ZA 71, 62c

SEAL no. 7099 · BM 122691 (1931-4-13, 4) · Incantations · dog · Tell Duweihes (vicinity of Nippur) (uncertain) · 7 lines · 18 words · 45 signs · 3 Sumerograms

CDLI No. P274698 (no photo). "Tel Duweihes", the location of the tablet's provenance as listed in the registers of the British Museum, is unknown (see Farber 1981, 61 "Phantasiename?", but cf. Cunningham 1997, 99 n. 4). 

Transliteration

Rev.

13 da-mu-um da-ma-nu-um

14 ka-al-bu-um ru-bu-ṣú-um

15 e-re-šum na-aš-pu-um

16 še-na i-la-ku ur-ḫa-am

17 š[e-n]a i-[l]a-ku ḫa-[r]a-{NA}-na

18 [ ] x na la/AD ba? AG

19 [ ] x

Translation

Rev.

13–15 The dark wailing (canine), the lurking dog (whose names are) 'Niggling' (and) 'Noisy',

16–17 The two are walking in the path, the two are walking in the road.

18–19 .... ....

Commentary

13: da-mu-um da-ma-nu-um: Balkan (apud Hirsch 1972 Nachträge, 30b) translated this phrase "Blut und Jammer", namely dāmum damāmum. Farber (1981, 70) saw in it an untranslatable magical formula, similar to da-mu-um da-ma-mu-um which opens the OA dog incantation Fs. Hirsch 427 (Veenhof 1996, 428 = SEAL no. 7220). As blood does not seem to fit the context, daʾmum "dark-colored" (CAD D 74f.) comes to mind. In SB texts, this adjective is mostly written with an aleph, da-ʾ-mu-um, but earlier sources have da-a-mu-um, which in non-plene spelling could result in da-mu-um. The partial parallel to the OA dog incantation suggests that the next word, da-ma-nu-um (not listed in the dictionaries), is related to damāmum "to wail, moan" (said also of animals). Taking into account the parallelistic construction in this couple of lines, the "lurking dog" (l. 14) and "the dark wailing" (l. 13) probably refer to two members of the Canidae family, the former characterized by its bawling voice.

15: The pair of adjectives errēšûm '(persistingly) demanding', 'nagging' (AHw 243: "viel wünschend") and našpûm (< šapûm-N) 'getting loud', 'noisy', are two appellations for the canines figuring in this incantation. Note that the two dogs that were walking behind the goddess Gula in an OB incantation (YOS 11, 5b: 10 = SEAL no. 7174; see Wasserman 2010, 81f.) had similar names: suppû 'Supplication(s)' and ṣūḫum 'Laughter'.

16–17: Note the absence of the du. form in šena illakū.

Michael P. Streck and Nathan Wasserman, Sources of Early Akkadian Literature (SEAL), seal.huji.ac.il. No commercial use is allowed. Published under CC BY-NC-ND (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives). Reproduced unmodified. Cite as SEAL no. 7099; view on seal.huji.ac.il.