Position in chronology
A praise poem of Shulgi (Shulgi L)
Written in modern English
Shulgi spreads terror across foreign lands and defeats his enemies in battle. He silences his opponents, crushes rebel territories, and his war-cry reaches even the most distant mountains and hills. At his roar, something — the text is too damaged to say what — is utterly devastated. An unknown number of lines are lost, and three more are too fragmentary to reconstruct, but the surviving portion ends with Shulgi's fearsomeness likened to a forest set on fire, making enemies tremble.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — scholar edition
ETCSL1 line fragmentary ...... in battle and fight ....... You gave ...... to your offspring (?) ....... ...... shepherd Culgi, you spread fearsomeness over the foreign countries. ...... shepherd, your offspring (?) will praise you duly. sa-gida. You defeat ....... You impose silence on ....... You subdue the rebel lands ....... Your battle-cry ...... even the distant mountains and hills. ...... at your roaring devastate (?) ...... completely. unknown no. of lines missing 3 lines fragmentary ...... like a forest set on fire, ...... covers all the ....... ...... your fearsomeness makes ...... and the enemies tremble.
Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature — scholar edition (Oxford, Black/Cunningham/Robson/Zólyomi).
Scholarly note
Composition c.2.4.2.12 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.2.4.2.12: A praise poem of Shulgi (Shulgi L). 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.2.4.2.12.
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