Position in chronology
A balbale to Ningishzida (Ningishzida B)
Written in modern English
Ningishzida is addressed in ecstatic praise: holy, dignified, and charged with ferocious terror. He is a falcon preying on the gods, a leopard, a murderous howling serpent-dragon snarling in the lagoon, a raging storm that sweeps over all people. He rests, lofty-headed, deep in the mountains, smashing the skulls of his enemies. The text breaks off mid-sentence as his mouth is likened to that of a pure magician — though one manuscript reads instead 'a snake with a great tongue'; the passage continues but the surface is lost.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — scholar edition
ETCSLLord with holy dignity, imbued with great savage awesomeness! My king, lord Ninjiczida, imbued with great savage awesomeness! Hero, falcon preying on the gods, my king -- dignified, with sparkling eyes, fully equipped with arrows and quiver, impetuous leopard, murderous, howling muchuc, ...... (1 ms. has instead: ......), dragon snarling (?) in the lagoon, raging storm reaching (1 ms. has instead: covering) all people! Lofty-headed prince, resting in the midst of the mountains, ...... smashing heads! Lord, your mouth is that of a pure magician (1 ms. has instead: a snake with a great tongue,…
Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature — scholar edition (Oxford, Black/Cunningham/Robson/Zólyomi).
Scholarly note
Composition c.4.19.2 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.4.19.2: A balbale to Ningishzida (Ningishzida 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.4.19.2.
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