Position in chronology
An adab to Bau for Luma
Written in modern English
An chose Bau in his holy heart, across the great sky and the great earth, and declared her worthy to be lady of the Land. From the shining E-kur, Enlil looked on her with favour — on this young woman, this mother Bau — and made her the perfect match for lord Ninjirsu. The passage then turns to the E-tarsirsir, a temple founded for her, but the text breaks off there.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — scholar edition
ETCSLChild of An, he has chosen you in his holy heart in the great sky and on the great earth and made you worthy of the ladyship of the Land. Bau, child of An, he has chosen you in his holy heart in the great sky and on the great earth and made you worthy of the ladyship of the Land. Enlil has looked at you with favour, young woman, mother Bau, from the shining E-kur, and made you eminently fit for lord Ninjirsu. The Great Mountain Enlil has looked at you with favour, young woman, mother Bau, from the shining E-kur and made you eminently fit for lord Ninjirsu. In the E-tarsirsir, founded for you…
Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature — scholar edition (Oxford, Black/Cunningham/Robson/Zólyomi).
Scholarly note
Composition c.2.3.1 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.2.3.1: An adab to Bau for Luma. 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.2.3.1.
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