RICERCA ITALIANA     

Catalogue, publication, and analysis of the Neo-Sumerian administrative tablets from Girsu and Umma, belonging to the collections of the British Museum.

Università degli Studi di Messina

Abstract

The British Museum, represented by Dr C.B.F. Walker, has come to a formal agreement with the Universities of Messina (Prof. F. Pomponio) and Rome “La Sapienza” (Dr. F. D’Agostino), co-opting the C.S.I.C. of Madrid (Dr M. Molina), for the cataloguing, publishing and studying of the unpublished Neo-Sumerian administrative tablets of Umma and Girsu stored in the British Museum. The number of these tablets, according to the Trustees of the British Museum, is nearly of 4.000 for Umma and almost 20.000 for Girsu. We are confident that through this vast amount of documents it will possible to improve and, under certain aspects, to modify the present state of the knowledge of the administration, management and terminology of the power system, the economy and the historical framework, both provincial and central, of the Ur III Dinasty.

An introductory stage of the work of all the research units is the cataloguing of the documents, according to period, administrative area, typology; the texts will be eventually edited on the basis of this classification. The catalogue will present the material according to two main orders of data: firstly, the philological information necessary to assess the administrative and economic contents; secondly, the more strictly archaeological information.

Prof. Pomponio’s reasearch unit (Messina) will be primarily concerned with cataloguing and analyzing the unpublished tablets of Umma. Considering the amount of material, vast still approachable, it can be feasibly conceived that the cataloguing for the whole of the tablets will be accompanied by the publication of a few, though very representative, typologies.
Dr D’Agostino’s research unit (Rome) will be concerned with the tablets coming from the province of Girsu. As we said before, the quantity of texts in this collection is so high as to prevent the eventual publication of the material studied, at least for the period of funding of this research; the final aim of the research unit, thus, is primarily the completion of the cataloguing of the whole material. It is assumed, however, the possibility of publishing by the end of 2006 a few texts extracted from the amount as most interesting and particularly representing the collection.
The research unit led by P. Mander (Naples), finally, will deal with the task of cataloguing, publishing, and studying the Umma and Girsu messenger texts, which is absolutely one of the categories richest in tablets as well as one of the most peculiar of the Neo-Sumerian documentation. together with a few other minor "archives" of Girsu, regarding food allotment.

We envisage the creation of a web site regarding the project, where users will be able to find information on the development of individual aspects of the research (catalogue, indexes) and where an exchange of information and opinions could fruitfully take place between the staff directly involved in the research, on the one hand, and users and colleagues interested in the documents from Ur III, on the other hand, for the sake of the project most effective management. In the WEB site, moreover, the photographs oh the most significant tablets of each category will appear. <<<

Principal Investigator

Francesco Vincenzo POMPONIO Università degli Studi di MESSINA

Research Objectives

The aim of the project is threefold:
1) the catalogue of all the unpublished Neo-Sumerian tablets from Girsu and Umma belonging to the collections of the British Museum;
2) the edition of a part of these tablets grouped according to their categories with an analysis of the category in object;
3) the realization of the web site of the project, which will offer information on the project, will make available the preliminary data of the catalogue and edition of the texts, and will present the photos of a large number of tablets. <<<

First Results

The predicted result for the first phase is the cataloguing of the largest possible number of the 24.000 Neo-Sumerian still unpublished tablets from Girsu and Umma kept in the British Museum, according to the above-mentioned criteria.For the research unit of Messina the predicted result is the edition of a good number of the Umma tablets, grouped according to their category, together with the study of the involved categories.
For the research unit of Neaples the predicted result is the edition of all the unpublished messenger texts of Umma and Girsu kept in the British Museum according to a new subdivision in groups.
For the research unit of Rome the predicted result is the edition of a few most significant tablets from Girsu. <<<

Timescale

24 months

National and international background

Umma and Girsu, distant from each other only thirty kilometres, represent two of the many small states in the varied political panorama of Southern Mesopotamia in the Early Dynastic period. Their historical vicissitudes are indissolubly bounded for many generations: at first, because they seem to have belonged to the so-called Šuruppak Hexapolis; successively, on account of the boundary conflict which opposed them and drained their resources for more than a century (this is the first of the human wars whose events are historically known). During the following Sargonic period, the two small states were absorbed by the empire of Sargon and, after an initial phase in which the ruler of Lagaš perhaps collaborated with the occupants, they both allied with the other Sumerian cities in an obstinate, however unsuccessful, struggle for independence. The following occupation by the highland Gutians was probably suffered more profoundly by Umma than by Girsu.
Eventually, even though the occupation of Umma had occurred earlier, both states became provinces of the empire of Ur III, and two of the most important ones of this huge state. Their secession, occurred almost in the same year for reasons yet to be clarified (though we can feasibly argue the destruction for both cities and a decisive one for Umma), and must have represented a heavy stroke for the economy of Ur, a severe loss, in particular, for the food resources of the empire, bringing about the same destructive effects as the Amorite occupations or the Elamite raids.
The importance of the two provinces is further underlined by the fact that, firstly, they provide the majority of the economic and administrative Neo-Sumerian documents (though in different ways: official excavations for Girsu, illegal excavations only for Umma); this considerable amount of documents covers the longest period of time, including the last third of the kingdom of Šulgi and the reigns of his three successors up to the fifth or sixth year of Ibbi-Sin.
Notwithstanding the enormous Ur III documentation at our disposal in more or less complete and updated form, particularly with regard to Girsu and Umma, we don't as yet have an overall study on the provincial system of Neo-Sumerian state, in its political, administrative, and economic aspects. Some fundamental questions on this topic are far by from being settled, beginning from the highest provincial office, the ensi. We don't know, e.g., the modality of their appointment and dismissal; so, a stimulating study (the article of K.Maekawa in ASJ 18), which pointed out the confiscation of the property of two among the most important governors both of Girsu (Ur-Lama) and Umma (Ur-Lisi) and even suggested that the property confiscation and the execution of three sons of Ur-Lama occurred in the second year of Amar-Suena, while their father acted still as ensi of Girsu in the following year, seems to jumble the situation rather than to make it clearer.
It is of course possible and desiderable that a large amount of new texts added to the existing amount of tablets that we already possess will provide explanatory elements to the solution of the above problems, as well as to further issues arising. Nearly the whole of the Neo-Sumerian texts of the British Museum come from the capital Ur and from the two provinces mentioned above. The Ur tablets, nearly 1.800, have been edited by L. Legrain (UET, 3) and the catalogue of other one thousand texts, mainly fragments, will be published by F. D’Agostino and F. Pomponio in Nisaba, 5. Hundreds of tablets from the latter two cities have been published, particularly by F.D'Agostino, Th. Fish, T. Gomi, L. W. King, T. Maeda, K. Maekawa, P. Mander, G. Pettinato and M. Sigrist. About twenty and four thousand tablets, however, still remain unpublished: these will be the object of the present research. Nearly seven thousand of the unpublished tablets are listed in the catalogue of M.Sigrist, M.M.Figulla, and C.B.F.Walker (London 1996), which, however, limits itself to mentioning dimensions, date and a concise description of the content of the texts.
Among the Neo-Sumerian documents, one of the most numerous as well as most interesting types of texts is the group of the so-called messenger texts; their importance also lies in being a possible linking element between the two confining provinces. The Umma texts have been studied by R. McNeil, whose dissertation, although published more than thirty years ago, is still considered a substantial contribution; fresh examination of the subject, however, particularly a reformulation of the text groups listed, is strongly required. The subdivision of the Girsu messenger texts, on the other hand, is limited to the types and quantities of the foodstuffs provided; the need for a complete study of these texts like McNeil’s for Umma tablets, or at least the individuation of the criteria for their classification into groups, thus, is strongly felt in the field of the Neo-Sumerian studies. <<<