New Light on the Sumerian Literary Letter Abaindasa to Sulge

Abstract

Abstract The first part of this article offers a structural analysis of the literary letter of petition Abaindasa to Sulge, one of the most unstable OB literary compositions that has posed considerable problems to scholars in the past. Both the difficult reconstruction of the text and questions as to its connection to other Sumerian literary letters will be analyzed. A close examination of the sources and identification of intertextual relations will help our understanding of its textual reconstruction and its place among different subgroups of Sumerian literary letters. The second part of the article will be dedicated to the edition of a previously unpublished duplicate of this letter in the Musée d’art et d’histoire, Geneva, supplemented by a comparison to another tablet with a Sumerian literary letter in the same museum, which might have been written by the same scribe.