Ur III

This article examines 15 cuneiform tablets from the late 3rd millennium BC from southern Mesopotamia. As administrative tools of the Ur III state bureaucracy, the texts are primarily concerned with the administrative and economic affairs of the central authority, but they also offer important information on the individuals living in the Ur III state and their different roles within the state's bureaucratic structures.

Full-text access to articles in ORIENT: https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/browse/orient/

RATIONALE (PART I of II) Much has been made of the physical presence of Gudea, énsi of ancient Girsu, as portrayed again-and-again in his statues. He is taken to be an imposing figure, radiating a calm self-assurance. By contrast, there is little extended commentary on the performative nature of the statues and the audience for which they were intended.

This essay, allusive and suggestive rather than discursive, uses tools of narratology and anthropology to think about how Gudea’s statues “worked” in the real world--a burgeoning urban society in Mesopotamia at the turn of the second and third millenniums BCE.

The gleaming diorite surface of the statues so aggressively modified by Gudea’s scribes and stone carvers is liminal between two spheres, that of the ruler and his gods and that of his subjects and their occupations. I will maintain that this surface is altered in unaccustomed, seductive, and provocative ways that lend force to the embodied performative power of the monuments themselves. To appropriate a concept championed by Poirier, inscription is a form of “[e]nergy [that] cannot arrange itself within the existing order of things” (1992: xxiii).

So when I speak of the performative nature of Gudea’s inscribed statues, I mean to evoke an unsettling re-arrangement of known things in service of larger cultural and political ideas. Winter’s “affective image of rulers,” (1992: 15) and Suter’s “structural, decorative, or ritual purposes” (1999: 68) have rather to do with maintenance of order, “magic anch[ors]”, in Suter’s felicitous formulation (Ibid.)

The statues have an assigned task. The inscriptions replicate each other, referencing themselves again and again, changing form, but insisting on a singular message, Gudea’s imperial building plan. They are “energy in motion” (Id.) as much as they are word. And because this message is received reflexively, in so many incarnations, the crafting of the inscription and the striking of the ductus stand as a complex performative event inculpating a triad of communicants (populace, scribe/stone carver, governor).

In effect, Gudea’s inscribed statues act as markers; they delimit the stage for the enculturation of workers and populace, a practical, step-by-step indoctrination in temple-building, but no less an encounter with a new self as it is being unmade and made.

This performative event encompasses the building of an urban model that retains its power even to this day.

Historians consider the biblical account about Chedorlaomer's campaign against Sodom as a pious fiction (Genesis 14:1-20). However, the Gospels refer to it as a real story which is even described as essential to faith (Hebrews 6:20-7:2). According to the chronology drawn from the Masoretic text, Abraham's departure from Ur and his arrival in Canaan are dated in 1963 BCE when Abraham is 75 years old (Genesis 12:4-5). The revolt of Transjordan kings against Chedorlaomer occurs in the 13th year of his reign and the following year (1954 BCE) Chedorlaomer was shot by Abraham (Genesis 14:4-17).
A chronological reconstruction based on synchronisms shows that among dynasties from Sumerian lists the 3rd and last Elamite king of the Awan I dynasty was Kudur-Lagamar (1990-1954). Ashurbanipal, after his conquest of Elam and Susa ransacking, exposed (in 646 BCE) the capture of the goddess Nanaya (in Uruk) by Kudur-Lagamar which occured around 1300 years earlier (in 1968 BCE). The Spartoli tablets (c. 650 BCE) describe this famous attack of Babylonia by a coalition of evil kings named Kudur-KUKUmal, king of Elam, Tud!ula, king of Gutium, and Eri-Aku [king of Larsa]. This coalition of kings (Sumer, Larsa, Gutium) united under Kutur-Lagamar is quite likely, because all these kings were vassals or allies of the king of Elam (and Akkad) at that time, moreover, they came from neighboring regions. One can notice that Puzur-Insusinak, a powerful king of Elam, founded a new dynasty which has been classified as belonging to the kings of Akkad, which explains the gap of about 30 years between the end of the Elamite dynasty of Awan II and the beginning of the dynasty of Simaski. After the destruction of Ur by Kindadu, which marked the end of Ur III, the dynasty of Awan I has been postponed just after the dynasty ofUr I instead ofUr III.
The Chedorlaomer's route and the description of his actions show that this king came to this region near Egypt in order to maintain control over this new land trade route. This ambitious project had to make worry Amenemhat I (1975-1946) because southern Canaan was a big source of supply. In order to protect Egypt, Amenemhat I built the "Wall of the Ruler". In addition, first Execration Texts against Canaan and western Syria appear at this time. One can notice that the area of Sodom is called Shutu[m] in execration texts (then Moab after 1800 BCE).

This article presents for the first time the earliest documented association between the healing goddess, dogs and physicians in Mesopotamia. This is done by compiling all relevant administrative texts from the livestock archive at Puzriš-Dagan (modern Drehem) dated to the Ur III period.

The damgar accounts of the Third Dynasty of Ur have been the subject of much debate, resulting in very different reconstructions of social and economic realities. One important aspect of these discussions involves the basic meaning of native terminology with such divergence of opinion that it is even debated whether these accounts show that the merchants, also translated trade-agents, typically operated with a deficit or a surplus. In this article, I edit one such account dealing with Pada, among the best-known merchants from the period, together with the rest of the cuneiform collection housed at the University of Mississippi Museum.

RATIONALE (PART I of II) Much has been made of the physical presence of Gudea, énsi of ancient Girsu, as portrayed again-and-again in his statues. He is taken to be an imposing figure, radiating a calm self-assurance. By contrast, there is little extended commentary on the performative nature of the statues and the audience for which they were intended.

This essay, allusive and suggestive rather than discursive, uses tools of narratology and anthropology to think about how Gudea’s statues “worked” in the real world--a burgeoning urban society in Mesopotamia at the turn of the second and third millenniums BCE.

The gleaming diorite surface of the statues so aggressively modified by Gudea’s scribes and stone carvers is liminal between two spheres, that of the ruler and his gods and that of his subjects and their occupations. I will maintain that this surface is altered in unaccustomed, seductive, and provocative ways that lend force to the embodied performative power of the monuments themselves. To appropriate a concept championed by Poirier, inscription is a form of “[e]nergy [that] cannot arrange itself within the existing order of things” (1992: xxiii).

So when I speak of the performative nature of Gudea’s inscribed statues, I mean to evoke an unsettling re-arrangement of known things in service of larger cultural and political ideas. Winter’s “affective image of rulers,” (1992: 15) and Suter’s “structural, decorative, or ritual purposes” (1999: 68) have rather to do with maintenance of order, “magic anch[ors]”, in Suter’s felicitous formulation (Ibid.)

The statues have an assigned task. The inscriptions replicate each other, referencing themselves again and again, changing form, but insisting on a singular message, Gudea’s imperial building plan. They are “energy in motion” (Id.) as much as they are word. And because this message is received reflexively, in so many incarnations, the crafting of the inscription and the striking of the ductus stand as a complex performative event inculpating a triad of communicants (populace, scribe/stone carver, governor).

In effect, Gudea’s inscribed statues act as markers; they delimit the stage for the enculturation of workers and populace, a practical, step-by-step indoctrination in temple-building, but no less an encounter with a new self as it is being unmade and made.

This performative event encompasses the building of an urban model that retains its power even to this day.

Thirteen tablets from LAUSD's collection of antiquities
are presented dating to the Ur III period
(2112-2004 BC). Six come from the sites of Drehem (ancient
Puzriš-Dagān) and Umma respectively, while one
tablet likely comes from Girsu. As with most collections
of this type, these tablets represent a medley of known
Ur III archives. And, as is typical of such administrative
miscellany, this potpourri of tablets offers certain insights
into the terminology (šu-gid2 , ab2-rig5 ) and practices
(bala, abbreviating year names, sealing) of the Ur III
state apparatus.

Thousands of Ur III cuneiform tablets flooded the antiquities markets in the 1910s and 1920s and filled small and large museums and collections around the world. Thanks to the painstaking research of many scholars, both past and present, we are today in a position to ‘locate’ tablets and documents originating from the tell of Drehem  and to differentiate them from those originating from the other sites of the South, such as Umma, Girsu, Ur, Nippur, and most recently Iri-Sagrig and Garšana. We should be able nowadays to put these disparate tablets into hypothetical archives based on patterns and content (Sallaberger 1999; ibid 2004; Paoletti 2012; Tsouparopoulou 2013a). But how correct can our hypotheses be? How certain can we be that our visualization of how this organization of the vast documentation worked is accurate and renders the chaîne opératoire of past bureaucrats at Tell Drehem?
With this article, I intend to put into scientific inquiry - and thus prove or disprove - a theory based on the study of the sealing and archiving practices from material looted from the ancient site of Puzriš-Dagan (modern Drehem) and dispersed in collections around the world. This is done knowing that in due course the publication of the preliminary official Iraqi excavations led by Dr. Shalkham at Drehem and consequently the publication of the tablets unearthed during this excavation by Shalkham and Dr. al-Mutawalli, will see the light of day. Indeed, while writing these lines, the first publication of five such texts excavated in 2007 at Drehem were published in the Sumer volume of 2012, printed in 2013 (al-Mutawalli & Shalkham 2012). It seems to be only a matter of time before our hypotheses can finally be tested.

This short paper is a prosopographical study of one of the judges in Ur III Girsu, Lu-Ningirsu, the son of Lu-Baba, aiming to add as many details about his activity as possible on the basis of seal impressions and documents unearthed in Girsu.
The evidence discussed here indicates that Lu-Ningirsu was not only a judge but also an official of high status in the Lagaš province. Moreover, it is probable that his function as judge was precisely the result of his high status.

This short communication investigates the Sumerian expression a-ra2 X-kam, which was used to denote ordinal numbers in the Ur III period, typically to rank in a sequential order deliveries/receipts within the state administration. The literal and the cognitive meanings of a-ra2 X-kam remain unchallenged, and the article will focus on the practical application of the expression within the Ur III state bureaucracy, and its significance for our overall understanding of the administrative and archival procedures of the period. The use of sequentially ordered installments in the Ur III administration supports the hypothesis that many Ur III texts may have been written post factum, and suggests that such texts were produced anywhere from a few days up to several weeks after the economic transactions they document would have occurred.

All individual articles in the volume are available at:
https://sites.uci.edu/dabirjournal/issues/issue-09/

Based on the administrative accounts from the Ur III period (2112-2004 BC according to the Middle Chronology), this article offers an overview of the economic activities of the official Ilum-asu and his family, who worked as scribes in the important administrative center of Irisagrig in southern Mesopotamia. Ilum-asu's father Bibi provided foodstuffs as rations to the female (sesame) oil pressers (mostly different types of birds and animals), and Ilum-asu and his two brothers (Mašum and Ašgi-ibra) can all be attested as the recipients of provisions for this group of workers in the city, in some cases directly from their father. The activities of Ilum-asu and his family of scribes illustrate the importance of familial affiliations and kinship groupings within the institutional economy of the Ur III state, and demonstrate that administrative roles within the public households would often transcend generations. The article argues that the institutional households of the Ur III state regularly relied on, and even took advantage of, existing hereditary structures and kinship ties within the society as a whole.

This paper was delivered in Warsaw as part of a panel specifically to honor Professors Piotr Steinkeller and Piotr Michalowski, in lieu of the festschrift neither wished to receive. I stressed the contributions of my teacher, Piotr Steinkeller, but as these two scholars have often built on the work of one another and cross-fertilized each other, being almost like Gilgameš and Šulgi, brother-peers, both shall enter this narrative. The paper begins by stressing how different the field of Ur III studies was before Profs. Steinkeller and Michalowski began their careers. I will then go on to Šulgi, the most important, and certainly the longest reigning, king of this dynasty, suggesting that the early history of Šulgi's reign is far murkier than we might like to admit. Furthermore, I will argue that Šulgi deliberately shifted his geographic focus away from Ur itself to concentrate on the Nippur region and that this culminated in the year name used for Šulgi year 39.

In this article, I provide an edition of Vasiliy Struve’s letter to the Editor of the VDI (Journal of Ancient History) with his objections against the proofreading of the article “Producers of wealth in the royal household of the third dynasty of Ur” (1954) by Alexander Tumenev. This letter gives us an example of a self-historiography of a Soviet historian and his confession about the birth of his main conception and its defense from the criticism of his colleagues.

The present article offers a compilation of inscribed clay tablets from various auctions and collections. It continues the first part, which contains material from the Third Millennium B.C. up to the beginning of the Third Dynasty of Ur. The aim of this collection is, to make the artefacts available for scholars and for research.

The goal of this article is to study the Shimashki potteries in the Saymarreh valley. Archaeological surveys conducted in the Saymarreh valley shows that the painted pottery tradition of Godin III has become prevalent in the valley during the Bronze Age and only once, development of this pottery tradition had cracked. This event took place in the phase of Godin III4, which we relate it to the influence of pottery traditions penetrating from Susiana plain to the Saymarreh valley. Contemporary with phase of Godin III4, there have been no potteries of such tradition, but the ceramics by the Shimashki styles appeared in Saymarreh valley. Diagnostic ceramics of Shimashki phase has been gathered in the archaeological surveys of Saymarreh valley at Ghale Zinal and Gharatmalghah. It seems that development of Shimashki period pottery as far as the Saymarreh valley, took place because of Ur III conflicts with polities at northern regions of Susiana plain. Saymarreh valley again joined to the distribution area of painted pottery tradition of Godin III and after the Shimashki period, diagnostic ceramics of Godin III2 phase have been wide-spread in the Saymarreh valley. Development process of painted pottery tradition of Godin III at Saymarreh valley support the view that Shimashki may was located in the highlands, somewhere in the northern parts of Susiana plain, although we cannot prove this in the absence of non textual data.

This article presents the earliest documented association between the healing goddess, dogs and physicians in Mesopotamia. This is achieved through mining all relevant administrative texts from the livestock archive at Puzriš-Dagan (modern Drehem) dated to the Ur III period and corroborating the information gathered with the few pertinent iconographic and archaeological attestations.

Esej na temat wojskowości w państwie Ur III.
Opracowanie powstałe w ramach seminarium Zakładu starożytnego Bliskiego Wschodu Instytutu Archeologii UW, poświęconemu ważnemu mezopotamskiemu organizmowi politycznemu z XXI w. p.n.e. ze stolicą w Ur.

Summary of the letters John Henry Haynes sent to the supervisory Committee in Philadelphia reporting on the progress of his excavations at Nippur. The letters are held in the University of Pennsylvania Museum Archive. They, supplemented by a small number of rubbings and sketch plans, are the primary reported material for the excavations conducted by Haynes. In 1895 Haynes was working on the Temple Area (chiefly before the south eastern façade of the ziggurat) in a huge deep sounding; and on Mound X on the other side of the Shat-en-Nil.

The five unpublished cuneiform texts presented in this study are currently housed in the collection of the  Creighton University, Omaha, Nebraska. This article provides the publication of three Neo-Sumerian
tablets from Umma; an inscription from the king Sîn-kašid and one tablet dating from the reign of Nabû-
kudurrī-uṣur (Nebuchadnezzar) II.