Position in chronology
A shir-namshub to Nanna (Nanna K)
Written in modern English
Lord Nanna — called here also Acimbabbar and Suen — is as remote as heaven and as vast as the earth, though a line repeating that image is too damaged to complete. He tends his herds like a cowherd with countless cows and calves, and he moves among the people in the pens, though the details of several lines are broken beyond reading. He has butter; a figure named Iterda has milk; cheese is compared somehow to milk, but the surface is cracked and the comparisons break off. Then Ningal, his wife, speaks directly to him — calling him her lover, her Suen, her ritually bathed man — but each of her tender lines is damaged at the end, and an unknown number of lines after them are gone entirely.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — scholar edition
ETCSLAs remote as heaven, ...... as the earth! Lord Nanna, as remote as heaven, ...... as the earth! Lord Acimbabbar, as remote as heaven, ...... as the earth! A cowherd with his numerous cows, Suen ...... the men in (?) the pens. A ...... with his numerous calves, Suen ...... the men in (?) the pens. Suen ....... Nanna ....... 1 line fragmentary Suen ....... The spouse ....... Ningal ....... He has butter, ....... Iterda milk ....... Cheese ...... like milk. Mother Ningal addresses him: "My ...... man, my lover, .......! My ...... man, my Suen, ......! My man who has ritually bathed, ......! My ......! unknown no. of lines missing
Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature — scholar edition (Oxford, Black/Cunningham/Robson/Zólyomi).
Scholarly note
Composition c.4.13.11 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.4.13.11: A shir-namshub to Nanna (Nanna K). 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.4.13.11.
Related tablets
Related sources
The single most important literary discovery of the 19th century. It rewired the understanding of the Bible's literary context and proved that the Mesopotamian flood tradition is older. It is the oldest surviving epic poetry in human history.
The literary tradition is no longer anonymous from this point. Authorship — the idea that a specific human voice composes a specific work — enters the historical record with her.
The single most influential Mesopotamian king list — the model for every later attempt to chronicle the deep history of the region. It transmits the political theology of divinely granted kingship, an idea that would echo through Babylon, Assyria, and into the Hebrew Bible. The Weld-Blundell prism (WB 444) at the Ashmolean is the most complete surviving copy.