Considerations on the Proto-Euphratic Language (PE)

II. THE “PE QUESTION”

The title of this chapter is borrowed from Englund, who wrote a sub-chapter (4.4) called “The Sumerian Question” in OBO 160/1, 73–81. In principle, it is about one and the same thing, only PE instead of Sumerian comes to the fore here. All questions that are necessary or could be useful in order to “pin down” those who created cuneiform (‘proto-cuneiform’) are addressed by Englund. Among other things, he deals with numerical systems, the sequence of signs in ‘cases’¹, Sumerian readings in general, the “inadequacy of cuneiform in representing the phonetic structure of Sumerian words”, possible multivalent signs, phonetic elements, the conceivable adoption of PE readings into Sumerian, the “verbs” BA and GI as well as the Uruk III period personal names, which usually cannot be interpreted as Sumerian. Reference is always made to Englund where relevant.

1. General Information

Most of the texts (or expressions) of the Uruk period do not make sense when translated as Sumerian texts (examples: → III–1–h and VI–1; texts: a7/21914, m4/79). Yet almost all scholars adhere to the opinion that they are written in the Sumerian language. In addition to the passage quoted in the preface, explicit reference shall be made to § 6 in the RlA, article “Sumer, Sumerisch”.

When working with a pictographic writing system (the first known script besides the Egyptian hieroglyphic script) where only the essentials are recorded in a kind of telegram style, it is not easy to distinguish two languages from each other. As late as in the ED I–II period, hardly any grammatical elements were written (cf. among others Burrows 1935, 22f. and Lecompte 2013, 9), which – not surprisingly – shows that for a Sumerian the texts were understandable even without (written) grammatical elements. There is a tendency to classify the records from Uruk as “readable in any language” if the meaning of the individual signs is known; the (document) form is considered “the grammar” (for example, cf. Nissen et al. 159; Englund 1998, 79). This is not entirely correct, as the order of the signs (in the Uruk period almost always corresponding to the spoken language [→ III–3–g], in the following ED I–II period “sloppy” [Burrows 1935, 27]) definitely allows conclusions to be drawn about the language. In Japanese, for example, the standard word sequence is subject – object – predicate, whereas in Chinese it is subject – predicate – object. It is well known that the same characters (with different pronunciation) are used for writing in both languages; in Japanese syllable characters are additionally used for writing grammatical elements. A Japanese person can roughly understand a Chinese text; it should also be the case the other way round.

In the Uruk period, no bilingual texts are to be expected, since there were presumably only PE scribes (and possibly Sumerian pupils) and no literature existed yet (an exception could be the lexical list a3/TRIBUTE, → III–1–h). Glosses might exist; unfortunately, it has not been possible to identify one yet. It seems rather likely that glosses do not exist. Just think of the Middle Ages in Europe – the monks wrote Latin; the Old High German gloss “diutisce gellit” (“in German: ‘Schale’ [bowl]”), which explains galeola, seems to be a “fortunate” exception. Bilingual dictionaries are not known (→ Index of Terms, Words–3b [PE]).

Three examples in which one and the same fact is represented in the language of the Uruk period texts by different sign combinations are discussed in → III–note 4 (EN.KID/É vs. EN.NUN), V–2 (HAL.GAR vs. NAGAR) and V–3 (UB.ŠÀ vs. ŠÀ.URI).

In the ED I–II period there seem to have been no glosses (and certainly no Sumerian–PE bilingual texts); the document form of the texts is different; they were almost certainly only written by Sumerians. The aforementioned kudurrus pose certain difficulties (→ I–3; Gelb et. al.1989; 1991).

Therefore PE must be made accessible more or less “from out of itself” (compare NABU 2018/93 and 2019/58).

2. Criteria that could argue for a change from PE to Sumerian

The following selection is to be understood as an anticipatory look ahead with cross-references. With a few exceptions (in my view), the criteria set out below are not necessarily conclusive as one could always argue that there has been a development over time (though the temporal gap between the PE and the ED I–II texts is, as already mentioned, not that significant).

–Calendar: the leap year probably existed already in the Uruk period, names of months did not exist yet (→ IV–7 and ~ 9).

–Document form changes (externally: the ‘subcases’ disappear, apart from a few exceptions [Lecompte 2013, 8]; internally: there are – again apart from a few exceptions – no more subscripts [Lecompte 2013, 8]).

–The numerical and metrological systems change (Lecompte 2013, 15–20; cf. also Englund 1998, 77f. and a3/p35 top).

–With few exceptions (cf. c1/70 “U₄ GIBIL” vs. c1/83 “GIBIL U₄”; → III–2–b ad GAL.SANGA.SANGA; → III–3–c ad Enlilti), the order of the signs in the cases was strictly regulated in the Uruk period (cf., for example, the sign sequence BA-AB.APIN in m1/97–99 or the boustrophedon subscript in m1/20); in the ED I–II period, however, it was relatively free (Burrows 1935, 27).

–The old “realm of the gods” (MÙŠ.U₄/SIG – Venus as morning and evening star [→ IV–7]) disappears; from the ED III period onwards, the Sumerian pantheon is established (SF 1: long list of gods from Fara); in the time in between (ED I–II) only a few deities are attested (UET 2, pp. 19–21; ATFU, p. 11). In the Uruk period there were probably no “gods” yet – there was also no sign for the abstract term ‘god’ (‘AN’, later ‘god’, means ‘star’ in the Uruk period, → III–2–f; IV–7). The “gods” of the Uruk period (MÙŠ = Venus, possibly BU+DU₆ = snake deity, Niraḫ [cf. ATFU, p. 65 with note 26]) are more likely to have been elves, nymphs and satyrs (nature spirits). The religion was probably a nature religion, comparable to the Minoan or Old Hellenic. The Greek god Pan still bears features of this archaic religion. Apart from the “standard deities”, the Sumerian pantheon gives the impression of having been “conceived” by scholars in the Fara period.

–Disappearance of the former occupational names (apart from a few exceptions); the lexical list a3/Lú A is “replaced” by Lú E (Englund 1998, 85 and 88–89; ATFU, p. 15 top).

–Changes in the onomasticon that cannot be overlooked (for the Uruk period cf. Englund 2009, for the later periods Th. E. Balke, Das altsumerische Onomastikon. Namengebung und Prosopografie nach den Quellen aus Lagas, dubsar 1, Münster 2017; M. Krebernik, Zur Struktur und Geschichte des älteren sumerischen Onomastikons, AOAT 296 [2002] 1–74). In addition to a structural comparison (PE vs. Sumerian names), Englund offers a list of approximately 440 PE personal names of “slaves/prisoners”, which can be easily identified by their designations MÍ and KUR (Englund 1998, 176–179; → VII). The fact that there were slaves/prisoners at that time is clearly proven by the so-called prisoner seals (figure in Englund 1998, p. 44). As foreigners, prisoners may have had names in a non-native language (cf. Englund 1998, note 407), but they may also have been given PE names. In the first case, it should be considered whether they could be written with the PE script (cf. also Englund 1998, 79–80). A list of personal names (personal names cannot always be strictly separated from occupational names) that are not necessarily names of slaves or captives can be found in → chapter VII². It is indicated whether the name can also be found among the slave names in Englund’s list; this allows certain conclusions to be drawn about the language behind the names.

–ABGAL, written NUN.ME; the element ME occurs eleven times in the list of occupational names, a3/Lú A, in compounds with other signs (in four of them, however, apart from NUN.ME itself, NUN.ME is a constituent of the compound); a Sumerian explanation can hardly be found; → III–1–g.

–Disappearance of PE verbs (e.g. GI; see NABU 2018/93; cf. → IV–11, note 51).

–Reduplications of signs lose their meaning (ŠE.ŠE in m1/1 and many others); the reduplication as such is given a new function (e.g. designation of the plural), → III–2–b.

–Non-designation of the plural (passim without any exception; 14 MÍ+ZATU751_b [m1/215], 13 UDU [m1/208], 7 SUḪUR [m1/116], ...), → III–3–d.

–The adjective is placed before the noun in the PE texts, and after the noun in the Sumerian texts of the ED period, as is customary in the Sumerian language (Englund 1998, note 170; → III– 3–g); this fact can hardly be dismissed as a “development”.

–Sign substitutions in Sumerian (AN [star; → IV–7] → AN.AN.AN = MUL [AN is assigned the meaning “deity”]; EN → PAD.AN.MÙŠ or ĝeš-tag-ga, respectively; → V–1–a).

–In Sumerian, an animal head is used for the word “foot” instead of the sign for foot (DU): GÌR /ĝìri/; → III–2–c.

–Inexplicable reading of the sign for beer (KAŠ /kaš/) as /bi/ in Sumerian; → III–2–c.

–Appearance of previously undocumented syllabic spellings (áš-gàr; Lecompte 2013, 9) in the ED I–II period (Sumerian); presumably the PE language was not suitable for this “technique” because of its word structure; otherwise those spellings should have occurred before (PE people must have possessed a high ability to abstract; think of the sophisticated number systems), cf. → III–1–g and ~h.

–Special cases: EN = “sacrifice” and “the one who offers up the sacrifice (= priest)” in PE, “priest” and “Lord” in Sumerian (→ V–1); GÁN EN (m1/2–6) denotes a quality of the field, not the field and its owner (→ V–1–d); there is no evidence for EN = “Lord” in PE.

III. WRITING, VOCABULARY AND GRAMMAR

As already mentioned in → chapter II, there are apparently no glosses, bilingual dictionaries¹ or even bilingual texts in the Uruk period. The texts must be deciphered without assistance.

Initially, the signs as such do not allow any conclusions to be drawn about the written language; over time, they develop graphically from their (mostly pictorial, but sometimes also abstract) original form into more abstract signs, which – depending on the language – can be read in different ways in context.

The PE vocabulary is significantly different from the Sumerian vocabulary. Hardly any of the entries in the so-called Vocabularies can be interpreted as Sumerian (a3/VOCAB; see a3/p37), but for obvious reasons, in most cases its PE meaning cannot be deduced either. The same applies to the “school texts” in CUSAS 21 (c21/156–303 [cf. S. F. Monaco, c21/pp6–8]). Entries consisting of only one sign (for example, c21/162: ŠUBUR) or those which will continue to be used in the ED period (NUN.ME = ABGAL) can, of course, also be read as Sumerian.

Since glosses and bilingual texts are missing, the PE grammar can only be distinguished from the Sumerian grammar by means of possible ‘indirect bilingual texts’ and grammatical peculiarities (e.g. the word order). Furthermore, it has to be proven that a Sumerian interpretation, no matter how “archaic” the supposed Sumerian language period might be, is not possible. ‘Indirect bilingual texts’ are understood to be texts in which one and the same (administrative) process (e.g. a cattle inspection [amirtu]) is very likely to be written down in different languages. Some field survey texts and sacrificial texts resemble indirect bilingual texts (→ V– 1–d and ~e), but may not provide clear evidence for the existence of PE texts. In many cases the Sumerian document differs so markedly from the PE form that no direct comparisons are possible (see Green 1980). However, this could be interpreted as the result of a temporal development. The only known indubitable point against considering the Uruk III period texts as Sumerian texts is the positioning of the adjective. It is the declared aim of this chapter to work out a few more candidates (some points have already been addressed in the previous chapter with reference to chapters IV and V).

1. Writing

a) Every sign has a basic meaning, which is given by what is pictorially represented or – in the case of abstract signs such as UDU – by the meaning assigned by definition.

b1) As early as in the Uruk period, meanings derived from a sign occur; three examples:

i) U₄: rising sun (primal meaning, derived from the pictorial representation); day, month and year (U₄ plus various numerals, see a5/p20); “morning” (in “Venus as morning star” [U₄ AN MÙŠ], a7/21671 i3; →IV–7); white: a3/CATTLE no. 3 (U₄ ÁB [white cow, followed by GI₆ ÁB – black cow²]).

ii) ZATU753: a product (m1/179, line i1b4); a personal or occupational name (a3/OFFICIALS no. 8).

iii) ‘A’: water (primal meaning, to be derived from the pictorial representation, compare the lower register of the Uruk Vase [→ V–1–a]); the derived meaning (or possibly function) is unknown. ‘A’ can be found at the end of many sign combinations and cannot have the functions known from Sumerian grammar in this position (formation of the participle, nominalization, etc.). Examples: ENA [Sumerian: “Lord + A”] (a5/9656,n2 rev. ii2, m4/63 i3, ...), NUN-A [“prince + A”] (a5/6110, a3/WOOD no. 22, ...), BU-A [“*snake + A” (not water snake)] (a5/9656,eu rev.; a3/GEOGR 3, ii10, ...). The text a3/UNID 44 offers a compilation of sign combinations ending in ‘-A’. It is not clear a priori whether ‘A’ is to be understood as an independent word homonymous to “water” which “modifies” the other sign (e.g. as a verb which changes “noise” into “to make noise”), as a “grammatical modifier” (inflectional ending) or as an element to be re-interpreted on a case-by-case basis (→ on this below III–1–e and III–3–b). The X-A combinations have for the most part disappeared in Sumerian (BU.A [UET 2, 184] is retained, but could have a different meaning; cf. NABU 2018/93, note 1); what was denoted in PE by the addition of ‘-A’ no longer has any meaning in Sumerian. For example, IM and IM.A = NÍ coincide (see ZATU under no. 396).

b2) A sign can have several variants (e.g. EN_a, EN_b and EN_c). It is not always certain whether different meanings are associated with them; for KID see especially Englund 1998, note 151, for AB NABU 2014/58 and c21/281 (school text: AB_b AB_a É), for GÁ a7/22112 (rev. i4: GÁ_a, rev. ii5: GÁ_b), for EN → V–1–d. A sign can also be renamed in the case of rotations (and other “operations”): ŠU (hand) → TAK₄ (rotated clockwise by 90°; the meaning is also likely to have been different from “hand” in earliest times). In some cases, a sign could have been rotated for no particular reason (“handwriting”) or for lack of space (presumably GI in a5/9579,dz near the right margin); ligatures can also be dissolved for lack of space, see NÁM EŠDA in a3/20708 ii2 (pl. 81) or PAP BU NÁM (rather NÁM BU PAP) in m4/45 rev. i2.

c) As early as in the Uruk period, as in Egyptian, determinatives are used to divide nouns into classes (wooden objects are preceded by the word “wood”, etc.); the meaning must be defined (“bird + red” could mean, for example, robin or bullfinch, “plant + red” red beech or rose). It is noticeable that the determinative “^d” used in Sumerian (image of a star; denotes deities) does not yet exist in PE (→ IV–7; for the ED I–II period see UET 2, p. 19f.). The star still denotes a star, possibly also an adjective “sparkling” or similar. The (pseudo) determinatives AB and É for place names, which are still frequent in the lexical list a3/CITIES, are no longer perceived as such by the Sumerians (see NABU 2013/55, note 13); they additionally use the Sumerian place determinative KI (ki). Some determinatives are in front of (GIŠ [giš] – wood), others behind (KU₆ [kU₆] – fish) the noun to be classified. Unfortunately, nothing can be concluded from this. The later determinative DUG [dug] (jar, vessel; not yet used as determinative in PE; see a3/VESSELS) precedes KAŠ [kaš] (beer) in m1/244 (as does the determinative later), but could mean something else.

d) The writing is not phonetic (→ III–1–g)³, but descriptive or possibly “associative”⁴: a combination of several signs designates a certain word, if necessary a process or a state (“a situation”); compare modern traffic signs, especially the one for the “Beginning of a pedestrian priority area”. Signs like NINKUM, consisting of seven individual signs, are probably to be understood in a similar way.

e) The meaning of the combination “sign A + sign B” must have been fixed; in many cases it cannot be guessed (cf. in Chinese WOMAN + SON = GOOD [hăo]; TREE + SON = PLUM [lĭ]; see Tong & Shen 1995). Often it is not the cultural background but simply the language that provides the key to understanding (a German rebus: the “signs” UHR [clock] + LAUB [foliage] = URLAUB [holidays]). In the simplest case, the sign combination is language-independent and immediately obvious: HEAD (SAG) + BREAD (NINDA) = TO EAT (GU₇). Sign combinations (as well as individual signs: → III–1–b1) can have different meanings: 1N₅₇ + BA occurs as a personal name (→ VII), but is hardly a name or part of a name in a5/6066,a, ~b, a5/6288 and ~7343,1; compare also 1N₅₇ + U₄ as a personal name in → VII and as an age group in the → “Index of Terms”. The meaning of PE sign combinations in which the pairing of the individual elements does not make any recognisable sense (NUN + ME = ABGAL [sage]) can only be determined if they are still used in Sumerian. In this sense, ligatures are no longer to be classified as something special; they can be formed for aesthetic reasons (NÁM+EŠDA), but also to distinguish one term from another, cf. EN+NUN (a5/9578,b ii2; see ZATU s.v.) vs. EN NUN (m1/112 ii11). “Enclosing signs” (standard signs into which others are inscribed) such as GÁ or LAGAB serve a similar purpose.

f) Reverse spellings: A peculiarity of Sumerian orthography is some spellings that are read in the opposite order to the written signs; the best known example is ZU.AB with the reading /abzu/. The later Sumerian word for king (lugal) also occurs – albeit rarely – already in the Uruk III period texts as an inverse spelling (GAL.LÚ). Probably GAL.LÚ means “the great LÚ” in PE, in which LÚ presumably did not originally denote “man”. The Sumerians later read it as “lugal” – “the great man”, just as “WHITE + COW” (PE) became “COW + WHITE” in Sumerian; see NABU 2015/1.

g) Provided that the texts of the Uruk III period are not written in Sumerian (→ II–1), the claim that the writing is not phonetic (i.e. “syllabic”, with syllables for which homophonic words/signs are used in the respective case regardless of their meaning) can only be made plausible (not proven) by means of examples of words adopted into Sumerian, since PE, as an unknown language, is not phonetically legible⁵. ABGAL [sage] /abgal/ is written NUN.ME (in Sumerian it could have been written “syllabically” as AB-GAL; the known Sumerian phonetic values of NUN and ME do not permit a reading /abgal/). The ME constituent also occurs in EN.ME.GI /engiz/, but this reading has nothing to do with /abgal/. NUN occurs in the so-called “City Seal” (Matthews 1991) in the place name Nippur; also Nippur /nibru/ has nothing to do with /abgal/⁶. There are no indications of phonetic spellings.

Likewise, phonetic indicators that would have opened the door to the use of syllabic spellings have not been proven with certainty. The few cases in which one could think of phonetic indicators (such as EN in GÁ×EN “=” MEN; literature in note 5) are likely to be based on chance; they are not statistically relevant. Think of the adoption of the Phoenician alphabet by the Greeks. “Signs” (letters) that were in existence were retained but reinterpreted (spelling of vowels with letters denoting Semitic sounds that did not exist in Greek).

In summary, no convincing example is known of syllabic spellings or phonetic indicators being used in the texts of the Uruk period. One can only “translate” with certainty place names and occupational titles whose spelling is retained by the Sumerians. They are definitely not written syllabically. Animals, food, adjectives etc. are mostly represented by only one sign each. Longer passages in subscripts or subtotals often cannot be interpreted or even “read” (phonetically). Another indication that syllabic spellings are unlikely is the fact that the most frequent signs (Englund 1998, 70) all have a concrete meaning and can be understood – as far as possible – in that meaning in the texts (the signs are therefore not used syllabically; for the sign ‘A’ → III–I–b1 und III–3–b).

Syllabic spellings, on the other hand, already appear in the earliest Sumerian texts: áš-gàr (ATFU, text no. 2). Rebus spellings attested in the PE language (→ III–1–e) would almost automatically have pointed the way to a syllabary; had the Proto-Euphratians been able to use this technique, they probably would have done so. No evidence can be provided for such things for the time being. Ergo: any “syllabic” spellings in PE texts should be Sumerian. It would not be surprising to find a few Sumerian terms embedded in a PE text. After all, the Sumerians lived together with the Proto-Euphratians in Mesopotamia.

h) It is particularly revealing to take a look at the Uruk III period lexical list ‘Tribute’, which some scholars believe is the first piece of literature (a3/TRIBUTE; Englund 1998, 99–102; Civil 2013; NABU 2017/29). This list is known in redacted copies from the ED up to the OB period (for details see Civil 2013). Civil in particular tries to prove that ‘Tribute’ was written in the Sumerian language. The first two ‘cases’ (→ II, note 1) read as follows

Uruk III (according to a comparison of the copies in ATU 3; case 1):

SAG KI AD

(orKI SAG AD)

Civil writes instead of that:

UD:ADKI:SAG

Civil for ED–OB:

AD:GI₄KI:SAG

Uruk III (copies; case 2 [contains two lines, here separated by “|”]):

ḪAL DUAD | NUN.ME

(orDU ḪAL AD)

Civil writes instead of that:

AD:ḪAL | NUN:ME:DU

Civil for ED–OB:

AD:ḪAL | NUN.ME.DU

NUN.ME = ABGAL (→ III–1–g), NUN.ME.DU = ABRIG (an administrator). ABRIG (Civil’s reading) is only attested in this text and in the OB period, which means more than 1000 years later. As a comparison of the above transcriptions shows, ABRIG is not attested in the Uruk period. In both cases, AD is at the end of the line or half-line, not at the beginning, as transcribed by Civil. The sign UD (= U₄), which is not found in all texts, looks like it was shoehorned in afterwards. The order of the signs in texts of the Uruk period (in contrast to the ED I–II period) is relatively fixed (→ II–1), although two interchanges occur just here (see the transcription). The regroupings carried out by Civil are likely to go too far. KI.SAG was perceived as a unit, see a3/TRIBUTE no. 84; possibly this also applied to DU.ḪAL, hence perhaps the sign transpositions. The delimitation of KI.SAG and DU.ḪAL against AD is unambiguous, as a glance at the copies shows, as is the unit NUN.ME. “The compound word ad -ḫal [the Sumerian reading of AD.ḪAL; analogue in the following statements] seems otherwise unattested in archaic or ED texts” (Civil, p. 24); therefore it must not have existed either, nor is it in the text. “It seems more reasonable ... to take ad and ḫa l separately, taking a d as ‘advice’ or ‘decision’, as in line 01, and ḫal as ‘share’”(Civil, p. 24). According to the ePSD, “share” in the spelling ḪAL is only attested after 2000 BC. In “line 01”, AD is not translated as “advice”; rather it says there: “The meaning of the phrase AD-GI₄, ‘deliberation, deliberated decision, advice,’ is not controversial.” According to the ePSD ‘ad-gi₄’ means “to give advice” (‘gi₄’ means “to return”, ‘ad’ might be “voice”); AD alone is not attested in the meaning “advice” (AD looks like a tool; it occurs in the list a3/WOOD). All sources except the Uruk source have GI₄ (the oldest copies of the list are from the Fara period, so they are about 400 years younger than the original). The GI₄ was presumably “added” at a later date in order to give meaning to the archaic Uruk text, which had now become incomprehensible. Should Sumerian AD.GI₄ have been meant for AD from the outset, it could and should have been written by a Sumerian on the assumption that it is an expression composed of two components (“to give [GI₄] advice [AD]” or similar; this is presumably what Civil means by “phrase”, see above), since AD, taken by itself, means something else (cf. the use of the sign ‘A’ in a figurative sense, → III–3–b): there was the sign GI₄⁷. Should AD.GI₄ have been a word whose etymology was no longer known (as in German, e.g. Himbeere [raspberry]), which was only broken up into the two components AD+GI₄ in order to be able to write it (similar to the sign for Dilmun in NI+TUK for technical reasons of writing), a Sumerian in the Uruk period would have written only the first syllable of the word (“syllabic” with a sign [AD] which – taken by itself – means something else). This is extremely unlikely: he would thereby have recognised the syllabic structure of the language; one could have written everything syllabically, as in later times. However, this was not the case (so in the Uruk version of the list a3/TRIBUTE, AD was meant, not AD.GI₄). AD.GI₄ occurs once in the name (?) ḪI.AD.GI₄ in the Uruk III period text m4/79 (but could mean something else there; in any case, the text shows that AD.GI₄ could be written). The text is therefore not Sumerian and remains incomprehensible. There are further inconsistencies in the list a3/TRIBUTE (such as the alleged occurrence of EN.GÁN = *BURU₁₄ [harvest] in line 83), which will not be listed here; the reader is referred to the literature cited above.

2. Vocabulary

a) The determinatives AB u É disappear (→ a3/CITIES) and are no longer recognised as such in Sumerian (addition of ‘ki’: ŠEŠ(“=” ÙRI).AB^ki); this does not necessarily mean that there are two different languages involved (→ II–2 and III–1–c). Determinatives can be placed before (uru, dug) and after (MUŠEN [mušen], KU₆ [kU₆]) a word.

b) Reduplication: A reduplication can be regarded as a special case of “sign A + sign B” (→III–1–e). By reduplication, a new word is formed – in a different way than in Sumerian –, the meaning of which cannot be directly deduced from the sign. A new term is implied, e.g. by ÁB.ÁB in a3/CATTLE (no. 25) and EN.EN in a3/VOCAB 3 (ii3); these terms also occur in administrative texts, see below. Sumerian equivalents are not known. The reduplication does not denote the plural as in Sumerian (ŠE.ŠE [“barley.barley”; m1/1] would be meaningless; nor is a genitive compound possible here). GÁN ŠE.ŠE does not exist in Sumerian⁸, but ‘gán še’ does (cf. P247596 rev. ii2–4 [ED IIIb], fields with barley, white emmer and wheat [še, zíz-babbar and gig]), which, however, also occurs in PE: m1/7. Further examples that speak against the plural: a7/20274,12 i2: 1 NE ÁB.ÁB (see a3/CATTLE nos. 2 and 25), c1/63 rev. i3: 1 MÍ TUR.TUR. In a regens-rectum compound, it seems that both the regens and the rectum can be reduplicated. Rectum: cf. besides the cases already mentioned, GAL KID_b.KID_b (a3/Lú A no.124 [no. 123: GAL KID_b]; another possibility is to take GAL as an adjective and KID_b.KID_b as a new term in the sense mentioned above); GAL SANGA.SANGA (many attestations, including m3/73 i5; sometimes written SANGA-GAL-SANGA [m3/79 rev. ii], but probably always to be understood as GAL SANGA.SANGA). Regens: EN.EN KID_a (m1/107 rev.; possibly, however, to be read EN.KID_a, EN); KID_b.KID_b EN (m3/30 ii3; hardly: KID_b.EN.UR₄, KID_b.TI); c31/89 ii8: MÍ A, c31/101 ii2: MÍ.MÍ A, though in this case it is not clear whether MÍ denotes a woman. For a comparable example from a later period, see the references s.v. sarru (thief) in the CAD: lú.IM = sarru, lú.IM.IM = šarrāqu (thief).

Reduplications can be adopted into Sumerian: DAḪ = MU+MU, NIR = NUN+NUN (sign form of writing phase Uruk III).

c) Adoption of the PE pronunciation of signs into Sumerian: Englund presumably rightly assumes that the PE sign for foot (DU) in Sumerian was replaced by the sign of an animal (GÌR) because of the consonance of the PE animal name and the Sumerian word for foot (Englund 1998, 80). It could be similar with the sign for beer (KAŠ), which was retained (and pronounced as Sumerian), but additionally assigned the otherwise hardly justifiable phonetic value ‘bi’: was ‘bi’ an echo of the PE word for beer (Englund 1998, 80)? Another candidate is the “bevelled rim bowl” (Glockentopf) denoting “bread” (Sumerian ninda); the additional reading ‘ĝar’ = “to put” could be due to PE pronunciation. It is likely that PE words in which the signs are read singly in Sumerian (and subsequently no longer make sense) can be adopted. An example could be the place name Girsu (a3/CITIES no. 59: GÍR.SU; SF 23 IV 4: ⌈su⌉-gír; OIP 99, 21 iv10: su-[ ]). There is still something similar today. The Japanese word jindō “humanity”, which is written with two characters (“jin + dō” = “human + way”; Wendt 1961, 169), has been adopted in Chinese in this form; however, the characters here are not read in Japanese but in Chinese: réndào (jin = rén, dō = dào) [Tong & Shen, 1995].

d) Substitution of PE words by Sumerian words: NÁM.DI (a3/Lú A no. 3; almost certainly “chief judge” [Sumerian: NÁM (nám) = Lord, DI (di) = legal decision]) → di-kud = judge (Sumerian ‘kud’ = to cut, to decide).

e) The most frequent sign, EN, means (almost certainly) in PE “offering” and “the one who offers up the sacrifice (= priest)”, in Sumerian “priest” and (because of the linguistic similarity) “Lord”. There is not a single passage in the texts of the writing phases Uruk IV and Uruk III which – as is commonly accepted – requires the translation “Lord”, → V–1.