own pronominal morpheme. In some cases, these sequences again correspond to a
noun phrase or constitute one (/bsˇi/ = /b/ + allative = “to it/them”); in others, a
relational prefix modifies a verb’s meaning (de 2 “to pour” means “to pour out” with a
locative prefix not corresponding to a noun phrase).
Four more prefix slots exist in this template. The first, following any marker of
polarity or modality, can be occupied by a vocalic prefix (/a/, /i/ or /u/). The functions
of /a/ and /i/ are complex and to some degree unclear; /u/, however, connects clauses
and is often translatable as ‘after.’ Another clause-connection morpheme (/nga/ “and
also”) can follow. The next possible morpheme is cislocative /m/, indicating an
orientation toward the verb’s subject, and thus modifying the verb’s meaning (gˆen“to
go” becomes “to come”). The morpheme that may follow (/ba/) indicates instead that
the verb’s subject is affected by the action of the verb, thus resulting in reflexive, middle
and passive translations in English.
Finally, at the other end of the verb a suffix (/’a/) can be added which turns a main
clause into a subordinate clause, the Sumerian morpheme thus being functionally
equivalent to the English subordinator that.
CONCLUSION
For many years scholars have been lamenting the ever-increasing rate at which
languages are dying. This loss in linguistic diversity reduces human knowledge and our
intellectual heritage: when a language dies, it is not simply a linguistic structure that
is lost but the centuries of thinking about the world embodied in that language, the
different ways that particular language had of dividing the world up and defining it.
The modern response to endangered languages is to document them and where
possible revive them. Sumerian long since ceased being endangered when it became the
first written language to die. However, the task of documenting the language also
began long ago, ancient scholars originating a process that their modern counterparts
have revived, many useful online and print resources, listed in the bibliography, now
being available for the study of the language. This chapter began with a dismissive
question from one of those ancient scholars: “What kind of a scribe is a scribe who does
not know Sumerian?” While one answer remains “A modern scribe,” we are slowly
becoming less deserving of this disdain.BIBLIOGRAPHY
Alster, B. 1997. Proverbs of Ancient Sumer: the world’s earliest proverb collections. vol. 1. Bethesda: CDL
Press.
Attinger, P. 1993. Eléments de linguistique sumérienne. Fribourg: Editions Universitaires/Göttingen:
Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht.
Black, J. 2007. Sumerian. In J. N. Postgate (ed.), Languages of Iraq, Ancient and Modern. London:
British School of Archaeology in Iraq, pp. 4 – 30.
Black, J. and Zólyomi, G. (eds), 2005. Acta Sumerologica, 22.
Bomhard, A. R. 1997. On the origin of Sumerian. Mother Tongue, 3 : 75 – 92.
—— 2008. Reconstructing Proto-Nostratic: comparative phonology, morphology, and vocabulary.
vol. 1. Leiden: Brill.
Cunningham, G. 2006. Sumerian. In K. Brown (ed.), Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics,
vol. 12. Oxford: Elsevier, pp. 271 – 274.
–– The Sumerian language ––