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Sumerian and Akkadian and Cuneiform | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| Hampie Diglot Senior Member Sweden Joined 6601 days ago 625 posts - 1009 votes  Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: Latin, German, Mandarin | Message 33 of 49 26 January 2012 at 7:56am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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DIĜIR-Nanna
dumu saĝ DIĜIR-En-lil₂-la lugal-a-ni Ur-DIĜIR-Namma nitaḫ kalag-ga en unug-KI-ga lugal uri₅KI-ma lugal ki-en-gu-KI ki-uri-ke₄ e₂ temen-ni₂-guru₃ e₂ ki-aĝ₂-ĝa₂-ni mu-na-du₃ ki-be₄ mu-na-gi₄ {dNanna, {dumu saĝ dEnlil}ak, lugalani}r, {Ur-Namma, nitaḫ, kalaga {en Unug}ak, {lugal Urima}k {lugal Kiengi Kiuri}k}e, e temen- ni-guru, e kiaĝani, munandu; kibe munangi. -k, -ak, -k- genitive -e ergative -r dative -e locative-terminative -ani his/her -pi its pi and e merges to pe To Nanna, the foremost child of Enlil, Ur-Namma, a powerful person, en of Uruk, king of Ur, king of Sumer and Akkad, built the E- temeniguru, his beloved abode, he restored it to its place. E-temeniguru is the name of a temple, and it means ‹House: platform clad in terror› Temple names very often begun with e, house, and then seemingly ungrammatically some stuff is put thereafter. Edited by Hampie on 26 January 2012 at 8:00am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Hampie Diglot Senior Member Sweden Joined 6601 days ago 625 posts - 1009 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: Latin, German, Mandarin | Message 34 of 49 01 February 2012 at 3:14am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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And so far I’ve progressed to the 3rd chapter of Huenergard’s Grammar of Akkadian. Tomorrow I will do the
exercises for that chapter. Now I will do the sumerian that I missed in class for today due to oversleeping. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Teango Triglot Winner TAC 2010 & 2012 Senior Member United States teango.wordpress.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5498 days ago 2210 posts - 3734 votes Speaks: English*, German, Russian Studies: Hawaiian, French, Toki Pona | Message 35 of 49 01 February 2012 at 4:46am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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It's wonderful to see someone studying Akkadian and Sumerian on the forum. I try to sneak in a lesson from the L'Égyptien hiéroglyphique book that sits on my night table before hitting the pillow each night, and often consider learning a bit of cuneiform one day. Could you suggest a fun basic primer for Sumerian? Edited by Teango on 01 February 2012 at 4:47am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Hampie Diglot Senior Member Sweden Joined 6601 days ago 625 posts - 1009 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: Latin, German, Mandarin | Message 36 of 49 01 February 2012 at 5:36am | IP Logged | ||||||||
As sad as it might sound, but, there is none. There is one book, albeit almost impossible to get due to it being out of print, that is informative enough for self study, but other than that I don’t know of any sumerian courses. What we use at university is «A sumerian reader» with nothing but cuneiform text in it, and a little word list in the back of the book. There are reference grammars to find, like 3-4 go them, but they are reference grammars and not books for learning. But, if you’re a zealot of second hand book shopping, the name is ‹A manual of Sumerian grammar and texts› and it’s written by John L. Hayes 1990. How do you find the Assimil L’Égyptien hiéroglyphique by the way? 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Teango Triglot Winner TAC 2010 & 2012 Senior Member United States teango.wordpress.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5498 days ago 2210 posts - 3734 votes Speaks: English*, German, Russian Studies: Hawaiian, French, Toki Pona | Message 37 of 49 01 February 2012 at 12:02pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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Thanks Hampie, I'll keep an eye out for that Sumerian reader. The Assimil book on hieroglyphics is great by the way, and I'm really enjoying it so far. I'm just taking it really really easy, as it's a bit of fun on the side and I only started this week. I simply try to read through a new lesson before going to sleep, and then listen to and read that lesson the next day for review. I'd love to go the Ancient Egyptian section of a museum one day and be able to say to myself, "Hey, I know what that means now!" (better not say anything out too loud though, I might wake up a mummy). :) Edited by Teango on 01 February 2012 at 12:04pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6645 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 38 of 49 01 February 2012 at 12:46pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
When I reread your excellent answer it struck me that the use of the Sumerian word in transcriptions of Akkadian texts could be a bad habit rather than imposed by the writing system. I assume from your answer that the phonetic value of the king-sign is derived from the Sumerian word for king, but when it is used logographically it must be a complication that you have to mix Sumerian words into your transcription. We don't use many logographical signs in the languages I use apart from numbers, &, @, £ and $ - but let's assume that each time I saw the sign '&' I had to say "ampersand". Well I don't - when I read "Anders And & co." I change it into "Anders And og /kompani/". So I read the 'and'-sign with its Danish translation, while I use the original English word with a Danish pronunciation for "co." - which actually isn't too far from the way transcribers apparently see texts in Akkadian. But I hear a lot of English, and "co." still reminds me of the word "company". Now the problem is: what did the Akkadians do? My guess is that they read "šar" when they saw the king-sign and decided to interpret it as a logogram. They would only use the Sumerian word if Sumerian was very much a fact of their daily life, but did the Akkadian scribes actually speak Sumerian on a daily basis? If the Akkadian scribes didn't say "lugal" when they read a text I don't see why the transcription in a modern edition should use the word. Edited by Iversen on 01 February 2012 at 12:51pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Hampie Diglot Senior Member Sweden Joined 6601 days ago 625 posts - 1009 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: Latin, German, Mandarin | Message 39 of 49 01 February 2012 at 2:18pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Well, I presume the ancient egyptians were about as repetitive as their eastern neighbours, so I definitively think you’ll be able to! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Hampie Diglot Senior Member Sweden Joined 6601 days ago 625 posts - 1009 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: Latin, German, Mandarin | Message 40 of 49 08 May 2012 at 4:18pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
I agree, but, you can't fight a scholarly status quo. I have to learn the sumerian values, even though I'd rather read them out as they're pronounced in Akkadian. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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