37. Meaning of Sumer?
>I just wanted to know what the word Sumer itself means
>in the Sumerian language. Could you kindly let me know ?
It is not known why the Akkadians called the southern land Shumeru. The Sumerians called it ki-en-gir15 (literally, 'place of the civilized lords'). The etymology of the Akkadian term is unknown. It could possibly be a dialectal pronunciation of the Sumerian word kiengir. This possibility is suggested by the Emesal dialect form 'dimmer' for the word 'dingir'.
In March 2007, Dr. Nicholas Postgate (University of Cambridge) corresponded with me about the Sumerian term for Sumer, ki-en-gir15.
I wrote to Dr. Postgate,
>>Did you write in your book Early Mesopotamia: Society and Economy at the
>>Dawn of History that ki-en-gi means 'land of the Sumerian tongue'? If so,
>>is that because you think that eme, 'tongue; language' became en, 'dignitary;
>>lord; ancestor (statue); high priest', through vocal assimilation?
He responded with an affirmative,
>Admittedly Sumerologists haven't gone much for consonantal assimilation,
>but going from emegir to engir doesn't seem too far fetched, and it explains
>why it has -r as a final consonant. Aage Westenholz also suggested the same
>etymology independently. It also is Ok given the combinations like ki-unug
>"Warka land" which are also not genitival syntagms. It still seems to me an
>economical solution.
To which I replied,
It seems possible. It turns out that there are not many instances of ki-en-gi-ra2 that can be interpreted as a free-standing genitival syntagm - I only find a couple in The Victory of Utu-Hengal, ETCSL transliteration : c.2.1.6.
4. ki-en-gi-ra2 nij2-a-erim2 /bi2-in\-si-a
21. sig-ce3 ki-en-gi-ra2 {gana2} {(1 ms. has instead:) jic} bi2-kece2
So the paucity of these instances favors your interpretation. I had just never heard it or thought about it until this week.
If you look at my published lexicon's suggested reinterpretation of saj-ji6[gig2]-ga as having originally meant 'native persons', instead of its literal meaning of 'the black-headed', you will see that I am open to consonantal assimilation gradually changing words which were then reinterpreted in the popular understanding and writing.
To which, Dr. Postgate replied,
>Well in fact I think even both those instances can be taken as locatives:
>as suggested by the bi2- prefix in line 2, and by the ETCSL translation
>("in Sumer") in line 21.
>
>Do by all means cite me, I am still happy with it.
https://www.sumerian.org/sumerfaq.htm#s36别人主页上,对苏美问题的有关问答,我衷心希望像楼主这样的人,能够看得懂。
你当然可以完全不同意,不认同这些观点。希望是有干货的前提下,而不是仅凭嘴硬。