Mesalim and the border conflict of Umma and Lagash

[sheshki]

In the book below i found some interesting informations about Mesilim and the border conflict between the cities Umma and Lagaš. Not sure where to put these information on the board, so a new topic it is.

from:
The Metamorphosis of Enlil in Early Mesopotamia, Xianhua Wang, 2011
Part II: ENLIL IN THE FARA PERIOD
2.2.2 Me-salim(DI) lugal-Kiš

The "divine intervention" of Enlil in the demarcation of the border line between Lagaš and Umma in Pre-Sargonic Lagaš inscriptions that Collingwood commented upon cannot be set in history even if original inscriptions of Me-salim(DI) lugal Kiš are known to testify to the king as a historical figure. Nevertheless, if seen together with other attestations of Me-salim in Early Dynastic royal inscriptions, a careful (re)-reading of the beginning of the cone of Entemena provides new insights (Ent 28-29)

^{Obv. 1,1 d}En-líl ^1,2lugal-kur-kur-ra ^1,3ab-ba-dingir-dingir-ré-ne-ke₄
^1,4inim-gi-na-ni-ta ^1,5dNin-gír-su ^1,6dŠára-bi ^1,7ki e-ne-sur ^1,8Me-salim
^1,9lugal-Kiš^ki-ke₄ ^1,10inim-dIštaran-na-ta ^1,11éš GÁNA bi-ra ^1,12ki-ba na bí-rú

"Enlil, king of all the lands, father of all the gods, by his authoritative commands, demarcated the boundary between Ningirsu and Šara. Me-salim, king of Kiš, at the command of Ištaran, measured it off and erected a monument there."²²²

In this later Lagašite interpretation of the past event, it may be noted that Enlil demarcated the boundary line between Ningirsu and Šara by its own command, while Me-salim acted on the command of ^dIštaran, inim-^dIštaran-na-ta. The action taken by Enlil was not simply a parallel translation into theocratic terms of that taken by the lugal-Kiš^ki, since Enlil acted by his own command while Me-salim had to act by the command of ^dIštaran. The relationship between Me-salim lugal-Kiš and ^dIštaran but not that between Me-salim lugal-Kiš and ^dEnlil lugal-kur-kur-ra ab-ba-dingir-dingir-ré-ne, was that which is in parallel to the relationship between Eannatum and Ningirsu.²²³
It has been suggested that Me-salim(DI) was actually from Der rather than Kiš since ^dIštaran was the patron deity of the city of Der.²²⁴ The possibility also exists that the attestation of ^dIštaran in the account was due to its functionality as a deity instead of its city of patronage if assuming that the writing of the name ^dIštaran with the signs KA.DI had to do with the "role" of the deity in legal affairs such as an event of border demarcation.²²⁵ In any case, the association of Me-salim with an ^dIštaran also from places other than Lagaš has to be taken into consideration. In my perception, it attests to Me-salim´s identity as a ruler from the outside in the border demarcation.
Me-salim(DI) lugal-Kiš in an inscription from a stone vessel found at Adab was named as dumu-ki-ág NIN.ḪUR.SAG.AN, to be read dumu ki-ág ^dNin-ḫur-sag, "the beloved son of Ninḫursag", who performed the bur-gi₄ rite presumably in the é-sar of Adab when Nin-kisal-si was the énsi-GAR of Adab, according to another inscription (Mes 2-3).²²⁶ It can be inferred from the title of Me-salim not only that ^dNin-ḫur-sag was revered in the city of Adab, not necessarily centred there, but also that Me-salim, who in his own tradition was associated with ^dIštaran, had been once active in the local rites of Adab as an outsider at that time.
In the inscription on a mace head found at Girsu, Me-salim was named as the builder of the temple of Ningirsu, é-dù-^dNin-gir-su, while the name of the énsi of Lagaš was Lugal-šà-engur (Mes 1). Lugal-šà-engur as attested in this inscription is also unknown in other Lagašite royal inscriptions. The phraseology of the border demarcation and the situation in Adab may support the interpretation of Me-salim´s title in this inscription that Me-salim was granted the title on some occasion of his actual involvement in Lagašite affairs, more specifically the (re)building of the temple of Ningirsu. In terms of political history, the fact that Me-salim participated in the local affairs of Lagaš and Adab is important although precisely which relationship the two cities had to the lugal-Kiš^ki cannot be immediatly inferred from the sources. The suggestion can only be that, the actual involvements of Me-salim in Lagaš and Adab may have been justified by a rational that he was the arbitrator for the cities not of his own but under his jurisdiction, as the beginning of the cone of Entemena explains.

²²² The translation is adapted from that of Cooper 1986, p.54.
²²³ Cooper 1983, p.27, however, regarded the relationship between Me-salim and Enlil as in parallel to Eannatum and Ningirsu in the ruler´s dream in which Ningirsu came to tell the ruler "Kiš will itself abandon Umma".
²²⁴ Cf. Postgate 1994a, p.31. Franke 1995, pp.95-96, took Kiš in the royal epiphet as the name of the city but it is clear that people with this title did not all come from Kiš. Gelb and Kienast 1990, p. 64, interpreted the title as šar kiššati.
²²⁵ Cf. Such-Gutiérrez 2003, p. 333, n. 1445, on ^dIštaran in the "UNKEN.A" names from Fara. ^dIštaran(KA.DI) was ku-li-ki-ág of Lugalzagesi the énsi-kal-ga-^dEn-líl in another text also records events related to border, then the construction of the border channel (Luzag 2).
²²⁶ Steible and Behrens 1982a, p. 217.

[sheshki]

from:
The Metamorphosis of Enlil in Early Mesopotamia, Xianhua Wang, 2011
Part II: ENLIL IN THE PRE-SARGONIC PERIOD
3.2.7 The Narrative Parts
3.2.7.1 sa-šuš-gal ^dEnlíl

In the Stele of Vultures, EAN 1, when Eannatum defeated the "man" of Umma and restored the Gu´edena to Ningirsu´s control, the ruler of Umma was forced to repeat an oath by the names of the gods Enlil, Ninḫursag, Enki, Su´en, Utu, and Ninki. The text describes how the oath was taken by the defeated ruler in the context of the border conflict between Umma and Lagaš, presumably in a way acceptable to both the winning Lagašites and the losing Ummaites. In so far as the Pre-Sargonic votive and buidling inscriptions are concerned, the description of oath taking is unique since the ritual setting was provided in considerable detail.

[sheshki]

Stele of vultures including transliteration and translation

www.cdli.ucla.edu/P222399

[enkur]

That's an interesting topic indeed, and the best work I have ever read thereon is "Mesalim, Lugal of Kish - the Political History of the Early Sumer XXVIII - XXVI century BCE" by Plamen Rusev (2001). Unfortunately it's available in Bulgarian only, and in the National Library only. It's not easy to find scholar works on the matter of Mesopotamia in this country, the Assyriology having been not studied in the universities since many years, but this work is an exceptionally serious and interesting investigation of the available Sumerian sources from the ED III b period. I’m very sorry I haven’t the necessary time to present here more fully this interesting work. What follows is my awkward translation of certain quotations in the context of the thread:

"The royal inscriptions from the Lagashian dynasty of Urnanshe are the irrefutable treasure-house for the investigation of the South Mesopotamia's early political history - over 370 inscriptions by 9 consequent rulers. This sound base for historic research, however, has its objective limitations: the inscriptions derive only from the the last stage of the early dynastic Sumer's development - the so called Early Dynastic Period III b; the inscriptions of the early rulers are not dated and and it makes it difficult to understand the chronology of their activity.
...............
The present book is an attempt for overcoming the specified difficulties and searching for answers to the laid questions. But it doesn't describe its character. In essence, it's a complete systematical variant for reconstructing the political events, the historical process in Sumer from the earliest real information about it to the middle of the 3d millenium BCE i.e. till the beginning of Urnanshe's rule."

One of the most interesting parts of the book is its chapter III - "Mesalim and Ishtaran":

"Mesalim appears to be connected with Ishtaran only in the context of fixing the border in the famous territorial quarrel between Lagash and Umma for Gueden. Therefore, the connection is to be analyzed in this sense. Another particularity is that it is announced only by Entemena, i.e. in the latest information about Mesalim. In Mesalim's own inscriptions there is no information for that act of his and his relations with Ishtaran. On the contrary, he declares a connection with Ninhursag only - 'the favorite son of Ninhursag' as well as his cares for the local cults in Lagash and Adab.

The earliest information about the arbitration and fixation of the border by Mesalim is in the inscriptions of Eannatum, however without any indication of Ishtaran's participation therein. The late appearance of Ishtaran because of concrete reason - measuring and defining the border should be given meaning and understood. This is achievable by getting to the heart and specifying the particularities of the cult to Ishtaran in Mesopotamia. The recorded sources from the region till the end of the 3 millenium are limitied in quantity, yet they allow certain important local aspects of that cult to be manifested and perceived..

The deity of Der appears again in a royal inscription – already by Lugalzagesi, and to be noticed, again concerning the border regulation between Umma and Lagash…”

There follows a quotation of Lugalzagesi’s inscription which unfortunately I have no time to translate here right now but the author Plamen Rusev compares it with the inscription by Entemena. Lugalzagesi calls himself “the favorite friend of Ishtaran”, and again the formula “by the command of Ishtaran” is used.


“The comparison between the texts of Entemena and Lugalzagesi deprives of its basic argument the thesis of the Derian origin of Mesalim as a source of his connection with Ishtaran. Lugalzagesi also fulfills ‘the command of Ishtaran’, moreover he entitles himself ‘the favorite friend of Ishtaran’, but this doesn’t prove his origin from Der. On the contrary, he himself witnesses his origin from Umma – his father Bubu was the ensi of Umma.

An additional information, which helps the meaning and function of Ishtaran in the debate between Lagash and Umma to be more concretely assessed, is contained in Gudea’s hymn about building Ningirsu’s temple in Lagash: ‘I (Ningirsu) like Ishtaran will settle the rights in my city (Lagash)’. On the ground of this, despite of the limited sources, it’s admissible that the juridical aspect was leading in the cult of Ishtaran. It is to be remarked that the self-comparison of Ningirsu with Ishtaran confirms again the high authority of the deity and his stability in the region of Lagash ( at least till Gudea – about 4 centuries after Mesalim), without this to be provoked by any hypothetical interference on the part of Der.

A possibility for a more correct assessment of Ishtaran’s juridical functions is contained in the analysis of his messenger – the serpent-god Nirah (Sherah, Sahan), also worshipped in Der. The specific qualities of Nirah are also manifested in Gudea’s hymn: ‘on its door (of the temple of Ningirsu) they tied the sacred measuring string – it is the pure Nirah, who divides Abzu’. This information is confirmed by a passage in the Epos of Enmerkar and Lugalbanda: ‘As for your breast, you are Nirah, who divides (the waters)’.

The presentation of Nirah as an attribute of the border zone – the door and the water, is a reason to see in him the function of demarcator and guardian of the border, understood as the opposition between the sacred and the profane, but also as my own and another’s in the applied practice. Such an understanding of the serpent Nirah is confirmed by the inscription of Eannatum in the Stele of Vultures, according to which a snake will bite the feet of Umma, if it steps across the border with Lagash. One is led to such an understanding of Nirah’s image also by the mentioned place of the snake in the later boundary stones kuduru.”

The author arrives to certain conclusions, some of which I will translate here:

“When comparing the text of Entemena about the arbitration of Mesalim: ‘Enlil… for Ningirsu and Sharra the border fixed. Mesalim, the lugal of Kish by the command of Ishtaran the fields measured and set up a stele on this place’ with the text legitimating Lugalzagesi as an arbiter of the border: ‘…the favorite friend of Ishtaran, the mighty ensi of Enlil… by the command of Ishtaran he set up a (new) stele on this place’, an essential familiarity is seen. Despite of the minimal sources, with the indicated reason it’s possible to express a supposition about the existence of some stable mechanism for legitimating solutions of territorial problems during the ED period. The probable scheme was: a.) a sanction by the authoritative all-Sumerian cultic centre of Enlil – Nippur; b.) legitimating by the juridical authority of Ishtaran ( about a possible participation of Der – see III.2); c.) the ruler, the institution synthesizing the secular and the sacral, accomplishes the arbitration. This is the exceptional right of the lugal-hegemon, a bearer of an ex-territorial power and authority. The territory-demarcation competences of Ishtaran are manifested in the inter-state relations subordinated by the sanction of Enlil.

The cult of the snake in Mesopotamia has its tradition before the ED period. It could be illustrated, for example, by the seals from the archaic Ur. For the time prior to the 3d Dynasty of Ur, except by the already quoted sources, the spread of the cult to Ishtaran and Nirah could be traced by the theophoric personal names. To the time of Mesalim – XXVI century BCE is attributed the newly discovered archive from Tel Abu Salabih. Thanksgiving to the publication of R.Bigs there is known a set of Semitic personal names indicated in the colophony of the documents. Amongst them repeatedly is found a name theophoric of Ishtaran: AbS T 228, I$-dup-d KA.DI; AbS T 43, I$-dup-d KA.DI; AbS T 60, $-du

-d KA.DI; AbS T 270, [I$]-dup-[KA.DI] (?)

In a juridical document from Adab dated about XXVI – XXV century BCE the name ur-d nirah is found. The Sumerian King-List indicates puzur-d nirah amongst the lugals of Akshak. According the editor of the list Puzur Nirah ruled between the 3d and 4th dynasty of Kish. At the end of XXIII century BCE in certain juridical documents the name ur-d i$taran is found twice.”

“Ishtaran is comparable with Ningirsu (the patron of Lagash). They are local main deities of military functions and juridical competences. Except by their functions they are familiar by their mythological structure. An attribute-satellite of Ningirsu is the lion-headed eagle Anzu (Anzud, Imdugud) canonically represented as being stepped on two lions. By their zoomorphic satellites, both the deities encode a global spatial opposition: Ishtaran-Nirah = serpent-below-border, and Ningirsu-Anzu = eagle = lion-above-border. There could be pointed out at least two facts that such an opposition was meant in the cult of Ningirsu in Lagash. When Gudea decorates Eninnu, he sets up his sign as well: ‘Your standard, which was set up at the house, is Imdugud (= Anzu) who moves away from the Mountain of the Snake’. An application from the ED period of Lagash bears the ‘iconography’ of this image – the lion-headed Anzu raises over a hill (mountain) from which two snakes emerge.”

As for the connection with Der (the Akkadian name for BAD.AN, the Wall of An), after analyzing the available facts about this city, Plamen Rusev concludes:

“1. The geographical facts make of Der a strategically important city for the security of Mesopotamia. The Sumerian community is reflected this understanding in its name. The city was a point of departure for military campaigns from and against Elam. The customary conditions for political and forceful confrontation of Der with the rest of the Sumerian cities are absent. The relatively high ‘strategic weigh’ of Der and the authority produced thereby, combined with the absence of direct interests in the conflicts in Mesopotamia, make of it a possible impartial arbiter in the inter-state debates within the frames of the ethno-cultural community – along with the traditional cultic centre of Nippur. Such a function would be formally accomplished by Ishtaran, as Enlil is the expression of Nippur’s function.

2. The cult of Ishtaran in Der has particular features. Except being the city’s main deity, he is also ‘the king of Der’, and seems to be of higher authority than the secular ruler. The cult of Ishtaran in Der has spiritual dimensions but tangible political ones as well.

3. The political behavior of Der is probably in result and manifestation of the collaboration between the secular authorities and the priesthood. The political interests of the city are in result of the interaction between its geographical situation, its place in the inter-Sumerian relations, and their all relations with Elam.

The connection with Ishtaran does not prove the origin or the belonging of Mesalim to Der. It is a concrete manifestation of a cultural and political phenomenon of a greater scale – the presence of the specific local cult to Ishtaran in Mesopotamia, the particular place of Der amongst the Sumerian patesi-ates. The reports about this cult do not put under doubt the reign of Mesalim in the city of Kish, but offer arguments which confirm such a localization. The relations of Mesalim with Ishtaran are of cultic nature, but there could be seen geo-strategic merits therein. The act of Mesalim in the inter-state debate between Lagash and Umma is significant, and an unprecedented phenomenon for the ED period of Mesopotamia. The participation of Ishtaran therein creates preconditions to admit possibilities for larger political dimensions of Mesalim’s activity.”

I would only like to add that the scholars who live in countries where the folklore is still alive, should get a bit interested in the fact that the snake (especially the big unvenomous Coluber) is still regarded as a guardian of the boundaries between the fields. Also, I tend to doubt that in the magical antiquity there was such a sharp distinction between the so called “secular” politics and the cultic activity.

Attachments:

[sheshki]

Enkur, thank you very much for translating this interesting text for us. Now i want to know more about Der!

[enkur]

As for Der, in the chapter III.2. of “Mesalim, the Lugal of Kish”, Plamen Rusev has written:

“The specific place and the participation of Ishtaran in the political relations in the South Mesopotamia make necessary an attempt to examine the possibility for an involvement of his cultic centre with these relations. Such a direction in the investigation of Mesalim’s relation with Ishtaran is in essence a search for a more global political profoundness in the behavior of Kish’s ruler.

It’s of an interest for the purpose of the present study to characterize the relative place of Der in the relations between the Sumerian patesi-ates and the particularities of the cult to Ishtaran in the city as far as it is perceptible from the sources. The modest reports about the city are systematized in the specialized literature. The Sumerian denomination of the city is BAD.AN ki (the Akkadian Der), which means “the Wall of An”. Recently the hesitations concerning its geographical location are on their way to be overcome, and it is localized under Tel Akhar nearby Badra. The location of Der is clearly distinguished from that of the other Sumerian cities. It was nearby neither a big river, nor a canal, but lied far in the east from the Tigris at the foot of the Zagros mountains, amidst a large plane, part of the so called 'Fertility Crescent'. Nearby Der there passed a direct and negotiable road from Elam to the central part of Mesopotamia – Kish, Akkad, Babylon. This road was also the most convenient, because the direct way from the region of Karuna and Kerhe to the west, towards the South Mesopotamia, was blocked by the largely flooded area of Tigris, which formed an almost insurmountable swampy sector.

Even if assumed, that the marshes along the lower course of Tigris and the close-meshed net of irrigational canals were comparatively easy surmountable for limited transitions and trade exchange, for more large-scale passings, especially for armies, the way through Der was without any alternative – it was convenient, resource-provided and negotiable. In the case of raids on the part of the mountainous Elam, through Der the foreign armies could suddenly appear before any of the big cities in the north and the central parts of Mesopotamia. The opposite was valid as well – traditionally Der was the point of departure for campaigns against Elam. These particularities characterize the road by Der as a 'trade gate' of Mesopotamia but also as a 'military highway'. The specific geographic location allows us to see in the theomorphic name of the city the pragmatic realization of the city’s key significance for the security of Mesopotamia amongst the Sumerian community – as a fortified wall of the supreme sky-god An, i.e. of Sumer. The objective strategic location of the city, and its actual realization according to the toponym, encourage searching for specific features in the status of Der amongst the Sumerian cities. The limited data, however, do not offer any direct information.

There are no archaeological investigations made in the region of Der, and this explains the modest quantity of sources about it, which are of external origin. Der appears in late sources. That’s why its significance during the pre-Akkadian period is interpreted by indirect reports. Its absence from the sources is a reason to admit, that the city wasn’t engaged in the conflicts between the Sumerian state formations – the routine occasion to be pointed out in the foreign inscriptions. The political isolation of Der from the relations and the conflicts in Mesopotamia is determined by its geographical facts – it’s located on an isolated crossroad place, which demanded making allies rather than enemies. The basic reason for the conflicts in Mesopotamia during the ED period – the partition of lands and the distribution of watery resources – is not actual for Der and does not motivate its relations with the other cities.”

That’s why, according to Plamen Rusev, Der plays the role of an objective arbiter in the Sumerian inter-patesial conflicts, and that’s why Mesalim from Kish relies on the authority of Der’s patron deity in solving the border conflict between Lagash and Umma. Further the author considers the cult of the city’s deity Ishtaran according to an inscription from the Old Babylonian period.

[sheshki]

From: Royal Statuary of Early Dynastic Mesopotamia,
by Gianni Marchesi and Nicolò Marchetti (2011)


^249. This ruler of Umma—whose name is also read “Giš” or “Uš/UŠ”—was probably a contemporary of both Ayakur-
gal and E’annâbtum of Lagas. After occupying the Gu`edenak (the border territory between Lagaš and Umma whose possession
was disputed by the two city-states) at the time of Ayakurgal, Nintah (“Male”) was presumably defeated by
E`annâbtum and killed by his own subjects (cf. Cooper 1983b: 24–26; Pomponio 1989: 29–30; Bauer 1998: 472).