
Source: ETCSL c.5.5.5: The song of the ploughing oxen. 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.5.5.5
Why it matters
Transliteration
Scholarly note
Composition c.5.5.5 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.5.5.5: The song of the ploughing oxen. 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.5.5.5.
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