Divine Epithets in Sumerian Literary Texts and Royal Inscriptions

Project Information

DESULITROI

Grant agreement ID: 101065852

DOI

10.3030/101065852

Project closed

EC signature date 18 July 2022

Start date 1 October 2022

End date 30 September 2024

Funded under

• Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)

Total cost

No data

EU contribution

€ 189 687,36

Coordinated by

UNIVERSITAET LEIPZIG
Germany

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - DESULITROI (Divine Epithets in Sumerian Literary Texts and Royal Inscriptions)

Reporting period: 2022-10-01 to 2024-09-30

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

The principal aim of the project is the creation of an online database of Sumerian divine epithets from selected Sumerian literary texts and royal inscriptions from the Old Sumerian to the Old Babylonian period (circa 2500-1600 BCE).
The overall objective is to have of a digitale tool that allows to easily retrieve information on Sumerian divine epithets. The database gives information which are useful for religious-historical investigations on single Mesopotamian deities as well as on semantic and grammatical investigations of the Sumerian language. In fact, each entry provides an initial analysis of the divine aspect expressed by the epithets as well as their grammatical structure and their basic semantic field. In addition, the database contains information on the function of the passage in which the epithet appears.
A further objective of the project is to provide an analysis of the divine epithets of the warrior god Ninurta using the data collected in the database.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

The first step has been the creation of the SQL-Database and of the web-based application.

At present, the database contains ca. 309ß epithets from 342 Texts, 98 literary texts and 244 royal inscriptions.

Papers presented in conferences:

1) July 2022 - 66. Assyriological International Conference (Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale – RAI) in Mainz

“Online Database of Divine Epithets in Sumerian Literary Texts and Royal Inscriptions”

2) July 2023 – 68. RAI (Leiden)

“Divine epithets and their context. Digital analysis of Sumerian divine epithets”.

3) Juni 2024 - Götterepitheta und Götterbezeichnungen in der Antike (Interdisciplinary workshop in Leipzig organized by the PI)

“The Online Database of Sumerian Divine Epithets”.

4) July 2023 - 69. RAI (Leiden) with the paper

“Digital analysis of Sumerian divine Epithets. Ninurta’s epithets in Sumerian texts”

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

The database is the first systematic collection of Sumerian divine epithets. So the potential impact will be relevant since there is no other comparable tool in the field of assyriology.

Electronic Database of Sumerian Divine Epithets (Front end)