Sumerian·Book

Position in chronology

The lament for Nibru

~1800 BCE·Old Babylonian

Translation · reference

High confidence
After the cattle pen had been built for the foremost divine powers -- how did it become a haunted place? When will it be restored? Where once the brick of fate had been laid -- who scattered its divine powers? The lamentation is reprised: how did the storeroom of Nibru, the shrine Dur-an-ki, become a haunted place? When will it be restored? After Ki-ur, the sanctuary, had been built, after the brickwork of E-kur had been built, after Ubcu-unkena had been built, after the shrine Egal-mah had been built -- how did they become haunted? When will they be restored? How did the true city become…

Source: ETCSL c.2.2.4: The lament for Nibru. 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.2.2.4

Why it matters

Transliteration

Scholarly note

Composition c.2.2.4 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.2.2.4: The lament for Nibru. 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.2.2.4.

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