#sumerian verbs

[sumerianlanguage]

Would you be able to translate the phrase ‘it’s all happening’? I know translations aren’t always direct. It would be as an exclamation that all things planned are coming to fruition and taking place with success and abundance.

It turns out there isn't a great translation of this, because there isn't a word I know of for "happen" in Sumerian! There's no distinct word for such a concept of something "happening" or "occurring" that appears in the texts I know of. When you see such a word in a translation, it's generally a circumlocution to make a sentence make sense in English. So in Shulgi G, when "Nanna... asked for the thing to happen," what it actually says is Nanna ning al banidug "Nanna insisted (on the) thing".

In Gilgamesh and Huwawa, there's a sentence that should be helpful here: "That will happen to me too - that is the way things go." It's U ngae urgin nambaake, urshe hemea, which I'd more literally translate as "And I really am done like that, may it be thus." Baake "It is done" is a form of aka "to do, take action", using the ba- prefix (which normally means "for it" or "in it") to construct a circuitous passive. I guess we could construct a sentence like Shar baake "All (of it) is done; all (of the action) has been taken".

But to convey the tone of success and abundance, I'd probably instead opt for a sentence using sa dug "to succeed". Shar sa duge "It has all succeeded" or Shar sa e "it is all succeeding". (All these use shar "all, totality, everything".)

I hope one of these is helpful!

[sumerianlanguage]

Silim! I was wondering what some of the basic verbs would be in Sumerian, e.g: 'to be', 'to have', 'to do', etc.

Hello! This is a more complicated answer than you may have expected. As with many languages, the most common & frequently-used verbs are also the most irregular - think of how irregular "be/is/are/were/been", "do/does/did/done", and "go/went/gone" are in English.

Of these core verbs, the simplest in Sumerian is tuku "to have, hold, possess, get", which only has two roots - tuku in the past and tukutuku in the present. Example: Ngae dub ibtukutukun "I have a tablet."

There is no perfect match for "to do" in Sumerian, but the verb aka "to act, take action" covers a lot of the same semantic space. It's used in a lot of phrasal verbs, like kurum aka "to inspect" (i.e. "to do an inspection"), or sagaz aka "to do a robbery, to commit a murder". It's basically regular, appearing as ak or aka in all tenses, but in certain participles appears as just k- (as in kede "for the purpose of taking action.") Example: Zae ana ibakan? "What are you doing? What action are you taking?"

The verb "to say, speak" is also both common and irregular in Sumerian, with three different roots: dug is the dictionary entry, but is only used in the past-tense singular; in the plural or present tense it's e, and in all non-finite forms (like participles) it's di. (Aka and dug are the only verbs in Sumerian with a dedicated participle root.) Example: Ngae iben "I'm saying it", Ngae dug "I said it", Dide "for saying".

The verb for "to go" takes this one step further, in having four separate roots, the only verb in Sumerian with this many. In singular past it's ngen, plural past is ere, singular present is du and plural present is sub. So: Ngenen "I went", Erenden "we went", Dun "I go", Subenden "we go".

And finally there's "to be", which barely operates as a verb at all. Instead, it acts like a set of suffixes at the end of a sentence - so -men "I am", -(a)m "it is", etc. It also works only in linking two nouns/pronouns, as in Ngae lugalmen "I am the king", Lugal is'habam "The king is a villain." In English we often use "to be" to connect a noun to an adjective, as in "The king is beautiful", but in Sumerian such a construction would use a dedicated verb like sag "(to be) beautiful". Lugal sage is literally, "The king beautifuls".

I hope that's helpful! If you'd like any more example sentences translated using one or more of these verbs, let me know.

[sumerianlanguage]

Hi, I'm new here and I'm learning sumerian for fun. I'm trying to translate three descriptions and I would like to know if they are correct. As a bonus: I would like to know how the verbal chain works. (Aba Ur nu tuku) "the one with no legs" (aba hush suhur nu tuku) "the angry one with no hair" (aba i dùg) "the fat and sweet one". Thanks in advance. SILIM

Hi! You're on the right track, but here are my notes. My first note is that you don't need aba "who" - nutuku phrases don't require a head noun, as in sangdu nutuku "the one not having a head" i.e. "stupid person". Ur for "leg" is mostly used for the upper legs, thighs, hips, pelvis - I'd use paphal for the entirety of the leg, so Paphal nutuku "the one without legs".

Suhur nutuku would be "the one without hair", but it can't generally have other adjectives appended to it, since I'd read Hush-suhur-nutuku as something like "furious about not having hair". Instead, you can use hush alongside the adjective barngarra "bald" with a noun root, like lu "person", to make luhushbarngarra "furious bald person".

I means "fat" as in a noun, culinary fat (think lard, butter, oil, etc), but doesn't work as an adjective. If you're describing a person or animal, you can use kurushda "plump, fat" in a phrase like lukurushdadug "the plump, sweet (as in pleasant) person". If you're describing a foodstuff, I'd use words more specific to the dish in question, like iudu "goat tallow fat" or lal "date-syrup-sweetened" - do you have additional context for this phrase?

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As for "the verbal chain", that's a pretty complex topic - one that one tumblr post can't quite cover! But the basics is that there are certain "conjugation slots" that each element can fit in, some of which are always used (like the verb root) and some of which are optional (like dimensional prefixes). The basic order is:

{verbal mood} or {initial prefixes i- a(l)- u- inga-} + {dimensional prefixes, corresponding to English pronoun prepositional phrases} + {initial person conjugation} + {VERB ROOT} + {final person conjugation} + {nominalization (if the verb is being subordinated)}

What initial/final conjugation looks like depends on if the verb is transitive and who the subject/object are, so may appear before or after the root (or both or neither). And don't forget that a given verb may have up to four different roots depending on tense/number/etc. If you have more specific questions on any of these elements, let me know!

[sumerianlanguage]

Hello and thank you for such useful blog.. In sumarian language what would be the best sentence for " i want to see you or communicate with you" a word or verb to communicate,talk, or see meaning any form of contact. Also do sumarian language has a he,she,it or does it usually refer with one to all. Thank you so much..

Hello, and thanks for the kind words!

There are a couple different verbs conveying what I think you're getting at in Sumerian. The closest is almost certainly dug "to speak, talk (to)". Dug is a pretty irregular verb in Sumerian, with three different roots (dug, e and di), but in this context, the form would be gamuedadug: ga- is the cohortative verbal mood "I want to..."/"Let me...", mueda- is a dimensional prefix meaning "with you", and dug is the root of the verb we'd use here. Gamuedadug thus means "I want to speak with you".

For "to see", the verb is igi (also the word for "eye"), which is much more regular - "Let me see you"/"I want to see you" would be gaigin.

And for your second question: In Sumerian, there is only one pronoun used for all third person humans, ane, covering he, she, singular they, etc. in English. However, you can't use this pronoun for non-persons (objects, places, ideas, etc), only for persons (humans, deities, and the like). There is no single pronoun covering what would be "it" in English, with several options depending on context.

[sumerianlanguage]

How Would you say " I Am"! As In I am a divine mother, or I am A queen Or I am a daughter?

Hello! The answer is almost certainly more complicated than you were expecting, because the verb me, "to be", operates differently than other verbs in Sumerian. The short answer is that "am" is not a word but a suffix, -men, attached to the noun being linked to "I", written ngae. So "I am a queen" would be Ngae gashanmen, with -men attached to gashan "queen". Technically, the ngae is optional, but it could then be confused with Zae gashanmen, "you are a queen", because -men looks identical for the first and second persons.

You can drop in any noun in place of gasham - try it out with dumu "child", abzaza "water buffalo", or anything from my Sumerian insults post. But note that -men generally only links nouns, and sentences with "to be + adjective" in English are generally translated differently in Sumerian.

I have a whole (very old) video on this verb & how sentences like this are structured, with more examples, which you can find on my youtube channel here. Enjoy!

[sumerianlanguage]

Heya! Love your blog, I follow it on three separate accounts lol.

Wanted to ask if there's a word for, or similar to the english word 'memory'? I saw your 2022 post that spoke of the verb phrase for "to be conscious of, remember" (me ngar) but couldn't find anything specific for memory.

Thanks! Keep doing what you do, your posts are so cool and educational.

Heya, and thanks for the kind words! I've answered about "to remember" a couple times before, including last year as you mention. I'm having some trouble finding an exact match for "memory". It's not listed in any of the dictionaries I use, and the only reference to it in the entire ETCSL (Shulgi E) translates ngeshtug as "memory", but with context (shirgnu ngeshtugge nandibbe "let my songs not pass from memory") I'd probably translate ngeshtug as "awareness" or another term here. (Ngeshtug literally means "ear, hearing, understanding".)

However, it's important to remember that Sumerian is a verb-dominant language; many terms which are basic nouns in English are instead derived from verbs in Sumerian. Thus it's possible to construct a word like nammengar "memory, consciousness, attention" from me ngar "to remember, be conscious of, pay attention", although such a term isn't attested. You can also make a verb into a participle, which can then act as a noun, like me ngarede "for the purpose of remembering/memory" or simply mengar "remembering, remembrance", which seems close enough.

This can often lead to reframing whatever sentence you're aiming to translate to replace "memory" with an equivalent verb or participle. "My memories of my childhood goldfish bring me joy" could change to "When I remember my childhood goldfish, it brings me joy" or "Remembering my childhood goldfish brings me joy". So if you have a specific sentence in which to translate memory, let me know and I'll do my best!

[sumerianlanguage]

Good day to you!

Can you help me translate the phrase "Always were, always will be", please? With omitted pronoun "we". And also I was interested in a category of time in Shumerian language. I studied some Gothic language at University, so want to know how the things are working with Shumerian.

Hello! I’m glad you’re interested in time categories and tense in Sumerian because it’s quite a complex topic - in that it seems improbably simple!

Sumerian has two basic “tenses”, called hamtu and maru, but they don’t exactly correspond to tense in English or other Indo-European languages. Instead, hamtu is used for events in the past, that are completed or punctual, or are generic throughout time; maru is used for ongoing, progressive, repetitive or future events. And the distinction is often very fuzzy, not a hard line like the past/present/future divide in English.

In addition, hamtu and maru aren’t distinguished for all verbs or all sentences. One of those is the verb ngal, “to exist, be (in a place)”, which is unchanging between hamtu and maru both in its root form and its conjugation (like most intransitive verbs). We can, however, add the special future marker -e(d)-, which only appears in intransitive conjugation.

As for “we”, this subject pronoun is almost always omitted in Sumerian, but is required to be marked in verb conjugation - so the sentence would be something like udmeda ngalenden, udmeda ngaledenden “(we) always are, (we) always will be”. To fully omit the reference to “we” the sentence would be udmeda ngal udmeda ngale “it always is, it always will be” instead.

[sumerianlanguage]

Hey mate.. how would u say I dedicate to you in Sumerian?

Would a-mu-ra-ru be correct?

Or e-ra-ru-en ? Or maybe

Gae mu-ra-ru..

ma-ra-ru?

I can read alot of text but when I come to try and write something myself I always second guess myself..

It turns out your first attempt, a mu-ra-ru, is the "correct" answer, but let's break this one down a little and see how we get there.

"To dedicate" in Sumerian is a ru, which is what's called a phrasal verb or compound verb. It's composed of a fixed object a plus the verb ru "to give, to send". So any phrase using it would have to include the object a ahead of the verb.

A ru is also a transitive verb, so it has to be conjugated for both the subject and the object. (It's normally used in the hamtu, or past-tense/completed, form, even if we're dedicating something now. Sumerian tense is complicated.) Fortunately, the conjugation we're going for with this is... a ru "I've dedicated it", with both the subject "I" and object "it" being the base forms.

"To you" here would be a dimensional verb prefix, which stands in for lots of pronouns or prepositional phrases in English. Because the verb ru implies dedication towards somebody, we use the ventive form, in this case mura-. (The era- form you used in one example would be non-ventive and imply dedication "away from" somebody, which doesn't make much sense - *a eraru "I dedicate it away from you".)

So the simplest form of this sentence would be a muraru "I dedicate it to you". You can add optional elements before this phrase, including the subject emphasis pronoun ngae "I" and/or the thing dedicated as a direct object - Ngae shirbi a muraru "I dedicate this song to you" - but these are optional.

And we can, fortunately, check our work! By far the most common usage of this verb is at the end of a dedication, a munaru "I've dedicated it to him/her", using muna-, the third person equivalent of mura- "to you". So a muraru is certainly the translation we're aiming for.

I hope that helps, and thanks for your question!