Position in chronology
A balbale to Nanna (Nanna C)
Written in modern English
This is a hymn of praise addressed to the city of Ur and its great temple, the E-kish-nujal, house of the moon god Nanna. Ur is called the wisdom of An and Uraš, the city fit for the temple E-temen-ni-guru; together with An it bestows kingship, and its majesty reaches the foreign lands. The god keeps the lordly purification rites in order and has taken his seat in Ur — his name is sweet, his holy word pleasing to An. The text then calls on En-hedu-ana to surpass even An in glory, and mentions the purification rites of the jipar (the high priestess's residence) and the divine powers held there — but several lines break off, two are only partially legible, and at least one is lost entirely, leaving Nanna's epithet Asimbabbar mid-sentence with nothing following.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — scholar edition
ETCSLO eastern (?) house of Sumer, I will declare your greatness! O E-kic-nujal, whose purification rites are brilliant, o house of Nanna! O shrine Urim, I shall glorify your name. Emerging from the holy heart of the pure hills, Urim, wisdom of An and Urac, appropriate for E-temen-ni-guru! With An you bestow kingship; your majesty ...... the foreign lands. I shall glorify your name far and wide! He keeps in order the lordly purification rites ....... He has taken his seat ...... in Urim. Your name is sweet! The Prince ....... Your holy word is pleasing to An. May my En-hedu-ana excel even An. ...... the purification rites of the jipar. ...... the lordly divine powers. ...... the excellent jipar. Acimbabbar ....... probably 1 line missing 2 lines fragmentary
Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature — scholar edition (Oxford, Black/Cunningham/Robson/Zólyomi).
Scholarly note
Composition c.4.13.03 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.4.13.03: A balbale to Nanna (Nanna 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.4.13.03.
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