CT50/ 004 Sollberger, Edmond, P010041

[sheshki]

Primary publication:	CT 50, 004
Author:	Sollberger, Edmond
Publication date:	1972
Secondary publication:	EDATS p. 3 (13)
Collection:	British Museum, London, UK
Museum no.:	BM 015827
Accession no.:	1896-06-12, 0047
Provenience:	Shuruppak (mod. Fara) ?
Period:	ED IIIa (ca. 2600-2500 BC)
Genre:	Administrative
CDLI no.:	P010041

ob.c1	transliteration	translation	calculation	remarks
	1. 2(aš@c) gin2 2(aš@c) ku3 ma-na	2 shekel, 2 mana of silver	2x1, 2x1
	2. 3(geš2@c) 1(u@c) 6(aš@c) uruda ma-na	196 mana of copper	3x60+1x10+6x1
	3. šu ba4-ti	received		way more often written šu ba-ti instead of šu ba4-ti
	4. 1(geš2@c) 5(u@c) la2 1(aš@c) mi#-gal2?	109 ?mi-gal2?	1x60+5x10-1x1	not sure about mi-gal2, maybe it is a PN, mi-gal2 the merchant
ob.c2
	1. dam-gar3	merchant		nig2-ka9 ak pa3-da dam-gar3 account of Pada, the exchange agent; P142827, trade agent P254294, trader P358588, merchant P212356

[us4-he2-gal2]

Sheshki:





Great to see you filling out the new section with these great posts! I like your format and sense of presentation and certainly the 'calculation' and 'remarks' columns are a good way to go for this type of text. You are forcing me to learn to work with ED administrative texts which can only be a good thing.


So I will see what I can say about this text:


line 3: šu bati is a Sumerian verb which I encountered in the Eblaite text that we worked on in class last semester (ARET 11). This would be termed a 'compound verb' as it is formed by combining a noun (šu = hand) + the verb which is ba.ti (ba is a prefix, the base is ti / teĝ = to approach). So together, 'to approach (with the) hand' which can be translated 'to receive'.

line 4: mi-gal2 is a tough one. At first I was trying to look this up as a noun, which didn't produce anything. Then I began thinking of it as a verb, which I think it is, so that would mean mi is a prefix and gal2 is the actual base, the verb itself.

Also, it can be confusing: are we dealing with gal2 or ĝal2 here? Well cdli and Labat give gal2, but ePSD and Mittermayer give ĝal2. An issue is Sumerian has the consonant ĝ but Akkadian does not. I think it is more technically correct to spell it ĝal2 in this case.

The same sign is used to indicated the Sumerian noun ig 'door.'

As a verb the sign indicates ĝal2 and there are a real range of values, according to ePSD: 'to be (there, at hand, available); to exist; to put, place, lay down; to have.'



So perhaps we may expect that the verb here would be either saying something like 'there are 109...' somethings, or, 109 somethings placed (maybe for or to the dam-kar mention in the next line). In the Gudea Cylinders, lines 112-113, it reads: "She held a stylus of refined silver in her hand, and placed it on a tablet with propitious stars..." the verb behind 'placed it on' is im-mi-ĝal2 is similar to the one we are dealing with here.