Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Sumer
Sumer (/ˈsuːmər/) is the earliest known
Sumer
civilization, located in the historical region of
(c. 5500 – c. 1800 BC)
southern Mesopotamia (now south-central Iraq),
emerging during the Chalcolithic and early
Bronze Ages between the sixth and fifth
millennium BC. Like nearby Elam, it is one of the
cradles of civilization, along with Egypt, the
Indus Valley, the Erligang culture of the Yellow
River valley, Caral-Supe, and Mesoamerica.
Living along the valleys of the Tigris and
Euphrates rivers, Sumerian farmers grew an
abundance of grain and other crops, a surplus
which enabled them to form urban settlements.
The world's earliest known texts come from the
Sumerian cities of Uruk and Jemdet Nasr, and
date to between c. 3350 – c. 2500 BC, following a
period of proto-writing c. 4000 – c. 2500 BC.

Name
The term "Sumer" (Akkadian: !"#,
romanized: šumeru)[5] comes from the Akkadian The general location on a modern map, and
name for the "Sumerians", the ancient non- main cities of Sumer with ancient coastline. The
Semitic-speaking inhabitants of southern coastline nearly reached Ur in ancient times.
Mesopotamia.[6][7][8][9][10] In their inscriptions, Language Sumerian
the Sumerians called their land "Kengir", the Geographical Mesopotamia, Near East,
"Country of the noble lords" (Sumerian: range Middle East
$%&, romanized: ki-en-gi(-r), lit. ''country" + Period Late Neolithic, Middle Bronze
"lords" + "noble''), and their language "Emegir"
(Sumerian: '(, romanized: eme-g̃ ir or '&
Age
Dates c. 5500 – c. 1800 BC
eme-gi15).[6][11][12]
Preceded by Ubaid period
Followed by Akkadian Empire

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 1 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

The origin of the Sumerians is not known, but

the people of Sumer referred to themselves as Sumerians
"Black-Headed Ones" or "Black-Headed
People"[6][13][14][15] (Sumerian: )*,
romanized: sag̃ -gíg, lit. ''head" + "black'', or
)*+, sag̃ -gíg-ga, phonetically /saŋ ɡi
ɡa/, lit. "head" + "black" + relative
marker).[1][2][3][4] For example, the Sumerian
king Shulgi described himself as "the king of the Left: Sculpture of the head of Sumerian ruler
four quarters, the pastor of the black-headed Gudea, c. 2150 BC. Right: cuneiform characters for
people".[16] The Akkadians also called the Saĝ-gíg () *), "Black Headed Ones", the
Sumerians "black-headed people", or ṣalmat- native designation for the Sumerians. The first is the
pictographic character for "head" ( , later ), the
qaqqadi, in the Semitic Akkadian
second the character for "night", and for "black"
[2][3]
language. when pronounced gíg ( , later ).[1][2][3][4]

The Akkadians, the East Semitic-speaking

people who later conquered the Sumerian city-states, gave Sumer its main historical name, but
the phonological development of the term šumerû is uncertain.[17] Hebrew ‫ִנְעָר‬+ Šinʿar,
Egyptian Sngr, and Hittite Šanhar(a), all referring to southern Mesopotamia, could be western
variants of Sumer.[17]

Origins
Most historians have suggested that Sumer was first permanently settled between c. 5500 and
c. 3300 BC by a West Asian people who spoke the Sumerian language (pointing to the names of
cities, rivers, basic occupations, etc., as evidence), a non-Semitic and non-Indo-European
agglutinative language isolate.[18][19][20][21][22]

Others have suggested that the Sumerians

were a North African people who migrated
from the Green Sahara into the Middle East
and were responsible for the spread of
farming in the Middle East.[23] However,
contrary evidence strongly suggests that the
first farming originated in the Fertile
Crescent.[24] Although not specifically
discussing Sumerians, Lazaridis et al. 2016 The Blau Monuments combine proto-cuneiform
have suggested a partial North African origin characters and illustrations of early Sumerians,
for some pre-Semitic cultures of the Middle Jemdet Nasr period, 3100–2700 BC. British Museum.
East, particularly Natufians, after testing the
genomes of Natufian and Pre-Pottery
Neolithic culture-bearers.[24] Craniometric analysis has also suggested an affinity between

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 2 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Natufians and ancient North Africans.[25]

Some scholars associate the Sumerians with the Hurrians and Urartians, and suggest the
Caucasus as their homeland.[26][27][28] This is not generally accepted.[29]

Based on mentions of Dilmun as the "home city of the land of Sumer" in Sumerian legends and
literature, other scholars have suggested the possibility that the Sumerians originated from
Dilmun, which was theorized to be the island of Bahrain in the Persian Gulf.[30][31][32] In
Sumerian mythology, Dilmun was also mentioned as the home of deities such as Enki.[33][34]
The status of Dilmun as the Sumerians’ ancestral homeland has not been established, but
archaeologists have found evidence of civilization in Bahrain, namely the existence of
Mesopotamian-style round disks.[35]

A prehistoric people who lived in the region before the Sumerians have been termed the "Proto-
Euphrateans" or "Ubaidians",[36] and are theorized to have evolved from the Samarra culture of
northern Mesopotamia.[37][38][39][40] The Ubaidians, though never mentioned by the
Sumerians themselves, are assumed by modern-day scholars to have been the first civilizing
force in Sumer. They drained the marshes for agriculture, developed trade, and established
industries, including weaving, leatherwork, metalwork, masonry, and pottery.[36]

Some scholars contest the idea of a Proto-

Euphratean language or one substrate
language; they think the Sumerian language
may originally have been that of the hunting
and fishing peoples who lived in the
marshland and the Eastern Arabia littoral
region and were part of the Arabian bifacial
culture.[41] Juris Zarins believes the
Sumerians lived along the coast of Eastern
Arabia, today's Persian Gulf region, before it
was flooded at the end of the Ice Age.[42]

Sumerian civilization took form in the Uruk Enthroned Sumerian king of Ur, possibly Ur-Pabilsag,
with attendants. Standard of Ur, c. 2600 BC.
period (4th millennium BC), continuing into
the Jemdet Nasr and Early Dynastic periods.
The Sumerian city of Eridu, on the coast of the Persian Gulf, is considered to have been one of
the oldest cities, where three separate cultures may have fused: that of peasant Ubaidian
farmers, living in mud-brick huts and practicing irrigation; that of mobile nomadic Semitic
pastoralists living in black tents and following herds of sheep and goats; and that of fisher folk,
living in reed huts in the marshlands, who may have been the ancestors of the Sumerians.[43]

Reliable historical records begin with Enmebaragesi (Early Dynastic I). The Sumerians
progressively lost control to Semitic states from the northwest. Sumer was conquered by the
Semitic-speaking kings of the Akkadian Empire around 2270 BC (short chronology), but
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 3 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Sumerian continued as a sacred language. Native Sumerian rule re-emerged for about a century
in the Third Dynasty of Ur at approximately 2100–2000 BC, but the Akkadian language also
remained in use for some time.[43]

Archeological discovery
The Sumerians were entirely unknown during the early period of modern archeology. Jules
Oppert was the first scholar to publish the word Sumer in a lecture on 17 January 1869. The first
major excavations of Sumerian cities were in 1877 at Girsu by the French archeologist Ernest de
Sarzec, in 1889 at Nippur by John Punnett Peters from the University of Pennsylvania between
1889 and 1900, and in Shuruppak by German archeologist Robert Koldewey in 1902–1903.
Major publications of these finds were "Decouvertes en Chaldée par Ernest de Sarzec" by Léon
Heuzey in 1884, "Les Inscriptions de Sumer et d'Akkad" by François Thureau-Dangin in 1905,
and "Grundzüge der sumerischen Grammatik" on Sumerian grammar by Arno Poebel in
1923.[44]

City-states in Mesopotamia
In the late 4th millennium BC, Sumer was divided
into many independent city-states, which were
divided by canals and boundary stones. Each was
centered on a temple dedicated to the particular
patron god or goddess of the city and ruled over by
a priestly governor (ensi) or by a king (lugal) who
was intimately tied to the city's religious rites.

An incomplete list of cities that may have been

visited, interacted and traded with, invaded,
conquered, destroyed, occupied, colonized by
and/or otherwise within the Sumerians’ sphere of
influence (ordered from south to north):

1. Eridu (Tell Abu Shahrain)SC A composite copy of a text listing cities from the
late Uruk period such as: Nippur, Uruk, Ur, Eresh,
2. Kuara (probably Tell al-Lahm)SU Kesh, and Zabala.
3. Ur (Tell al-Muqayyar)SC
4. Kesh (probably Tell Jidr)SU
5. Larsa (Tell as-Senkereh)S
6. Uruk (Warka)SC
7. Bad-tibira (probably Tell al-Madain)SC
8. Lagash (Tell al-Hiba)S

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 4 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

9. Girsu (Tello or Telloh)S

10. Umma (Tell Jokha)S
11. Zabala (Tell Ibzeikh)S
12. Shuruppak (Tell Fara)SC
13. Kisurra (Tell Abu Hatab)S
14. Mashkan-shapir (Tell Abu Duwari)S Anu ziggurat and White Temple

15. Eresh (probably Abu Salabikh) SU

16. Isin (Ishan al-Bahriyat)SC
17. Adab (Tell Bismaya)SC
18. Nippur (Afak)SH
19. Marad (Tell Wannat es-Sadum)S
20. Dilbat (Tell ed-Duleim)S
21. Borsippa (Birs Nimrud)M
22. Larak (probably Tell al-Wilayah)SCU
23. Kish (Tell Uheimir and Ingharra)MC
24. Kutha (Tell Ibrahim)M
25. Sippar (Tell Abu Habbah)MC
26. Der (al-Badra)M
27. Akshak (probably Tell Rishad)MCU
28. Akkad (probably Tell Mizyad)MCU
29. Eshnunna (Tell Asmar)M Anu ziggurat and White Temple at Uruk. The
ICU original pyramidal structure, the "Anu Ziggurat",
30. Awan (probably Godin Tepe)
dates to around 4000 BC, and the White Temple
31. Mari (Tell Hariri)WC was built on top of it c. 3500 BC.[45] The design
32. Hamazi (probably Kani Jowez)NCU of the ziggurat was probably a precursor to that
of the Egyptian pyramids, the earliest of which
33. Nagar (Tell Brak)W
S dates to c. 2600 BC.[46]
( a city in southern Mesopotamia)
(Man outlying city in central Mesopotamia)
(Nan outlying city in northern Mesopotamia)
(Wan outlying city in western Mesopotamia)
(Ian outlying city in western Iran)
(Ca city said on the Sumerian King List (SKL) to have exercised the Sumerian kingship)
(Ha holy city)
(Ua lost city)
Apart from Mari, which lies full 330 kilometres (205 miles) north-west of Agade, but which is
credited in the king list as having exercised kingship in the Early Dynastic II period, and Nagar,
an outpost, these cities are all in the Euphrates-Tigris alluvial plain, south of Baghdad in what

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 5 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

are now the Bābil, Diyala, Wāsit, Dhi Qar, Basra, Al-Muthannā and Al-Qādisiyyah governorates
of Iraq.

History
The Sumerian city-states rose to power during the
prehistoric Ubaid and Uruk periods. Sumerian written
history reaches back to the 27th century BC and before, but
the historical record remains obscure until the Early
Dynastic III period, c. 23rd century BC, when the language
of the written records becomes easier to decipher, which has
allowed archaeologists to read contemporary records and
inscriptions.

The Akkadian Empire was the first state that successfully

united larger parts of Mesopotamia in the 23rd century BC.
After the Gutian period, the Ur III kingdom similarly united
parts of northern and southern Mesopotamia. It ended in
the face of Amorite incursions at the beginning of the second
Portrait of a Sumerian prisoner on a
millennium BC. The Amorite "dynasty of Isin" persisted victory stele of Sargon of Akkad,
until c. 1700 BC, when Mesopotamia was united under c. 2300 BC.[47] The hairstyle of the
Babylonian rule. prisoners (curly hair on top and short
hair on the sides) is characteristic of
New Stone Age: c. 10000 – c. 5000 BC Sumerians, as also seen on the
Standard of Ur.[48] Louvre Museum.
Ubaid period: c. 6500 – c. 4100 BC
Copper Age: c. 5000 – c. 3300 BC
Uruk period: c. 4100 – c. 3100 BC
Uruk XIV–V phases: c. 4100 – c. 3300 BC
Uruk IV phase: c. 3300 – c. 3100 BC
Early Bronze Age I: c. 3300 – c. 3000 BC
Jemdet Nasr period (Uruk III phase): c. 3100 – c. 2900 BC
Uruk III phase: c. 3100 – c. 2900 BC
Early Bronze Age II: c. 3000 – c. 2700 BC
Early Dynastic period c. 2900 – c. 2334 BC
Early Dynastic I period: c. 2900 – c. 2800 BC
Eridu dynasty (Alulim)
Bad-tibira dynasty (Dumuzid)
Larak dynasty (En-sipad-zid-ana)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 6 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Sippar dynasty (Enmeduranki)

Shuruppak dynasty (Ziusudra)
Kish I dynasty (Enmebaragesi)
Early Dynastic II period: c. 2800 – c. 2600 BC
Uruk I dynasty (Gilgamesh)
Early Dynastic IIIa period: c. 2600 – c. 2500 BC
Ur I dynasty
Awan dynasty
Kish II dynasty
Hamazi dynasty
Early Dynastic IIIb period: c. 2500 – c. 2334 BC
Uruk II dynasty
Ur II dynasty
Adab dynasty
Mari dynasty
Kish III dynasty
Akshak dynasty
Kish IV dynasty
Uruk III dynasty
Early Bronze Age III: c. 2700 – c. 2200 BC
Akkadian period: c. 2334 – c. 2154 BC
Akkad dynasty (Sargon)
Early Bronze Age IV: c. 2200 – c. 2100 BC
Gutian period: c. 2154 – c. 2119 BC
Uruk IV dynasty
Gutian dynasty
Middle Bronze Age I: c. 2100 – c. 2000 BC
Ur III period: c. 2119 – c. 2004 BC
Uruk V dynasty
Ur III dynasty
Middle Bronze Age II A: c. 2000 – c. 1750 BC
Isin-Larsa period: c. 2004 – c. 1736 BC
Isin I dynasty
Larsa dynasty
Middle Bronze Age II B: c. 1750 – c. 1650 BC
Old Babylonian period: c. 1736 – c. 1475 BC

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 7 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Sealand dynasty

Ubaid period
The Ubaid period is marked by a distinctive style of fine
quality painted pottery which spread throughout
Mesopotamia and the Persian Gulf. The oldest evidence for
occupation comes from Tell el-'Oueili, but, given that
environmental conditions in southern Mesopotamia were
favourable to human occupation well before the Ubaid
period, it is likely that older sites exist but have not yet been
found. It appears that this culture was derived from the
Samarran culture from northern Mesopotamia. It is not
known whether or not these were the actual Sumerians who
are identified with the later Uruk culture. The story of the
passing of the gifts of civilization (me) to Inanna, goddess of A pottery jar from the Late Ubaid
Uruk and of love and war, by Enki, god of wisdom and chief Period
god of Eridu, may reflect the transition from Eridu to
Uruk.[49]

Uruk period
The archaeological transition from the Ubaid period to the Uruk period is marked by a gradual
shift from painted pottery domestically produced on a slow wheel to a great variety of unpainted
pottery mass-produced by specialists on fast wheels. The Uruk period is a continuation and an
outgrowth of Ubaid with pottery being the main visible change.[50][51]

By the time of the Uruk period, c. 4100–2900 BC calibrated, the volume of trade goods
transported along the canals and rivers of southern Mesopotamia facilitated the rise of many
large, stratified, temple-centered cities, with populations of over 10,000 people, where
centralized administrations employed specialized workers. It is fairly certain that it was during
the Uruk period that Sumerian cities began to make use of slave labour captured from the hill
country, and there is ample evidence for captured slaves as workers in the earliest texts.
Artifacts, and even colonies of this Uruk civilization have been found over a wide area—from the
Taurus Mountains in Turkey, to the Mediterranean Sea in the west, and as far east as western
Iran.[52]: 2–3

The Uruk period civilization, exported by Sumerian traders and colonists, like that found at Tell
Brak, had an effect on all surrounding peoples, who gradually evolved their own comparable,
competing economies and cultures. The cities of Sumer could not maintain remote, long-
distance colonies by military force.[52]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 8 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Sumerian cities during the Uruk period were probably theocratic and were most likely headed
by a priest-king (ensi), assisted by a council of elders, including both men and women.[53] It is
quite possible that the later Sumerian pantheon was modeled upon this political structure.
There was little evidence of organized warfare or professional soldiers during the Uruk period,
and towns were generally unwalled. During this period Uruk became the most urbanized city in
the world, surpassing for the first time 50,000 inhabitants.

The ancient Sumerian king list includes the early dynasties of several prominent cities from this
period. The first set of names on the list is of kings said to have reigned before a major flood
occurred. These early names may be fictional, and include some legendary and mythological
figures, such as Alulim and Dumizid.[53]

The end of the Uruk period coincided with the Piora oscillation, a dry period from c. 3200–
2900 BC that marked the end of a long wetter, warmer climate period from about 9,000 to
5,000 years ago, called the Holocene climatic optimum.[54]

Early Dynastic Period Uruk King-priest feeding the sacred

herd
The dynastic period begins c. 2900 BC and was
associated with a shift from the temple establishment
headed by council of elders led by a priestly "En" (a male
figure when it was a temple for a goddess, or a female
figure when headed by a male god)[55] towards a more
secular Lugal (Lu = man, Gal = great) and includes such The king-priest and his acolyte feeding
legendary patriarchal figures as Dumuzid, Lugalbanda the sacred herd. Uruk period, c. 3200
and Gilgamesh—who reigned shortly before the historic BC
record opens c. 2900 BC, when the now deciphered
syllabic writing started to develop from the early
pictograms. The center of Sumerian culture remained in
southern Mesopotamia, even though rulers soon began
expanding into neighboring areas, and neighboring
Semitic groups adopted much of Sumerian culture for
their own.

The earliest dynastic king on the Sumerian king list

whose name is known from any other legendary source is Cylinder seal of the Uruk period and its
Etana, 13th king of the first dynasty of Kish. The earliest impression, c. 3100 BC – Louvre
king authenticated through archaeological evidence is Museum
Enmebaragesi of Kish (Early Dynastic I), whose name is
mentioned in the Epic of Gilgamesh—leading to the
suggestion that Gilgamesh himself might have been a historical king of Uruk. As the Epic of
Gilgamesh shows, this period was associated with increased war. Cities became walled, and
increased in size as undefended villages in southern Mesopotamia disappeared. Both Gilgamesh
and one of his predecessors Enmerkar are credited with having built the walls of Uruk.[56]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 9 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

1st Dynasty of Lagash

The dynasty of Lagash (c. 2500–2270 BC), though omitted
from the king list, is well attested through several important
monuments and many archaeological finds.

Although short-lived, one of the first empires known to

history was that of Eannatum of Lagash, who annexed
practically all of Sumer, including Kish, Uruk, Ur, and Larsa,
and reduced to tribute the city-state of Umma, arch-rival of
Lagash. In addition, his realm extended to parts of Elam and
along the Persian Gulf. He seems to have used terror as a
matter of policy.[57] Eannatum's Stele of the Vultures
depicts vultures pecking at the severed heads and other
body parts of his enemies. His empire collapsed shortly after
his death.

Later, Lugal-zage-si, the priest-king of Umma, overthrew Golden helmet of Meskalamdug,

the primacy of the Lagash dynasty in the area, then possible founder of the First Dynasty
conquered Uruk, making it his capital, and claimed an of Ur, 26th century BC
empire extending from the Persian Gulf to the
Mediterranean. He was the last ethnically Sumerian king
before Sargon of Akkad.[43]

Akkadian Empire
The Akkadian Empire dates to c. 2234–2154 BC (middle
chronology), founded by Sargon of Akkad. The Eastern
Semitic Akkadian language is first attested in proper names
of the kings of Kish c. 2800 BC,[57] preserved in later king
lists. There are texts written entirely in Old Akkadian dating
from c. 2500 BC. Use of Old Akkadian was at its peak during
A fragment of Eannatum's Stele of
the rule of Sargon the Great (c. 2334–2279 BC), but even the Vultures
then most administrative tablets continued to be written in
Sumerian, the language used by the scribes. Gelb and
Westenholz differentiate three stages of Old Akkadian: that of the pre-Sargonic era, that of the
Akkadian empire, and that of the Ur III period that followed it.[58]

Akkadian and Sumerian coexisted as vernacular languages for about one thousand years, but by
around 1800 BC, Sumerian was becoming more of a literary language familiar mainly only to
scholars and scribes. Thorkild Jacobsen has argued that there is little break in historical
continuity between the pre- and post-Sargon periods, and that too much emphasis has been
placed on the perception of a "Semitic vs. Sumerian" conflict.[58] It is certain that Akkadian was

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 10 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

also briefly imposed on neighboring parts of Elam that were

previously conquered, by Sargon.

Gutian period
c. 2193–2119 BC (middle chronology)

2nd Dynasty of Lagash

c. 2200–2110 BC (middle chronology)

Following the downfall of the Akkadian Empire at the hands of

Gutians, another native Sumerian ruler, Gudea of Lagash, rose
to local prominence and continued the practices of the
Sargonic kings' claims to divinity.

The previous Lagash dynasty, Gudea and his descendants also

promoted artistic development and left a large number of
archaeological artifacts.

Ur III period
Later, the Third Dynasty of Ur under Ur-Nammu and Shulgi (c.
2112–2004 BC, middle chronology), whose power extended as Sumerian prisoners on a victory
stele of the Akkadian king
far as southern Assyria, has been erroneously called a
[59] Sargon, c. 2300 BC.[47][48] Louvre
"Sumerian renaissance" in the past. Already, the region was Museum.
becoming more Semitic than Sumerian, with the resurgence of
the Akkadian-speaking Semites in Assyria and elsewhere, and
the influx of waves of Semitic Martu (Amorites), who founded several competing local powers in
the south, including Isin, Larsa, Eshnunna and later, Babylonia.

The last of these eventually came to briefly dominate the south of Mesopotamia as the
Babylonian Empire, just as the Old Assyrian Empire had already done in the north from the late
21st century BC. The Sumerian language continued as a sacerdotal language taught in schools in
Babylonia and Assyria, much as Latin was used in the Medieval period, for as long as cuneiform
was used.

Fall and transmission

This period is generally taken to coincide with a major shift in population from southern
Mesopotamia toward the north. Ecologically, the agricultural productivity of the Sumerian
lands was being compromised as a result of rising salinity. Soil salinity in this region had been
long recognized as a major problem.[60] Poorly drained irrigated soils, in an arid climate with
high levels of evaporation, led to the buildup of dissolved salts in the soil, eventually reducing

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 11 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

agricultural yields severely.[61]

During the Akkadian and Ur III phases, there was a shift

from the cultivation of wheat to the more salt-tolerant
barley, but this was insufficient, and during the period from
2100 BC to 1700 BC, it is estimated that the population in
this area declined by nearly three-fifths.[61] This greatly
upset the balance of power within the region, weakening the
areas where Sumerian was spoken, and comparatively
strengthening those where Akkadian was the major
language. Henceforth, Sumerian remained only a literary
and liturgical language, similar to the position occupied by
Latin in medieval Europe.

Following an Elamite invasion and sack of Ur during the

rule of Ibbi-Sin (c. 2028–2004 BC), Sumer came under
Amorite rule (taken to introduce the Middle Bronze Age).
Gudea of Lagash, the Sumerian ruler
The independent Amorite states of the 20th to 18th
who was famous for his numerous
centuries are summarized as the "Dynasty of Isin" in the portrait sculptures that have been
Sumerian king list, ending with the rise of Babylonia under recovered.
Hammurabi c. 1800 BC.

Later rulers who dominated Assyria and Babylonia

occasionally assumed the old Sargonic title "King of Sumer
and Akkad", such as Tukulti-Ninurta I of Assyria after c.
1225 BC.

Population
Uruk, one of Sumer's largest cities, has been estimated to
have had a population of 50,000–80,000 at its height.[62]
Given the other cities in Sumer, and the large agricultural
population, a rough estimate for Sumer's population might
be 0.8 million to 1.5 million. The world population at this
time has been estimated at 27 million.[63]

The Sumerians spoke a language isolate. A number of

linguists have claimed to be able to detect a substrate A portrait of Ur-Ningirsu, son of
language of unknown classification beneath Sumerian, Gudea, c. 2100 BC. Louvre Museum.
because names of some of Sumer's major cities are not
Sumerian, revealing influences of earlier inhabitants.[64]
However, the archaeological record shows clear uninterrupted cultural continuity from the time
of the early Ubaid period (5300–4700 BC C-14) settlements in southern Mesopotamia. The

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 12 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Sumerian people who settled here, farmed the lands in this

region that were made fertile by silt deposited by the Tigris
and the Euphrates.

Some archaeologists have speculated that the original

speakers of ancient Sumerian may have been farmers, who
moved down from the north of Mesopotamia after
perfecting irrigation agriculture there. The Ubaid period
pottery of southern Mesopotamia has been connected via
Choga Mami transitional ware, to the pottery of the Samarra
period culture (c. 5700–4900 BC C-14) in the north, who
The Great Ziggurat of Ur, c. 2100
were the first to practice a primitive form of irrigation BC, near Nasiriyah, Iraq
agriculture along the middle Tigris River and its tributaries.
The connection is most clearly seen at Tell el-'Oueili near
Larsa, excavated by the French in the 1980s, where eight levels yielded pre-Ubaid pottery
resembling Samarran ware. According to this theory, farming peoples spread down into
southern Mesopotamia because they had developed a temple-centered social organization for
mobilizing labor and technology for water control, enabling them to survive and prosper in a
difficult environment.

Others have suggested a continuity of Sumerians, from the indigenous hunter-fisherfolk

traditions, associated with the bifacial assemblages found on the Arabian littoral. Juris Zarins
believes the Sumerians may have been the people living in the Persian Gulf region before it
flooded at the end of the last Ice Age.

Culture

Social and family life

In the early Sumerian period, the primitive pictograms suggest[65] that

"Pottery was very plentiful, and the forms of the vases, bowls and dishes were manifold;
there were special jars for honey, butter, oil and wine, which was probably made from dates.
Some of the vases had pointed feet, and stood on stands with crossed legs; others were
flat-bottomed, and were set on square or rectangular frames of wood. The oil-jars, and
probably others also, were sealed with clay, precisely as in early Egypt. Vases and dishes of
stone were made in imitation of those of clay."
"A feathered head-dress was worn. Beds, stools and chairs were used, with carved legs
resembling those of an ox. There were fire-places and fire-altars."
"Knives, drills, wedges and an instrument that looks like a saw were all known. While
spears, bows, arrows, and daggers (but not swords) were employed in war."
"Tablets were used for writing purposes. Daggers with metal blades and wooden handles
were worn, and copper was hammered into plates, while necklaces or collars were made of

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 13 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

gold."
"Time was reckoned in lunar months."
There is considerable evidence concerning Sumerian music. Lyres and
flutes were played, among the best-known examples being the Lyres of
Ur.[66]

Sumerian culture was male-dominated and stratified. The Code of Ur-

Nammu, the oldest such codification yet discovered, dating to the Ur III,
reveals a glimpse at societal structure in late Sumerian law. Beneath the
lu-gal ("great man" or king), all members of society belonged to one of
two basic strata: The "lu" or free person, and the slave (male, arad;
female geme). The son of a lu was called a dumu-nita until he married. A
A reconstruction in
woman (munus) went from being a daughter (dumu-mi), to a wife
the British Museum of
(dam), then if she outlived her husband, a widow (numasu) and she headgear and
could then remarry another man who was from the same tribe. necklaces worn by
the women at the
In early Sumer women played an important public rule as priestesses. Royal Cemetery at
They could also own property, transact business and had their rights Ur.
protected by the courts. Sons and daughters inherited property on equal
terms. The status of women deteriorated in the centuries after 2300 BC.
Their right to dispose of their property was limited, and the female deities also lost their former
importance.[67][68]

Inscriptions describing the reforms of king Urukagina of Lagash (c. 2350 BC) say that he
abolished the former custom of polyandry in his country, prescribing that a woman who took
multiple husbands be stoned with rocks upon which her crime had been written.[69]

Marriages were usually arranged by the Sumerian princess (c. 2150 BC)
parents of the bride and groom;[70]: 78
engagements were usually completed
through the approval of contracts recorded
on clay tablets.[70]: 78 These marriages
became legal as soon as the groom
delivered a bridal gift to his bride's
father.[70]: 78 One Sumerian proverb
describes the ideal, happy marriage,
through the mouth of a husband, who
boasts that his wife has borne him eight
sons and is still eager to have sex.[71]
A Sumerian princess of Frontal detail.
The Sumerians considered it desirable for the time of Gudea Louvre Museum AO 295.
c. 2150 BC.
women to still be virgins at the time of
marriage,[72]: 100–101 but did not expect

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 14 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

the same of men,[72]: 102–103 although one author considers premarital sex in general to have
been discouraged.[73] Neither Sumerian nor Akkadian had a word exactly corresponding to the
English word 'virginity', and the concept was expressed descriptively, for example as a/é-nu-
gi4-a (Sum.)/la naqbat (Akk.) 'un-deflowered', or giš nunzua, 'never having known a
penis'.[72]: 91–93 It is unclear whether terms such as šišitu in Akkadian medical texts indicate the
hymen, but it appears that the intactness of the hymen was much less relevant to assessing a
woman's virginity than in later cultures of the Near East. Most assessments of virginity
depended on the woman's own account.[72]: 91–92

From the earliest records, the Sumerians had very relaxed attitudes toward sex.[74] Their sexual
mores were determined not by whether a sexual act was deemed immoral, but rather by
whether or not it made a person ritually unclean.[74] The Sumerians widely believed that
masturbation enhanced sexual potency, both for men and for women,[74] and they frequently
engaged in it, both alone and with their partners.[74] The Sumerians did not regard anal sex as
taboo either.[74] Entu priestesses were forbidden from producing offspring[75][71] and frequently
engaged in anal sex as a method of birth control.[75][74][71]

Prostitution existed, but it is not clear if sacred prostitution did.[76]: 151

Language and writing

The most important archaeological discoveries in Sumer are
a large number of clay tablets written in cuneiform script.
Sumerian writing is considered to be a great milestone in
the development of humanity's ability to not only create
historical records but also in creating pieces of literature,
both in the form of poetic epics and stories as well as prayers
and laws.

Although the writing system was first hieroglyphic using

ideograms, logosyllabic cuneiform soon followed.
A tablet with pictographic pre-
Triangular or wedge-shaped reeds were used to write on cuneiform writing. Late 4th
moist clay. A large body of hundreds of thousands of texts in millennium BC, limestone. Height:
the Sumerian language have survived, including personal 4.5 cm, width: 4.3 cm, depth: 2.4 cm.
and business letters, receipts, lexical lists, laws, hymns, The Louvre

prayers, stories, and daily records. Full libraries of clay

tablets have been found. Monumental inscriptions and texts on different objects, like statues or
bricks, are also very common. Many texts survive in multiple copies because they were
repeatedly transcribed by scribes in training. Sumerian continued to be the language of religion
and law in Mesopotamia long after Semitic speakers had become dominant.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 15 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

A prime example of cuneiform writing is a lengthy poem that was discovered in the ruins of
Uruk. The Epic of Gilgamesh was written in the standard Sumerian cuneiform. It tells of a king
from the early Dynastic II period named Gilgamesh or "Bilgamesh" in Sumerian. The story
relates the fictional adventures of Gilgamesh and his companion, Enkidu. It was laid out on
several clay tablets and is thought to be the earliest known surviving example of fictional
literature.

The Sumerian language is generally regarded as a language isolate in linguistics, because it

belongs to no known language family. Akkadian, by contrast, belongs to the Semitic branch of
the Afroasiatic languages. There have been many failed attempts to connect Sumerian to other
language families. It is an agglutinative language. In other words, morphemes ("units of
meaning") are added together to create words, unlike analytic languages where morphemes are
purely added together to create sentences. Some authors have proposed that there may be
evidence of a substratum or adstratum language for geographic features and various crafts and
agricultural activities, called variously Proto-Euphratean or Proto Tigrean, but this is disputed
by others.

Understanding Sumerian texts today can be problematic. Most difficult are the earliest texts,
which in many cases do not give the full grammatical structure of the language and seem to
have been used as an "aide-mémoire" for knowledgeable scribes.[77]

Akkadian gradually replaced Sumerian as a spoken language somewhere around the turn of the
3rd and the 2nd millennium BC.[78] Sumerian continued to be used as a sacred, ceremonial,
literary, and scientific language in Babylonia and Assyria until the 1st century AD.[79]

An early writing tablet for A cuneiform tablet about an A bill of sale of a field and a
recording the allocation of administrative account, with house, from Shuruppak, c.
beer, 3100–3000 BC, from entries concerning malt and 2600 BC. Height: 8.5 cm,
Iraq. British Museum, London barley groats, 3100–2900 width: 8.5 cm, depth: 2 cm.
BC. Clay, 6.8 x 4.5 x 1.6 cm, The Louvre
the Metropolitan Museum of
Art, New York City

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 16 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Stele of the Vultures, c. 2450

BC, limestone, Found in
1881 by Édouard de Sarzec
in Girsu, now Tell Telloh, Iraq.
The Louvre

Religion
The Sumerians credited their Sumerian religion
divinities for all matters pertaining
to them and exhibited humility in
the face of cosmic forces, such as
death and divine wrath.[70]: 3–4

Sumerian religion seems to have

been founded upon two separate
cosmogenic myths. The first saw
creation as the result of a series of Wall plaque showing libations Naked priest offering libations to
to a seated god and a temple. a Sumerian temple (detail), Ur,
hieroi gamoi or sacred marriages,
Ur, 2500 BC 2500 BC
involving the reconciliation of
opposites, postulated as a coming
together of male and female divine beings, the gods.

This pattern continued to influence regional Mesopotamian myths. Thus, in the later Akkadian
Enuma Elish, creation was seen as the union of fresh and salt water, between male Abzu, and
female Tiamat. The products of that union, Lahm and Lahmu, "the muddy ones", were titles
given to the gate keepers of the E-Abzu temple of Enki in Eridu, the first Sumerian city.

Mirroring the way that muddy islands emerge from the confluence of fresh and salty water at
the mouth of the Euphrates, where the river deposits its load of silt, a second hieros gamos
supposedly resulted in the creation of Anshar and Kishar, the "sky-pivot" (or axle), and the
"earth pivot", parents in turn of Anu (the sky) and Ki (the earth).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 17 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Another important Sumerian hieros gamos was that between Ki, here known as Ninhursag or
"Lady of the Mountains", and Enki of Eridu, the god of fresh water which brought forth
greenery and pasture.

At an early stage, following the dawn of recorded history, Nippur, in central Mesopotamia,
replaced Eridu in the south as the primary temple city, whose priests exercised political
hegemony on the other city-states. Nippur retained this status throughout the Sumerian period.

Deities
Sumerians believed in an anthropomorphic
polytheism, or the belief in many gods in human
form. There was no common set of gods; each city-
state had its own patrons, temples, and priest-
kings. Nonetheless, these were not exclusive; the
gods of one city were often acknowledged
elsewhere. Sumerian speakers were among the
earliest people to record their beliefs in writing,
and were a major inspiration in later
Mesopotamian mythology, religion, and astrology. Akkadian cylinder seal from sometime around
2300 BC or thereabouts depicting the deities
The Sumerians worshiped: Inanna, Utu, Enki, and Isimud

An as the full-time god equivalent to heaven;

indeed, the word an in Sumerian means sky and his consort Ki, means earth.
Enki in the south at the temple in Eridu. Enki was the god of beneficence and of wisdom,
ruler of the freshwater depths beneath the earth, a healer and friend to humanity who in
Sumerian myth was thought to have given humans the arts and sciences, the industries and
manners of civilization; the first law book was considered his creation.
Enlil was the god of storm, wind, and rain.[80]: 108 He was the chief god of the Sumerian
pantheon[80]: 108 [81]: 115–121 and the patron god of Nippur.[82]: 231–234 His consort was Ninlil,
the goddess of the south wind.[83]: 106
Inanna was the goddess of love, sexuality, and war;[76]: 109 the deification of Venus, the
morning (eastern) and evening (western) star, at the temple (shared with An) at Uruk.
Deified kings may have re-enacted the marriage of Inanna and Dumuzid with
priestesses.[76]: 151, 157–158
The sun-god Utu at Larsa in the south and Sippar in the north,
The moon god Sin at Ur.
These deities formed the main pantheon, and in addition to this there were hundreds of other
minor gods. Sumerian gods were often associated with different cities, and their religious
importance often waxed and waned with those cities' political power. The gods were said to
have created human beings from clay for the purpose of serving them. The temples organized
the mass labour projects needed for irrigation agriculture. Citizens had a labor duty to the
temple, though they could avoid it by a payment of silver.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 18 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Cosmology
Sumerians envisioned
Earth to be a rectangular
field with four corners.[84]
The Sumerian afterlife
involved a descent into a
gloomy netherworld to
spend eternity in a
wretched existence as a
Gidim (ghost).[84]

The universe was divided

into four quarters:

To the north were the

hill-dwelling Subartu,
who were periodically
raided for slaves,
timber, and other raw
materials.[85]
To the west were the
tent-dwelling Martu,
ancient Semitic-
speaking peoples living
as pastoral nomads Sumero-early Akkadian pantheon
tending herds of sheep
and goats.
To the south was the land of Dilmun, a trading state associated with the land of the dead
and the place of creation.[86]
To the east were the Elamites, a rival people with whom the Sumerians were frequently at
war.
Their known world extended from The Upper Sea or Mediterranean coastline, to The Lower
Sea, the Persian Gulf and the land of Meluhha (probably the Indus Valley) and Magan (Oman),
famed for its copper ores.

Temple and temple organisation

Ziggurats (Sumerian temples) each had an individual name and consisted of a forecourt, with a
central pond for purification.[87] The temple itself had a central nave with aisles along either
side. Flanking the aisles would be rooms for the priests. At one end would stand the podium and
a mudbrick table for animal and vegetable sacrifices. Granaries and storehouses were usually
located near the temples. After a time the Sumerians began to place the temples on top of multi-
layered square constructions built as a series of rising terraces, giving rise to the Ziggurat
style.[88]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 19 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Funerary practices
It was believed that when people died, they would be confined to a gloomy world of Ereshkigal,
whose realm was guarded by gateways with various monsters designed to prevent people
entering or leaving. The dead were buried outside the city walls in graveyards where a small
mound covered the corpse, along with offerings to monsters and a small amount of food. Those
who could afford it sought burial at Dilmun.[86] Human sacrifice was found in the death pits at
the Ur royal cemetery where Queen Puabi was accompanied in death by her servants.

Agriculture and hunting

The Sumerians adopted an agricultural lifestyle perhaps as early as c. 5000–4500 BC. The
region demonstrated a number of core agricultural techniques, including organized irrigation,
large-scale intensive cultivation of land, monocropping involving the use of plough agriculture,
and the use of an agricultural specialized labour force under bureaucratic control. The necessity
to manage temple accounts with this organization led to the development of writing (c. 3500
BC).

In the early Sumerian Uruk period, the primitive

pictograms suggest that sheep, goats, cattle, and
pigs were domesticated. They used oxen as their
primary beasts of burden and donkeys or equids
as their primary transport animal and "woollen
clothing as well as rugs were made from the wool
or hair of the animals. ... By the side of the house
From the royal tombs of Ur, made of lapis lazuli
was an enclosed garden planted with trees and
and shell, shows peacetime
other plants; wheat and probably other cereals
were sown in the fields, and the shaduf was
already employed for the purpose of irrigation. Plants were also grown in pots or vases."[65]

The Sumerians were one of the first known beer-drinking societies. Cereals were plentiful and
were the key ingredient in their early brew. They brewed multiple kinds of beer consisting of
wheat, barley, and mixed grain beers. Beer brewing was very important to the Sumerians. It was
referenced in the Epic of Gilgamesh when Enkidu was introduced to the food and beer of
Gilgamesh's people: "Drink the beer, as is the custom of the land... He drank the beer-seven
jugs! and became expansive and sang with joy!"[89]

The Sumerians practiced similar irrigation techniques as those used in Egypt.[90] American
anthropologist Robert McCormick Adams says that irrigation development was associated with
urbanization,[91] and that 89% of the population lived in the cities.

They grew barley, chickpeas, lentils, wheat, dates, onions, garlic, lettuce, leeks and mustard.
Sumerians caught many fish and hunted fowl and gazelle.[92]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 20 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Sumerian agriculture depended heavily on irrigation. The

irrigation was accomplished by the use of shaduf, canals,
channels, dykes, weirs, and reservoirs. The frequent violent
floods of the Tigris, and less so, of the Euphrates, meant that
canals required frequent repair and continual removal of
silt, and survey markers and boundary stones needed to be
continually replaced. The government required individuals
to work on the canals in a corvée, although the rich were
able to exempt themselves.

As is known from the "Sumerian Farmer's Almanac", after

the flood season and after the Spring equinox and the Akitu
or New Year Festival, using the canals, farmers would flood
their fields and then drain the water. Next they made oxen An account of barley rations issued
stomp the ground and kill weeds. They then dragged the monthly to adults and children written
fields with pickaxes. After drying, they plowed, harrowed, in cuneiform script on a clay tablet,
and raked the ground three times, and pulverized it with a written in year 4 of King Urukagina,
c. 2350 BC
mattock, before planting seed. Unfortunately, the high
evaporation rate resulted in a gradual increase in the salinity
of the fields. By the Ur III period, farmers had switched from wheat to the more salt-tolerant
barley as their principal crop.

Sumerians harvested during the spring in three-person teams consisting of a reaper, a binder,
and a sheaf handler.[93] The farmers would use threshing wagons, driven by oxen, to separate
the cereal heads from the stalks and then use threshing sleds to disengage the grain. They then
winnowed the grain/chaff mixture.

Art
The Sumerians were great artists. Sumerian artefacts
show great detail and ornamentation, with fine semi-
precious stones imported from other lands, such as
lapis lazuli, marble, and diorite, and precious metals
like hammered gold, incorporated into the design.
Since stone was rare it was reserved for sculpture. The
most widespread material in Sumer was clay, as a
result many Sumerian objects are made of clay. Metals Gold dagger from Sumerian tomb PG 580,
Royal Cemetery at Ur.
such as gold, silver, copper, and bronze, along with
shells and gemstones, were used for the finest
sculptures and inlays. Small stones of all kinds, including more precious stones such as lapis
lazuli, alabaster, and serpentine, were used for cylinder seals.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 21 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Some of the most famous masterpieces are the Lyres of Ur, which are considered to be the
world's oldest surviving stringed instruments. They were discovered by Leonard Woolley when
the Royal Cemetery of Ur was excavated between 1922 and 1934.

Cylinder seal and impression Ram in a Thicket; 2600–2400 Standard of Ur; 2600–2400
in which appears a ritual BC; gold, copper, shell, lapis BC; shell, red limestone and
scene before a temple lazuli and limestone; height: lapis lazuli on wood; length:
façade; 3500–3100 BC; 45.7 cm; from the Royal 49.5 cm; from the Royal
bituminous limestone; height: Cemetery at Ur (Dhi Qar Cemetery at Ur; British
4.5 cm; Metropolitan Governorate, Iraq); British Museum
Museum of Art (New York Museum (London)
City)

Bull's head ornament from a

lyre; 2600–2350 BC; bronze
inlaid with shell and lapis
lazuli; height: 13.3 cm, width:
10.5 cm; Metropolitan
Museum of Art

Architecture
The Tigris-Euphrates plain lacked minerals and trees. Sumerian structures were made of plano-
convex mudbrick, not fixed with mortar or cement. Mud-brick buildings eventually deteriorate,
so they were periodically destroyed, leveled, and rebuilt on the same spot. This constant
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 22 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

rebuilding gradually raised the level of cities,

which thus came to be elevated above the
surrounding plain. The resultant hills, known
as tells, are found throughout the ancient Near
East.

According to Archibald Sayce, the primitive

pictograms of the early Sumerian (i.e. Uruk)
era suggest that "Stone was scarce, but was
already cut into blocks and seals. Brick was the
ordinary building material, and with it cities,
forts, temples and houses were constructed.
The city was provided with towers and stood on
an artificial platform; the house also had a
tower-like appearance. It was provided with a
door which turned on a hinge, and could be The Great Ziggurat of Ur (Dhi Qar Governorate,
Iraq), built during the Third Dynasty of Ur (c. 2100
opened with a sort of key; the city gate was on a
BC), dedicated to the moon god Nanna
larger scale, and seems to have been double.
The foundation stones—or rather bricks—of a
house were consecrated by certain objects that were deposited under them."[65]

The most impressive and famous of Sumerian buildings are the ziggurats, large layered
platforms that supported temples. Sumerian cylinder seals also depict houses built from reeds
not unlike those built by the Marsh Arabs of Southern Iraq until as recently as 400 CE. The
Sumerians also developed the arch, which enabled them to develop a strong type of dome. They
built this by constructing and linking several arches. Sumerian temples and palaces made use of
more advanced materials and techniques, such as buttresses, recesses, half columns, and clay
nails.

Mathematics
The Sumerians developed a complex system of metrology c. 4000 BC. This advanced metrology
resulted in the creation of arithmetic, geometry, and algebra. From c. 2600 BC onwards, the
Sumerians wrote multiplication tables on clay tablets and dealt with geometrical exercises and
division problems. The earliest traces of the Babylonian numerals also date back to this
period.[94] The period c. 2700–2300 BC saw the first appearance of the abacus, and a table of
successive columns which delimited the successive orders of magnitude of their sexagesimal
number system.[95] The Sumerians were the first to use a place value numeral system. There is
also anecdotal evidence the Sumerians may have used a type of slide rule in astronomical
calculations. They were the first to find the area of a triangle and the volume of a cube.[96]

Economy and trade

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 23 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Discoveries of obsidian from far-away locations in Anatolia

and lapis lazuli from Badakhshan in northeastern
Afghanistan, beads from Dilmun (modern Bahrain), and
several seals inscribed with the Indus Valley script suggest a
remarkably wide-ranging network of ancient trade centered
on the Persian Gulf. For example, Imports to Ur came from
many parts of the world. In particular, the metals of all types
had to be imported.

The Epic of Gilgamesh refers to trade with far lands for

goods, such as wood, that were scarce in Mesopotamia. In
particular, cedar from Lebanon was prized. The finding of
resin in the tomb of Queen Puabi at Ur, indicates it was Bill of sale of a male slave and a
building in Shuruppak, Sumerian
traded from as far away as Mozambique.
tablet, c. 2600 BC

The Sumerians used slaves, although they were not a major

part of the economy. Slave women worked as weavers, pressers, millers, and porters.

Sumerian potters decorated pots with cedar oil paints. The potters used a bow drill to produce
the fire needed for baking the pottery. Sumerian masons and jewelers knew and made use of
alabaster (calcite), ivory, iron, gold, silver, carnelian, and lapis lazuli.[97]

Trade with the Indus valley

Evidence for imports
from the Indus to Ur can
be found from around
2350 BC.[100] Various
objects made with shell
species that are
characteristic of the
The trade routes between Indus coast, particularly
The etched carnelian beads with
Mesopotamia and the Indus would Turbinella pyrum and
have been significantly shorter due to white designs in this necklace from
Pleuroploca trapezium, the Royal Cemetery of Ur, dating to
lower sea levels in the 3rd
have been found in the the First Dynasty of Ur, are thought
millennium BC.[99]
archaeological sites of to have come from the Indus Valley.
Mesopotamia dating British Museum.[98]
from around 2500–2000 BC.[101] Carnelian beads from the
Indus were found in the Sumerian tombs of Ur, the Royal
Cemetery at Ur, dating to 2600–2450.[102] In particular, carnelian beads with an etched design
in white were probably imported from the Indus Valley, and made according to a technique of
acid-etching developed by the Harappans.[103][98][104] Lapis lazuli was imported in great

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 24 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

quantity by Egypt, and already used in many tombs of the Naqada II period (c. 3200 BC). Lapis
lazuli probably originated in northern Afghanistan, as no other sources are known, and had to
be transported across the Iranian plateau to Mesopotamia, and then Egypt.[105][106]

Several Indus seals with Harappan script have also been found in Mesopotamia, particularly in
Ur, Babylon and Kish.[107][108][109][110][111][112]

Gudea, the ruler of the Neo-Summerian Empire at Lagash, is recorded as having imported
"translucent carnelian" from Meluhha, generally thought to be the Indus Valley area.[102]
Various inscriptions also mention the presence of Meluhha traders and interpreters in
Mesopotamia.[102] About twenty seals have been found from the Akkadian and Ur III sites, that
have connections with Harappa and often use Harappan symbols or writing.[102]

The Indus Valley Civilization only flourished in its most developed form between 2400 and
1800 BC, but at the time of these exchanges, it was a much larger entity than the Mesopotamian
civilization, covering an area of 1.2 million square kilometers with thousands of settlements,
compared to an area of only about 65.000 square kilometers for the occupied area of
Mesopotamia, while the largest cities were comparable in size at about 30–40,000
inhabitants.[113]

Money and credit

Large institutions kept their accounts in barley and silver, often with a fixed rate between them.
The obligations, loans and prices in general were usually denominated in one of them. Many
transactions involved debt, for example goods consigned to merchants by temple and beer
advanced by "ale women".[114]

Commercial credit and agricultural consumer loans were the main types of loans. The trade
credit was usually extended by temples in order to finance trade expeditions and was nominated
in silver. The interest rate was set at 1/60 a month (one shekel per mina) some time before
2000 BC and it remained at that level for about two thousand years.[114] Rural loans commonly
arose as a result of unpaid obligations due to an institution (such as a temple), in this case the
arrears were considered to be lent to the debtor.[115] They were denominated in barley or other
crops and the interest rate was typically much higher than for commercial loans and could
amount to 1/3 to 1/2 of the loan principal.[114]

Periodically, rulers signed "clean slate" decrees that cancelled all the rural (but not commercial)
debt and allowed bondservants to return to their homes. Customarily, rulers did it at the
beginning of the first full year of their reign, but they could also be proclaimed at times of
military conflict or crop failure. The first known ones were made by Enmetena and Urukagina of
Lagash in 2400–2350 BC. According to Hudson, the purpose of these decrees was to prevent
debts mounting to a degree that they threatened the fighting force, which could happen if
peasants lost their subsistence land or became bondservants due to inability to repay their
debt.[114]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 25 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Military
The almost constant wars among
the Sumerian city-states for 2000
years helped to develop the
military technology and
techniques of Sumer to a high Early chariots on the Standard of Ur, c. 2600 BC
level.[116] The first war recorded in
any detail was between Lagash and Umma in c. 2450 BC on
a stele called the Stele of the Vultures. It shows the king of
Lagash leading a Sumerian army consisting mostly of
infantry. The infantry carried spears, wore copper helmets,
and carried rectangular shields. The spearmen are shown
arranged in what resembles the phalanx formation, which
requires training and discipline; this implies that the
Sumerians may have used professional soldiers.[117]
Phalanx battle formations led by
The Sumerian military used carts harnessed to onagers. Sumerian king Eannatum, on a
fragment of the Stele of the Vultures
These early chariots functioned less effectively in combat
than did later designs, and some have suggested that these
chariots served primarily as transports, though the crew
carried battle-axes and lances. The Sumerian chariot
comprised a four or two-wheeled device manned by a crew
of two and harnessed to four onagers. The cart was
composed of a woven basket and the wheels had a solid
three-piece design. Silver model of a boat, tomb PG 789,
Royal Cemetery of Ur, 2600–2500
Sumerian cities were surrounded by defensive walls. The BC

Sumerians engaged in siege warfare between their cities, but

the mudbrick walls were able to deter some foes.

Technology
Examples of Sumerian technology include: the wheel, cuneiform script, arithmetic and
geometry, irrigation systems, Sumerian boats, lunisolar calendar, bronze, leather, saws, chisels,
hammers, braces, bits, nails, pins, rings, hoes, axes, knives, lancepoints, arrowheads, swords,
glue, daggers, waterskins, bags, harnesses, armor, quivers, war chariots, scabbards, boots,
sandals, harpoons and beer. The Sumerians had three main types of boats:

clinker-built sailboats stitched together with hair, featuring bitumen waterproofing

skin boats constructed from animal skins and reeds
wooden-oared ships, sometimes pulled upstream by people and animals walking along the
nearby banks

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 26 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Legacy
Evidence of wheeled vehicles appeared in the
-3000
mid-4th millennium BC, near-simultaneously in
Botai Bolshemys
Mesopotamia, the Northern Caucasus (Maykop
Corded Ware
culture Afanasievoculture
Culture Yamnaya Ancient
Culture culture Northeast Asians
culture) and Central Europe. The wheel initially Kura- Sarazm
Hongshan

took the form of the potter's wheel. The new Araxes

EBLA
culture Majia- Long- Dawen-
yao shan kou
Jeul-
mun
SUMER Proto-
concept led to wheeled vehicles and mill wheels.
INDUS Liang-
Elamite VALLEY Qujia- zhu
EARLY CIVILIZATION ling
The Sumerians' cuneiform script is the oldest (or
DYNASTIC
EGYPT

second oldest after the Egyptian hieroglyphs)

which has been deciphered (the status of even
older inscriptions such as the Jiahu symbols and Sumer and contemporary polities and cultures
Tartaria tablets is controversial). The Sumerians c. 3000 BC

were among the first astronomers, mapping the

stars into sets of constellations, many of which
survived in the zodiac and were also recognized by the ancient Greeks.[118] They were also aware
of the five planets that are easily visible to the naked eye.[119]

They invented and developed arithmetic by using several different number systems including a
mixed radix system with an alternating base 10 and base 6. This sexagesimal system became the
standard number system in Sumer and Babylonia. They may have invented military formations
and introduced the basic divisions between infantry, cavalry, and archers. They developed the
first known codified legal and administrative systems, complete with courts, jails, and
government records.

The first true city-states arose in Sumer, roughly contemporaneously with similar entities in
what are now Syria and Lebanon. Several centuries after the invention of cuneiform, the use of
writing expanded beyond debt/payment certificates and inventory lists to be applied for the first
time, about 2600 BC, to messages and mail delivery, history, legend, mathematics,
astronomical records, and other pursuits. Conjointly with the spread of writing, the first formal
schools were established, usually under the auspices of a city-state's primary temple.

See also
History of Iraq
Numeral system
Ancient Mesopotamian units of measurement
Ancient Mesopotamian religion
Indus–Mesopotamia relations
Egypt–Mesopotamia relations
History of institutions in Mesopotamia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 27 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

References
1. Foxvog, Daniel A. (2016). Elementary Sumerian Glossary (https://cdli.ucla.edu/pubs/cdlp/cdl
p0003_20160104.pdf) (PDF). University of California at Berkeley. p. 52.
2. "The Pennsylvania Sumerian Dictionary: saĝgiga [humankind]" (http://psd.museum.upenn.e
du/epsd/epsd/e4703.html). psd.museum.upenn.edu.
︠︡
3. Diakonoff, I. M.; D'I ︠︡
Akonov, Igor' Mik haílovich (1991). Early Antiquity (https://books.google.c
om/books?id=JSRAUIYENZoC&pg=PA72). University of Chicago Press. p. 72. ISBN 978-0-
226-14465-8.
4. Feuerstein, Georg; Kak, Subhash; Frawley, David (2005). The Search of the Cradle of
Civilization: New Light on Ancient India (https://books.google.com/books?id=wNlsRZh3rwgC
&pg=PA117) (Second Revised ed.). Motilal Banarsidass Publishers. p. 117. ISBN 978-81-
208-2037-1.
5. "emeĝir [SUMERIAN]" (http://psd.museum.upenn.edu/epsd/epsd/e1283.html). The
Pennsylvania Sumerian Dictionary. University of Pennsylvania Museum of Anthropology
and Archaeology. Retrieved 14 July 2021.
6. "The area in question (the extreme south of Mesopotamia) may now be called Sumer, and
its inhabitants Sumerians, although these names are only English approximations of the
Akkadian designations; the Sumerians themselves called their land Kengir, their language
Emegir, and themselves Sag-giga, "black-headed ones." in W. Hallo; W. Simpson (1971).
The Ancient Near East. New York: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich. p. 29.
7. Black, Jeremy A.; George, A. R.; Postgate, J. N.; Breckwoldt, Tina (2000). A Concise
Dictionary of Akkadian (https://books.google.com/books?id=-qIuVCsRb98C&pg=PA384).
Otto Harrassowitz Verlag. p. 384. ISBN 978-3-447-04264-2.
8. Miller, Douglas B.; Shipp, R. Mark (1996). An Akkadian Handbook: Paradigms, Helps,
Glossary, Logograms, and Sign List (https://books.google.com/books?id=27m3y6MNRzYC&
pg=PA68). Eisenbrauns. p. 68. ISBN 978-0-931464-86-7.
9. Piotr Michalowski, "Sumerian," The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the World's Ancient
Languages." Ed. Roger D. Woodard (2004, Cambridge University Press). Pages 19–59
10. Roŭ, Georges (1993). Ancient Iraq (3rd ed.). London, England: Penguin Books. pp. 80–82.
11. Toorn, Karel van der; Becking, Bob; Horst, Pieter Willem van der (1999). Dictionary of
Deities and Demons in the Bible (https://books.google.com/books?id=yCkRz5pfxz0C&pg=P
A32). Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. p. 32. ISBN 978-0-8028-2491-2.
12. Edzard, Dietz Otto (2003). Sumerian Grammar (https://books.google.com/books?id=HOx5D
wAAQBAJ&pg=PA1). Brill. p. 1. ISBN 978-90-474-0340-1.
13. "The origin of the Sumerians is unknown; they described themselves as the 'black-headed
people'" Haywood, John (2005). The Penguin Historical Atlas of Ancient Civilizations (https:/
/books.google.com/books?id=xtjtAAAAMAAJ). Penguin. p. 28. ISBN 978-0-14-101448-7.
14. Diakonoff, I. M. (2013). Early Antiquity (https://books.google.com/books?id=JU8pegs94uoC
&pg=PA72). University of Chicago Press. p. 72. ISBN 978-0-226-14467-2.
15. Finer, Samuel Edward; Finer, S. E. (1997). The History of Government from the Earliest
Times: Ancient monarchies and empires (https://books.google.com/books?id=aEziNfjinnMC
&pg=PA99). Oxford University Press. p. 99. ISBN 978-0-19-820664-4.
16. "I am the king of the four quarters, I am a shepherd, the pastor of the "black-headed
people"" in Liverani, Mario (2013). The Ancient Near East: History, Society and Economy (ht
tps://books.google.com/books?id=0d1JAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA167). Routledge. p. 167.
ISBN 978-1-134-75084-9.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 28 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

ISBN 978-1-134-75084-9.
17. van der Toorn, K.; van der Horst, P. W. (January 1990). "Nimrod before and after the Bible".
The Harvard Theological Review. 83 (1): 1–29. doi:10.1017/S0017816000005502 (https://d
oi.org/10.1017%2FS0017816000005502). S2CID 161371511 (https://api.semanticscholar.or
g/CorpusID:161371511).
18. Kramer, Samuel Noah (1988). In the World of Sumer: An Autobiography (https://books.goog
le.com/books?id=KliA7MjJEDQC&pg=PA44). Wayne State University Press. p. 44.
ISBN 978-0-8143-2121-8.
19. "Ancient Mesopotamia. Teaching materials" (https://web.archive.org/web/20131105200811/h
ttp://oi.uchicago.edu/OI/MUS/ED/TRC/MESO/writing.html). Oriental Institute in collaboration
with Chicago Web Docent and eCUIP, The Digital Library. Archived from the original (http://o
i.uchicago.edu/OI/MUS/ED/TRC/MESO/writing.html) on 5 November 2013. Retrieved
5 March 2015.
20. "The Ubaid Period (5500–4000 B.C.)" (http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/ubai/hd_ubai.ht
m). Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art,
Metropolitan Museum of Art. October 2003. Archived (https://web.archive.org/web/2021070
7020947/http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/ubai/hd_ubai.htm) from the original on 2021-
07-07. Retrieved 2014-02-22.
21. "Ubaid Culture" (https://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/articles/u/ubaid_culture.a
spx). The British Museum.
22. Carter, Rober A.; Graham, Philip, eds. (April 2006). "Beyond the Ubaid" (https://web.archive.
org/web/20140321143949/http://oi.uchicago.edu/pdf/saoc63.pdf) (PDF). University of
Durham. Archived from the original (http://oi.uchicago.edu/pdf/saoc63.pdf) (PDF) on 2014-
03-21. Retrieved 2014-02-22.
23. Arnaiz-Villena, Antonio; Martínez-Laso, Jorge; Gómez-Casado, Eduardo (2000). Prehistoric
Iberia: Genetics, Anthropology, and Linguistics (https://books.google.com/books?id=MJWcS
RSz9wEC&pg=PA22). International Conference on Prehistoric Iberia : Genetics,
Anthropology, and Linguistics; November 16–17, 1998; Madrid, Spain. Springer Science &
Business Media. p. 22. ISBN 978-0-306-46364-8.
24. Lazaridis, I.; Nadel, D.; Rollefson, G. (2016). "Genomic insights into the origin of farming in
the ancient Near East" (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5003663). Nature.
536 (7617): 419–424. Bibcode:2016Natur.536..419L (https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/201
6Natur.536..419L). doi:10.1038/nature19310 (https://doi.org/10.1038%2Fnature19310).
PMC 5003663 (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5003663). PMID 27459054 (
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27459054).
25. Reich, David; Pinhasi, Ron; Patterson, Nick; Hovhannisyan, Nelli A.; Yengo, Loic; Wilson,
James F.; Torroni, Antonio; Tönjes, Anke; Stumvoll, Michael (August 2016). "Genomic
insights into the origin of farming in the ancient Near East" (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pm
c/articles/PMC5003663). Nature. 536 (7617): 419–424. Bibcode:2016Natur.536..419L (https
://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2016Natur.536..419L). doi:10.1038/nature19310 (https://doi.or
g/10.1038%2Fnature19310). ISSN 1476-4687 (https://search.worldcat.org/issn/1476-4687).
PMC 5003663 (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5003663). PMID 27459054 (
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27459054). "Craniometric analyses have suggested an
affinity between the Natufians and populations of north or sub-Saharan Africa, a result that
finds some support from Y chromosome analysis which shows that the Natufians and
successor Levantine Neolithic populations carried haplogroup E, of likely ultimate African
origin, which has not been detected in other ancient males from West Eurasia. However, no
affinity of Natufians to sub-Saharan Africans is evident in our genome-wide analysis, as
present-day sub-Saharan Africans do not share more alleles with Natufians than with other
ancient Eurasians."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 29 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

ancient Eurasians."
26. "Sumerians had connections with the Caucasus" (https://web.archive.org/web/20210415032
734/https://scientificrussia.ru/articles/shumery-imeli-svjazi-na-kavkaze). Scientific Russia.
Archived from the original (https://scientificrussia.ru/articles/shumery-imeli-svjazi-na-kavkaz
e) on 2021-04-15.
27. Kassian, A. (2014). "Lexical Matches between Sumerian and Hurro-Urartian: Possible
Historical Scenarios" (https://cdli.ucla.edu/pubs/cdlj/2014/cdlj2014_004.html). Cuneiform
Digital Library Journal. 2014 (4).
28. The Diversity of the Chechen culture: from historical roots to the present (https://unesdoc.un
esco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000186004). UNESCO. 2009. p. 14. ISBN 978-5-904549-01-5.
29. Wilhelm, Gernot (2008). "Hurrian". In Woodard, Roger D. (ed.). The Ancient Languages of
Asia Minor. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 81–104.
30. "Sumerian Civilization" (https://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/watkins/sumer.htm). San José State
University. Retrieved 2024-10-19.
31. "Science: Home City of Sumer?" (https://time.com/archive/6811703/science-home-city-of-su
mer/). Time. April 18, 1960.
32. In the World of Sumer: An Autobiography (https://books.google.com/books?id=KliA7MjJED
QC&pg=PA44). Wayne State University Press. 1988. ISBN 978-0-8143-2121-8.
33. "Dilmun – Tilmun – Creation – Aliens – Middle East" (https://www.crystalinks.com/dilmun.ht
ml). Crystalinks. Retrieved 2024-10-19.
34. Harrassowitz, O. (2015-10-01), "Enki (Ea) in the mythology of creation" (https://dx.doi.org/10
.2307/j.ctvc16s63.14), The God Enki in Sumerian Royal Ideology and Mythology,
pp. 139–188, doi:10.2307/j.ctvc16s63.14 (https://doi.org/10.2307%2Fj.ctvc16s63.14),
retrieved 2024-10-19
35. Van Der Toorn, K.; Van Der Horst, P. W. (1990-01-01). "Nimrod Before and After the Bible" (
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/harvard-theological-review/article/abs/nimrod-befor
e-and-after-the-bible/0BC3FCE0DE038734776EDF2882A9580F). Harvard Theological
Review. 83 (1): 1–29. doi:10.1017/S0017816000005502 (https://doi.org/10.1017%2FS0017
816000005502). ISSN 1475-4517 (https://search.worldcat.org/issn/1475-4517).
36. "Sumer (ancient region, Iraq)" (http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/573176/Sumer).
Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 2012-03-29.
37. Kleniewski, Nancy; Thomas, Alexander R. (2010). Cities, Change, and Conflict: A Political
Economy of Urban Life (https://books.google.com/books?id=dWuQ70MtnIQC&q=samarra+c
ulture&pg=PA51). Cengage Learning. ISBN 978-0-495-81222-7.
38. Maisels, Charles Keith (1993). The Near East: Archaeology in the "Cradle of Civilization" (ht
tps://books.google.com/books?id=tupSM5y9yEkC&q=samarra+culture&pg=PA139).
Psychology Press. ISBN 978-0-415-04742-5.
39. Maisels, Charles Keith (2001). Early Civilizations of the Old World: The Formative Histories
of Egypt, the Levant, Mesopotamia, India and China (https://books.google.com/books?id=i7
_hcCxJd9AC&q=ubaid+samarra&pg=PA147). Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-10976-5.
40. Shaw, Ian; Jameson, Robert (2002). A dictionary of archaeology (https://books.google.com/
books?id=zmvNogJO2ZgC&q=samarra+culture&pg=PA505). John Wiley & Sons.
ISBN 978-0-631-23583-5.
41. Margarethe Uepermann (2007), "Structuring the Late Stone Age of Southeastern Arabia".
Arabian Archaeology and Epigraphy Arabian Archaeology and Epigraphy, Vol. 3, Issue 2,
pp. 65–109.
42. Hamblin, Dora Jane (May 1987). "Has the Garden of Eden been located at last?" (https://we
b.archive.org/web/20140109135715/http://www.theeffect.org/resources/articles/pdfsetc/Ede
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 30 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

b.archive.org/web/20140109135715/http://www.theeffect.org/resources/articles/pdfsetc/Ede
n.pdf) (PDF). Smithsonian Magazine. 18 (2). Archived from the original (http://www.theeffect
.org/resources/articles/pdfsetc/Eden.pdf) (PDF) on 9 January 2014. Retrieved 8 January
2014.
43. Leick, Gwendolyn (2003), "Mesopotamia, the Invention of the City" (Penguin)
44. Kramer (1963), The Sumerians, pp. 20–26.
45. Crüsemann, Nicola; Ess, Margarete van; Hilgert, Markus; Salje, Beate; Potts, Timothy
(2019). Uruk: First City of the Ancient World (https://books.google.com/books?id=muCvDwA
AQBAJ&pg=PT325). Getty Publications. p. 325. ISBN 978-1-60606-444-3.
46. "The stepped design of the Pyramid of Zoser at Saqqara, the oldest known pyramid along
the Nile, suggests that it was borrowed from the Mesopotamian ziggurat concept." in Held,
Colbert C. (University of Nebraska) (2018). Middle East Patterns, Student Economy Edition:
Places, People, and Politics (https://books.google.com/books?id=fOlgDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA6
3). Routledge. p. 63. ISBN 978-0-429-96199-1.
47. Potts, D. T. (1999). The Archaeology of Elam: Formation and Transformation of an Ancient
Iranian State (https://books.google.com/books?id=mc4cfzkRVj4C&pg=PA104). Cambridge
University Press. p. 104. ISBN 978-0-521-56496-0.
48. Nigro, Lorenzo (1998). "The Two Steles of Sargon: Iconology and Visual Propaganda at the
Beginning of Royal Akkadian Relief". Iraq. 60. British Institute for the Study of Iraq: 85–102.
doi:10.2307/4200454 (https://doi.org/10.2307%2F4200454). hdl:11573/109737 (https://hdl.h
andle.net/11573%2F109737). JSTOR 4200454 (https://www.jstor.org/stable/4200454).
S2CID 193050892 (https://api.semanticscholar.org/CorpusID:193050892).
49. Wolkstein, Diane; Kramer, Samuel Noah (1983). Inanna: Queen of Heaven and Earth: Her
Stories and Hymns from Sumer (https://archive.org/details/inanna00dian/page/174/mode/2u
p). Elizabeth Williams-Forte. New York: Harper & Row. p. 174. ISBN 978-0-06-014713-6.
50. Henrickson, Elizabeth F.; Thuesen, Ingolf; Thuesen, I. (1989). Upon this Foundation: The
N̜ baid Reconsidered : Proceedings from the U̜ baid Symposium, Elsinore, May 30th–
June1st, 1988 (https://books.google.com/books?id=gnpyREWsfG0C&pg=PA353). Museum
Tusculanum Press. p. 353. ISBN 978-87-7289-070-8.
51. Glassner, Jean-Jacques (2003). The Invention of Cuneiform: Writing in Sumer (https://books
.google.com/books?id=fhMTRcUm9WsC&pg=PA31). JHU Press. p. 31. ISBN 978-0-8018-
7389-8.
52. Algaze, Guillermo (2005). The Uruk World System: The Dynamics of Expansion of Early
Mesopotamian Civilization, Second Edition, University of Chicago Press.
53. Jacobsen, Thorkild (Ed) (1939),"The Sumerian King List" (Oriental Institute of the University
of Chicago; Assyriological Studies, No. 11., 1939).
54. Lamb, Hubert H. (1995). Climate, History, and the Modern World. London: Routledge.
ISBN 0-415-12735-1.
55. Jacobsen, Thorkild (1976), "The Harps that Once...; Sumerian Poetry in Translation" and
"Treasures of Darkness: a history of Mesopotamian Religion".
56. George, Andrew (Translator) (2003), "The Epic of Gilgamesh" (Penguin Classics).
57. Roux, Georges (1993). Ancient Iraq (https://archive.org/details/ancientiraq00roux).
Harmondsworth: Penguin. ISBN 978-0-14-012523-8.
58. T. Jacobsen. Toward the Image of Tammuz and Other Essays on Mesopotamian History
and Culture.
59. Cooper, Jerrold S. (2016). "Sumerian literature and Sumerian identity". Problems of
canonicity and identity formation in ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia (https://www.worldcat.o
rg/oclc/944087535). Kim Ryholt, Gojko Barjamovic, Københavns universitet, Denmark.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 31 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

rg/oclc/944087535). Kim Ryholt, Gojko Barjamovic, Københavns universitet, Denmark.

Problems of Canonicity and Identity Formation in Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia (2010:
Copenhagen, Denmark) Literature and Identity Formation (2010: Copenhagen, Denmark.
Copenhagen, Denmark: Museum Tusculanum Press. pp. 1–18. ISBN 978-87-635-4372-9.
OCLC 944087535 (https://search.worldcat.org/oclc/944087535).
60. Thorkild Jacobsen; Robert M. Adams (1 November 1958). "Salt and Silt in Ancient
Mesopotamian Agriculture: Progressive changes in soil salinity and sedimentation
contributed to the breakup of past civilizations". Science. 128 (3334): 1251–1258.
doi:10.1126/SCIENCE.128.3334.1251 (https://doi.org/10.1126%2FSCIENCE.128.3334.1251
). ISSN 0036-8075 (https://search.worldcat.org/issn/0036-8075). PMID 17793690 (https://pu
bmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17793690). Wikidata Q34677808.
61. Thompson, William R. (2004). "Complexity, Diminishing Marginal Returns and Serial
Mesopotamian Fragmentation" (https://web.archive.org/web/20120219134627/http://jwsr.ucr
.edu/archive/vol10/number3/pdf/jwsr-v10n3-thompson.pdf) (PDF). Journal of World-
Systems Research. 10 (3): 612–652. doi:10.5195/jwsr.2004.288 (https://doi.org/10.5195%2
Fjwsr.2004.288). Archived from the original on February 19, 2012.
62. "The Archaeology of Mesopotamia: Home" (https://archive.today/20150411005800/http://pro
teus.brown.edu/mesopotamianarchaeology/Home). Archived from the original (http://proteus
.brown.edu/mesopotamianarchaeology/Home) on 2015-04-11. Retrieved 2019-07-21.
63. Colin McEvedy and Richard Jones, 1978, Atlas of World Population History, Facts on File,
New York, ISBN 0-7139-1031-3.
64. Nemet-Nejat, Karen Rhea (1998). Daily life in ancient Mesopotamia (https://archive.org/deta
ils/dailylifeinancie00neme). Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 13 (https://archive.org/details/d
ailylifeinancie00neme/page/13). ISBN 978-0-313-29497-6. Retrieved 29 November 2011.
65. Sayce (Reverend), A. H. (1908). The Archaeology of the Cuneiform Inscriptions (https://arch
ive.org/stream/archaeologyofcun00sayc/archaeologyofcun00sayc_djvu.txt) (2nd
revised ed.). London, England; Brighton, England; New York: Society for Promoting
Christian Knowledge. pp. 98–100.
66. Goss, Clint (15 April 2017). "Flutes of Gilgamesh and Ancient Mesopotamia" (http://www.Flu
topedia.com/mesopotamian_flutes.htm). Flutopedia. Retrieved 14 June 2017.
67. Baring, Anne; Cashford, Jules (1993). The Myth of the Goddess Evolution of an Image.
Penguin Books Limited. p. 159. ISBN 9780141941400.
68. Glassman, Ronald M. (2017). The Origins of Democracy in Tribes, City-States and Nation-
States. Springer International Publishing. p. 344. ISBN 9783319516950.
69. Cinthia Gannett (1992). Gender and the Journal: Diaries and Academic Discourse, p. 62 (htt
ps://books.google.com/books?id=mpjk74blFDgC&dq=urukagina+%22two+men%22&pg=PA
62).
70. Kramer, Samuel Noah (1963). The Sumerians: Their History, Culture, and Character (https:/
/archive.org/details/sumerianstheirhi00samu). The Univ. of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0-226-
45238-8.
71. Nemet-Nejat, Karen Rhea (1998), Daily Life in Ancient Mesopotamia (https://archive.org/det
ails/dailylifeinancie00neme/page/132), Greenwood, p. 132 (https://archive.org/details/dailylif
einancie00neme/page/132), ISBN 978-0-313-29497-6.
72. Cooper, Jerrold S. (2001). "Virginity in Ancient Mesopotamia". Sex and Gender in the
Ancient Near East: Proceedings of the 47th Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale,
Helsinki (http://krieger2.jhu.edu/neareast/pdf/jcooper/jc%20Virginity.pdf) (PDF). Baltimore,
Maryland: Johns Hopkins University Press. ISBN 978-951-45-9054-2.
73. Dale Launderville. Celibacy in the Ancient World: Its Ideal and Practice in Pre-Hellenistic
Israel, Mesopotamia, and Greece, p. 28.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 32 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Israel, Mesopotamia, and Greece, p. 28.

74. Dening, Sarah (1996). "Chapter 3: Sex in Ancient Civilizations" (http://www.ishtartemple.org/
myth.htm). The Mythology of Sex (https://archive.org/details/mythologyofsexan0000deni).
London, England: Macmillan. ISBN 978-0-02-861207-2.
75. Leick, Gwendolyn (2013) [1994], Sex and Eroticism in Mesopotamian Literature (https://boo
ks.google.com/books?id=WKoWblE4pd0C&pg=PA64), New York: Routledge, p. 219,
ISBN 978-1-134-92074-7.
76. Black, Jeremy; Green, Anthony (1992), Gods, Demons and Symbols of Ancient
Mesopotamia: An Illustrated Dictionary, University of Texas Press, ISBN 0-292-70794-0.
77. Allan, Keith (2013). The Oxford Handbook of the History of Linguistics. Oxford: Oxford
University Press. pp. 56–57. ISBN 978-0-19-164343-9.
78. Woods, C. 2006. "Bilingualism, Scribal Learning, and the Death of Sumerian" (http://oi.uchic
ago.edu/pdf/OIS2.pdf). Archived (https://web.archive.org/web/20130429121058/http://oi.uch
icago.edu/pdf/OIS2.pdf) 2013-04-29 at the Wayback Machine. In S. L. Sanders (ed),
Margins of Writing, Origins of Culture: 91–120 Chicago.
79. Campbell, Lyle; Mixco, Mauricio J. (2007). A glossary of historical linguistics (https://archive.
org/details/glossaryhistoric00camp_191). Edinburgh University Press. p. 196 (https://archive
.org/details/glossaryhistoric00camp_191/page/n202). ISBN 978-0-7486-2379-2.
80. Coleman, J. A.; Davidson, George (2015), The Dictionary of Mythology: An A–Z of Themes,
Legends, and Heroes, London, England: Arcturus Publishing Limited, ISBN 978-1-78404-
478-7.
81. Kramer, Samuel Noah (1983), "The Sumerian Deluge Myth: Reviewed and Revised",
Anatolian Studies, 33: 115–121, doi:10.2307/3642699
(https://doi.org/10.2307%2F3642699), JSTOR 3642699 (https://www.jstor.org/stable/364269
9), S2CID 163489322 (https://api.semanticscholar.org/CorpusID:163489322).
82. Hallo, William W. (1996), "Review: Enki and the Theology of Eridu", Journal of the American
Oriental Society, vol. 116
83. Black, Jeremy A.; Cunningham, Graham; Robson, Eleanor (2006), The Literature of Ancient
Sumer (https://books.google.com/books?id=a1W2mTtGVV4C&pg=PA106), Oxford
University Press, ISBN 978-0-19-929633-0
84. Black, Jeremy; Green, Anthony (1992). Gods, Demons, and Symbols of Ancient
Mesopotamia: An Illustrated Dictionary. University of Texas Press. ISBN 978-0-292-70794-
8.
85. Whatever the assertions of cosmography here, when modern-day archaeologists carve out
areas of exploration based on physical-remains and other data, there is an emphasis on
three, vide Marcella Frangipane, "Different Trajectories in State Formation in Greater
Mesopotamia: A View from Arslantepe (Turkey)", Journal of Archaeological Research 26
(2018): 3–63. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10814-017-9106-2. Archived (https://web.archive.org/
web/20221123080651/https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10814-017-9106-2) 2022-
11-23 at the Wayback Machine: "southern Mesopotamia, northern Mesopotamia, and [to the
west] Upper Euphrates valley" (3), with no reference to any of these proper-names.
86. Geoffrey Bibby and Carl Phillips, Looking for Dilmun (London, England: Stacey
International, 1996; reprinted London, England: Knopf, 2013). ISBN 978-0-905743-90-5.
87. Leick, Gwendolyn (2003), Mesopotamia: The Invention of the City' (Penguin).
88. Mark M. Jarzombek and Vikramaditya Prakash, A Global History of Architecture (London,
England: Wiley, 2011), pp. 33–39. ISBN 978-0-470-90248-6.
89. Gately, Iain (2008). Drink: A Cultural History of Alcohol (https://archive.org/details/drinkcultur
alhis00gate_0/page/5). Gotham Books. p. 5 (https://archive.org/details/drinkculturalhis00gat
e_0/page/5). ISBN 978-1-59240-303-5.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 33 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

e_0/page/5). ISBN 978-1-59240-303-5.

90. Mackenzie, Donald Alexander (1927). Footprints of Early Man. Blackie & Son Limited.
91. Adams, R. McC. (1981). Heartland of Cities. University of Chicago Press.
92. Tannahill, Reay (1968). The fine art of food. London: Folio Society. ISBN 0850670063.
93. Melvin Kranzberg, Joseph Gies. By the sweat of thy brow: Work in the Western world.
Putnam, 1975.
94. Duncan J. Melville (2003). Third Millennium Chronology (http://it.stlawu.edu/~dmelvill/meso
math/3Mill/chronology.html). Archived (https://web.archive.org/web/20180707213616/http://it
.stlawu.edu/~dmelvill/mesomath/3Mill/chronology.html) 2018-07-07 at the Wayback
Machine, Third Millennium Mathematics. St. Lawrence University.
95. Ifrah, Georges (2001). The Universal History of Computing: From the Abacus to the
Quantum Computer (https://archive.org/details/unset0000unse_w3q2). New York, New
York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. p. 11. ISBN 978-0-471-39671-0.
96. Anderson, Marlow; Wilson, Robin J. (2004). Sherlock Holmes in Babylon: and other tales of
mathematical history (https://books.google.com/books?id=BKRE5AjRM3AC&q=sherlock+ho
lmes+in+babylon). ISBN 978-0-88385-546-1. Retrieved 2012-03-29.
97. Marian H. Feldman, Diplomacy by design: Luxury arts and an "international style" in the
ancient Near East, 1400–1200 BC, (Chicago, Illinois: University Press, 2006), pp. 120–121.
98. British Museum notice: "Gold and carnelians beads. The two beads etched with patterns in
white were probably imported from the Indus Valley. They were made by a technique
developed by the Harappan civilization". Photograph of the necklace in question.
99. Reade, Julian E. (2008). The Indus-Mesopotamia relationship reconsidered (Gs Elisabeth
During Caspers) (https://www.academia.edu/28245304). Archaeopress. pp. 12–14.
ISBN 978-1-4073-0312-3.
100. Reade, Julian E. (2008). The Indus-Mesopotamia relationship reconsidered (Gs Elisabeth
During Caspers) (https://www.academia.edu/28245304). Archaeopress. pp. 14–17.
ISBN 978-1-4073-0312-3.
101. Gensheimer, T. R. (1984). "The Role of shell in Mesopotamia : evidence for trade exchange
with Oman and the Indus Valley" (https://www.persee.fr/doc/paleo_0153-9345_1984_num_1
0_1_4350). Paléorient. 10: 71–72. doi:10.3406/paleo.1984.4350 (https://doi.org/10.3406%2
Fpaleo.1984.4350).
102. McIntosh, Jane (2008). The Ancient Indus Valley: New Perspectives (https://books.google.c
om/books?id=1AJO2A-CbccC&pg=PA189). ABC-CLIO. pp. 182–190. ISBN 978-1-57607-
907-2.
103. For the etching technique, see MacKay, Ernest (1925). "Sumerian Connexions with Ancient
India". The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland (4): 699.
JSTOR 25220818 (https://www.jstor.org/stable/25220818).
104. Guimet, Musée (2016). Les Cités oubliées de l'Indus: Archéologie du Pakistan (https://book
s.google.com/books?id=-HpYDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA355) (in French). FeniXX réédition
numérique. p. 355. ISBN 978-2-402-05246-7.
105. Demand, Nancy H. (2011). The Mediterranean Context of Early Greek History (https://books
.google.com/books?id=YVSg-DOHzJMC&pg=PA71). John Wiley & Sons. pp. 71–72.
ISBN 978-1-4443-4234-5.
106. Rowlands, Michael J. (1987). Centre and Periphery in the Ancient World (https://books.goog
le.com/books?id=YDs9AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA37). Cambridge University Press. p. 37.
ISBN 978-0-521-25103-7.
107. For a full list of discoveries of Indus seals in Mesopotamia, see Reade, Julian (2013). Indian
Ocean In Antiquity (https://books.google.com/books?id=PtzWAQAAQBAJ&pg=PA148).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 34 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Ocean In Antiquity (https://books.google.com/books?id=PtzWAQAAQBAJ&pg=PA148).

Routledge. pp. 148–152. ISBN 978-1-136-15531-4.
108. For another list of Mesopotamian finds of Indus seals: Possehl, Gregory L. (2002). The
Indus Civilization: A Contemporary Perspective (https://books.google.com/books?id=pmAuA
si4ePIC&pg=PA221). Rowman Altamira. p. 221. ISBN 978-0-7591-0172-2.
109. "Indus stamp-seal found in Ur BM 122187" (https://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collecti
on_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=805148&partId=1&images=true). British
Museum.
"Indus stamp-seal discovered in Ur BM 123208" (https://www.britishmuseum.org/research/c
ollection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=804667&partId=1&museumno=193
2.1008.178&page=2). British Museum.
"Indus stamp-seal discovered in Ur BM 120228" (https://www.britishmuseum.org/research/c
ollection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=805338&partId=1&images=true).
British Museum.
110. Gadd, G. J. (1958). Seals of Ancient Indian style found at Ur (https://archive.org/details/in.g
ov.ignca.33779/page/n11).
111. Podany, Amanda H. (2012). Brotherhood of Kings: How International Relations Shaped the
Ancient Near East (https://books.google.com/books?id=JTvRCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA49).
Oxford University Press. p. 49. ISBN 978-0-19-971829-0.
112. Aruz, Joan; Wallenfels, Ronald (2003). Art of the First Cities: The Third Millennium B.C.
from the Mediterranean to the Indus (https://books.google.com/books?id=8l9X_3rHFdEC&p
g=PA246). Metropolitan Museum of Art. p. 246. ISBN 978-1-58839-043-1. "Square-shaped
Indus seals of fired steatite have been found at a few sites in Mesopotamia."
113. Cotterell, Arthur (2011). Asia: A Concise History (https://books.google.com/books?id=9_vVT
WXK5kQC&pg=PT42). John Wiley & Sons. p. 42. ISBN 978-0-470-82959-2.
114. Hudson, Michael (1998). Michael Hudson and Marc Van De Mieroop (ed.). Debt and
Economic Renewal in the Ancient Near East. Bethesda, Maryland: CDL. pp. 23–35.
ISBN 978-1-883053-71-0.
115. Van De Mieroop, Marc (1998). Michael Hudson and Marc Van De Mieroop (ed.). Debt and
Economic Renewal in the Ancient Near East. Bethesda, Maryland: CDL. p. 63. ISBN 978-1-
883053-71-0.
116. Roux, Georges (1992), "Ancient Iraq" (Penguin).
117. Winter, Irene J. (1985). "After the Battle is Over: The 'Stele of the Vultures' and the
Beginning of Historical Narrative in the Art of the Ancient Near East". In Kessler, Herbert L.;
Simpson, Marianna Shreve. Pictorial Narrative in Antiquity and the Middle Ages. Center for
Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, Symposium Series IV 16. Washington, D.C.: National
Gallery of Art. pp. 11–32. ISSN 0091-7338 (https://www.worldcat.org/search?fq=x0:jrnl&q=n
2:0091-7338).
118. Thompson, Gary. "History of Constellation and Star Names" (https://web.archive.org/web/20
120821025411/http://members.optusnet.com.au/~gtosiris/page11-4.html).
Members.optusnet.com.au. Archived from the original (http://members.optusnet.com.au/~gt
osiris/page11-4.html) on 2012-08-21. Retrieved 2012-03-29.
119. "Sumerian Questions and Answers" (http://www.sumerian.org/sumerfaq.htm#s39).
Sumerian.org. Retrieved 2012-03-29.

Further reading
Ascalone, Enrico. 2007. Mesopotamia: Assyrians, Sumerians, Babylonians (Dictionaries of
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 35 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Ascalone, Enrico. 2007. Mesopotamia: Assyrians, Sumerians, Babylonians (Dictionaries of

Civilizations; 1). Berkeley, California: University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-25266-7
(paperback).
Bottéro, Jean, André Finet, Bertrand Lafont, and George Roux. 2001. Everyday Life in
Ancient Mesopotamia. Edinburgh, Scotland: Edinburgh University Press, Baltimore,
Maryland: Johns Hopkins University Press.
Crawford, Harriet E. W. 2004. Sumer and the Sumerians. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
Leick, Gwendolyn. 2002. Mesopotamia: Invention of the City. London, England and New
York: Penguin.
Lloyd, Seton. 1978. The Archaeology of Mesopotamia: From the Old Stone Age to the
Persian Conquest. London, England: Thames and Hudson.
Nemet-Nejat, Karen Rhea. 1998. Daily Life in Ancient Mesopotamia. London, England and
Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press.
Kramer, Samuel Noah (1972). Sumerian Mythology: A Study of Spiritual and Literary
Achievement in the Third Millennium B.C. (Revised ed.). Philadelphia, Pennsylvania:
University of Pennsylvania Press. ISBN 978-0-8122-1047-7.
Roux, Georges. 1992. Ancient Iraq, 560 pages. London, England: Penguin (earlier printings
may have different pagination: 1966, 480 pages, Pelican; 1964, 431 pages, London,
England: Allen and Urwin).
Schomp, Virginia. Ancient Mesopotamia: The Sumerians, Babylonians, and Assyrians.
Sumer: Cities of Eden (Timelife Lost Civilizations). Alexandria, Virginia: Time-Life Books,
1993 (hardcover), ISBN 0-8094-9887-1).
Woolley, C. Leonard. 1929. The Sumerians (https://www.fadedpage.com/books/20170924/ht
ml.php) Archived (https://web.archive.org/web/20210415032728/https://www.fadedpage.co
m/books/20170924/html.php) 2021-04-15 at the Wayback Machine. Oxford: Clarendon
Press.

External links
Ancient Sumer History – The History of the Ancient Near East Electronic Compendium (http:
//ancientneareast.tripod.com/Sumer.html)
Iraq's Ancient Past (http://www.penn.museum/sites/iraq/) – Penn Museum
A brief introduction to Sumerian history (http://sumerianshakespeare.com/21101.html)

Geography
Kessler, Peter (2008). "Ancient Mesopotamia" (https://www.historyfiles.co.uk/MainFeatures
Mesopotamia.htm). The History Files. Kessler Associates.

Language
Sumerian Language Page (https://www.sumerian.org/), perhaps the oldest Sumerian
website on the web (it dates back to 1996), features compiled lexicon, detailed FAQ,
extensive links, and so on.
Black, Jeremy Allen; Baines, John Robert; Dahl, Jacob L.; Van De Mieroop, Marc.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 36 of 37
Sumer - Wikipedia 31/12/2024, 23:42

Cunningham, Graham; Ebeling, Jarle; Flückiger-Hawker, Esther; Robson, Eleanor; Taylor,

Jon; Zólyomi, Gábor (eds.). "ETCSL: The Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature" (ht
tps://etcsl.orinst.ox.ac.uk/). Faculty of Oriental Studies (revised ed.). United Kingdom.
Retrieved 2022-09-23. "The Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature (ETCSL), a
project of the University of Oxford, comprises a selection of nearly 400 literary compositions
recorded on sources which come from ancient Mesopotamia (modern Iraq) and date to the
late third and early second millennia BCE."
Renn, Jürgen; Dahl, Jacob L.; Lafont, Bertrand; Pagé-Perron, Émilie (2022) [1998]. "CDLI:
Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative" (https://cdli.ucla.edu/) (published 1998–2022). Retrieved
2022-09-23. "Images presented online by the research project Cuneiform Digital Library
Initiative (CDLI) are for the non-commercial use of students, scholars, and the public.
Support for the project has been generously provided by the Mellon Foundation, the
National Science Foundation (NSF), the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), the
Institute of Museum and Library Services (ILMS), and by the Max Planck Society (MPS),
Oxford and University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA); network services are from UCLA's
Center for Digital Humanities."
Sjöberg, Åke Waldemar; Leichty, Erle; Tinney, Steve (2022) [2003]. "PSD: The Pennsylvania
Sumerian Dictionary" (http://psd.museum.upenn.edu/) (published 2003–2022). Retrieved
2022-09-23. "The Pennsylvania Sumerian Dictionary Project (PSD) is carried out in the
Babylonian Section of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Anthropology and
Archaeology. It is funded by the NEH and private contributions. [They] work with several
other projects in the development of tools and corpora. [Two] of these have useful websites:
the CDLI and the ETCSL."

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sumer&oldid=1264660647"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer Page 37 of 37