On Tue, 17 Jun 2003 12:20:43 -0400, rmccalli@... wrote:

>
>Can we see some type of proof of what people are claiming re Sumerian? Can
>you be more precise as to which Sumerian you're talking about and which
>time period?
>I would suppose that given that Sumerian was used as a prestige
>cultural-liturgical written language long after it seems to have
>disappeared as a spoken language, then it would have picked up influences
>from the native languages of those who used wrote it. Since societies and
>their commodities change, there would have to have been neologisms, right?
>So, I'd like to see concrete examples and proof for your speculations
>--given that I know virtually nothing about Sumerian.

An excellent introduction is Marie-Louise Thomsen "The Sumerian Language",
Copenhagen 1984.

We can distinguish between Old Sumerian (2600-2200), Neo-Sumerian
(2200-2000), Old Babylonian Sumerian (2000-1600) and "Post Sumerian"
(1600-150).

Most Old Sumerian texts are problematical because the langauge was written
only very summarily. As an example, Thomsen gives an Old Sumerian text
from Abu Salabikh and its equivalent from the Old Babylonian period:

(1) g~es^tug2 inim zu kalam til-la S^uruppak dumu na na-mu-ri
wise, word(s) know, land liv-ing, Shuruppak son instructions indeed-gave.

(2) ... S^uruppak g~es^tug2 tuku ... inim zu-a ka-lam-ma ti-la-àm,
S^uruppak{ki}-e dumu-ni-ra na na-mu-un-ri-ri
Shuruppak, wisdom having, words knowing, (who) is living in the land
(=Sumer), Shuruppak-ERG to-his-son instructions indeed-was-giving-to-him.

The old text is really just shorthand, like Japanese written only in Kanji.
The Old Babylonian version is closer to the language as it had actually
been spoken: the locative (kalam-a), the copula (-àm), the ergative
(S^uruppak-e), the dative and possessive (dumu-ni-ra) are all expressed, as
is the complete form of the verb <ri> (na-mu-n-ri.ri: particle na-
"indeed", conjugation prefix mu- (meaning obscure), 3rd. person indirect
object -n-, reduplicated root (imperfective aspect) ri.ri. [No ending,
because the 3rd. person sg. has a zero ending in the imperfective].

Ironically, Sumerian was already a dead language in the old Babylonian
period, and it was written more carefully precisely because it was not the
native language of the Babylonian scribes.

The best evidence for Sumerian are the Gudea texts from the Neo-Sumerian
period. The language was written in full, and it was still the native
language of the writers.

In later texts, more and more errors are evident, and it is clear that
those elements of Sumerian grammar which were quite unlike the Akkadian
system were not properly understood anymore. Sumerian was still very much
part of the curriculum in the scribal schools, but, not surprisingly,
Sumerian grammar and pronunciation was more and more fit into an Akkadian
mould.

Thomsen gives the example of a royal inscription from Hammurabi:

Akkadian: s^ar-ru in LUGAL-rí ma-na-ma la i-pu-s^u "which no king among
kings has ever made"

Sumerian: lugal-lugal-e-ne-er lú na-me ba-ra-an-dím-ma.

In real Sumerian that would mean "for all the kings, no one shall ever make
it". The wrong case, and the wrong negative prefix on the verb are used.

The proper Sumerian translation, according to modern scholarship, is:

lugal-lugal-e.ne-a lú na.me nu-un-dím-ma (or: nu-mu-na-an-dím-ma)

=======================
Miguel Carrasquer Vidal
mcv@...