First Tattoo Request

[enkidu7]

Hello Everyone. 

I have several Tattoo Requests, I plan to get a whole sleeve in Akkadian Cuniform with different prayers and incantations spread out.

For now..My first request if anyone is so kind to assist: A spell off a Hebrew Seal in the Greater Key of solomon, 4th Pentacle of Mercury. 

"Wisdom and Virtue are in this house, and the Knowledge of all things remain with him forever"

I would love for this to be put together in Akkadian Cuniform as Accurately as possible. I appreciate all contributions and assistance. Thank you!!

[enkidu7]

Small bump. Anyone knowledgeable able or willing to assist me with this?

[Lu-uri-ning-tuku]

My Akkadian isn't perfect but since the text is short I could probably handle this. Do you want Babylonian or Assyrian dialect? What time period would you like?

[enkidu7]

Hi thanks for your offer of assistance. If you can Babylonian cuneiform would be great. I'm interested in Sumerian too but I'm not well versed in the differences in how the cunfiform will look. Is one more complex than the other? Thank you I appreciate it

[Lu-uri-ning-tuku]

So the cuneiform script was originally pictographic and over time it became more and more abstract looking. With the third millenium cuneiform typical of Sumerian it still looks partially pictographic. By the time Akkadian became dominant the signs are much more abstract looking. A typical Sumerian text looks like this:



And an Akkadian more like this:

[us4-he2-gal2]

A difficulty with this tattoo request is that it is perhaps partly anachronistic. Well... The Mesopotamians certainly valued wisdom so that's not a problem. But I am hard pressed to see the developed notion of virtue as Mesopotamian, seems Greek to me. I suppose when Mesopotamian texts speak of the sun god, in particular, they often talk about his justice and truth, which are virtues...nonetheless, virtue as a fully developed concept is something I generally associate with the Greeks.

It may be possible to translate the English word virtue into Akkadian. In Parpola's English/Akkadian dictionary there is an entry for kēnāti, which seems to be the feminine plural form of kēnum 'truth'. Parpola gives the interpretation of kēnāti as 'righteousness' 'loyalty' 'truthfulness' and 'virtues' . The closest Akkadian word for virtue seems then to be a nuance of their word for truth.

[enkidu7]

Greetings, thanks for your swift responses and assistance the both of you. I'm fond of both Sumerian and Akkadian. I feel I'm leaning more towards Sumerian Cuniform after having seen the tablets. You mentioned Akkadian However. I dont mind slightly altering the word/s in the tattoo that can be related to give the same message for the expression I want in the sentence. Can this be done for Sumerian too to replace Virtue with "Truth" or "Righteousness"?

Another quick Question, being that it is an ancient Semitic language, would it be correct for me to assume the Cuniform is supposed to be read/written from Right to Left on a Tablet, similar to Hebrew and Arabic? So would know best how to properly position the tattoo on my Forearm.

Thank you guys!

[Lu-uri-ning-tuku]

For Sumerian I'd say:

Ngeshtug2 u3 ning2-zid-de3 e2-a nam-mu-ni-in-me-esh, u3 ning2-zu dur-ra(k) du-ri2 nam-mu-un-da-dur2

Or in early abbreviated orthography:

Ngeshtug2 ning2-zid e-a nam-me-esh, ning2-zu dur-ra du-ri2 nam-dur2

Not really any semantic difficulties, ning2-zid is truth/righteousness.

For reading direction, cuneiform was originally read top to bottom but came to be written left to right.

Ushegal: do we have resources here for rendering the signs?

[sheshki]

Yes we do I have weekend on tuesday, then i´ll post the signs.

Btw, what sign do you mean with ning₂?
This one maybe, nig₂?


edit: Just checked ePSD, and i think you do

[Lu-uri-ning-tuku]

Thanks Sheshki! Sorry about my orthography, in English the velar nasal is written with ng and I am too lazy to set up my keyboard to type a circumflexed g.

[sheshki]

Version number one, earlier ortography. I can post bigger signs when we are 100% sure.

ĝeštug2	nig2-zid	e2-a	nam-me-eš	nig2-zu	dur-ra	du-ri2	nam-dur2

edit: fixed

[us4-he2-gal2]

Hey folks - very good progress, thanks for your contributions. I am pondering some of the grammar here, will sleep on it and post again tomorrow.

[us4-he2-gal2]

***************Under Construciton


Hey everyone:




So I looked over the Sumerian as it has so far been developed. Thanks very much Lu-uri-ning-tuku for taking the initiative and proposing a translation. This has been quite helpful although if you were to include an explanation (loose translation, philological notes) this may make it easier for myself or others to consider the proposal.



First I want to mention a few minor errors which are basically typo. Above, Sheshki has the line:

ĝeštug2 nig2-zid e-a nam-me-eš nig2-zu dar-ra du-ri2 nam-dur2

The sign values which are highlighted have been affected by typos: in the case of e, Lu-uri-ning-tuku typed e but meant e2 I believe, the sign must be changed from e to e2. And in the case of dar, Sheshki I think you meant to type dur - the sign in your cuneiform is dur and does not need to be changed.




Secondly, I have given some thought to the grammar of this line and I may be able to make a few suggestions. I will discuss each of the highlighted words in
turn.


geštug niğ2-zid e2-a nam-me-eš niğ2-zu dur-ra du-ri2 nam-dur2

Basic lexical values:
wisdom - righteousness - house+loc - verb ‘to be’ hamtu - knowledge - totality+gen - forever - verb ‘to reside’ maru +commit


1. nam-me-eš:

This would have been really troublesome to work out if you hadn't also included a transcription earlier: na.mu.ni.n.me.eš so we have na (model) + mu (conj) + ni (loc) + n (pl agent) + base: me (hamtu trans) + eš (3rd plur). The first prefix na- is difficult to work with. I am assuming that you are using it in the non-negative asseverative sense that we used in class sometimes 'verily' . Outside of this possible meaning, the translation of non-negative na- seems quite obscure, see Jagersma p. 579.

However, a problem arises when one uses non-negative -na with the verb me 'to be' as we are doing here. In Rubio's overview of Sumerian morphology, he points out that -na used in combination with the verb me seems never to be the modal -na we want, but always functions as the negative -na in this situation as in sipa engar nam-me 'the shepherd shall not be a farmer'. When you search nam-me on ETCSL and check the translation, the translations uniformly interpret a negative statement. Hence, we would need to find another solution.


Another option would be to simply use a copular clause, as is discussed in Jagersma 4.4.1 . The example sentence 'These are the consumed rams of shepherds" is given there:
ugu gu7-a sipa-de2-ne-kam

The -am at the end is the 3S copula 'is'. I'm not sure why the plural copula isn't used in this case, but if you search Jagersma 2014 for 'they are' you can spot a good number of plural copula clauses. So my suggestion is that we should simply modify the first part of this line to a copula clause using plural copula -meš as it appears in Jagersma p. 681:
geštug niğ2-zid e2-a-me-éš
for
geštug niğ.zid e.a.meš (e (house) a (locative1) meš (plural copular))
'Wisdom and Righteousness are in this house'




2. dur-ra

[Lu-uri-ning-tuku]

Thanks for catching my typo Ushegal! As for the translation:

Ngeshtug2 u3 ning2-zid-de3 e2-a nam-mu-ni-in-me-esh, u3 ning2-zu dur-ra(k) du-ri2 nam-mu-un-da-dur2

Wisdom and righteousness(agentive suffix) house(locative suffix) (affirmative na + conjugational mu + locative ni + n + to be + esh)

Notes: In my experience affirmative na is very often used when expressing "evertruths" so I have used it here. The pronominal enclitics n and esh together denote the 3rd plural intransitive agents "wisdom and righteousness."

and knowledge totality(gen suffix) forever (affirmative na + conjugational mu + initial personal prefix 3sg n + da + to reside + (/)

Notes: I am using Jagersma's conventions. Elsewhere -nda- might be considered one element. The nil suffix denotes the 3rd impersonal subject of a maru intransitive verb. I was considering using conjuctive -nga- instead of u3 which I think would be more conventional, but I'm not really comfortable messing around with the unusual and not-perfectly-understood elements when rendering a tattoo. 

[us4-he2-gal2]

Lu-uri-ning-tuku:



I wasn't quite finished with my above post - my convention here is to put up a "******under construction*****" notice when the post is still being written. However, since you responded already, I will refrain from moving to the next words until we address your response.


Now you say "In my experience affirmative na is very often used when expressing "evertruths" so I have used it here. The pronominal enclitics n and esh together denote the 3rd plural intransitive agents "wisdom and righteousness."



Are you suggesting that your original use of the -na prefix is legitimate and we should maintain it? If that is the case, 'in my experience' isn't the most compelling support for such a usage do you have examples or discussions from the grammars that would support this usage? Or are you issuing a FYI and intending we go with my counter suggestion?

[Lu-uri-ning-tuku]

Ah, sorry about that. I have not seen an under construction post before. When I wrote my post the counter suggestion was not up yet, but seeing the Rubio note we should definitely change it. I was thinking about using the copula -me-esh but since I haven't seen it used very often I wasn't sure how to handle the orthography (e.g. e2-am-me-esh2 vs e2-a-me-esh2).

[us4-he2-gal2]

Ok so the two other words which I thought would be worth discussing:





2. dur-ra :

dur-ra for ‘totality’ seems like a reasonable word, however, ETCSL texts featuring a similar expression ‘who knows everything’ and the Sumerian here uses the word nig2-nam: nig2-nam zu 'who knows everything' (see c.2.5.6.2 line 1). This may mean that in expressions of this sort, nig2-nam is the more natural Sumerian word to use. Natural to native usage.



And:


3. nam-dur2 :


I notice you are using the imperfective, the maru form of the verb tur 'to sit/dwell (reside)' here. Again, I think the na- prefix will cause us trouble. Jagersma 2014 p. 57 states "The negative prefix {na(n)} should not be confused with the non-negative prefix {na} that is only found in perfective forms." Because this is a maru form, it means that the -na prefix is not the affirmative suffix you intend, but the negative -na ('it shall not reside').


As for a possible counter suggestion.. well we could simply use a plain and simple imperfect form. Jagersma 2014 p. 37 mentions that an imperfect form can express a past action which is not complete in some way - for example 'headache has placed its hand upon a man' (which has the meaning 'he now has a headache'). Hence a simple imperfect can communicate that knowledge took up residence in the house (and continues to reside there).

Another possibility is to attempt a stative verbal form using the prefix -al/-a. See Jagersma 2014 p. 52.

[Lu-uri-ning-tuku]

Good thinking. Perhaps we should ask Enkidu7 if he would prefer a very literal translation or one more likely to be spoken by a native Sumerian. Gah, it seems I've become too liberal with my na-s. Its a surprisingly common element given such limitations. A simple maru seems like a good fit.

[enkidu7]

Greetings Everyone. I have gone through this thread the past several days and have learned a lot, am now having a chance to respond and give feedback after reviewing the post *Under Construction*. I appreciate everyone's hard work and sincerity put into this.

To compare to the original: "Wisdom and Righteousness are in this house, and the knowledge of all things remain with him forever." how would the full sentence come off as literal sentence structure for the same expression in Sumerian in Full when translated to English. So I have two ways of explaining the Tattoo to others, its inspiration off a Hebrew Seal that conveys the beauty of it's message, and it's literal translation related in Sumerian. Whichever can make this process easier , which can still capture the essence and beauty from the words in the seal, I dont mind the variations,but if possible can remain the closest it can be in the proper form to stay true to the original words.

I would like to see how the full sentence would be translated in English from Literal Sumerian how a Native would speak it compared to what's written above.

Another Question, when pronouncing the Sumerian words with the Cuneiform symbol it's aligned with, I'm wondering what is the purpose of the small subscript numbers, and how it is involved with how I would pronounce the words? I'm still in the beginner learning process in studying the Sumerian Language myself.

Thank you Everyone, I'm looking forward to what will turn out to be a Very Great tattoo.

[Lu-uri-ning-tuku]

Hey Enkidu7. A literal English translation of the first proposal would be: "Wisdom and righteousness are in the house, and knowledge of totality forever resides with him/her." We are considering substituting the word "totality" with a word that typically means "anything" but was clearly used to mean "everything" in the specific context of knowing everything. I'm sure a Sumerian would understand either but it seems the latter would fit the context better from a native's perspective.

As for the pronunciation, the numbers specify exactly which sign would be used in cuneiform. So for example I mistakenly wrote e instead of e2 in one of my earlier posts. Both are pronounced the same, but the e sign means speak and the e2 sign means house.

[us4-he2-gal2]

I think we may get a 3rd opinion here shortly on the state of translation so far. So hang on.